John 1:1-5 - ”Origin of it All” - Abundant Life (Gospel of John)

The Old Testament reading this morning

is from Genesis 1:es 1-5.

In the beginning, God created the

heavens and the earth.

The earth was without form and void, and

darkness

was over the face of the deep.

And the spirit of God was hovering over

the face of the waters.

And God said, "Let there be light." And

there was light. And God saw that the

light was good. And God separated the

light from the darkness. God called the

light day and the darkness he called

light. And there was evening and there

was morning, the first day.

The New Testament reading is from the

Gospel of John, chapter 1, verses 1-5.

John 1:1–5

In the beginning

was the word and the word was with God

and the word was 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. This is the word of the

Lord.

>> Thanks be to God.

>> All right, here we go. John's Gospel. It

is going to be enjoyable. I really

believe you'll enjoy it. There's two

types of texts I don't like to preach,

and John is one of them. The first one I

don't like to preach because um nobody

knows what it means and then they all

kind of have their own ideas is a book

like Revelation

where everybody thinks they know what it

means until you do the study on it and

you realize there's a whole genre there

that you've got to learn and those are

tough because you have to spend a whole

lot of time working to get it

understood. That's the first type. The

second type is the hardest

texts that people think they already

understand because they've heard it so

many times, but they don't always

understand them because then you're

preaching against something that

somebody's held to very dearly. Now, I'm

going to tell you that the theology of

John isn't going to change, but I'm

hoping by the end of John, you're going

to see that this book is an incredible

book. Number one, when you take firstear

Greek, it is. Do you remember the books

Dick and Jane? Do you Did you guys take

English with Dick and Jane? Yeah. Okay.

I'm seeing the older folks. So, the

young folks had some

some hip names like I don't know.

I don't even know what a hip name is

now.

Dick and Jane was a book that you go

through. Dick and Jane went to the

woods, right? Dick and Jane got a bucket

of water. Dick and Jane. And you repeat

it. John's gospel is the Greek Dick and

Jane. Okay? It repeats itself again and

again and again. And so you learn it

when you first start out. So when I was

a first year Greek student, this is what

I learned. But here's the craziest thing

about this amazing book. It is one of

the deepest books that's going to tell

us amazing stuff

if we want to go in it. So in other

words, a 5-year-old can swim in it and

an elephant can swim in it deeper on. It

can handle it all. All right.

So, we live in a different culture now,

don't we? The world has changed. The

world's changed in my 25 years of

ministry. People think different. And

now there's a whole movement. Have you

heard of this? The deconstruction of the

Christian faith. Put your hand up if

you've heard of that. So, this is a

movement that has come out in the last

uh 30 years, maybe 20 years. And the

basically the idea is I have been under

the teaching. I've been a Christian.

I've been a practicing Christian. And

now I am not comfortable with

Christianity. The cultures made me

uncomfortable with Christianity. So now

I must deconstruct my faith by going

through and re-examining all of these

theological ideas.

I did use AI. You're going to be proud

of me. Okay. This is my first AI. And I

like using AI because when if it's

wrong, I can blame AI. Right. Right. You

don't blame my head anymore. It's its

head. This is how he described

deconstructing theology. Christianity

says, "Deconstructing Christianity is a

personal, often painful process of

critically examining and questioning

traditional beliefs, doctrines, and

practices from one's religious

upbringing, frequently stemming from

evangelicalism, to find a more authentic

faith or to move away from it entirely."

That's the principle of what they say

they're doing.

Now, I have some suspicions of this

movement, but I recently heard a podcast

say Christianity is going to fall

because everyone's deconstructing

h

the funny thing is I'll get into

deconstructing theology in a bit, but

here's the point.

Is sit a threat?

Is it really

is our Christianity falling apart? Is it

deconstructing before our eyes?

Well, I have good news. No. And John's

gospel is a wonderful gospel to bring us

back on track, bring us back to what

scriptures motivated for and hopefully

free some of these people who are

feeling angst with the gospel. Let's

pray.

Heavenly Father, we thank you for your

living word. We thank you for John's

gospel. We pray it will speak to us and

that we will gain life through it. Amen.

