John 1:1-3

 John wrote his gospel (biography of Jesus) with two hopes (John 20:31):

1. That we would believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God.
2. That by believing we would have life in his name.

For the next four weeks we will read John 1 and my prayer is that our belief will deepen and thereby our experience of life will heighten.

Note, this is not Santa belief. We have to stir up “the Christmas spirit” in order to empower Santa. With Santa, the strength of our belief enables his existence. With Jesus, the strength of his existence enables our belief. And our belief enables us to have true life.

Jesus is God

When it comes to Jesus, there are two types of people. There are those who do not believe Jesus is God, and there are those who do. Which category you fall into determines everything about your life. These verses are full of reasons to believe that Jesus is God, and thus to entrust yourself to him. We’ll examine these under the headings: Eternity, Trinity and Creation.

Eternity

 In the beginning was the Word (v.1a)
We will examine why John calls Jesus “the Word” later. For now, let this take your mind to Genesis 1:1. Before the beginning of creation (heavens and earth and everything contained in them) the Word (Jesus) already was. There was no time that Jesus was not. He has always been. He is eternal, a characteristic only attributed to God himself.

In John 8:56-59 there’s an interesting interaction between Jesus and the Jews in which he says “before Abraham was, I am.” This enraged the Jews to the point that they tried to kill him because they understood this as a claim to divinity, which, if it wasn’t true, was blaspheme. The Bible claims that Jesus is eternal, therefore Jesus is God.

Christmas confronts you with this question: Do you believe that Jesus is God? If so, does your life reflect that belief?

Trinity

And the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. (v.1b-2)
How can the Word be both God and with God at the same time? This hints at the doctrine of the Trinity (Father, Son and Holy Spirit – all distinct from each other – all united as the one God). Here is the Trinity in six simple statements:

1. The Father is God.
2. The Son is God.
3. The Holy Spirit is God.
4. The Father is not the Son.
5. The Son is not the Holy Spirit.
6. The Holy Spirit is not the Father.

Tim Keller is such a clear thinker; I’ll let him explain it to you:

The Christian teaching of the Trinity is mysterious and cognitively challenging. The doctrine of the Trinity is that God is one God, eternally existent in three persons. That’s not tritheism, with three gods who work in harmony; neither is it unipersonalism, the notion that sometimes God takes one form and sometimes he takes another, but that these are simply different manifestations of one God. Instead, trinitarianism holds that there is one God in three persons who know and love one another. God is not more fundamentally one than he is three, and he is not more fundamentally three than he is one. (The King’s Cross, page 5-6)

Jesus is among the trinity, therefore he is God. Do you believe it? Do you live in light of it?

Creation

All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made. (v.3)
Jesus was intimately involved with the creation of all things. He is described here as the conduit of creation. John states it in two ways. First, all things were made through Jesus. Second, there was no ‘made thing’ made without his involvement. This shuts the door on any possibility of Jesus having been created.

He made the heavens and the earth. He made the light. He made the sky. He made oceans and the dry land. He made the vegetation. He made the sun and planets and stars. He made the fish and birds. He made the animals. He made Adam and Eve.

This means Joseph and Mary traveled on an animal that Jesus created across land that Jesus created to a stable made out of materials that Jesus created where Jesus would be born among more animals that Jesus created. Later, three wise men would navigate their way to Jesus using a star that Jesus created in the sky that Jesus created.

That’s your Maker in that manger!

What a rich, complex and wondrous event we celebrate at Christmas!

The Bible states that Jesus is eternal, Jesus is among the trinity and Jesus is the creator. In other words, Jesus is God.

As you celebrate this Christmas, do not celebrate a merely sentimental story about a little baby in a little manger. Celebrate God with us. Celebrate “Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men” (Philippians 2:5-8).

Do you believe this? If so, live in light of it.

Discussion Starters

1. Why does John begin his gospel with “In the beginning?” What is significant about this? (See Genesis 1:1; John 8:57-59; 17:5; Colossians 1:15-17 for clues.)
2. Why does John call Jesus “the Word?” (John 1:14; 1 John 1:1-2; Hebrews 1:1-4; Revelation 19:11-15)
3. How could the Word be both “with God” and God himself at the same time? (John 8:19; 10:30; 12:44-45; 13:20; 15:23; Hebrews 1:3-4)
4. Work together to list all the evidence from these five verses that Jesus is God.
5. How is the life within Jesus “the light of men?” (John 3:16-21; 5:25-29; 8:12; 9:5; 11:17-27; 12:46;  1 John 1:1-3; 1 John 5:11)
6. What is the “darkness” John refers to in verse 5? (John 3:19 and Acts 26:12-18)
7. How does all this shape our understanding of Jesus? How does the fact that Jesus is God affect your day-to-day life?