John 1, Prologue, One Word

Covenant Reformed Baptist Church

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Please open your Bibles with me to John chapter 1 to 1 starting verse 1 reading to verse 18

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Hear the word of the Lord in The beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was

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God He was in the beginning with God all things were made through him and without him was not anything made that was made in Him was life and the life was the light of men the light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it

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There was a man sent from God whose name was John He came as a witness to bear witness about the light that all might believe through him

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He was not the light came to bear witness about the light the true light which enlightens

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Everyone was coming into the world He was in the world and the world was made through him yet.

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The world did not know him He came to his own and his own people did not receive him But to all who did receive him who believed in his name

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He gave the right to become children of God who were born not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor the will of man

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But of God and the word became flesh and dwelt among us and we have seen his glory

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Glory as of the only son from the father full of grace and truth

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John bore witness about him and cried out. This was he of whom I said he comes after me ranks before me

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Because he was before me and from his fullness we have all received grace upon grace

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For the law was given through Moses grace and truth came through Jesus Christ No one has ever seen

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God the only God who was at the father's side. He has made him known May the

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Lord add his blessings to the reading of his Holy Word Now if you had to describe what you wanted out of life

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Whatever it is, you know what holds your life together what drives you might get you up in the morning

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Keeps you going through the day gives you something to look forward to, you know When you go to bed if you had to describe that in one word

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What would it be? One word that's all you have What would it be?

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Money maybe You've you've got to pay the bills right you got to put food on the table That's what you're working for the money right money after all makes the world go around they say

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No, of course not. I hope you don't think that what about family? Yeah, that's why you want the money, right?

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That's why you're working for that money for your family. What can be what can be greater than family? One thing what is it one idea one cause?

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What is it that your life is about Of course many people haven't even bothered to stop and think about that They're just too busy trying to earn a living or to you know to get the next thing they want whatever it is

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Maybe it's a good job. Now. Maybe it'll be a spouse next maybe then a child maybe a boat maybe just You know what's for lunch next?

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They're like a hamster on a wheel You know not aware of the big picture or the fact that no matter how hard they run they don't still don't get anywhere

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Socrates said that the unexamined life is not worth living in other words He meant, you know stop and think what is the one thing that is worth living for?

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there must be one unifying principle that makes sense of Everything else now the ancient

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Greeks and the time this gospel of John was written called that one thing The logos

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Greek word logos means the word Could be or it could be translated in the way they used it in their culture

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The principle what's the principle idea? That is the cause and the purpose of everything including you know

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Why you get up in the morning? That lunch that you're planning next They thought that this this word or this principle was a spiritual force

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It's an abstract idea and immaterial thing nothing with a body nothing with matter the material world they thought was only a shadow of that word and We're kind of like captives chained in a cave

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With the entrance behind us and we're looking in into the cave and we see these shadows on the cave wall and we think the shadows

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Which are these material things our bodies and the money whatever it is the things of this world

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We think the shadows are other are the real world When they said no, it's the spiritual things the logos.

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That's the real thing Now if the ancient Greeks thought the logos was immaterial All spirit and no body

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Modern people have fallen into the opposite error The late famous astronomer

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Carl Sagan began a series of in PBS in the 80s with a remarkable statement of faith The cosmos is all there ever was all there is and all there ever will be prove that Prove it.

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He can't of course. That's just a statement of faith The famous cosmologist Stephen Hawking wrote the eventual goal of science is to provide a single theory that describes the whole universe

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Same thing the Greeks were after in their philosophy, right single idea That's a noble goal and Christians should be pro science

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Christians have nothing to fear from science but notice what Hawking's assumes by that by assuming that science

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Which is the investigation of material things that science then can explain the whole universe

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He has assumed that everything is material like Sagan. He has it proved it

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He has it found that out by scientific investigation He simply believed it from the start and then everything he does and thinks and says is based on that assumption

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Everything is material the modern world says and that being the case then well

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The only things worth living for are material things, you know The food in your stomach the clothes you wear the sexual experiences you can get money that you can earn or steal the luxuries that you can have

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Of course, that's only if you don't think too much Because after all the same scientists that say the world is only material also tell us is all gonna eventually dissolve anyway

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So it's all kind of pretty much meaningless, isn't it? So according to them there really isn't any reason to live at all

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Which is why the Bible just mocks them saying, you know According to your philosophy.

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We should just eat drink and be merry for tomorrow you die What is this single theory?