The wonderful thing about John's gospel

you don't get anywhere else or very

often is he actually tells you the

purpose he writes it. That makes a

preacher's job way easier because if you

know the purpose of the writing, then

you can direct your sermon or your

teaching in the right direction. And

here's what he said. Now Jesus did many

other signs in the presence of the

disciples which are not written in this

book. But these are written so that you

listen to these words. But these were

written so that and I don't want to say

you because we're going to take it as an

individual. It's in the third person.

y'all.

So that y'all

may believe that Jesus is the Christ,

the son of God, and that by believing

y'all may have Zoe. This word's going to

come up. Life is going to jump. Zoe

means abundant life. It doesn't mean

just life as you live and breathe. It

means a life that is exploding,

vibrant, that you may have life,

abundant life in his name. So his

purpose is for you to believe that Jesus

is the king, the son of God, and that

you that y'all may have this life. It's

a very positive gospel.

His purpose for writing this whole thing

is that it's for you

because this God is for you. So every

week we will ask ourselves, how did this

text fulfill John's practice?

And the first one of course is the one

you guys have heard a million times

probably in the beginning. Now why does

he start with in the beginning? I gave

you a hint with what Ross Wait read as

our Old Testament text. What was that

again?

>> Genesis. How does Genesis start?

So, what is he doing? Is he's saying,

"I'm going to use the Genesis story as a

template for my gospel."

All of the gospels, all of Paul's

letters, it's the first part that's the

most important because they're telling

you how to read and what to look for. So

when you get to John's gospel, he uses

as his map

this this is how you look at it. This is

how you look at the text. Now he does

some things that are he he doesn't use

it perfectly onetoone. It's a different

genre frankly than the original. But

what he's going to do is he's going to

say, "I'm going to show you that the God

of creation, the one in the first

Genesis, is the very one that came in

Bethlehem that day." Okay, that's what

he's going to do. And he's going to note

that we must have a much higher view

thus of Jesus. Now if you go into

um the other gospels, they start at ma

they start with uh Moses, they start

with David, they start with the

prophets, they start with uh the kings,

they start with everything, but not

John. He's going back to before

creation. Do you see that? So what

perspective does he want you to have?

He's inviting you to have a view of God

in Jesus as massive.

Okay? He wants you to come. He's

starting right away and saying, you know

who this Jesus is? He's it.

He was in the beginning. In the

beginning was the word. Here is a

beautiful word that we get

misunderstood. The word in Greek is

logos and it has spiritual meanings, but

it's the Hebrew, which this was a Jewish

writer. So he was translating his word

word into Greek and his word was dbar.

And so the word dbar was always attached

to God. They couldn't have God because

remember in the Old Testament human

beings couldn't interact with God or

they die. Do you remember that? So they

had to have these means in which God

could have imminent connection with his

people. And there were three. There were

the spirit of God. There were the angels

of God. And then there was the word of

God. Okay? And when the word of God

came, it was God but his word. And it

always announced three things.

Salvation,

revelation,

creation.

So this word is the word that's always

connected with creation. So we must out

now realize that this is going to be all

about creation and new creation which

means it's going to be bigger than

individual us.

Remember that part where he says God so

loved the do you remember that cosmos is

the word.

Do you know what cosmos means?

Everything.

He doesn't say God so loved human

beings.

So we have a God that is not a tribal

God. He is the God of everything.

In the beginning was this word and this

word already has tons of meaning for

those hearers. This is the revelatory

entity. This is the the salvation

entity. This is the creation entity. And

then he goes on and he goes, "And the

word was with God."

Fascinating use of a verb here. The word

with here, the verb, he was with God,

is a verb that only has an intimacy

component.

So,

it's a verb. I might say to you, Emry,

what did you do last night? I was

watching TV with an

an intimate kind of thing. Now, I might

be asked, what were you doing today? And

I say I was with some guy at the bus

stop. That's a different one.

The with here is that the word is in

right away deep relationship with God.

You see that it starts off with love

with intimacy and the word was with God

and the word was God. Now this gets a

lot of people confused.

