John 1:1-18 - This is Jesus: True God and True Man (The Prologue - Part 2)
Preached on May 20, 2007, by Eric Schumacher
Topics: Gospel Of John
(c) Eric M Schumacher - Preached May 20, 2007 at Northbrook Baptist Church, Cedar Rapids, Iowa
The Doctrine of the Incarnation
I want to spend our time this morning meditating on the first five words of verse 14. In this passage, John introduces us to what systematic theologians call "the doctrine of the incarnation." As Wayne Grudem summarizes it, "The incarnation was the act of God the Son whereby he took to himself a human nature." [1] We sometimes refer to is as "God becoming a man." What we see in this verse is that the Eternal Second Person of the Trinity (the Word) gained a full and genuine humanity. We therefore affirm that Jesus Christ is fully God and fully Man, in one person, simultaneously.
1) Jesus Christ is fully God.
Last week, we learned that "the Word" is John's title for the eternal, second person of the Trinity, the uncreated Creator and the Life-giving Light.
We learned that the Word...
· is eternal.
· was with God.
· was God.
· was the agent of Creation.
We affirm that Jesus is fully God. This has been explicitly stated in the Prologue. It will be confirmed in the rest of the Gospel as Jesus displays attributes of God (1:48; 2:24-25; 16:30; 21:17), claims to be God (10:30; 12:45; 14:9; 8:57-59; 17:5), and accepts worship as God (20:28).
We deny the heresies of:
Modalism. Modalism is the view which claims that the One God eternally exists as one person (and not three) who manifests himself in three difference modes. This view would state that God reveals himself as Father in the Old Testament, as Son in the Gospels, and as Spirit in the church after Pentecost. Therefore, there is no such person as "the eternal, second person of the Trinity." Rather, there is only one person, who manifests himself in three different ways.
Support for this view is claimed from verses in John's Gospel, such as where Jesus says "I and the Father are one" (10:30) and "Whoever has seen me has seen the Father" (14:9). They claim that these verses show that the One God is one person, not three.
However, modalism must deny the clear picture that the Gospel paints of the Godhead existing in multiple persons simultaneously (for example, see John 16:7, 10, 17).
In our immediate context, modalism must deny the plain teaching of John 1. In verse 1, we have seen that while the Word was God, the Word was "with God." And in verse 18, John refers to the only Son as God and yet being "in the Father's bosom." The Prologue is opened and closed by careful and clear statements of Jesus Christ the Word being God himself, yet a distinct person from God the Father.
Is Modalism something that you should be concerned about? Yes! Less that one-hundred years ago, in 1917, the Assemblies of God adopted a statement of faith with a clear statement on the Trinity, a statement which ministers were required to adhere to. A group of modalists was forced out and formed the United Pentecostal Church, which sometimes uses the slogan "Jesus only," insisting that people should be baptized in the name of Jesus alone, not using a Trinitarian formula. [2]
Modalism is alive and well today. I was recently on the website of one popular preacher and author whose statement of faith affimed the "three manifestations of God: Father, Son and Spirit." Note the careful wording--three "manifestations," not three "persons." He denies that God eternally exists as three persons. The God of modalism is not the God of the Bible. Modalism therefore is not biblical Christianity.
Unintentional modalists can often be found in our own homes and churches. One practical way this should help us is in the simple matter of clarity in prayer and in speaking about God. In our prayers, it can be easy to drift back and forth "Father" and "Son" in the language we use to address God. In fact, I have heard people pray, "Father, thank you for coming and dying on the cross for our sins." The Father did not die on the cross. The Son did. A religion in which the Father dies on the cross is a different religion. A gospel in which the Father dies on the cross is a different Gospel than the one preached by the Apostles and recorded in the Bible.
It is not enough to say, "Oh well...the Father is God, the Son is God, the Spirit is God. It doesn't matter if I get their titles confused." God has graciously and precisely revealed himself as One God who eternally and simultaneously exists in three persons. It is not honoring to God to be haphazard in the way we speak to and about him. And, it does not help our children to know and love God as he is when we are careless with our language about God.
Arianism. It is worth noting that the earliest heresies faced by the church had to do with the person of Christ--specifically with how his divinity and his humanity relate. From the very beginning, Satan has sought to confuse the church (and the world) about who Jesus Christ was and is.
John likely wrote his Gospel somewhere between the years 70 and 90 A.D. In the early fourth century, only about 230-250 years later, Arius, a Bishop of Alexandria, began to teach that the Son was created by the Father. In fact, it is said that the children in Alexandria would sing in the streets "There once was when He was not."
Arius taught that the Son was the first heavenly being created and is greater than all of creation. Nevertheless, he is not equal with the Father. While the Son is like the Father in some ways, he is not "of the same nature" as the Father.
