The Glorious God Man

I want to invite you to open your Bibles with me and turn to John chapter 1. John chapter 1 and hold your place at verse 14. We have been now looking at the Gospel of John for several weeks and yet we find ourselves still in the prologue which is the first 18 verses of John's Gospel and we have slowed down to a literal verse by verse exposition of this prologue because the verses themselves are so profound and full that it would not do us well to try to go too far too fast and this week is certainly one of those weeks where there's enough in this one passage to preach a series of sermons.

So there's no way we should try to go any further than just this one verse. Last week we talked about the miracle of the new birth. We said, we looked at verse 13 where it says that we were born not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man but of God.

We talked about the fact that our regeneration, the new birth that we receive from God is not something we accomplish by decision or by the works of our own hands but by a miraculous work of the Holy Spirit whereby he comes into our dead souls and grants us life and gives us the regenerating power to live for him.

And yet, while that miracle is profound and inexplicable, that miracle in a sense pales in comparison to the miracle we are going to examine today. In fact, I would argue that today's passage, John 1 .14, is the seminal passage for the preeminent miracle in all of Scripture, the miracle of miracles, more profound even than creation itself is the miracle of the incarnation.

C .S. Lewis in writing on the incarnation said this, he said, the central miracle asserted by Christians is that God became man. Every other miracle prepares for that miracle, exhibits that miracle, or results from that miracle.

Therefore, it stands as the preeminent miracle of miracles in all of sacred Scripture. So today, as we examine this preeminent miracle, I want us, as best as we can, to look at this text anew and afresh, that we would never allow the fact that this miracle is celebrated all throughout the year, particularly during the time of the Advent season, let us never allow this miracle that has become so commonplace in our minds and hearts to become ordinary.

Because what this text proclaims is far from ordinary. It's more than extraordinary. It's profound at the highest level. So as we examine it today, may we be absolutely moved in regard to its profundity.

May we be enamored with its truth. May we be humbled by its power. Let's stand together and read. John chapter 1 and verse 14 begins with a conjunction, and it says,. And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us.

And we have seen His glory, glory as the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. As we come before Your presence, Lord, let us do so, not as Nadab and Abihu, who would come before You, not considering You as holy, not considering Your commands as necessary, but Lord, let us come before You with a humble and contrite heart, not as the Pharisee who came and said, look at all that I have done, but as the tax collector who beat his breast and said, Lord, have mercy upon me, a sinner.

Lord, let us come today. Help us to come before Your Word humbly on our knees, prepared for the feast that You have prepared for us in the words of Scripture. May our soul nourish upon them. May our spirit be satisfied by them.

May even our flesh be empowered. Lord, to live for You because of them. And as we consider today the depth of truth which is found in the doctrine of the incarnation, Lord, may we not ever see this as commonplace.

May we not ever lose the majesty of the truth that we are going to see. And may we forever be in awe of the fact that the logos became flesh. And Lord, I pray as I always do, not for the sake of repeating myself, and certainly not in vain repetition, but Lord, I pray when I enter the pulpit.

That You would keep me from error. Lord, use this word to edify Your people and use this word to draw those who are not yet Your people into Your kingdom through faith in Your Son. May Jesus be exalted and Lord, as John the Baptist said, may He increase and I decrease.

And it's in His name.

Amen.

The Logos in John’s Prologue

Since we began looking at these first 18 verses of John's gospel, I have noted several times that what we have in these first 18 verses is the foundation upon which all of John's gospel will be built.

If you don't lay the foundation level, the house will be unlevel. So we must make sure that if we are going to understand John's gospel correctly, that we seek to understand these first 18 verses correctly.

For upon them is the entire gospel built. And it all deals with who is this one called the logos? Greek logos means word. And the book begins, in the beginning was the word, the logos. And the word was with God and the word was God.

He was in the beginning with God. And all things were made through Him. And of course it goes on to say, without Him not anything was made that was made. So it tells us something about who this logos is.

It tells us He is creator. It tells us He is divine. It tells us He is distinct from the Father and yet equal to the Father. It tells us that in Him was life. It tells us that that life was the light of men.

That that light has come into the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it. It tells us about John who came to bear witness of the light, who himself was not the light. It tells us that He came into the world and the world did not receive Him.

He came unto His own and His own people did not receive Him. But to as many as did receive Him, who believed on His name to them, He gave the power to become the children of God. Who were born miraculously, not of anything that they had done or anything any other man had done, but by the will of God.

Profound truths, eternal truths. Truths that should make us absolutely stagger. Who is this word? Who is the logos? Well, I will say this. If John 1, 14 was not in scripture, then it might be left to interpretation.