So, and you can see the beginning of the

trinity here, can't you? The word was

with God and the word was God. How can

you be with if you are? And that's

driven the Jehovah Witnesses quite nuts

and many others like them. And their

exclamation is that we don't understand

it right because the word God here

doesn't have a article in front of it.

So, in the in other words, in the Greek,

it says, "And the word was God." Not a

god, not the god. If he meant that Jesus

was the god, he should have put in the

god. The Jehovah witnesses tell me or a

god,

but he couldn't.

And there's a reason for that. If he

made him the god, he couldn't be a

trinitarian god. If he is the god, the

word, then there can't be more persons

than one. Do you see that?

But more importantly in the article is

when you don't have an article, it means

you're putting an exclamation mark at

the end of the sentence.

Okay? And what that means is why this is

interesting is here's how John would

have read this. In the beginning was the

word and the word was with God and the

word was God. Do you see

he's shocked that the word was God? Can

you believe this word was the actual God

because no one expected it? We're so

used to the idea of Jesus being divine,

being the God. They were shocked that

this word was God.

And he was in the beginning with God.

You see, he does that twice. This with

when Jews do things twice, they're ex

they want you to take it very serious.

Remember when Pet Jesus says, "Truly,

truly, I say unto you." You remember

that? Whenever you see things twice,

they don't have exclamation marks. They

don't have punctuation. That's how they

do it. So, right after that, he goes,

"He was in the beginning with God." This

is a this word is in deep intimacy

with God and he's God. Okay? So, already

these Jews and you got to remember they

weren't expecting this. You can imagine

John writing this just be blown away

about this revelation about who God is.

Then he gets into it. Now in the ancient

world, you have to understand he's

writing to a plethora of different

views. Okay? Some people there were gods

that made the moon. There were gods that

made the stars. There were gods that

made the oceans. You've heard all of

this. The lower gods, the bigger gods,

the but they all were connected to

making something, right? Mars was the

made the the moon the the the planet

Mars.

What does he say in light of that?

All things were made through him

and without him was not anything made

that was made. Notice he said it twice.

His point here for the listener and for

the Jesus is there is nothing on the

heavens or the earth, nothing in the

seen realm or the unseen realm that

Jesus Christ pre-incarnate word did not

create.

This is who we are dealing with.

So when Jesus says why are you worrying?

It's because he's saying if I've made

everything

and I'm in control of everything

then nothing is in control besides me or

what I let it. Do you see that

all things were made through him and

without him was not one thing made that

was made in him. Now we we're starting

at this in this word was Zoey

was abundant life. In the original

creation story when God Yahweh breathes

upon man he breathes psyche into him. He

breathes the natural life that we all

get at birth. This birth whatever this

life is Jesus is talking about is a

abundant life that's going to be

correlated with resurrection life.

In other words, Christians should have

life in them,

right? Presbyterians.

How many are asleep already?

In him was life. Mhm.

And the life was the light of men. Now

you're going to start seeing life and

dark light and darkness and death always

because what is the Genesis account?

Light and darkness. Now in that case the

darkness hovers over the deep. God comes

and commands it to be done and then dark

and night and it gets called good and

that's how he separates it. In this case

darkness

is the representation of all malevolent

forces both within you and outside.

everything that turns away from God. In

him was life and life was the light of

men. The light shines in the darkness

and then the good news is going to come.

Notice he doesn't deny darkness

but he says the light that darkness

cannot it's not has not cannot overcome

it.

And right there in those five verses, we

find out who God is, who this one is we

worship, who made everything, and is in

control of everything. Tonight, I give

you a homework assignment. Go out and

stare at the stars and think Jesus

Christ is in control of that.

So maybe you won't worry about your test

paper or whether your Wi-Fi goes down.

I don't know what we worry about

anymore.

Maybe we can have hope because the

darkness can't overcome it.

What a powerful first five verses. I'm

telling you, it is laid out for us. The

greatness of Jesus Christ.

Our problem, I would say, in the church

is our Jesus is too small.

I want to tell you that, you know, it's

the old um kumbaya Jesus. Do you know

what I'm talking about? Kumbaya, my

lord. Kumbaya.

