Incarnation

Well, great to see you this morning, folks. My name is Graeme. I've got the joy of being the pastor here at the church.

Let me encourage you to have John chapter 1 open in front of you.

John 1 · chapter mention

And we're just going to pause as we begin this afternoon and we're going to pray.

So let's close our eyes, let's just still our hearts as we come to God's words today.

The words of Psalm 18.

This God, His way is perfect. The word of the Lord proves true.

He is a shield for all those who take refuge in Him.

So, Father, we pray that you would help turn our eyes to that which is true today.

By turning our eyes to your Son, Jesus, in whose name we pray. Amen.

Well, with John chapter 1 open in front of you, let me just tell you what we're going to be doing as we build up to Easter,

John 1 · chapter mention

which is just around the corner. We're starting a new series today that we've called Ichthus,

which I'm sure the Greek boffins out there will know is the Greek word for fish.

So what the earliest Christians used to do to let each other know that they follow Jesus

is that they drew a fish symbol in the ground.

Because Ichthus is a Greek acronym for the phrase,

Jesus Christ, God, Son, Savior.

So this was their common confession about all those who followed the Lord Jesus.

And it's why, besides the cross, the fish has become the recognized symbol for Christianity down the ages.

As many others, countless others, make this their confession too about the Lord Jesus.

And so what we're going to be doing on the Sunday mornings as we work our way up to Easter

is we're going to be thinking and working through some of the key moments in Jesus' life.

These moments that take us to the heart of who he is and what he came to do.

Because I recognize there's many of us here today who are investigating the Christian faith,

which is a wonderful thing. You are so welcome here.

Let me just encourage you that there is no greater place to start thinking through those claims of Christianity

than by looking at the life of Jesus Christ as we find him in the Gospels.

And for those of us here who are following Jesus, maybe we've done so for a week,

maybe we've done so for many years.

It's my prayer that we would increase both in our knowledge of him

and that we would increase by God's grace through his spirit in our affections for him

as we together we savor the saviour.

And so let me just get, crack on, get us to the first one of these.

Let me just tell you about an experience I had recently on the city bypass.

So I'm in the car and I'm heading out of town.

Now you get the whole idea of a bypass, right?

That you try and bypass the traffic.

Well, this particular day I was driving out of town and I'm hitting the bypass

and I recognise that the cars are crawling along.

Now normally when you see that you recognise that it's because

either some of these cars broken down up ahead, maybe their battery's gone flat

or it's because people are trying to join at different junctions

and it slowed the thing right down.

But not in this particular day.

So the bypass was crawling along

and do you know what was making it crawling along?

It was the sun.

It was the sun.

It was so unbelievably bright

that drivers couldn't see where they were going.

The sun was forcing them to slow right down

and the speed of the bypass dropped to about five miles an hour.

It was an incredible thing to see and think about.

I wonder if you've ever had an experience like that.

I guess that's kind of why they invented sunglasses, isn't it?

I was thinking of it this week.

Google's a wonderful thing.

And I didn't know this until this week

that apparently the sun is 93 million miles away from the earth.

Did you know that?

Learned something today, right?

Great fact.

93 million miles away from the earth.

And it got me thinking,

I wonder how,

if that, from our point of view,

is how we react to something that is 93 million miles away,

how bright must the sun be?

And then I got thinking,

I love to think on these things.

I wonder how close one could get to the sun

before you just shriveled up and died.

What could we take in?

How close could we get

before simply our bodies just gave up the ghost?

Here's the thing about this passage today.

If that's the case with the sun,

then how much greater the case

if we were to ever encounter the one who made the sun?

Now here's the confession

that you know if you are an Old Testament Jew.

Really simple.

It goes like this.

You cannot look on God and live.

You cannot look on God and live.

You cannot take him in.

If you were to take it in,

you wouldn't be here to tell the story.

You cannot look on the God of the universe's glory,

his greatness, his goodness,

his otherness,

his majesty,

his holiness,

his splendor.

This is who the God of eternity is.

And you know as an Old Testament Jew

that you cannot look on God and live.

And you find this repeatedly in the Old Testament

when people encounter the living God.

