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The four Sundays before Christmas day are the Sundays of Advent.
The season of Advent (name derived from the Latin advenire—to come to,
and adventus—an arrival) is that time (between 21-28 days) when the church
prepares the faithful to celebrate Christ’s coming into the world. Traditionally
the focus has been twofold, both on his first coming—with rejoicing,
and in his expected second coming—with repentance.
This series of sermons will seek to address the Advent themes
by means of a study of the first fourteen verses of the prologue of the Gospel
of John (John 1:1-18). It will then address the themes of Epiphany through
verses 15 to 18 of the prologue along with chapters one to four of the Gospel.
I will treat “listening to the text” as brief exegetical notes on
lexical or theological issues deemed significant to a proper understanding
of the text. In treating “engaging the text” I will attempt to indicate
the hermeneutical considerations that would be helpful in arriving at the
sermon from the text. My treatment of “preaching the text” will
simply indicate briefly what would be the desired focus of the sermon and
the function that the sermon is expected to perform.
The text is introduced by the same words that begin the Bible
(Genesis 1:1). It therefore intends to take the reader “back there”
as the basis for taking her or him forward. The subject matter to be presented
necessitates addressing foundational matters in order to appreciate what is
to follow. Leon Morris (65) points out that along with the presence of other
salient themes from the Genesis creation story such as life (v. 4), light
(v. 4) and darkness (v. 5) in this passage a new creation is in view. “John’s
theme is God’s new creation.” (Morris 65) This new creation is however
related to the old creation. It is “new” in the sense of the renewal
of the old and not in the sense of the replacement or the abandonment of the
old.
Double meanings are a feature of Johannine writings. His use
of “beginning” carries the idea of both, “before everything”
that is at the start of history and the “origin of everything” that
is “at the root of the universe”. (Morris 65)
In the Greek, the tense of the verb to be—“was”
has theological significance in this text. The imperfect tense has the force
of continuous action in the past. “The verb ‘was’ is most naturally
understood of the eternal existence of the word: ‘the word continually
was.’” (Morris 65) The “word” existed continuously before
creation and therefore was not a part of the creation.
John uses this term in an extremely creative way that would
effectively speak to both the Jewish and Grecian elements of his audience.
The historical context is believed to be Ephesus in the late first century
CE. This historical setting would be one in which their world would be influenced
by both Jewish and Greek ideas. To the Jew, the traditions of circumlocuting
(that is getting around pronouncing the divine name) along with various Old
Testament associations of the word of God (daber) with his actual deeds and
nature, the term “word” (memra) pointed to and often stood in place
of the references to God’s name and to God’s self. To the Greeks,
centuries of philosophers had used the terms “word” to denote the
rational principle that originated, organized and gave meaning to the universe.
William Temple explains that, “Alike for Jew and gentile
represents the ruling fact of the universe and represents that fact as the
self expression of God . . . both will agree that this logos (word) is the
starting point of all things” (Morris 108). Morris states that, “John
was using a term that with various shades of meaning was in common use everywhere.
He could count on all his readers catching his essential meaning.” (Morris
108)
John’s use of the term “word” exceeds familiar
popular Greek and Jewish usages however, in that it means more than the abstract
“universal principle” associated with Greek philosophy or the convenient,
mere semantic “personification” of Jewish religious practice. For
John, the “word” is a person.
The Greek language has different options for the word “with”.
These options distinguish “beside” or “alongside” from
“toward.” The word used in this context is best translated “toward”
indicating a face-to-face relationship. This denotes a relationship that is
intimate and close—a relationship between persons.
Having listened to the text I offer an expanded paraphrased
rendering of John 1:1-2 as follows:
Before the start of history and at the very root of the universe,
the “word” i.e, the previously continually existing, self-revealing
person that gives meaning to the universe was in the closest possible relationship
with God and whatever God was the “word” was also. He was already
in the closest possible relationship with God before everything started.