Are we all happy? Are we happy? Oh,

that's good. I'm happy, too. Cuz little

Jesus is going to come in. He's going to

sit beside us and go, "I love you.

You're my sheep." Okay.

That is not the God of John.

It isn't. John's God is going to come in

and he's going to be booming stuff are

happening and he is exploding and he's

turning this he's turning water into

wine. Not a lot of

he turned water into wine. You never

hear that. You never hear songs about

that.

He's going to do things that are

unbelievable. He's going to raise the

dead. He's going to change stop storms.

He's going to come into the temple and

say, "Get out the everybody out of the

pool."

Our Jesus is just too functionally small

and he's too individualistic.

How many times do people say, "Oh, me

and Jesus.

I'm glad you have Jesus, but guess what?

He's way bigger than just you.

He's doing something so profound in this

world." And we want to get that in

John's gospel that this God is bigger

than even Trump.

I know you're shocked

or whoever else is big right now.

Yeah.

Our Jesus is too small because he chose

to come and be a slave. But do not ever

think that that is it. And because our

Jesus is the creator of the heavens and

earth, guess who wins in the end? End

revelation. Who wins?

>> Jesus.

>> Amen.

I'm preaching now, brother.

That first verse is what Barrett's

speaking of here. He says John intends

that the whole of his gospel be read in

the light of this verse. The deeds and

words of Jesus are the deeds and words

of God.

If this be not true, this book is

blasphemous.

I like John's gospel. People give it to

new believers and they're like, "Oh,

that'll be nice and soft." Have you read

John's gospel? It's crazy power.

Crazy stuff. And you're going to realize

how amazing it is. And this is the heart

of God, you guys. The one who made

everything. Let us allow ourselves to

see Jesus bigger than little meek and

mild Jesus. Little Mr. Rogers,

if you remember that guy.

Yeah, he's been dead for I got to find

new references.

And here's the problem. When we get into

our deconstruction, they're very sure

that they're going to be a threat to

Christianity. I assure they're not

deconstructing

into darkness. That's what happens. You

see, you you come in and you feel

uncomfortable because your cultural

norms make you uncomfortable with

Christianity. Well, we live in a world

where the sexual ethics right now are in

conflict with the culture with Christian

ethics, right? And that's and we are I

don't know if you've noticed this, we

have been worshiping sexuality like a

god for years since the 60s. And what's

happened is people have been told that

if you don't accept the cultural gods

view of sexuality or gender or any of

these other things, you are going to uh

you are I don't know whether they call

you fascist or or close-minded that

doesn't matter. And so people come into

their churches and maybe they know

somebody who struggles in that area and

they say well no this couldn't be right.

I feel uncomfortable. I'm going to

deconstruct my faith. And that's what

happens. They have an issue beforehand,

a Jesus of their culture sat in their

back pocket, and then they begin to

deconstruct. Now, I had a chance to sit

down and chat on a on a little podcast

with a lady about deconstruction. And I

realized she was very into it. About 10

minutes in, she didn't have a clue what

the Bible really said.

She understood the straw man of

fundamentalism.

She did not know. And what broke my

heart is I asked her after what has she

been done? Like where has this led her

to? And she said, "I'm lonely and I

don't have my church because I can't go

back because I am free theologically."

But what she made the greatest mistake

is she thought that her reason could

somehow

be better than God's revelation.

She made her reason God. But her reason

betrayed her because her reason was just

what the culture had told her. I wasn't

angry. I was saddened because here's

what I know. This God has given us this

so we might believe and have life. If

you have decided to search your life for

nonbelief and it leads to what?

Darkness and death.

>> Yeah.

Lesley Noob again, I mean, he's he I

love the way he talks and and he's got a

great commentary on this on on John's

gospel. He says, "The darkness cannot be

as such a subject for research. It is

simply darkness. It is what confronts

one who turns away from the true source

of his being. Tries to find its meaning

elsewhere and thereby plunges into

meaninglessness."

And I've seen that again

and again.

I've seen it when people stop coming to

church.

I'm going to tell you something. I

believe in church more than I ever used

to because as 25 years of a minister,

how many people I'm just going to go,

not come, not come. You know, their

faith will eventually go.