Arians--those who follow Arius' teaching--depend upon verses such as John 1:14 to support their claims. In this verse, Jesus is referred to as "the only begotten of the Father." They take this to mean that Jesus was at one point created by the Father.
We'll see next week why this verse does not teach what Arius said it does. But, for now I would point you to verse 18, in which John writes, "No one has ever seen God; the only begotten, God, who is at the Father's side, he has made him known." The greek is constructed so as to emphasize that "the only begotten" is "God" himself, in his own right.
The church was so disturbed by Arius' teaching that a Council of church leaders was called to meet in Nicea in 325. They condemned Arius' teaching in a statement (revised at Constantinople in 381), which has become known as the Nicene Creed. It states:
We believe...in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten of Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds, God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father; by whom all things were made; who, for us men and for our salvation, came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary, and was made man...
They affirmed that Jesus was "begotten, not made." That is they affirmed that Jesus was not created by the Father, but is of the same essence as the Father.
Is Arianism a problem today? Arians knock on your door, peddling their heresy under the name of Jehovah's Witnesses, who believe that "Jesus was created by God as the beginning of God's invisible creations."
Jesus' divinity is important to affirm. If Jesus is not fully God, then we should not worship or pray to him as such. Likewise, we should not credit him, someone less than God, with our salvation.
2) Jesus Christ is fully man.
While we affirm that Jesus is fully God, we affirm that he is also fully human.
Verse 14 is perhaps the most shocking statement in the Prologue, if not in the Bible. John very plainly and crudely states, "The Word became flesh."
John uses shocking and straight-forward language. He does not say, "The Word became a man," though this is certainly true. He says, "The Word became flesh," emphasizing "flesh"--a body made of material stuff.
What does it mean that "the Word became flesh"? In his commentary, Herman Ridderbos explains "flesh" as "all of the human person in creaturely existence as distinct from God." In other words, whatever it is that makes us human persons as creatures distinct from God--that is what the Word became without sin. In other words, the Word (the Eternal, Uncreated Creator, the Life-Giving Light and Second Person of the Trinity) gained a full and genuine humanity.
Jesus is fully man. Like his divinity, Jesus' humanity will also be emphasized in John's Gospel. [3]
Jesus has a human mother. While John does not speak of the miraculous conception and virgin birth, he will refer to the "mother of Jesus" (John 2:3), recognizing that he had a human mother (and therefore a physical, human birth).
Jesus had a human body. His body displayed the weaknesses and limitations of a human body. In John 4:6, we read that "Jesus, wearied as he was from his journey, was sitting beside the well." As Jesus hung on the cross, he said, "I thirst" (19:28). After the resurrection, Jesus invited Thomas to touch his hands and side (20:27). We could multiply these examples with references from the other Gospels. (And, I should add that Jesus continues to possess his human body, and his full human nature, and will for eternity!)
Jesus had a human soul and human emotions. As the hour of his death approached, Jesus would say in John 12:27, "Now is my soul troubled." In 13:21, John tells us, "Jesus was troubled in spirit." When Lazarus died, we read, "Jesus wept" (11:35).
Jesus was seen by people as only a man. In John 6:42, the Jews ask, "Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How does he now say, 'I have come down from heaven'?" We are told in 7:5 that "not even his brothers believed in him." (So, it is not as if a halo or divine, supernatural light shone from him as he walked around.)
Fully God & Fully Man in One Person
To summarize: We can (and must) affirm that in the One Person Jesus is full divinity and fully humanity. The divinity of Jesus does not in any way diminish the humanity of Jesus. Likewise, the humanity of Jesus does not diminish the divinity of Jesus.
Thus, we deny the heresies of:
Gnosticism. Gnosticism was an early heresy that afflicted the church. Gnosticism taught that having "knowledge" was essential to salvation, and that such knowledge belonged to those who were indwelt with a spark of the divine. One of its central beliefs was that matter was opposed to spirit. They believed that matter was evil and therefore against the spirit.
In this statement, "the Word became flesh," John is putting a clear end to any idea that matter and spirit are opposed to each other. God created matter. He created good. It is under a curse due to sin, yet God will redeem Creation and make it new.
Is Gnosticism a problem today? Absolutely! Many "New Age" philosophies can be modern appearances of Gnosticism. A pseudo-Gnosticism exists when we neglect the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead or the physicality of the new world to come--as though the physical redemption of the cosmos is less important.
Apollinarianism--the view that Christ was one person with a human body and a divine spirit (half-human and half-God). Apollinarius became the bishop of Laodicea in 361. He taught that Jesus was only one person, yet half-God and half-man. Jesus had a human body. However, his spirit and mind were of a divine nature. His views were rejected by several church councils. The realized what Hebrew 2:17 teaches--Jesus must be like us in every respect if he is to be our great High Priest.