And some men might create all forms of different ways to try to explain who this logos is. For in Greek culture, the logos was the idea of the personification of rationality and order and consistency in the universe.

So, the Greeks may have read John's words and come to some wild conclusion that this logos is some ethereal power that exists outside of the universe that holds all things in order. Who knows what other cultures would have come to conclude if they read who this logos was, the one who was with God and was God and created all things.

Who knows what other cultures would have come to the conclusion about who the logos was. Maybe even ascribing this to some other character like Muhammad or Buddha or someone else that could be the logos.

But John, to ensure that we do not come to any other conclusion than the right one, chose in verse 14 to pin a passage under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit to define with clarity who in fact the logos is.

By identifying the logos as the word made flesh. By identifying the logos as the one who dwelt among us. And identifying the logos as the one who we beheld his glory. We know that the logos is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ.

It can be no other man. The title can be ascribed to no other human being. It cannot be placed upon some ethereal, eternal ideal or some disembodied power. But it applies only to one person in history.

The one person in history who in his coming changed the world forever. Who's divided time, who set upon the world a new direction and gave the people of God a new course. Jesus Christ is the logos made flesh.

The Full Divinity of Christ and the Creeds

We read this morning from the Athanasian Creed. The Athanasian Creed is based on the teachings of one of the early church fathers by the name of Athanasius of Alexandria. He was one of the men who not only fought against but overcame the false teachings of a man named Arius.

Arius taught that Jesus was not fully God but that he was a created deity which is an oxymoron. And Arius taught these things and his teaching began to spread throughout the Roman Empire. And so Constantine who had very recently come to faith in Jesus Christ and you can have your own opinion about the attitude or the evaluation of his conversion if you care about what I had to think about it go listen to our church history class I talked about it at length.

I'm not going to do it today. But because this issue became such a profound problem within the kingdom that even commerce was beginning to be interrupted because people who believed that Christ was begotten did not want to associate with people who thought he was unbegotten and there became even in the marketplace an unwillingness to do trade with those who had theological differences.

There was a calling for a council and at that council Arius made his case and a conclusion was drawn that he was in grave error not just grave error but heresy because he taught that Jesus was not fully divine.

Out of that came the Nicene Creed which we read here in this church as well it wasn't today but we've read it before. Later there was an Arian resurgence which had to be battled against and who was the man battling the Arian resurgence it was Athanasius himself to the point that there came a line in history Athanasius Contramundum, Athanasius against the world because the Arian ascendancy reached even to the kingdom's leadership the son of Constantine, Constantius II actually adopted Arianism in the kingdom and so even Athanasius fought.

He was exiled six different times and yet he fought for the truth of the full divinity of Jesus Christ and by God's grace truth won the day. And so now we have this creed this Athanasian Creed which was not written by Athanasius himself but was based upon the truths and the teachings that came out of that and it's a long creed which is why we've divided it into four sections.

But I want to remind you again what you read earlier I have the ability to pull it up here on the screen maybe yeah I do. This is what we read. Furthermore it is necessary to everlasting salvation that he also believe that being the Christian that he also believe rightly in the incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ.

It is necessary to everlasting salvation that we get Jesus right. We can be wrong about a lot of things. You want to disagree about spiritual gifts we can have that conversation until the cows.

Come home.

You want to disagree whether Mr. Mike and I are wrong about partial preterism and Andy too that we're all wrong. We'll have that conversation with you. You want to talk about the millennium. Giddy up.

But don't bring us another Jesus.

That's it.

There are things upon which we can differ but there are things upon which we will stand and hills upon which we will die. And the truth of who Jesus Christ is is a hill worth dying on. Amen.

Amen.

The Incarnation: God Became Man

So with that in mind we're going to go back if I can find it sorry go back to the sermon notes and look at this this outline of today's text. Now today's text I have outlined in three parts based upon three verbs.

The action is in the verbs as you know from Schoolhouse Rock. I learned it. So we learned the action is in the verbs and this text gives us three specific ones to look at it says it gives us the incarnation the interaction and the revelation.

And the word became flesh. That's the incarnation. And he dwelt among us. That's the interaction. He was among us. And we have seen his glory. I actually prefer the word beheld.

Yeah.

And I see King James people happy. I prefer that. I prefer that. But I actually like because the idea is not just that they seen it but they experienced his glory.

Huh? Yeah.

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

So we have this this threefold idea of the incarnation all wrapped up in John 1 14. We have the incarnation the interaction and the revelation of the logos. So by God's grace we're going to spend our time walking through each one of these.

