John 1:1-18

Burn Your Plastic Jesus

A recent book by author Dan Kimball well explains the popular view of Christianity in Western culture. Kimball writes that “They Like Jesus, but not the Church.” It’s an interesting statement that when developed indicates that while the church’s popularity is declining among the culture, Jesus is a quite an admirable character. In fact historian Stephen J. Nichols has written that Jesus is as American as baseball and apple pie. But the Jesus we find in our culture is not necessarily the one we find in Scripture. Jesus has taken on a different image in our culture. We see Jesus the Homeboy, Jesus the flower child, Jesus the humanitarian…or, as Johnny Cash once said, “Jesus the greatest cowboy that ever was.” What we don’t see as very popular, however, is Jesus the Son of God and savior of sinners. But this is the Jesus whom the apostle John is interested in communicating.

John, after all, was a personal friend of Jesus and knew him well. He had spent years with him and in the opening of his book he aims to introduce us all to the glorious person of Jesus. He starts, in verse 1 with a phrase that would have been very familiar to his readers: In the beginning…It takess us back to Genesis and the creation of the world, where “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” Verse 1-3 indicate that this same Jesus, whom John is introducing us to, was present at the creation of the world and he was present because this Jesus is God himself! Jesus was “The Word,” which would have meant a great deal to both Jews and Greeks. To the Jew it was a testimony to God’s creative power – God spoke and things came into existence, the prophets declared, throughout the Old Testament history, with great authority what the Word of the Lord was, and each Jew knew the power that God’s word carried. Jesus, John says, is that power. To the Greek “Logos” (the Greek term translated as “word) mean “logic,” for many Greeks this was the unifying theme of all of life. Heraclitus taught that the “Word” was the most powerful force in the world. John writes to the Greeks saying this force is Jesus!

What we have here in just these simple verses is a proclamation of the divinity of Jesus. You see despite that everyone likes Jesus, what they like is not the true Jesus of Scripture. They like those simple little bobble head Jesus figures you can buy at novelty stores. The type that are sweet and pleasant to look at. The kind of Jesus who, if you touch his head ever so slightly, will nod in agreement with whatever you are doing. But John confronts that idolatry in our hearts when he announces that Jesus is very God of very God.

He continues, then, to show the gloriousness of this Christ by saying that He came into the world. God raised up a man named John the Baptist to prepare the way for the coming of the Messiah, one for whom the Jews had been waiting centuries. John the Baptist declares that this “true light, which enlightens everyone” was coming into the world! This is a profound statement that must not be overlooked! For centuries people had interacted with their gods through ritual, fear, and with trepidation. Even the Jews knew that they could not approach the true God in a casual manner. Their sin had made a separation between them and God, so that for a sinful man to come before a holy God would result in their destruction. But here is the very holy and just God, creator of the universe, entering His sinful creation to bring light to the darkness. This is a miraculous reality. God enters the world and displays His glory and His grace before us. This Jesus comes “full of grace and truth” revealing God to us (v. 18).

What’s important for us to see in this opening prologue, as it is called, is that John would have us love and cling to the truly glorious Jesus. The bobble head Jesus might be comforting when we are in the midst of sin, he might make us feel okay with our failures…but when we need a savior all he can do is nod. His glory is puny and weak, and his beauty is fleeting. But the truly glorious Christ, the creator of the universe has entered our world to display His glory, a glory we see most visibly in the Son of God’s death and resurrection! Trust in this Christ, and no other!