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That describes the universe It's not something that science can find it's helpful as science can be in many ways science can't find it because it's not purely material and it's not merely some

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Impersonal abstract idea like the Greeks thought the single theory the one word that explains

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Everything and is the reason for everything that doesn't leave you ignoring the material world

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Because he was in it Materially and doesn't leave you with nothing to live for Because he's eternal that one word is

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Jesus John the writer here shows us that one word

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Jesus in the prologue to his gospel the first 18 verses introduced the rest of his gospel

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But introduced Jesus is far more than just kind of a historical figure that he's writing this biography about He introduces him as the word

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Saying to his Gentiles who are reading him, you know raised perhaps and that kind of Greek philosophy that described earlier

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Saying to them that this Jesus is the unifying principle that your philosophers were speculating about But he's not immaterial and abstract and out there the logos the principle of the universe is a person the person of God and a person who became a man

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Even in Chinese philosophy they to look for one unifying principle They call it the

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Tao at the way now the Tao is the principle of creation Determines everything it guides the way everything works

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Confucius and Lao Tzu and others looked at nature and saw that there was one ordering principle behind it

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Even CS Lewis in his wonderful small book the abolition of man Takes that Chinese idea of the

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Tao and says as a Christian there is this ordering principle in nature Lewis calls it the

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Tao Here John calls it the logos and art Lewis says in his book is supposed to celebrate that Art is supposed to bring out the beauty of creation in by showing its order

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Good literature is supposed to show something wonderful in life Good paintings are supposed to show that you know, there's light and there's there's balance in the world

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Good music is supposed to show that there's this beautiful order The music of the spheres a harmony in creation because there is a maestro directing it all

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People have tried to rebel against that especially in the modern world, especially over the last century They try to rebel against that idea that there has to be this order this principle

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But most of it just find it most of us just rebel recoil at their rebellion

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In the art world, you know, we find it ridiculous that with people would pay for paintings

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There are just paint kind of randomly splattered on a on a on a canvas You know, you think of a monkey can do that.

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Why not? I got to pay for it the 20th century composer music composer met man named by the name of John Cage had a

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Composition which he called four minutes and 33 seconds in which for four minutes and 33 seconds.

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The musicians just sat I'm gonna try this Brittany for a special one day.

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What do you just sit? Yeah, you know, they don't play their instruments People are supposed to listen to whatever sounds

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That they're make whatever Raymond happens to be doing at the time, you know doors opening and closing

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Babies crying You know, whatever, but we kind of hate that there's no order to it.

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It's not music. It's ridiculous We want our art to display the beauty of that one unifying principle call it

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Lagos here the Tao and Christians not only support science but art too because science is the exploration of What Christ has created and art is the celebration of that Lagos that Tao?

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ultimately of Jesus himself Well, John shows us that one unifying principle here in four parts in his prologue first He says the word is

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God second he talks about the words witnesses third the word became flesh and Finally the word received makes children of God So the first three of those

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First three of those parts are in two parts each before and after What's really the middle part?

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So listed last the word received makes children of God in verses 12 and 13 both before and after verses 13

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Are those other three parts that idea the word received make children of God is held up Sort of in the middle of this as the focus and this the summit to which all of this is building now

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All of it's important. He begins and ends with the idea First That the word is

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God John begins his gospel about Jesus exactly as the book of Genesis begins, of course the whole

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Bible, you know in the beginning sounds very You know just like exact same words except that John goes

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Really past the beginning to the pre -creation past the creation to the pre -creation in the beginning

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He says was That is, you know already it was already he

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I should say was already in existence Didn't say in the beginning the logos was created but in the beginning the word

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Was he's there already? Already having come from before creation

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The word was already there being uncreated and Then he says and the word was with God He was in God's presence.

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He was another Distinct person a self with God in The beginning never created because he too is eternal but he is with God and Then it says famous words and the word was

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God He too is God He is God with God now.

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He's not another God and this gets a little confusing You gotta pay attention to the words here He isn't he is with God first and he is

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God But he's not another God because there is only one God and yet he was with God. He was near him

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He was relating to him in verse 18 It says he is in the father's side or his bosom, but he's not the same as God.

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And so here we have two persons One is God Who the word was with and the other is the word who is also

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God All that we need to see Is that the Trinity? I should say all that we need to see is that the

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Holy Spirit is also God and He is all and he is a person and then we have three persons and one

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God the Trinity Now some have refused to accept this now. I can't say that just That's their idea they just were

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Either got to be one God and Jesus is a lesser or he's just another he's just another name for the one

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God But John's Greek is clear and simple. His ideas are very profound and deep

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His language is very clear and simple. The word was God he begins and ends this prologue

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Insisting on that notice he begins in verse 1. He says the same similar thing in verse 18 in verse 18.