In December 2003 the human need to know “ultimate things”
is as active as it was in John’s society. Indeed, one of the features
of our postmodern society is an increased popular curiosity in respect to
the paranormal, the spiritual and the mysterious. The success of TV programs
such as “Crossing Over” and others with science fiction themes illustrate
this increased curiosity in the paranormal. The movies, “The Lord of
the Rings” and “X Men 2” tend to reinforce the observation
that there is a heightened climate of curiosity regarding things spiritual
and mysterious. This need to know and experience things beyond our mundane
experience is a need recognized by the text.
With the so called global village getting smaller because of
advances in communication and international travel, and with the challenge
and collapse of Christian religious hegemony, there is a new awareness of
competing religious systems that demand equal recognition and informed response.
Added to this scene is the notion of radical tolerance in which religious
beliefs and practices are to be equally regarded in culture and, in some cases,
under law. Any notion of one’s religious belief being superior to or
exclusive of others is viewed negatively as an expression of bigotry and intolerance.
In this arena where there is a “babel” of voices we all must address
afresh the existential questions posed implicitly to John and his community
in first century Ephesus: “Who or what must we believe about God?”
or more colloquially, “Will the real God please stand up?”
The questions as to what to believe about God and as to the
nature of God are not simply functions of human curiosity on comparative religion.
These questions function as part of the fundamental yearning of the human
heart for ultimate meaning and a sense of personal place. This cry of the
human heart is universal and centers around the need for a sense of identity
(who am I), the related need for a sense of origin (where did I come from),
the need for a sense of mission (why I am here/what must I do) and the need
for a sense of destiny (where am I going). These personal, universal, ultimate,
existential questions require an answer that is personal, universal and ultimate.
Is there such an answer? Is it one that is ultimate yet knowable, universal
yet personal? This text says yes there is indeed such an answer. This is definitely
good news in the face of human need.
The universal human need for ultimate yet personal meaning finds
its answer in the nature of God. Humankind does not need to feel lost in a
vortex of chance, because behind everything and before everything there was
the “word,” which was with God and which was God. The “word”
is eternally in the most intimate relationship to God and is essentially what
God is. There is at “the root of the universe” and before the start
of history an eternal communication, eternal communion and an eternal community
that reveal what God is like.
The main focus of the text is the “word,” a term which
has an essential function in communication. Whatever else “word”
denotes, it must be conceived as a basic vehicle for information, its capture
and conveyance. The assertion of the text that the “word” was God
(i.e., what God was the “word” was) indicates that in the self-revealing
“word” God is revealed. The “word” is therefore a continually
existing, self-revealing person, the “information” of whose self-revelation
is “God”. God is therefore not hiding, but is through the “word”
always making himself known. The good news then is that the “ultimate”
is knowable and this is so through the “word”. God’s answer
to the cry of the human heart to know the truth in light of postmodern curiosity,
religious pluralism and the search for personal meaning is the “word”—a
continually existing person in which there is the eternal communication of
God himself.
The repeated concept in this portion of the text is that “the
word was with God”. This is obviously a major emphasis of the text. The
eternal relationship of communion between God and the “word” that
is indicated by this repeated idea gives an important insight into God’s
nature. If God lives in a face-to-face relationship with the “word”
it follows that God is both capable of and interested in personal relationships.
This will be a critical starting point in answering the existential question
of whether God can communicate with me and whether he is interested to do
so. Later in this gospel John tells us the good news that God so loved the
world that he gave his unique son so that whoever believes on him would have
eternal life. This truth has an important starting point in our text. If God
lives in an eternally loving relationship himself then it is believable that
this loving God would love people and act in a loving way to rescue them from
ultimate danger. Being loving is essential to his nature out of which emanates
loving acts in which we can hope to be involved. That the gospel indicates
that God wants to commune with us in a personal, loving relationship seems
then to be simply an expression of the nature of this God. God is a God of
personal communion. We humans can personally commune with that which is ultimate.