We're going to start with the incarnation. I'll put I have some extended notes on the board. Please don't allow those to confuse you. I just do this to help. And if it becomes a hindrance I'll take it down.

But this is the outline I've done for each one of these points because they are so weighty. So let's begin first looking at the incarnation. When it says the word became flesh the logos gonna my sarks the word became flesh.

This sentence is felt in its weight only when it is combined with verse 1. In fact this is often how you'll hear me say it if I'm talking about Christ and his nature. I'll say in the beginning was the word the word was with God the word was God and the word became flesh.

Because that's really the idea. Everything in between verses 1 and 14 is true and important but it's all building to this. John has introduced the logos in verse 1. He is now ensuring that we understand the identity of the logos in verse 14.

In the beginning was the word the word was with God the word was God and the word became.

Flesh.

I want you to imagine and I know this is hard. It's nigh impossible. But I want you to imagine if you will being in the first century and reading that for the first time. Hearing someone say that for the first time.

It would be an outlandish idea. It would be one that would hit with so much power and so much weight that it would almost immediately and viscerally be rejected because it seems so outside of possibility.

Because when it says the word became flesh what it's saying is God became man. How do we come to that conclusion? In the beginning was the word the word was with God the word was God right? So the word was God the word became flesh natural syllogism.

If the word is God and he is and if the word became flesh which he did then God became.

Man.

That's what John 1 14 is saying. That God became man. There was a song years ago I don't remember the title of it but I remember hearing a lady in our church sing it and there was just this one verse and maybe you'll remember I'm not going to try to sing it and then do an injustice to the song.

But the song said in a miracle of love God became a man. In a miracle of love God became a man. And I remember just hearing her sing that and saying wow how amazing that we can just sing that that we can repeat the affirmation creed that we can sing a mighty fortress and all these songs and just go back to normal.

We should not go back to normal after this. We should not be faced with such profound truth and it not affect us to our very core. We get lost in the familiar amen. This is the only negative thing that's ever said about taking communion weekly.

Is that the danger of the weekly communion is that it can become too familiar. By the way if you're a guest with us this morning we do take communion every week and most of us who have done this for years recognize the power and importance of it as the as the final thing we do in worship is remembering the the the fact that Christ who died for us his body and his blood is represented on this table.

It's a powerful truth. But as we recognize the power we also recognize the potential for familiarity robbing the power and if such is true for the communion table how much more true is it for the power of the incarnation that we would not be overwhelmed by this truth.

Is such an amazing thing that it should that it would not put us down on prostrate before the Lord on our faces before the Lord when we realize he walked among us. God became a man. And by the way he became truly man.

He did not simply put on a suit of flesh but he took on the nature the full nature of humanity. The Bible speaks of Christ in his flesh. It speaks also of his soul and also of his spirit thereby referencing the whole man.

Matthew 26 38 Jesus says my soul is sorrowful even unto death. Luke 23 46 he says father into your hands I commit my spirit. Dr. R .C. Sproul said if Jesus were not fully man body soul and spirit he could not be our substitute only a man can atone for the sins of mankind and only by coming as a true man could he do what only he could do.

Wayne Grudem says this he says Jesus did not merely become man in part but he entered fully into our human experience by taking on a human body mind and soul. This is why the church fathers in attempting to get this idea into the minds of the church knowing that they had the creeds and confessions also created short statements of faith that would be easy to remember and adopt into the culture of Christianity and one of those was the Latin phrase vera homo vera deus.

Now if you spend any length of time with me you're going to hear me say that a bunch and it's not because I just like Latin which I do but it's also because of what it's saying. Homo in Greek is same where we get the word homosexual means one who is of same sex relationship but in Latin homo means man homo sapien the thinking man right that's where just how two different languages can use the same word in two vastly different ways.

Vera means true so we get the word verity or veracity or even when the King James translates Jesus's words verily verily I say unto thee which means truly truly I say unto you. Vera means true veritas truth so vera homo vera deus means truly man truly God.

Jesus is not less than man in any way neither is he less than God in any way for in the divine union what we call the hypostatic union all that is God united with all that is man and created in that instance what we call a union a union of natures.

Hypostasis means nature the hypostatic union one person with two natures truly God and truly man. And in that there was a great act of humiliation. You know what it means to be humiliated don't you. We've all had moments in life where someone has humiliated us by either saying something or doing something that caused us great shame or embarrassment.

Right. And maybe we did it to ourselves. You ever humiliated yourself. Yeah. Humiliation means to be brought low. It means to be abased. It means to be stepped down. It's the idea of humbling. Humbling means we do it in a right way.