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He concludes Skip down there No one has ever seen God, right?

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Jesus will say that in verse in chapter 4. God is spirit No one's ever seen him.

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But here in now in verse 18 The only God that's the next phrase here at ESV.

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It's translated. The only God that term only Here in the ESV could be translated the one -of -a -kind

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God or in the NIV. It's the one and only That's the same term used there

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I think here is only at using John chapter John 3 16 famously in the King James Version as the only begotten

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Now I think one -of -a -kind is probably a good translation. And so look at verse 18 No one has ever seen

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God, right? And then there's another the only God The one -of -a -kind

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God who is at the Father's side He's the same one in verse 1 who is the word this one -of -a -kind

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God in verse 18 is the same one who is the word In verse 1 who is with God in the beginning?

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Here he is at the Father's side in verse 18 he has made him known

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Jesus the one -of -a -kind God has made the father whom no one has ever seen

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No, and you notice that verse 18 he introduces it The term a term for that one got from that for that God that no one has ever seen.

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He calls him the father The father no one has ever seen the one -of -a -kind

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God the logos has made him known Understand so now some say we can't really know

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God, you know, he's infinite and we're finite. He's so far beyond us He's just above us we can't really understand him in Chinese philosophy

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Lao Tzu described the Taoist is unknowable You can't know this principle the

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Tao that can be described is not the Tao He said if you can explain it, it's not what we call here. The word is not the

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Tao He described defined the Tao is the sound of one hand clapping Other words, it's an absurdity.

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It's just beyond our imagination It's a mysterious thing and while it's true that by our minds alone by our logic and logic is a

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Word based on the Greek word here logos by that alone we can't

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Know the word We can't know God But what John tells us here is not that we ascend to God with our knowledge with our mind

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With our studying with our logic Somehow using logic to know the logos

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No, Jesus is he says the one -of -a -kind God in verse 18

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He has made the father known the father that we could not see He has revealed to us the one -of -a -kind

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God Jesus has he reveals to us what we couldn't know on our own

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God reveals God God reveals himself in verses 16 and 17 and he reveals himself as a bountiful generous

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God He is good and he is blessing to his people he says there verses 16 verse 16 from his fullness

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This is his bounty his his great generosity all that he has we have all received grace upon grace

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It's like grace after grace in other words he has this abundance and From it he gives us grace and then grace and then more grace

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It's like waves of grace One after another each bigger and better than before grace upon grace

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And we see this in history as he describes and here first week. He saved his people from slavery

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Right Moses came and he gave the that grace gift. God gave the grace gift of his law through Moses The law came through Moses.

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He says he doesn't mean to put that law down at all That's God's ways that lead to a better life if you follow it

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Which even now make clear to us our need for salvation so that we will

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Once we see that we need salvation turn to God for grace and then after God Then after that after giving us the law to show us our need then

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God met that need By giving us grace grace and truth

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Through Jesus Christ notice in verse 17 and notice that also verse 17, by the way

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Jesus Christ is is named. He's the word. He's the one -of -a -kind

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God who reveals the Father the word the one -of -a -kind God is Jesus Christ Now as God in verse 2 skipping back down there

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He was in the beginning with God and at least so far we see two persons of both

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God But only one God they both existed eternally They were there already at creation in verse 3 all things were made through him

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Through Jesus Christ the one -of -a -kind God the logos. It doesn't say that he made all things by himself

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It it implies that that God really all of God created the universe But the word

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Jesus was the creative mediator. He was the one through whom

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God created everything and He was the means which

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God created the universe as as psalm 33 verse 6 says by the word of the

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Lord the heavens were made You know you read that first you think it's just by his speaking, but we hear in John the word is more than just word spoken

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He's Jesus Christ and through him the heavens that the universe It was made and then here back in John 1 without him was not anything made

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That was made In other words, Jesus was involved in it all the stars the galaxies, you know the black holes

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This planet earth the mountains the trees the birds The single cells takes a microscope to see the molecules the

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DNA You know the God particles there's some scientists think that's gonna be it that's gonna contain a single theory that explains everything these little subatomic particles

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Except they'll never be able to explain where those subatomic particles came from God explains that and Jesus the one -of -a -kind

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God was involved even in that Because the word was

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God in verse 4 Because he's God in him was life

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That's in Jesus Christ physical life Spiritual life, you know scientists still haven't been able to explain where physical life comes from How did it just arise

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Out of a sterile planet and even if they somehow do explain that that is not all the life that there is there is the spiritual life which scientists can't study and that life is the light of People it that it

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Shines and it shows them God and the darkness in verse 5

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That's the conspiracy of people that darkness they conspire because they hate the light and they choose the darkness

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They want to destroy the dark the light because they prefer the darkness, but that darkness has not overcome the light

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Even though the darkness tries to destroy the light as we see this in this gospel, you know when Judas Finally chooses to betray

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Jesus He chooses money 30 pieces of silver over the light and it says he went out away from Jesus He went out and it says and it was night in John chapter 13 verse 30.

