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Bro. Otis Fisher
John 1 .1. We find an amazing fact in the fact that we can do nothing about everything. The Apostle and Evangelist John seems to have been the youngest of the twelve. He was especially favored with our Lord regarding confidence so as to be spoken of as the disciple whom Jesus loved.
He was sincerely attached to his master. He exercised his ministry at Jerusalem with much success and outlived the destruction of that city which was agreeable to Christ's prediction. History relates that after the death of John's mother, John resided chiefly at Ephesus.
Towards the close of Dimension's reign, he was banished to the Isle of Patmos where he wrote a revelation. On the ascension of Nerva, he was set at liberty and returned to Ephesus where it is thought that he wrote the gospel, wrote his gospel and epistles about 97 AD, the one that lived the longest.
Now turn, hold your place in John, but turn to the Genesis 1 .1, the first chapter, first verse of the first chapter in our glorious book. I'll give you the Hebrew and then we'll take up the English. The English, Bereshith Bar Elohim, Eth Hashemayim Veth Heretz, God in the beginning created the heavens and the earth.
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now hold your finger and go to first John 1 .1. That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and our hands have handled of the word of life, for the life was manifested and we have seen it and bear witness and show unto you that eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested unto us.
They handled, looked upon the eternal life. What's that mean, Dennis? Christ is eternal life. All right, now let me read you a general definition of God. I have given this to you several times, but I want to give it again.
He was the first cause of the first cause. This is as far as human words dare attempt one. This may be given. The eternal, independent, self-existent being whose being, whose purposes and action spring from himself without foreign motive or influence.
He who is absolute in dominion, the most pure, the most simple, most spiritual of all essence, infinitely benevolent, beneficent, true and holy, the cause of all being, the upholder of all things, infinitely happy because infinitely perfect and eternally self-sufficient, needing nothing that he has made, illimitable in his immensity, inconceivable in his mode of existence and indescribable in his essence, known fully only to himself because an infinite mind can be fully apprehended only by itself in a word, a being who from his infinite wisdom cannot err or be deceived and who from his infinite goodness can do nothing but what is eternally just, right and kind.
The word God is certainly the plural form of Lael or Halel and has long been supposed by the most eminent, learned and pious men to imply a plurality. In other words, every place you see the word God in the Old Testament, it is plural.
The writer is speaking of the plural personality and it is from that that we get the doctrine of the triune God, nor are the Christians the only ones to receive this doctrine as it derived from the first words of the divine revelation.
An eminent Jewish rabbin, Simon Ben, well, J-O-A-C-H-I, Johash, in his comment on the sixth section of Leviticus, has these remarkable words, come and see the mystery of the word Elohim. There are three degrees, each degree by itself alone and yet notwithstanding they are all one.
Now he must be strangely prejudiced indeed who cannot see that the three doctrines of the triune God and of a Trinity in unity is expressed in those words. The verb arababara he created, being joined in the singular number with this plural noun has been considered as pointing out of the unity of the divine persons in this work.
In the ever-blessed Trinity from the infinite and indivisible unity of the persons, there can be but one will, one purpose, and one infinite and uncontrollable energy. In the beginning, before the creativity, creative acts mentioned in this chapter, what was in existence, joy?
It was eternity, all eternity. Now we find time belongs to the creation. Time signifies duration measured by the revolutions of the heavenly bodies. And if you think about it, that's the way we got our time.
So prior to creation of these heavenly bodies, there could be no measurement, no measurement of duration, and consequently no time. Therefore in the beginning must necessarily mean the commencement of time which followed or rather was produced by God's creative acts as an effect follows or is produced by a cause.
Remember everything works upon cause and effect. The particle ta says ebin ezra signifies the substance of the thing. Now I had to fight myself to not go off into the full discussion of that first verse, but to suffice I did say this, the heaven and the earth, the matter out of which these things afterwards were to be formed, that's the first creation.
He spoke into existence the matter, and we'll leave that right there. Now come to John 1 1. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. David turned to John 5 18, and Greg go to John 17 5 please.
Read your John 5 18. You see they could not handle that. They were looking on the physical. John 17 5, so we know that he came from before the beginning. He always has been with God. He's spoken of here as the Word, a term by John to the second person of the Godhead in his eternal existence.
Just as he is called the life, the light, because he has in himself life and light, and imparts them to his creatures at his pleasure, so he is called the Word, because in him are hid all the treasures of all wisdom and knowledge, and by his word and spirit he reveals them to men.
And in Revelation 19 13, you won't need to turn to it. Now we had the words with God in holy union, fellowship, and communion. Then we have was God. This is a direct assertion of his divine nature as existing from eternity.
We're on a search as to when and where Christ began. The Bible reveals that Jesus Christ is God. Now when it says Jesus Christ is from the man's viewpoint, and the man is represented in Jesus. The maker of all things that ever were made, all who have the Bible are therefore bound to acknowledge him in this character, and to pay him divine honors, Jesus Christ.