Humiliation means it's been done to us or we've done it to ourselves in a way that brings shame. Degradation in the incarnation God becomes man in the greatest act of humiliation in all of the universe takes place in a moment for God who is outside of creation enters into his creation as part of his creation and in doing so demonstrates an act of humiliation.

By the way this isn't just my words but the words of Scripture in Philippians chapter 2 the Apostle Paul says have this mind among yourselves which is also yours in Christ Jesus who though he was in the form of God did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant being born in the likeness of men and being found in human form.

He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death even death on a cross. Jesus came into the world through the womb of the Virgin was laid in a manger lived his life in vast amount in obscurity spent the last three years changing the world and then died to save it naked stapled to a tree.

That is an act of humiliation out of love. This is the incarnation. God humbled himself in the person of his son. And out of that rises a theological question. Now I promised myself I wouldn't allow this to take all my time.

Mike and Mike and Bert are teaching the attributes of God and the revelation of God on Sunday night in our Academy. So I won't I won't go too far into this because I'll just let you guys have have it.

But there is a doctrine that is important in Christianity. It is called the doctrine of God's immutability. Immutability comes from the word mute which we think about making our TV quiet. But that's not what it means in this sense to be mute does mean to be quiet in our language.

But in the language of the doctrine it's referring to the doctrine of change. So if you talk about mutation what is mutation change. Right. So when you say something is mutable you're saying it's changeable.

But when you say something is immutable what are you saying it's change less. Right. God defines himself throughout scripture as one who does not change. I the Lord do not change. Therefore you are not destroyed.

Right. The scripture says we have these wonderful passages that tell us God does not change. And so when the doctrine of the incarnation is brought up an immediate question in the mind is if God changes not how can he take on a human nature and not undergo change.

And I rightly admit that's a dilly of a pickle. That's a it really is a good question theologically. But one thing we must remember and and please hear me on this you immutability does not mean that God cannot act.

And God does act in time. Creation is an act of God that does not violate his immutability. Amen. Revelation is an act of God as he reveals himself in time but it is not violating his immutability. Neither is incarnation a violation of his immutability because God's nature takes on the human nature but does not change from being God.

This is why we affirm Jesus is truly God. Because if he ceased to be truly God then we would be attacking the doctrine of immutability he would no longer be God. But because he remains truly God and now becomes man his divinity is uninterrupted.

His divinity is unchanged. But now there is the adoption of that which was not. And that is the human the man. Here's the beauty and take this for what it's worth. The logos has always been God but has not always been man.

Man became in fact the way the Greek reads is and the word flesh became. We say the word became flesh. But the idea is the word flesh became what he was not now he is for the sake of the purpose of dwelling with us.

And we're going to move to part two here in a second. But before we do I was really thinking about these this outline this week. And the second word almost became fraternization. But I thought boy that's a hard one for an outline.

But you know what fraternization is. It means to be in fellowship with. We think of like a frat is a group of men who come together to fraternize. You're told in war don't do what. Don't fraternize with the enemy.

That's what Christ did by becoming flesh. He fraternized with the enemy. He came into the world full of sinners who hate God. And he came as God's representative as God in flesh and fraternized among us.

How wild is that thought. The interaction of God with man through the person of Jesus Christ. Well that's a frat. We all should want to belong to. That's what he did. He became flesh for the purpose of being with us in a way that he could only do as a man.

And by the way I'm not making that up either. That's not coming out of my head either. That's coming directly from Scripture. In fact I'll read it to you in Hebrews chapter 2 speaking of Jesus it says this.

Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God to make propitiations for the propitiation for the sins of the people.

He had to be made like his brothers in every respect save one. And what is that. No sin. He's like us in every way save one. No sin. And some people get offended by that. And they say he can't be a man if he doesn't sin.

Sin is not an essential part of humanity. Because Adam was man before he sinned and Jesus is called the last Adam. Jesus is fully man but without sin. The word became flesh and dwelt among us. Let's look at number two the interaction.

The Word Dwelt Among Us

The Logos did not merely become flesh for a moment in time but he became flesh and is still flesh today. Let me ask you a question. And because I said this a few weeks ago and it confused a few people so let me just clarify.

What rose from the dead. Jesus the Spirit. Or his body. His body. Because it weren't there no more right. They went to go look for it. What was gone. His body. What ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of the Father.

His body what will return in power and glory with a name that no one knows written on his leg as Mike talked about in Revelation. Jesus Christ and his glorified body. When we see him as he is we will be as he is.

You see the Logos shows up in the Old Testament. Jesus shows up in the Old Testament but not as a man. He shows up as a vision of a man. He ate with Abraham. Don't ask me how he did it but he did it. He wrestled.