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It was darkness That's what Judas was going into but even the crucifixion didn't overcome the light and it tells us why here because in him was life

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The word is God Well, the word has witnesses in verses 6 to 8 and then in verse 15

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We hear about one of the most important witnesses to the word is John the Baptist He was a man sent from God It says that's like the prophets the prophets are sent from God all of the

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Gospels Began by mentioning something about John and so does this one? And this one focuses in on the fact that he's a witness

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That's his primary mission is to bear witness to the light to that one word who makes sense of it all

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To Jesus John came that more people would believe in Jesus not that they would believe in him

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Now when it is in his time John was a you know, very notable figure. He was a celebrity He was widely known thought to be a prophet by the people

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We know even in Acts chapter 16 that several years after his death that there was still groups of people who believed in John You know who tried to follow

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John the Baptist But we're here We're told in verse 8 that he was not the light became witness came for the purpose of bearing witness

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To the light for testifying pointing away from itself to Jesus in verse 15.

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He's even he's even quoted there Jesus is not the one Jesus is the one he says who comes after me

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John says he ranks before me. He's higher than me because he was before me

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And of course, it's foolish isn't it to follow someone or follow something that is supposed to be a witness to someone greater

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Why would you follow John when he's trying to tell you to follow Jesus? Just make much sense

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Why follow who someone's ranked less? When he's trying to tell you about the one who's ranked more than him that he's trying when he's trying to draw your attention away from himself

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To Jesus what the church to is a witness like John, you know, we're not the light

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We're supposed to bear witness to the light now Sure, the Lord Jesus said to speaking to the church to us that you know, you are the light of the world

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But we are only the light If we're like the moon Reflecting the

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Sun. I got that from Brittany's Facebook page But some people are more concerned with following their following their church, you know believing in it and glorifying it is

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I guess it's easier They can just ask them questions and do what the church says But they're more concerned with believing the church glorifying their church

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Than they are in following Jesus and believing him and glorifying him some churches or cults

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Even put themselves in the place of Jesus and Telling their people that you don't if you

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Believe us because we speak for Jesus basically the same Believing in us is the same as believing in Jesus, but instead we should be like John here.

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We're not the light We're bearing witness to the light to him who ranks higher than us who was before us

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Because he was with God in the beginning to Jesus who is the one -of -a -kind

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God And so we don't use church this assembly to draw attention to ourselves, you know to celebrate ourselves our traditions or our citizenship our nationality our culture, but to point

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To someone is high above all of that to Jesus. We should be a witness to the word

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The word became flesh in verses 9 to 11 and verse 14

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We see that the word is the logos the Tao the one uniting principle.

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He came into this world The very planet he had made hosted him and This is why

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I'm believing in Jesus is not merely about You know just kind of abstract doctrines and theories and ideas

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Sound good, maybe get excited about them nice to sing about but but You know, they really can't be practiced and we go out we live no differently but this is why our world because the word became flesh is why our world are even our physical world of bodies and Jobs and and school and relationships and money

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It isn't merely a shadow on the wall That God doesn't really care about as long as our hearts are somehow good we can send all we want

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No, God came into this world into a body like ours The grand miracle see us

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Lewis called it the word becoming flesh with flesh here meaning all of our human existence and it's it is frailty in his vulnerability

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He was tired and thirsty at a well He was able to be killed at a cross

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Well, just like our human lives which Isaiah describes in chapter 40 all flesh is grass the one -of -a -kind

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God Came into that kind of flesh and he dwelt

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He lived among us literally They're Tabernacled not a word we commonly use tabernacled just as God lived among Israel in the

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Old Testament You know in that tabernacle Remember in Joshua, they brought the tabernacle into the promised land and God lived in that tabernacle in the middle of his people

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And so he's saying here in Jesus God was living in a body in the middle of his people, but who are his people?

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You know verse 10 says that the world world of people At least those who he came to Didn't recognize him.

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They didn't receive him in verse 11. He came to his own That is he came to the nation the ethnic group to which he naturally belonged to which physically he was descended

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Him and his family to Israel He lived among the Jews just as the tabernacle had been literally among the

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Jews among Israel But they didn't receive him his natural people according to the flesh at least not most of them

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Those natural people according to the flesh according to birth according to ethnicity didn't accept him

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That's what it means. They're his own did not receive him but those Weren't really his people

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People who don't receive him aren't really his they aren't children of God Well, who are his people?