The Christian doctrine of the Triune God is one in which God
is understood to live in an eternal self existing, self sufficient, self revealing
community. Although this text may not be used as proof of the full blown doctrine
of the Trinity, it does indicate that those forms of radical monotheism that
do not appreciate the existence of God as a multiple personal community may
miss some important elements of the essential nature of God. Whereas the Gospel
of John asserts that, “God so loved” (John 3:16), the epistle of
First John declares that “God is love” (1 John 4:16). Loving is
not simply some thing that God does but more fundamentally it is something
that God is. Philosopher Tim Erdel, in a paper presented to the Evangelical
Philosophical Society, argues for the logical grounds of asserting that “God
is love” by saying, “Well to reduce what is potentially a very long
discussion to a simple assertion, I will simply suggest that if God is love
then a triune God seems to me to provide a much more likely ground and basis
for the claim that God is love than does a monotheism asserting that God exists
solely as one person. For if the very nature and essence of God is to be a
being of love, then it is hard to see how this could be so if there is no
possibility for a relationship of love, for love by its very definition suggests
a relationship of some sort. That is, when God alone exists and when God is
but one person then it is difficult to understand how the very nature and
essence of God could be that of a loving being. If however, there is a triune
God, a God in three persons, then, even before God creates any other being
or object, God can exist in an eternal relationship of love.” (Tim Erdel)
The “word” who is with God is God and therefore points to the revelation
of the eternal community in which God who is love exists.
The personal relationship between God and human persons finds
a model in the eternal community of God. This model calls us into this loving
community with God and other persons. Again John’s epistle proclaims,
“That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have
seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this
we proclaim concerning the Word of life. The life appeared; we have seen it
and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with
the Father and has appeared to us. We proclaim to you what we have seen and
heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is
with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ.” (1 John 1:1-3)
In the face of God’s answer to the human need to know,
the need to have clarity in the face of confusing and competing “truths”,
the need to have personal communion in meaningful relationships, and the need
for community—we see what God is like by means of the “word”.
Our response is one of grateful relief. Human beings are not left to engage
in a pessimistic quest for knowledge of the ultimate truth without a handle
to find it. God is effective in revealing himself and is therefore knowable
by means of the eternally communicating, self-revealing “word”.
Later in his gospel John portrays Jesus praying to God and saying, “Now
this is eternal life: that they may know you the only true God and Jesus Christ
whom you have sent” (John 17:3).
Relief, no need of perpetual guessing—we can know what God is like. Indeed
we can know who God is because he has revealed himself through the “word”.
Beyond the relief based on the fact that we can know who God
is there is also the reality of confident living based on what we know. When
we know that God is eternally loving, that at the very core of his being he
is interested in and is perpetually expressing a person to person relationship,
when we know further that this loving God is indeed the ultimate context and
source of history and the universe itself, it gives us a solid basis to trust
him with our lives. We can be confident that we are not products of impersonal
chance and time but that we are cradled in the care of a communing God who
seeks to include us in this eternal community of love. John will later in
his gospel show us Jesus praying to God and asking, “That all of them
(the disciples) may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you.
May they also be in us . . . I have given them the glory that you gave me,
that they may be one as we are one: I in them and you in me. May they be brought
to complete unity to let the world know that you . . . have loved them even
as you have loved me” (John 17:21-23).
We are aware that in this text (John 1:1-2) John does not yet
identify the “word” with Jesus Christ, which he will do later but
he begins to lay a firm foundation for this understanding. From it we discern
that we can know the true God and the knowledge of him gives the tremendous
sense of clarity and safety necessary for confident living in a confused and
calloused world.
The focus of this sermon is that the eternally pre-existent
“word” is self-revealing and is in an eternally loving communion
and community with God. This “word” was God and is therefore the
effective means of revealing God.
The function of this sermon is to produce hope in the possibility
of knowing God personally through knowing the “word”. It gives assurance
of the eternally loving character of God and offers an invitation to confidently
trust him with one’s life.
Morris, Leon. NICNT, rev. ed. (Eerdmans, 1994).