As we now think, Dennis, as you clothe your thoughts in words, now that's the only way we can communicate is using words and expression of words, but as you clothe your thoughts and words, God reveals his will by his word.
He revealed his will to us by his word, and when that word is clothed in flesh, as the teacher of men, we recognize it as Jesus Christ. Second verse, if the same was in the beginning with God. For God to work with the creation represented himself as a person.
It is as though he said, I will not create, and therefore there must be the second party to do this. The second party was the Christ. Christ was the in the beginning. He was in the beginning with God.
This seems to be a repetition of what was said in the first verse, but it is stated over again for a particular reason. That's to guard and to prevent the possibility of a mistake. John had said that he existed before the creation, and that he was with God, but he had not said in the first verse that the union with God existed in the beginning.
He now expresses that idea and assures us that that union was not one which was commenced in time. That's what I want to get over to you. Christ did not begin in time, and which might be therefore a mere union of feeling or of the compactness like that between any other beings, but was one which existed in eternity, and which was therefore a union of nature or essence.
Verse 3, all things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that was made. All things were made by who? By the Christ. We don't come across Jesus until he's born in the New Testament, but when you speak of Jesus Christ, I hope you're realizing it's Christ.
All things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that was made. God declares that his everlasting Godhead is the same as the Father's, both by creation of all things and also by preserving them, and especially by the excellent gifts of his reason and understanding with which he has beautified all human beings.
Paul expounded on this in Colossians 1 15 16, that is, as the Father did work, so did the Son work with him, for the Son was a fellow worker with him. Turn to Colossians 1 15 and 16. Greg read that to me.
1 15 and 16. So we find that everything came from him, and it was for him. The Son of God is of one and the self same eternity, everlastingness, and of one and the self same essence or nature with God.
From the beginning, as the Evangelist says in 1 John 1 1, it is as though he said that the Word did not begin to have his being when God began to make all that was made. Do you follow that? That the Word, Christ, did not begin to have his being when God began to make all that was made.
For the Word was even then when all things that were made began to be made. Christ existed when he made all things, and therefore he was before the beginning of all things. If you were to go back to eternity, just jump back there a minute, and when you get there and look back behind you, you would see Christ coming toward you from that moment on, even from before that.
Now the word thee points out to us a peculiar and choice thing above all others, and puts a difference between this Word, which is the Son of God, and the laws of God, which were also called the Word of God.
This word with points out that there is a distinction of persons here. There has to be. This word word is the first in order in the sentence, and is the subject of the sentence, and this word God is the latter in order, and is the predicate of the sentence.
In the beginning, that is before there was even space, before there was anything. I can't imagine, I can't think outside of time. I have to relegate everything to time, but God existed in his three forms before that.
God began the great work of creation. This is the major meaning of the word in Genesis 1 -1, to which the evangelist evidently alludes. This phrase fully proves in the mouth of the inspired writer, that Christ was no part of the creation, as he existed when no part of that creation existed, and that consequently he is no creature, as all created nature was formed by him.
Let us return to the third verse again. All things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that was made. The statement of as large and vast extent as the whole world. Cosmos is the word there.
All things were made by him, not this or that particular thing, but all things. But to prevent the least imagination of anything having another author than Christ, here is the most positive statement that can be made.
We have to assign everything as coming from Christ, and so he had to be in existence prior. That without him was not anything made that was made. Not without him as an instrument, but without him as an agent.
Christ, being a co-worker with the Father, and the Spirit in the work of creation, he was an author of the creation, not an instrument in creating it. That Christ, as God, being the creator and maker of all things himself, is excluded from being a creature or anything that was made.
Now, as what was before creation must be eternal, and as what gave being to all things could not have been borrowed or derived its being from anything, therefore Christ, who was before all things and who made all things, must necessarily be the eternal God, was the word or the logos.
He who is the fountain of all wisdom, who giveth being, life, light, knowledge, reason to all men, we're all equal in receiving from Christ the properties that we make up life. He is the grand source of revelation, who has declared God unto mankind, who spake by the prophets for the testimony of Christ, is the spirit of prophecy, who has illustrated life and immortality by his gospel, and who has fully made manifest the deep mysteries which lay hidden in the bosom of the invisible God from before eternity, or from all eternity.
And the word was God, or God was the logos. Therefore, no subordinate being, no second to the most high, but the supreme eternal Jehovah. Some say that Christ made all things by delegated power of God.
That's absurd. Dennis, answer me this question. Can an omnipotent, can an omnipotent God, let me get it right here, can God delegate his omnipotence to someone else? Greg, what do you think? All right.
David? Yeah. Were this possible, he to whom this omnipotence was delegated would, as a result, become God. And he from whom it was delegated would cease to be such. He wouldn't be God. For it is impossible that there should be two omnipotent beings.
