12/22/19 John 1:1-14 “A Peasant King”

20 Dec 12/22/19 John 1:1-14 “A Peasant King”

12/22/19    John 1:1-14         “A Peasant King”

It’s now just a few days before Christmas.  I would like to thank all of you who tune into this every week.  It’s always my pleasure to do this.  I’m going to keep doing this until I find out  what Jesus has next for me.  I hope that everyone is just about done with any shopping you have to do.  Sharon and I have a little rule where no matter what we buy in the last two months before Christmas, we wrap it up and put it under the tree.  We have gotten some pretty far out presents from each other.  It’s all part of the fun at our house.  We also try to celebrate Christmas Eve at Zion, the country church where we used to serve.  There is just something about that service that just grabs us.  Anyway, Merry Christmas!

Years ago, and some of you will remember this, you could go to a bank, car dealer or implement dealer and make a deal to buy something.  It might be a car or it might be a tractor.  You would shake hands and the deal was done.  Our word was good enough to make the deal.  Today, you can hardly buy a toaster and you have to fill out all kinds of paperwork.  It seems that no matter what we do, we have to sign this or sign that.  It is as if our word isn’t good anymore.  In law, giving your word can be is as good as a signature.  In today’s Scripture we have John talking about the Word.  This Word is good for all of us and we need to take it on faith.  Let’s take a look at this passage and find out why it is one of the best known series of verses in the Bible.  In the process we will find out who the Word is and how great is the Word.

Rodney Buchanan tells of a Korean artist named Elder Rhee who made a very distinct and unique piece of art.  He used a very fine point pen and wrote the words of the entire New Testament on a scroll.  The original scroll was 6’x4’ and there were about 1000 words per line.  It took him 2 years to finish the work.  He had shaded the letters so that some were thick and some were thin.  When we got done, it looked like a portrait of Jesus with 27 angels surrounding Him representing the 27 books of the New Testament.  It was truly beautiful.

The figure of Christ was not imposed onto the words, but rather the words revealed the picture of Christ as they were inked, light and dark, to bring out the portrait of Jesus.  The words became flesh, a person.  If you took a magnifying glass to this, you could actually read the words.  The message that the artist was trying to get across was that the New Testament reveals one thing and that is the person of Jesus Christ.  Out of these words arises the Word, Jesus Christ, and the Word became flesh.  E. Stanley Jones puts it this way, “Out of the Gospels arises the Gospel.  Jesus is the Gospel, the Gospel lies in His Person.  He did not come to bring the Good News, He was the Good News.”  And this is the Good News for all of us.

John begins his gospel with his own version of the Christmas story.  Instead of starting with the birth of Jesus, he goes back to the beginning of time.  “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”  He doesn’t even tell us that Jesus is the Word is until verse 14.

As we can see John wrote his gospel a little different from the other three.  This is probably because he wrote it much later.  Mark begins as he writes in about 70 AD.  Then Matthew and Luke write a few years later and finally we have John writing in about 90 AD or so.  John has read the other writers so he decides to write his Gospel a little differently.  He was also writing to a different audience.  By the time that John writes, there was tremendous persecution from both the Romans and the Jews.  So John wants to tell the story of Jesus, the story of hope to everyone.

Therefore he begins by calling Jesus the Word.  Actually the word is Logos.  The Jews would recognize this instantly because this is another name they have for God which comes from the Old Testament.  The Greeks also would know this word as the underlying good life force in all things.  So in the first two verses John captures the attention of many of his readers.  And he does this in a positive way.

We can learn a huge lesson from these first lines.  We will never get the positive attention of non-believers by making fun of them or belittling their religion.  We will never win anyone over by telling them that it is senseless to worship an idol.  We won’t be able to convert Muslims or Buddhists unless we first respect them.  I will never get to first base if I drive out to visit one of your neighbors who is an atheist and belittle him for not believing in anything.

It doesn’t work that way.  We have to be able to respect others and their beliefs.  I am not saying that we have to agree with them, but we do have to respect them.  This takes a strong belief on our part.  This is not for the weak.  One of the beautiful characteristics of the Christian faith is that it will stand alone.  It doesn’t need anything that we can do.  God will do it all.  Once we realize some of the do’s and don’ts of our beliefs and we start to let ourselves go and let God take over, then the people will come running to Christ.  We see this happen in China and many other third world places.  John begins by is telling us to be gentle.

He is also telling us the Jesus was there in the beginning and He made the world and that nothing was made without Him.  He made life for us and became the light for us.

John tells us how the light, who is Jesus, shines in the darkness but the darkness doesn’t understand.  When John talks about light, he is talking about the goodness of Jesus Christ.  When he talks of the darkness, he is talking about evil.

Right away, John is setting the ground work for his gospel and for history.  He will show us the darkness as we read on in his writings.  And we only have to look around ourselves to see it.  It has become so dark in our world today that it is hard to see any light at all.  The darkness won’t let us have Christmas programs, or prayer in school or show any type of public religion.  The darkness runs our entertainment business even though it has been shown that movies and programs that have some light make far more money.  Darkness runs our government as we can see by all the corruption scandals, all the payoffs, this phony impeachment and all the rich Senators and Representatives.  The darkness tries to tell us that everyone will get to heaven because we have this loving God who won’t let anyone go to hell.