The prophet Isaiah, Isaiah chapter 6,

Isaiah 6 · chapter mention

he fears for his life

when he finds himself in God's presence.

Because he realizes he's not aware of his smallness,

he's more aware of his sinfulness.

That who is he,

an unclean human being,

a sinful human being,

to come into the presence of the three times holy God.

He falls down and he declares,

woe is me,

I am done.

We see it again similarly.

Ezekiel,

he finds himself in the presence of God,

a prophet,

falls on his face.

And you get this constant refrain in the Old Testament.

You'll see it on the screen.

Who is able to stand before the Lord?

This holy God.

Which is a cracking question, isn't it?

Who can stand before him?

And so with that backdrop,

you can appreciate the sheer audacity of the claim

that John makes in the prologue of his gospel.

If you've got it there,

John chapter 1.

John 1 · chapter mention

Who can see the glory of God

and live to tell the tale?

John puts his hand in the air

and he declares,

I can.

I can tell you.

What does he say at verse 14?

See these words.

We have seen his glory.

Now either your boy is wearing some spectacular sunglasses

that offer him some unparalleled UV protection.

He needs to get a patent on that quick.

Which given we're talking in the first century,

we're calling that unlikely, okay?

Or something's happened.

And what's happened,

verse 14,

and this is where we hit the jaw-dropping claim

that's right at the heart of the Christian faith,

that the words became flesh.

The words,

the one,

if you want to scan your eyes back

to the beginning of John's gospel,

when your boy doesn't go for any small talk,

does he?

He just goes straight for the jugular.

What does he say?

The words who John has introduced us to at verse 1.

The word who is eternal.

This is what we're learning about the word.

The word who,

through whom all things were made.

The word,

the one who sustains the stars and planets.

The word,

the one who gives life to every human being

who holds our lives in his hand.

Let me just take this opportunity to say,

in our world at the minute,

let's not lose sight of the fact

that our God is sovereign,

that it's him that holds our lives in his hands.

So we act with wisdom.

We wash our hands.

We want to love the people around about us

by doing that and by visiting

and by going to see them

and helping them in any way that we can,

kind of loving our neighbor.

But let's not lose sight of the fact

that our lives and our times

are held in the hand of our good father.

So back on track.

The word is Jesus.

This is what he's saying.

The word is Jesus.

It was him who became flesh.

Jesus Christ,

get your heads around this,

took a human body.

And whilst not relinquishing

one ounce of his deity

as God in the beginning,

he stepped into our humanity.

He entered our existence.

He inhabited our skin.

He stepped into our situation

in all its frailty,

in all its brokenness,

and all its vulnerability.

Jesus Christ,

the theme of heaven's praises,

the one on whom angels long to look,

God became flesh.

in what is known as the incarnation

in Christian circles.

And the old hymn we used to sing,

thou who was rich beyond all splendor,

all for love's sake became us poor.

Thrones for a manger did surrender.

Sapphire paved courts for a stable floor.

Thou who was rich beyond all splendor,

all for love's sake became poor.

There's a reason that this doctrine,

this truth,

has been and will be celebrated

by Christians down the ages.

And we saw him, says John.

Worth maybe dipping into this guy, John.

He's a fisherman

who Jesus called to come

and be one of his 12 disciples.

John finds himself,

not just one of the 12,

but part of the inner three,

along with James' brother and Peter,

meaning that he gets to watch,

he got to watch Jesus up close

and personal in action, right?

Brought into things,

seen things,

the teachings,

the interactions,

the miracles,

the people whose lives

Jesus transformed,

who he called to sin no more

after they'd encountered him.

He heard Jesus explain his mission.

And here's something cool

I was thinking about this week.

At the end of John's gospel,

what does he tell us?

He tells us that Jesus

is hanging suspended on the cross,

bearing the sin of all those

who would look to him in faith.

Jesus points to his mother Mary,

or rather, sorry,

looks at his mother Mary,

speaks in her direction,

who's standing next to John,

and says to John,

John, you take care of her

as your own mum.

And church tradition,

if you look it up,

tells us that John cared for Mary

for something like 11 years or so

before she died.

Now, here's the point.

These two are living together.