Nestorianism--the view that Jesus was two persons in one body--a human person and a divine person. This view is wrong because we never read of Jesus being referred to as two person, only as one--"he" and not "they." Neither do we read of Jesus' "human nature" doing this and his "divine nature" doing that. In our passage this morning, we do not read of Jesus gaining another person, a human one. Rather, we read that the one divine person, The Word, becoming flesh--gaining a real, human nature.
Monophysitism--the view that Jesus has only one nature. Eutyches, a leader of a monastery in the 5th century) taught that Jesus' human nature and his divine nature mixed together to form a third nature, such as when a drop of ink is placed in a glass of water, the resulting mixture is neither water nor ink. Likewise, Jesus is neither God nor man--he is something else.
Our passage this morning--and the other passages referred to above--demonstrate that Jesus is the Eternally God and keeps his divinity when he becomes human and is fully human. If his full humanity is denied or diminished, then he cannot be our substitute on the cross. If his full divinity is denied or diminished, then he can neither be God and earn our salvation nor worshipped and prayed to as God.
These last three heresies were all condemned in 451 at a church council in Chalcedon (near modern day Istanbul). They affirmed in a short statement what the Scriptures teach:
We, then, following the holy Fathers, all with one consent, teach men to confess one and the same Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, the same perfect in Godhead and also perfect in manhood; truly God and truly man... [4]
So, we--along with orthodox Christians throughout the centuries--affirm that the Scripture teach that Jesus is fully (100%) God and fully (100%) man.
Why is it important to get this right?
Is all this just theological "head knowledge" that is otherwise unimportant to our spiritual lives? Can it really be that important? Why does it matter?
To answer those questions, we will spend next Sunday morning why "the Word became flesh" is an essential aspect of the storyline of the Bible. I want to show how this--the Incarnation--is a major event in the history of redemption.
For now, I want to emphasize what John emphasizes. The "Word became flesh" is an essential aspect of the Christian faith. To deny the humanity of Jesus Christ is to deny the Gospel--the only Gospel through which we can be saved.
John emphasizes the importance of what he teaches in this verse in his letters to the church. In 1 John 4:2-3, John tells the church that they can distinguish between the Spirit of God and the spirit of the antichrist, based on what a teacher says about Christ's humanity:
By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already.
Even more startling, John states that the one who denies the Incarnation is the antichrist:
2 John 1:7 For many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not confess the coming of Jesus Christ in the flesh. Such a one is the deceiver and the antichrist.
You see, Satan hates the humanity of Christ every bit as much as he hates the deity of Christ. When we speak of Christ as fully God, we remind Satan that Jesus Christ is the very God who he rebelled against and hates. When we speak of Christ as fully man, we remind Satan that Jesus is the seed of woman promised in Genesis 3 who will crush his head. We remind Satan that Jesus, the Son of God and Son of Man, defeated him in the cross and will come again to destroy him forever.
If we would be saved, we must believe and remain in the truth. Therefore, the most practical and the most important skill that you can develop as a Christian is doctrinal discernment--the ability to recognize truth and error. That is why it is important to study a little phrase of Scripture so closely. That is why it is important to study the heresy and orthodoxy of church history--so that we can learn from the past to avoid its errors and stand on its victories.
The Incarnation and the Lord's Supper
I think that it is quite appropriate to meditate on the Incarnation on a morning in which we celebrate the Lord's Supper.
At the end of this section in John, he writes, "No one has ever seen God." There are at least two reasons in Scripture for why man cannot see God. First, God is spirit (John 4:24). Second, man is sinful. Sinners cannot see God and live (Isa 6:5; Gen 32:30; Judges 6:22).
The incarnation solves both these dilemmas. The God who is spirit "became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory." Therefore, the God who is spirit can been seen in the Incarnate Word. The glory of God that is revealed, we shall see is revealed in the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ. Therefore, the second problem--our sin--is solved in verse 29 when John announces, "Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world."
We can see God, not only because the Eternal Word became flesh, but because the Eternal Word became the Lamb who would be slain on the cross as a substitutionary sacrifice for our sins. Those who are born of God and believe in Him are given the right to become the children of God. Through the work of the Son of Man, they have their sins removed, paid for and forgiven.
When you hold and eat and drink these elements--the bread and the cup--feel them. Taste them. They are real. They are physical. Let that remind you that the Eternal Word became flesh.
And, remember what this meals points to--the death of Jesus Christ on the cross. Remember that his physical, real, human flesh and blood were broken and poured out for the forgiveness of your sins.
Those who see the Son through the eyes of faith have truly seen the Father. Through the work of the Incarnation, we can see the glory of God.
[1] I owe much in this sermon, especially on the history of Christological heresies, to Grudem's Systematic Theology.
[2] See footnote 23 in chapter 14 of Grudem.
[3] Again, see Grudem for many, though not all, of these proofs.
[4] For the full statement, see Philip Schaff, Creeds of Christendom, 2:62-63.