Well John gives us a news flash here.  The darkness doesn’t understand.  They don’t know what they are talking about.  It is up to us to stick to our guns or, in this case, to Jesus Christ.  It is hard for us believers to understand that those who don’t know Jesus cannot make heads or tails out of the Scripture.  It doesn’t make any sense to them so they will try to shoot holes in it all the time.  It isn’t until we know Jesus on a personal level, that these Scriptures are revealed to us.  It is then and only then that the Bible begins to speak to us.

We are going to skip down to verses 10-11.  I think that these are two of the saddest verses in the Bible.  If you have ever wondered why Jesus wept when Lazarus died or why did He weep when He entered Jerusalem, here is the answer.  “He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him.  He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.”  God was rejected by his own people.

In the Old Testament, He was rejected and rejected and rejected.  The same is true in the New Testament.  Even at the birth of Jesus, He was rejected.  There was no room at the inn.  We even threw out a little baby to be born in a barn.  Herod tried to kill the baby so they had to flee.  He was rejected.  Just about everything He did was or is being rejected.  When it came time for Jesus to be crucified, no one remembered all the people He healed.  No one remembered all the mouths He fed.  He was rejected.  And John tells us right away, that this will happen.

We really don’t have to look very far to see the rejection today.  Everyone wants to have some sort of proof before they will believe.  The darkness wants proof.  This Bible is not good enough for them.  Eye witnesses aren’t good enough for them.  There is plenty of proof available to them but they still will not believe.  I have just one thing to say to these people.  Every man and woman in the world will believe in Jesus Christ when they are standing in front of Him on Judgment Day.  Everyone will believe and may God have mercy on you if you are too late.

There is really no excuse for people not to believe.  In this country there are lots of churches so you can go to the one where you feel most comfortable.  We have religious networks on TV that will help us.  We have many radio programs that will give us the Good News.  But the biggest thing we have going for us today is you.  You are the messengers of God.  Many times, without you even knowing, you are spreading the word of Christ.  There will be no excuse for anyone in the civilized world not to be a Christian.

But John will not leave us here.  John was the writer who continually showed us the truth and grace of God.  In all of John’s writings he shows Jesus presenting the truth, followed by grace.  Jesus told the people then and tells us today the truth about ourselves.  He will tell us where we have sinned and what we have done wrong.  He will not pull any punches.  He will tell is like it is.  So if you are stealing, or if you are looking at someone else’s spouse, or if you covet what your neighbor has, Jesus will tell you it is wrong.  But He will not leave it there.  He will also extend to you His grace.  He will not leave you in a bad place.  If you stay in a bad place, then it has been your decision.  But Jesus will do all that He can to get you to join with Him.  He loves you that much.  He doesn’t want anyone in the world left behind.  He will help you.

John is telling us that we can become children of God by receiving him.  You can be born of God.  This is your decision to make.  If you make the right one, you can join hands with Jesus.  You can hear His word.  You can rejoice in the midst of strife.  You can be loved like you have never been loved before.

But this love is easy for us to forget.  In this area we have had a tough fall getting the harvest gathered.  We have had a tough fall as the government has all but fallen.  We have had a tough fall as Satan finds more and more ways to attack us.  We get caught up in the things of this world and we forget the love that Jesus has for us.  We forget that he will not leave us.  We forget that we will not get more than we can bear.  No matter what happens to you, Jesus will always be there.  He loves you and will not leave you.

He loves us so much that in verse 14 we see, “The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us.”  God’s plan from the beginning was that he would send himself in the form of Jesus to live with us and die for us.  This is a love that we find hard to understand.

Soren Kierkegaard tells the story of a prince who was running an errand for his father one day in the local village.  As he did so he passed through a very poor section of town.  There, from his carriage window, he saw a beautiful peasant girl walking along the street.  He was smitten and couldn’t get her off his mind.  He returned day after day, just to catch a glimpse of her.  He wanted to start a relationship with her but didn’t know how.  He could order her to marry him as he had the power to do so.  But he wanted the girl to love him from her heart and willingly.  He could impress her with all his riches but then he would never be certain whether she loved him or the wealth he could bring.  Finally he came up with another solution.  He decided to give up all his riches and robes and power and he came to live in the village as a peasant himself.  He lived among the people, dressed like them, shared their interests, shared their concerns and talked their language.  In time the peasant girl came to know him and eventually love him.  This prince gave up all he had to love a poor peasant girl.

Jesus Christ did the same thing for us.  Jesus is the King of kings and Lord of lords.  Jesus is God.  He had things that are beyond our imagination.  He had everything.  And yet, because of this tremendous love that he has for us, he gave all of it up to join us peasants.  He walked with us, he talked with us, he ate with us and He died for us.  If you don’t have Jesus in your heart today, then ask Him.  Confess, repent and ask Jesus to live in your heart.  It will only be then that you will get this wondrous love that Jesus has for you as He pours it out to you and over you.

This is the beginning of John’s Gospel.  This is John’s Christmas story.  We have a God who loves us so much that He came to us in the form of a tiny baby, a tiny precious baby.  Jesus is the Word and He is with us and let Him be a part of us.  It is a wonder that someone who is this powerful, this strong would love us so much that He would be willing to be a part of us, us peasants.  We don’t deserve it but thank you Jesus for first loving us.  And Merry Christmas.  Let’s pray.