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you know, it doesn't doesn't depend on Ancestry or on race or a nationality or on family

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God's people have never been about a nation or a race or You know an ethnic group but about faith his people are those who have seen his glory

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They've seen that Jesus is full of Grace and truth in verse 14.

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He has grace For their sins So that they can be right with God not a kind of sloppy excusing of sin

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So they keep on sinning but truth to set us straight truth

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That sets us free the light shines It exposes the truth the truth that we're sinners and that we need grace the truth that Jesus Christ gives us grace upon grace in Verse 14 the word who became flesh and set up his tent in this world is again described as the only son

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That's the same term. We were looking at earlier. The only the one and only the only begotten

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The one of a kind here. He is named as the son Right.

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We've seen the father named here. We see the son named He is the son the one of a kind God from the father

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God whom no one has ever seen and he is Jesus Christ is you know, not just Have a little bit of grace and truth, but mixed in with some severity and legalism and darkness

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But he is it says full full of grace and truth the word became flesh

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To but to be the word who makes children of God Who are

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God's people? Not everyone Some as it says here receive him not they don't accept him

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But starting in verse 12 to all who receive him what's it mean to receive him?

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It means to believe in his name to believe in the revelation of himself who he has made himself known to be

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To believe that he has been given the name that is above every name Greater than every other so -called

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God everything that we we tend to put our trust in and hope for greater than money

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Greater even than family greater than even science, you know when science has concluded people

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Listen people bow and obey science says so it's okay, but to receive him

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Jesus is to believe in Jesus to believe that at that name

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Every knee will bow and Everyone will finally admit that he is the one to obey

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To those who receive him Jesus gives the right it says the authority the right to become children of God He came to his own to the people who should have been should have been his family

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And found that they were not his family, you know for a time literally even his own immediate family didn't accept him

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Eventually they did but for a time Even his brother scoffed at him and this got very gospel and John they mock him

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He make fun of him his mother and brothers Come at one point to try to take him away from teaching

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But he pointed to those who are around him listening to him who had received him who believed him pointed to them and Said this is my family and he gives them he gives them believers the right the authority

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To be children of God now sure It's not exactly like Jesus because Jesus is the one -of -a -kind son to the father

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But by the power given to us by the Word of God the Word made flesh we become

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Children of God we become God's family Now if it stopped right there at the end of verse 12

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Some would conclude well, then, you know, we become God's people His family by our choice the decision we make by our choosing to believe it's up to us then

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It's in the power of our free will and we get to congratulate ourselves if we think we made the right choice

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But it doesn't stop right there verse 13 says we the children of God Became Children of God we were born again.

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That is he's determined to use in chapter 3. We were born again not of blood

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It's not by physical birth because we were born into the right family The right bloodline is though faith is just you know, just faith just kind of runs in the blood

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No, he says not of blood nor Look at that carefully

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Verse 13 Nor of the will of the flesh our will or of the will of man

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What Paul says in Romans chapter 9 verse 16? This salvation does not depend on human will both here

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In John chapter 1 verse 13 and in Romans 9 the Bible Says directly that being born again does not come about by an act of our will

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We cannot choose to make it happen Someone once joked that a book entitled how to be born again

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Must have been written for God Because he's the only one who can make people born again It's not dependent on anything we do or anything.

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We choose here, but of God we are born again, but of God God's choice

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Well, that's the peak That's the focus To which all of this prologue has been building up and then flows down from Jesus gives to those who receive him power to become children of God the word

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The one that everything is about came to the world to gather a family

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That family believed him That family received him Because they were past tense born of God because God willed it they were born of God because Jesus gave them life

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He shined his light into there really into our dark hearts that quickening ray

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The light that makes alive shown into our dark hearts that light was life and we were born again

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By God's life by God's will and finally finally then we saw ah

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He's full of grace and truth. We're not the light. No, it's not us

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He is and so we believed and and then we knew we were now

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Children of God he had given us that right as that great hymn puts it

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He left his father's throne above so free so infinite his grace

37:27

He emptied himself of all but love and bled for Adams helpless race

37:33

Tis mercy all immense and free for oh my god, it found out me

37:39

Long my imprisoned spirit lay fast bound in sin and nature's night thine

37:47

I Diffused a quickening ray I woke the dungeon flamed with light

37:53

My chains fell off. My heart was free. I rose with forth and followed thee