He Is

Hey, Cobblestone,

     I’m about to put a dangerous piece of information into your hands. Please handle it with utmost care, and use it for its intended purpose:

     Jesus, the Christ, is the Son of God.

     There are four Gospels in our Bibles, four accounts of the life and times of Jesus of Nazareth walking, talking, preaching, healing, loving – initiating his kingdom on earth. Three of them pose a question, “Who do you say I am?” (see Matthew 16:15, Mark 8:29, and Luke 9:20). Jesus himself asks the question. The fourth Gospel doesn’t even ask. It simply opens with a bold declaration:

    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 any thing made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men (John 1:1-4).

     This information is dangerous for three reasons. First, it can be used for nothing better than winning the argument. In evangelism, winning the argument is a dismal strategy. When we get to heaven, I think we’ll find out that it never resulted in anyone feeling bad enough to be saved. Jesus is always the smartest person in the room – no one else need aspire to the title. The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world (John 1:9).

     Second, it may not be put to the correct purpose. This reminds me of the plot from an old Western TV show I saw once. A bounty hunter and a scientist were trying to recover several cases of nitroglycerine that was being sold as tonic by a huckster who didn’t know what it was. People in the town were buying it as tonic, hoping to be relieved of what ailed them. The town was being blown to bits, and nobody felt better. John 1:10 speaks to this scenario: He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him.

     The third danger is of the good variety, as a medical laser is dangerous, but nothing else can do the job it does. Of all the baubles and trinkets that have been offered as a substitute for the gospel, nothing has come close. It is the ultimate weapon of spiritual warfare, and when it finds the intended target, the devil’s plans for damnation are obliterated. Why? Because Jesus, the Christ, is the Son of God. But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God (John 1:12-13). 

     Why would anyone trust in Jesus if he is not the Christ, the Messiah, the Anointed One, the only begotten Son of God, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world? Well, there would be no reason to, none at all. That’s why it’s important to settle the question. In three straight Gospels, Jesus has asked. What is your answer?

     And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth (John 1:14).

     Over the course of his lifetime, my dad memorized 1.5 verses of Scripture that stuck with him. Others would float in and out of his vernacular, but at any given moment he might quote half a verse from James – ye have not because ye ask not (4:2b) – or the opening verse of John’s Gospel: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Dad wasn’t overly concerned with millennialism or how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, but he owned one solid Bible statement on prayer and one on who Jesus is. If he needed to know anything else, he knew who to ask.

     All the verses I’ve shared from John in this letter come from what’s called the “prologue” – the warm-up for the rest of that Gospel. “Let’s get one thing straight” is the urgent message. Get that one thing straight, and then we’re ready for the mystery of the miracles, the horror of the crucifixion, the glory of the resurrection. Get that one thing straight, and we won’t worry so much whether the Calvinists or the Arminians are right. Neither the Calvinists nor the Arminians saved us. The only one who could save us saved us. His name is Jesus. He is the Son of God. He never fails.

  

Grace and Peace (and one thing straight),

 

John