Now we have the phrase, was the word. He who is to God what man's word is to himself. The manifestation or expression of himself to those without him was with God, having a conscience, personal existence distinct from God as one person is extinct from another, but inseparable from him and associated with him.
Again, as our words are the conception and image of our minds. Right now my words, I hope, are getting over to you and not in a confused state. So we find that Christ is the expressed image of his Father's person and was begotten of the Father even as our words are begotten of our minds.
Yes. Yes. Only it's Christ, not Jesus. Christ gave us life, but Christ is God. That's right. His eternal existence, his personal coexistence, and his divine essence, his eternal existence in the beginning was the word.
We're so limited, Bob, by our English language. It's hard for me to express my thoughts as I go through this. I hope you're getting a little. We all can absorb only so much. His eternal existence in the beginning was the word.
In beginning, when all things received their being, Christ existed. The word was and did actually subsist even from all eternity. I guess I'm trying to just get you over the hump of thinking that Christ, that it's God the Father, God the Son, and the Holy Spirit separate, but they're all one.
Our thinking and our minds just don't think that way. Not in the beginning of the gospel state, it wasn't that beginning, but in the beginning of creation. All things were made by him. Now, David, can you make something out of wood, we'll say, make something and not be there to make it?
Can you make something and you be part of that that you made? No. So Christ existed before all of creation existed, before the cosmos existed. All things, and we have to take that literally, meaning all things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that was made.
Which plainly shows that the evangelist is here speaking of the creation, or beginning of all things created. That Jesus Christ not only preceded his incarnation, but even before all time and the beginning of all things had an actual being and existed.
His personal coexistence with the Father. The Word was with God, that is eternally and inseparably with him. In the same essence and nature, being in God the Father, as well as with him, so that the Father never was without him.
I was by him as one brought up with him, found in Proverbs. Was by his side, says the Chaldees. The Son is a personal, the Son is a person distinct from the Father, but of the same essence. Greg, what does the word essence mean?
Well put. He was the same nature with the Father. He is God of God. Very God of very God. Being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made. The Word was God. His divine essence. The Word was God.
Here John declares the divinity as he did before the eternity of our blessed Savior. He was with God and existed in him. Therefore he must be God and a person distinct from the Father. The Word was God, but the word God is used 11 times in this book, never once incorrectly.
So it's reasonable to conceive that it should be used the same as here. That eternity, the person ality, and divinity of Christ are of necessity to be believed. If we will worship him aright, Christ tells us that we must worship the Son even as we worship the Father, found in John 5 23.
Now unless we acknowledge the eternity and divinity of Christ, the second person, as well as God the Father, the first person, we honor neither the Father nor the Son. There is a difference between natural things and supernatural.
Natural things are first understood and then believed. And I've said this time and time again. But the supernatural, the mysteries, must first be believed and then you can understand them. The same was in the beginning with God.
The word in is not in the original. The word beginning can be simply mean as I start to write to you and has the same time bring to us the truth that the word has always existed. The definition of the word word is that a word is a vehicle, like a pickup is used to carry supplies.
In this case it is carrying the mind of God to the mind of man. That's what I'm doing this morning. I'm trying to expand your mind. Only one person can do that and it is Jesus. The word with is not in a sense together with or beside, but with the sense of abiding in as one.
To be in the same exact place at the same time and he was God. I hope you can understand at least a little. That's all I understand. He is not a subordinate to the Most High. He is the mighty Jehovah.
All things were made by him. Without him was not anything made that was made. He is in all things. Can you see that Greg? So the Druids were not wrong in saying that God was in the tree and they worshiped the tree.
That was wrong, but God did make the tree and the tree came from him. In Genesis 1 -3 the creative work of the Son is carrying out of the creative purpose of the Father. In Genesis 1 -3 and God said let there be light and there was light.
I can't get away from Genesis. I guess I'll have to go back and teach it sometime. This light is not the visible light that you see. It's the power behind that light. In Hebrews 1 -2 hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son whom he hath appointed heir of all things by whom also he made the worlds.
Who being the brightness of his glory and the express image of his person and upholding all things by the word of his power when he had by himself purged our sins sat down on the right hand of the majesty on high.
Colossians 1 -16 for by him were all things created that are in the heaven that are in the earth visible invisible whether they be thrones or dominions or principalities or powers all things were created by him and created for him.
In him was life and the life was the light of the world. Now the two words was proved that he was the source and that it was given all life came from him. Here we have a further proof of his divinity.
I've got to stop my voice is giving out but I hope I have not carried you too fast or gone not not too deep I'm sure but now I plan to teach only the first chapter of John and then go on to something else but the fifth verse is where we'll start and it has to do with light and darkness.
When you want a light where does the darkness go and light and darkness cannot be in the same place. Study that fifth verse. Is there anything from anybody? Greg dismisses please.