Right?

Probably having an educated guess

that they're not making small talk

with one another.

Right?

Another tea vicar?

No, they're not doing that.

What do you think they're talking about?

Do you not think they're spending

every waking moment

talking about Jesus?

Remember when he said that?

Oh, how cool was that?

How brilliant was that?

Do you remember when he did that?

I could not believe it.

Do you remember how the crowd reacted?

Do you remember how they marveled

at his teaching?

Like they'd seen nothing

like this before.

And so John,

having lived this kind of life

and having thrown himself

into chewing it all over,

has written this gospel

so that you and I,

down the generations,

would find ourselves here

able to read about

the life of Jesus.

And as you read his gospel,

the thing is that you get a sense

that this guy's never stopped

being thrilled

with the risen Jesus.

maybe a challenge for some of us today.

Have we grown cold

in our affections for him?

You've been a Christian for years.

Today, are you still thrilled

with the person

and the work of Jesus?

You know,

I think about the Christians,

particularly I'm thinking about uni,

the lecturers who have had

the greatest impact on me

as I've journeyed through.

And it's those who I can tell

have just never stopped

thinking about Jesus.

And they are 80,

pushing 90,

they're still learning things,

they're still marveling at this.

I've got a guy,

a lecturer,

who weeps his way

through Hebrew poetry.

He just finds it that beautiful

that he encounters

the God of the Word

and this is him.

John has never stopped

being thrilled

with the person of Jesus.

How can John say

that he's seen God's glory?

Let's rattle through

three quick things from this text.

He can say it

because he saw Jesus.

John wants us to know

where Jesus came.

Okay, 14 to 18 in the text,

follow with me.

Verse 14, it says,

he dwelt.

He dwelt quite literally.

He tabernacled.

That's the word.

If you know your Old Testament,

this is the tent

that we read about

in the Old Testament

that Israel carried with them

before the temple

was constructed.

The tabernacle

that signified God's presence

with his people,

that God desired to dwell

with his people.

And where has the word dwelt?

It's tabernacled.

Where?

Among us.

With us,

as we were singing about earlier,

because you might have

half expected,

given who Jesus is,

that when he came to earth

that he would go straight

to the palace.

And we have to say

that that would be humility

enough on his part

if he did that.

Having waiters serve him,

having people bow to him,

making sure that the world

recognizes him.

But where is he?

He's not locked away

in the green room

of some concert venue,

saying to the bloke

on the door,

would you make sure

that no one gets in here

unless I say.

He's not in the business class

of British Airways,

saying,

can you just draw

the curtain please

so I don't have to interact

with the riffraff

who are in the economy class.

Where is he?

No.

Born in lowly Bethlehem,

grows up in joked

about Nazareth.

And where is he so often

in the Gospels

when he's not praying?

Who is he with?

He's with people.

People.

Engaging them,

teaching them,

healing them,

helping them to think,

listening to them,

eating with them,

crying with them,

speaking with them

to the extent

that people look on

and they mockingly

give him the nickname

the friend of sinners.

As he steps in,

as he calls a world

to himself

and says,

you need to stop

going your own way,

you need to turn

from your sin,

repent,

start going my way,

Jesus turns up

and offers the world

himself.

Of course,

as we see Jesus

interacting with a world,

this is how we should

interact as those

who would follow him,

by engaging with the world,

loving the world

with the heart of Jesus.

Do you see how

in the person of Jesus,

God chose to dwell

among his people

in the most personal way possible?

He dwelt among us.

John wants us to know

where he came,

he wants us to know

how he came.

End of verse 14,

he came full of grace

and truth.

You get the same

double words again

at verse 17,

for the law was given

through Moses,

grace and truth

came through Jesus Christ.

And we think about

that word,

grace.

You know,

mercy,

not getting something

that we do deserve,

that's the definition

of mercy.

Grace,

getting something

that we don't deserve.

God's grace to us,

to undeserving,

rebellious human creatures,

comes not in the giving

of stuff,

but it comes

in the giving us

of his son.

What we need to understand

is if in the person

of Jesus,

it's as if God

has reached into

his inner being

and he's plucked

out his own heart

in giving us

his son Jesus.