That's how you say it in the South. He wrestled with Jacob and I believe that's Jesus Christ. He was displayed in Isaiah 6 on the throne when Isaiah saw the Lord high and lifted up in the temple. John even tells us that was a vision of Jesus.

But in all of those instances what we call Christophanies Old Testament visitations of Jesus Christ. That's what that word means. And all of those Old Testament Christophanies it was marked by two realities.

One it was not an incarnation it was a vision or at least an app. It was some type of physical manifestation but not an incarnation. Physical manifestation but not an incarnation. Asked me the difference.

I'm just going to say not fully man. That's the difference. The fully man part came in Bethlehem. But the second thing it was temporary. When Abraham ate with Jesus afterwards he was gone after Jacob wrestled afterwards he was gone.

But when. When Jesus came in the incarnation he came to stay. He came to dwell. He came to live among us. The word dwell here comes from skeinu which is only used a few times in the New Testament and it's only used by John.

It's used in John's gospel and in Revelation. And it means to pitch a tent. In fact I am fully convinced that John in his writing and the word dwelt among us I have I have no doubt that in some way he was at least referencing the Old Testament tabernacle.

Because that was the the presence of God with the people in a tent it represented the presence of God and it was where God dwelt. Did God dwell among the people of Israel. Yes. Where'd he dwell. In the tabernacle.

Right. In the Holy of Holies the dwelling place of God was in the tabernacle. And why did the tabernacle exist. Because it was God's way of giving them back something that had been lost in the garden.

Because in the garden which was in its in a sense a form of a temple tabernacle there in the garden they had the presence of God unfettered. They walked with God. That one song what is it. In the garden it was most real in the garden.

Wait didn't even realize. And he walks with me and he talks with me. Right. Remember that song in the garden Adam and Eve experienced unfettered relationship in the dwelling place of God that was lost because of sin.

God and his mercy calls Abraham out. He blesses his family and out of his family comes the building of this erection this tabernacle which is erected there in the center of the people. And that tabernacle becomes the presence of God.

Later the temple replaces it. Jesus comes he sees the temple and he says destroy this temple and I'll raise it up again in three days. And they said it took 80 years to build that temple. But Jesus wasn't talking about the temple of Herod.

He was talking about what his own body. Because he is now the dwelling place of God with men. He is God with us. He is the fulfillment of Isaiah's prophecy which says what the virgin shall conceive and bear a son.

And you shall call his name Emmanuel which means God with us. People get upset. Well his name's Jesus. It's not Emmanuel. Emmanuel is a title God with us. Jesus dwells with us. He pitches his tent with us he tabernacles with us.

And then in the last chapter I'm sorry the second to the last chapter of the Bible when John is giving us this great vision of the new heaven and the new earth. And he says this is where the other place where that word comes up in Revelation it says the dwelling place of God is with man.

Christ has ascended and we look forward to the day when he will descend and we will be with him forever. But here's something we shouldn't forget when he said I must go away and I will send you another comforter one like me.

Because now where is the dwelling place of God. Mike talked about it in Sunday school. Where's the dwelling place of God right now in our hearts. Right. We are the temple of God because the Spirit of God comes and lives in us as Jesus walked with his disciples.

The Spirit indwells us as we follow after Christ. We're not alone as we await his return but we have his Spirit indwelling us. The word became flesh and dwelt among us. Lastly we've received we've seen his glory.

Beholding His Glory

Now this last one does not deserve a shortening but I will say this. I had already planned on cutting this last section in half and doing the second half next week. So don't think that if it's shorter than you think it ought to be that it was me just cutting it off.

It's part of the next week because here's the thing it says this it says. And we have seen his glory. And then the whole nother sentence start. Glory is the only begotten of the father full of grace and truth.

I didn't even think I was going to get past the comma just so you know I'm going to the comma and I'm stopping. But the glory is the only begotten of the father full of grace and truth will be next week because I can't get to that today.

But let me just end by talking to you about this third verb here this idea of seen or beheld. John says the word became flesh. The the the flesh this this person this god man dwelt among us and we beheld.

We have seen we saw his glory we experienced it we touched it for a moment. I want you to go over to John chapter 2. Go over to John chapter 2 and look with me at verse 11. Now I look forward to preaching this text as we're going through John.

I'll get I'll get there eventually. But this is the story of the wedding at Cana and we know the story. Jesus is there. The wine has run out. His mother says listen to him. Jesus goes turns six water pots into six vessels of wine.

And this is what it says. This is the commentary on that text from John as he is inspired or as the text is inspired by God it says this this being this miracle that was done. This the first of his signs Jesus did at Cana in Galilee and manifested his glory.