I've seen it again and again.

Now they say, these people, these

deconstructors, that they have liberated

themselves and now have found this new

way and it's going to destroy

Christianity. And you know what? I

laugh.

Voltater, the great 19th century

atheist, told us that he would himself

and two other philosophers disprove

Christianity and there will not be

churches in a hundred years. 100 years

later, they were making Bibles out of

the house he lived in.

True story.

There's one truth I'm going to tell you

is God is the word. He's the creator and

he is going to win

>> whenever the and I and I notice

Christians get anxious when this stuff

comes. I'm telling you, don't be

anxious. God is so much bigger than this

stuff.

And to quote the great GK Chesterton, if

one studies church history carefully,

there are about five different times

when it looks as if the church has gone

to the dogs, but that in the end, all

five, it was the dogs who died.

So, what about us? We know this

deconstruction stuff is out there and

you might hear about it. Well, for us,

it's to move away from that and to get

good belief. And let me stop and say one

thing. I have no trouble with people

deconstructing bad theology they grew up

with. Do you hear the difference?

It's okay to not accept everything

you've heard when you were a kid that

might not be right.

Prayerfully, but never lose the creator

in the process.

Never lose Jesus. I will sit and I can

talk to you about this. I have wrestled

with things in my own theological life,

but always with the heart for Jesus and

you'll be fine.

You see, because God has given us the

word for us.

Why did he give us this word?

Well, yes, so that he could save us.

Yep. And yes, so that uh he could reveal

himself. But here's the truth. He gave

us this word because without it, he saw

the kinds of gods we make.

I'm convinced the greatest gift he ever

did was give us his word and tell us who

he is and by becoming human, showing us.

Because have you ever seen the other

gods humans make?

They're evil.

They destroy

ideologies like communism and national

socialisms. All of these, these are all

religions, by the way.

They just destroy and kill and and if

you go back to paganism when this was

written, they h they were they it was

all about slavery and one or two people

being from God. And these gods they made

were vicious and misunderstanding and

judgmental and couldn't wait to kill

you.

And then this text comes in and I'm

telling you, he gave us the word as the

greatest gift to us.

He showed us who he really is so we

could start to become who we were really

meant to be.

There is no greater gift than God's

word.

Don Carson says, "In short, God's word

in the Old Testament is his powerful

self-expression

in creation, revelation, and salvation."

And the personification of that word

makes it suitable for John to apply it

as a title to God's ultimate

self-disclosure, the person of his son.

What we have got,

John tells us in Jesus

is the creator of the heaven and earth

right here

telling us things for us.

Never forget that.

And that's why scripture is so

important.

Scripture is not the word as you

understand it as it being the fourth

member of the quadrilateral. But don't

hear me out. Let me finish.

Jesus is the word.

But he's chosen to inspire those texts

and those texts are the word of Jesus

speaking to us.

The greatest gift we have are our

scriptures.

One truth I'm going to say that I

guarantee you can stop praying for a

while, you can do pretty good. You can

stop,

I don't know, whatever else doing Sunday

school teaching or doing your eldership.

But there's one thing I've noticed that

if somebody's going to walk with the

Lord that they need to do is they need

to get their head in the word.

They need to sit there and let it read

them. It's a living book.

Let it cut through to us. Let it convict

us and also encourage us. That's the

greatest gift. And John's telling us the

word has been given for us.

It is incredible. It's God in creation

knowing you better than you know

yourself, wanting to go down and into

your depth of your being, make you into

somebody you were meant to be.

That's why I get so frustrated with

preaching that is not biblically based.

I don't care about seven steps to a

happy marriage. I'm sure there's other

times you can do that. But if the pulpit

is about that and not about Jesus

Christ,

we've missed it.

We can't be here for entertainment. We

got to come in here to grow so we can be

the people of God and make decisions

together

that are lifegiving.

You know, God gave his word because he

wants us, he tells us to have Zoey,

abundant life. That's his goal is that

you have life abundantly. Think about

that.

Most people are like, "Well, if I'm good

enough,

God will like me."

and they're never good enough because

you know what? I'm just like you

because we go at it like religion, not

relationship.