Such is his great love

for a lost world.

He came full of grace

and truth.

And if you think about it,

in theory,

he could have come

and not brought grace

and truth.

He could have come

and he could have

laid down the law.

Right?

I don't know

if you've noticed that.

It's what they do

in rugby.

I remember growing up

playing rugby,

never really understood it.

You commit a foul,

you need to back off

10 metres.

And if you don't

back off 10 metres

by the time the ref

sees it,

you're back another

10 metres.

And technically,

you can keep on going

all the way to the

tri-line if you keep

making the same mistake.

The ref says,

get back,

get back.

You committed a null foul,

get back,

get back.

I was thinking this week,

Jesus could have so easily

come and said,

see those Ten Commandments.

You know those Ten Commandments,

the ones that you stink

at keeping?

I'm here to make it 20.

And you know what's happening.

If you don't believe it,

he's going to be 30.

He's going to keep on going.

No,

in Christ,

John says

that we have received

grace upon grace.

In other words,

God's grace to the world

and that in

which in particular

he has already

consistently shown

to his people

down the ages

reaches new heights

in the coming of Jesus.

I encourage you

to come along

the next few weeks.

We're going to see

exactly how that grace

works itself out

specifically in Jesus' life.

Come back next week

and we'll see another

wonderful truth

about who he is.

But you see for now

that he has come

full of grace

and truth.

Talking of grace,

our little girls,

their favorite game

at the minute,

one of their favorite games

is to run into any room

in our house,

to shut the door,

turn the lights off

and say spooky,

spooky.

They love doing this.

Which is all fun

and games, right?

Until somebody's

banging heads

or somebody's

running into a cupboard

and spooky, spooky

turns into daddy,

daddy, mommy, mommy.

But here's what

they're gradually learning

in the school of hard life.

School of hard knocks,

the school of life.

That you can't see

where you're going

and you don't know

what you're doing

when you're living

in the dark.

What does John

call Jesus

at verse 9?

He calls him what?

The true light.

The light

by which you can see.

The light

that shines

into the room

of our dark existence

where we are

groping around

trying to figure

our existence

and our lives out.

What does the light

bring as he shines?

He brings truth.

Truth about us,

truth about our world,

truth about our God,

truth about our predicament.

And so the wonderful thing

about these verses

is if you're here today

and you want to know grace,

if you're here today

and you want to know truth,

John's pleading with you

to see that you are living

your life in the darkness,

that you are on the wrong end

of this holy God's anger

against our sin.

And he's begging us

to come in to know the truth,

to come to the light

by giving our lives

to Jesus Christ.

John wants us to know

where he came.

He wants us to know

how he came.

Finally, he wants us

to know why he came.

Here's the thing

that I've noticed people do

when they know

that a baby's on the way.

They start trying

to guess the sex,

right?

And they say,

well, I've got a feeling

that it's going to be a girl.

It's got a hunch

it's going to be a boy.

And you say,

how do you know?

And you say,

well, I guess my sister's

baby, right?

And I think I've got

a kind of gift in this.

And you say,

well, maybe you got lucky

with a 50-50.

But people say that,

don't they?

They try and guess.

I've got a feeling.

I know.

And the thing is

that people also do that

with God.

I think God might be like this.

On and around,

I couldn't possibly believe

in a God like that.

But what this truth,

the incarnation,

is telling us

is that when it comes

to what God is like,

we no longer have a choice.

God has made himself

fully known.

How do you know

what the baby is

when it comes out?

Here is God in the flesh.

Here is God

making himself known

to a world.

Why do we know that?

Because of what John says

about Jesus at verse 18.

No one has ever seen God,

but the one and only Son

who is himself God

and is in the closest relationship

with the Father,

he has made him known.

It's out in the open.

Jesus, the one who,

and you've got to wonder at this,

the one who has been

from eternity past,

who was face to face

with the Father,

right,

which means he's qualified

to tell us

and to show us.

Jesus has taken on flesh

and come down to us

with the words of the text,

the express purpose

of making the Father

known to us.

In other words,

if we want to know

what God is like,

we need look no further

than to look

to the Son, Jesus.

