Some Pretty Deep Stuff

Jeremiah 31:7-14; Ephesians 1:3-6, 15-18; John 1:1-18

The first chapter of the gospel of John is a Christmas story. Of course, most of us might not recognize it as such. After all, it doesn't start out with an announcement made to Mary that she would have a baby. It doesn't have anything in it about a dream that Joseph might have had. It doesn't have any information in it about a baby in the manger, or shepherds, or wise men, or rotten old King Herod, or Bethlehem, or innkeepers, or sheep, or donkeys, or Caesar Augustus.

Instead, what it does have is a fairly deep theological statement about the Word, which was not only with God at the beginning, but was God. And not only was this Word with God, but we are told that it was with this Word that everything that has ever existed was created. This Word was life, it was light, and this light and life stands in direct contrast to non-life and darkness. And in a direct reference to Jesus, and this is where Christmas comes in, John tells us that this Word became flesh and dwelt among us.

Now, I realize that these first verses of John are not written on as many Christmas cards as are verses from Matthew and Luke. And that's because Matthew and Luke's description of the event was laid out in more concrete, story-like, images. In Luke's version of the Christmas story, we get, for instance, information about shepherds being visited by angels telling them about the birth of the Savior. So, they all go to Bethlehem to find him, wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger, with Mary and Joseph taking it all in.

Indeed, this is the stuff that Christmas cards are made of. You can draw a picture of this. You can visualize it in your mind. On the other hand, it is much harder to visualize the first few verses of John. I mean, what does a Word look like, anyway? How can you describe something that was with God and yet God, at the same time? It's hard to put it onto a Christmas card. And maybe Luke and Matthew understood that and stuck with angels, shepherds, and a baby in a manger, instead.

But, still, I'm glad we have John's version of the Christmas story. For, John tells us what happened and leaves it up to us to imagine how such a thing could have happened, while Matthew and Luke tell us how it happened and then leave it up to us to imagine what it was all about. So, putting them all together, Matthew, Luke, and John tell us quite a bit about how and what happened when God's Word became flesh. Indeed, if we were left with only Matthew or Luke's versions without having the advantage of John's account to enlighten us concerning the philosophical and theological meaning, we would really only have half the information we need.

So, I, for one, take John's first few verses very seriously. I've studied them closely. I've translated them from the Greek. I've done word studies on the key words. For while Matthew and Luke tell us about a baby in a manger, John gives us information about who he was.

It is very important for us to read the Bible like this. All to often we approach the Bible and read too little of it. We may find a little passage that satisfies us, or bolsters our political position, or gives us an answer about some question we have. And, as soon as we do this, we close the Bible and go on our way, satisfied that God has spoken.

But I think that if we use the Bible like this, we really do ourselves a dis-service. For the Bible is meant to be read and studied in its entirety. Not just a little bit, here and there. And not just topically, either, to find out what the Bible says about this or that. Rather, we should read with the understanding that every passage of scripture in the Bible can be used by God to speak to us afresh through the power of the Holy Spirit. For God's Word is not just ink on paper. Rather, the Word is God revealing God's self to us.

And this, of course, requires something from us. It requires us to be more than simply passive participants. Rather, it requires us to be actively involved in the struggle that goes on whenever a meaningful communicative process takes place between two or more persons.

Take the typical teenager, for example. I can use this example, because as a parent of one I am some experience in the subject. For instance, when a parent tells a teenager to do something, like "Clean your bedroom!" any uninitiated neophyte (that is, a person not familiar with teenagerdom) would think that such a clear statement as that would be all that is necessary. I mean, how clear can something like "Clean your bedroom!" be? But, as every parent of a teenager knows, most teenagers may understand the statement in a variety of ways. They may think their parent has simply said, "Clean your bedroom, sometime! Maybe tomorrow. Maybe sometime within the next 30-60 days!" Or, the typical teenager might think "Clean your bedroom!" actually means, "I like clean bedrooms." Or, the typical teenager might think "Clean your bedroom!" means something more like, "Pick your dirty clothes up off the floor and dump them in the hallway. Never mind the pile of papers in the closet and the stuff under the bed, keeping the mattress from fitting the bed frame properly!"

And, so, it sometimes becomes necessary for the parent to clarify him or herself, a bit by saying, "Clean your room, now!" or "Take these five garbage bags into your room and put everything on your floor that weighs less than a pound into them."

Nevertheless, the struggle to communicate goes on. The teenager may then ask something like, "Why? Who's coming over?" And when the parent answers, "No one is coming over!" the teenager then gives you a puzzled, almost hurt look, and asks, "Well, then, why do I have to clean my room, now?" And then the parents has to really pull deep down into his or her bag of tricks in order to communicate. One of my best answers to questions like this is the one where I come off as a dictator, but it still gets results: "You are going to clean your room now, completely, thoroughly, immediately, and immaculately, because I say so! And if you don't like it you can forget about the T.V. and the telephone! So there!" Usually, by this time, total communication has been achieved. Not only does the teenager understand what is wanted, but also to what degree it is wanted, when it is wanted, who is to do it, and what will happen if it isn't done.

More often than not, our communication with God is like this. God's Word may certainly begin with scripture. But it doesn't always end there. For the process goes on after the pages of the Bible have closed -- through prayer, through life's experiences, through worship, through things which people say to us, through the teachings of the church, and through reason, itself. God speaks to us. God's Word continues to come into our life.

Take the story of Adam and Eve in the garden, for example: Aren't we like them? In fact, I believe that we are so much like them that we are them. And when God tells us not to eat of the fruit of a certain tree in the garden, don't we begin to wonder how serious God really is about it? We may try to rationalize all sorts of reasons why God may actually want us to eat of the fruit. And when we go ahead and give it a try, we may trivialize God's command, thinking to ourselves that God really didn't mean what he said. And then when God confronts us with our sin and we are punished, we may even accuse God of being unfair. And, so, the communicative process which goes on between ourselves and God is continuous. And it is a living process. For God's Word is as alive as God is.

But, the wonderful thing for us is that the Word of God was Jesus, himself. And although it is the Word which guides us in our lives. It is also this very Word which understands us, and became one of us, and even died for us. So, rather than being condemned by the Word when we sin, we are saved by the Word through our kinship with him, by faith.

Or, as John said, "For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ." Amen.