And what this God has said, how many of

us really believe that right now God

wants to give us abundant life.

Life that transcends what we're

experiencing right now. That's what John

says. I didn't make this up. An abundant

life is not how much stuff you have.

I've met out too many rear very rich

people who did not have life

and I've met too many poor people who

had abundant life.

This is the beauty of this story. The

God of heaven and earth that made

everything including you

has come to give you abundant life.

And how does he do it? He does it by

coming into the darkness as the light.

coming into us and to our darkness as

light so that we're free to be who we're

called to be.

You know, when it says the light has not

overcome the darkness, as I meditated on

this this last past week, I think of the

darkness not just of events that happen

around you, but the darkness that's

here. You know what I'm talking about?

That thing that keep you fight all the

time. Do you know what I mean?

And sometimes it can feel overwhelming

like you might lose or just give up.

Have you ever felt that way?

And then that word hit me. The light

cannot be overcome.

You're not going to lose

cuz his light's inside you.

The darkness you see around, the light

does not get overtaken.

That's good news.

Now our world, there's a very depressed

world. We are the number one world

top ever of anti-depressants,

antiscychotics

sales in the richest country ever. And

this is US facts.

And there's a correlation, believe it or

not, between the use of those things as

it not everyone needs them once in a

while. I've been on them. I'm talking

about the constant need of it all the

time. There's a correlation between that

and the loss of church attendance.

There is

because we've been given a lie.

One of the de devil's greatest lies is

that the path to a fulfilling life is to

live for oneself.

And I can't tell you if have you been to

like a there's not these bookstores so

much, but I was in Chapters with Anne

over Christmas and it was the self-help

section. Have you seen this?

And there's thousands of books you can

get. You can get self-help for a

carpenter.

That was one of the books, a self-help

for a carpenter. I bet you that that

book nailed it. Anyways,

that's for you, Jason.

No, we got you know how we get the

abundant life by going into the word,

going into that life, pushing into that

and dying to self.

There's another thing too why we are

living such unhappy lives right now is

we're thinking we have to do this as

individuals.

In my opinion, there's never been a

stronger need for the church and to be

part of a church.

I need you and you need me because this

word only works when we're together.

Notice that word is expressed. It needs

a hearer.

It isn't just an individual. It doesn't

say he came as a thought,

came as a word.

The great Dietrich Bonhaofer, the

Christian needs another Christian who

speaks God's word to him. The Christ in

his own heart is weaker than the Christ

in the word of his brother.

I'm going to tell you, I've been

involved in this small group in our

church for

long time.

And the crazy thing is watching this

church grow and love each other. But

where it is strongest is we're studying

the word and I'm watching people talk to

each other about it and watching them

grow,

challenging them on to good things. That

is life.

And I'll tell you what, I can't imagine

not living it. Praying for each other.

The best thing I saw from this little

small group, and we have four or five

going on, and if you want to join,

you're welcome.

They're so close now that all of a

sudden out of the blue on their I'm on

their text chain. It said, "Let's go

caroling."

And a bunch of them just went out and

got their books and little kids with

them. I always bring little kids because

they can't yell at you. And

they went out and they carolled. And

then they came in and Jason was the band

was here. And he's got a video. Maybe

he'll put it on the web page for you.

And they came in and there they were

singing as they walked down into our

church. And I just saw community life in

the word. And I said, "That's abundant

life.

That's good.

In our world, we are going to have to

realize that the darkness is there. But

John's gospel is here and it's not going

to happen in the first sermon.

But he's going to lead us into how to

believe so that we can have

vibrant

abundant life.

And then we have God.

I'll end with St. Augustine,

he who has God has everything.

He who has everything, but God has

nothing.

This is an invitation

throughout John's gospel to come close.

The word has been proclaimed. God has

spoken and communicated. It's up to us

whether we'll listen.

Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, we thank you for your

amazing goodness to us that you are the

living word, the breathing word, that

you inspired your scriptures, that you

gave them to us as a gift.

We pray Lord

that whatever you do that we uh

that we listen and we act and we build

each other up and we die to self so you

are abundant life can live in us

in Jesus' name. Amen.

Okay, now we're doing