And we have to see

that there's nothing

other than lovingly,

loving consistency

between the Father

and the Son.

He is

the exact representation

of God the Father.

He is the image

of the invisible God.

And what that means

is that if you and I

want to see

what God is like,

if we want to know

what he thinks,

if we want to hear him

speak to us,

then we simply have

to look to Jesus.

John says,

we saw his glory.

As we looked at the Son,

we saw his glory.

You know,

just as we close,

I wonder if you're here today

and you're saying to yourself,

that's all very good

for this guy

because he saw Jesus.

Maybe if I had seen Jesus,

if I see Jesus,

I too could see his glory.

I'm never going to see Jesus.

How can I see his glory?

Well, just as we close,

let me tell you one story

to help convince you

on this a little bit.

It's a story

I recently heard

from a Christian speaker

who works down in London

called Richard Bergonin.

He's the author

of the Word One to One.

And after one of his talks,

he was telling this story.

A Chinese woman

ran up to him

and she proceeded

to tell him the story

about how she became

a Christian.

And I don't know if you know this.

Many of you know

that when Mao

was in power in China,

he wanted to put an end

to Christianity.

He wanted to stamp it out.

He wanted to stop its spread.

And one of the ways

that he tried to implement that

was to tell all the Christian missionaries

to get out.

And the Christian missionaries

had no choice, really.

They had to get out

and they took everything with them

except their Bibles.

The local people,

after the Christian missionaries

had left,

they picked up these Bibles.

They had absolutely

no interest in reading them.

But what they realized

is that these Bibles

were made of really,

really good paper.

Really good paper.

They could feel it.

So they thought,

that would make some great

wallpaper for our houses.

So they went back

and they started

rolling this paper

on their walls.

And this lady

was one of,

I think she was

the fifth generation

of people

who had become Christians

by reading about Jesus

in the house

of the wallpaper.

And they nicknamed it

the Bible Room.

And so she was one of the,

she was, I think,

the fifth generation

of people to become Christians

in the Bible Room.

So what that means,

here's the point,

if you and I,

by faith,

have eyes

that will see Jesus

for who he truly is,

as we read of him

and encounter him

in the pages of the Bible

and trust him

as our Savior and King,

if we will have eyes

to see it,

we too can say with John

that we have seen

God's glory.

And that's why,

if we want to see

our friends

and our family members

and become Christians,

come to know Jesus

for themselves,

and that really is

the heartbeat

of this church,

then the best way

to do that

is to get reading

the Bible with them.

Where are they going

to meet Jesus?

As he walks off

the pages of Scripture.

For God who said,

let light shine

out of darkness,

made his light

shine in our hearts

to give us the light

of the knowledge

of God's glory

displayed in the face

of Jesus Christ.

Why don't we just

take a moment, friends,

and let's respond

to God's words today.

Today,

I want you to do

a couple of things,

maybe just in the silence.

Maybe you're here today

and you don't know Jesus

as your Lord

and your King

and your Saviour.

Just to encourage you

to use this moment

just to think about

his claims

as we've read about them

there in John chapter 1.

John 1 · chapter mention

And also,

if you're here

and you are a Christian,

I want you to both

maybe bask in the truth

of this,

but I also want you

to pray for a friend

that you can think of

in your life

who you desire

and you long

that they would come

to know Jesus.

So maybe just in the silence

now and then I'll pray.

Why don't we just lift

our prayers to God

knowing that he hears us

because we pray

in Jesus' name.

And so Father,

we thank you,

gracious God of heaven,

for this time together today.

Thank you, Lord,

for the freedom

that we enjoy

in this country

to meet together.

And it's our prayer

as we've heard your voice

today as it resounds

in John chapter 1.

John 1 · chapter mention

We ask us, Lord,

we ask you, Lord,

that you would help us

this week

to lift our eyes

off of ourselves.

Lord, we know

our proneness to wander.

We know how much

distracts us

and we pray

that you would

help us look to Jesus

and in so doing

savor something more

of your glory.

Lord, we ask

that your spirit

would come

and he would help us

this week

to do just that.

Thank you

for this time together.

We commit this time

to you in Jesus'

precious name.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.