Rev. Rob Jones
January 4, 2026
John 1:1–18
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being 4 in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overtake it. 6 There was a man sent from God whose name was John. 7 He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. 8 He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light. 9 The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. 10 He was in the world, and the world came into being through him, yet the world did not know him. 11 He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. 12 But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, 13 who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God. 14 And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth. 15 (John testified to him and cried out, “This was he of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me ranks ahead of me because he was before me.’”) 16 From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. 17 The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. 18 No one has ever seen God. It is the only Son, himself God, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known.
Introduction
The Gospel of John is one of the most hopeful of the gospels. The first chapter has always spoken to me. Scholars will say it declares Christ's divinity, His eternal existence, and His mission in the world. They would also say from a Reformed perspective that this passage reveals the glory of the triune God, the necessity of divine revelation, and the grace found in Jesus Christ.
I recall the terror I felt while translating it from Greek into English in seminary. Working with a group in my cohort, trying to capture John's theology was an interesting feat of verbal gymnastics. Lexicons, Grammars, and the Greek New Testament lay out, wondering how I got myself into this situation. Then it hits me like a stack of books that is stacked too high for anyone’s own good… As we translated the Greek into English, repeatedly trying to capture the essence of John’s account, I realized that John is also translating. He is translating Genesis through a Christological lens.
John is not inventing a new story or writing some epic poetry at the start of his Gospel; he is intentionally reinterpreting, or rather re-examining, Genesis. He realizes what most Bible teachers will explain on day one: Genesis begins with “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth,” and then immediately shows us a God who creates by speaking: “And God said…” Repeatedly, creation is portrayed as happening through the power of God’s spoken word.
John takes us behind those words to their eternal source. When he says, “All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being,” he is claiming that Christ, the eternal Word, is the progenitor and agent of every spoken word of God in Genesis. Every “Let there be…” in Genesis is grounded in the eternal “Word” who is with God and who is God. The voice we hear in Genesis 1 is the voice of the Son—the same Christ who would later take on flesh and dwell among us. This means that Christ is not merely present at creation; He is the One through whom creation came to be. Christ, who becomes Jesus in the flesh, is the living, active Word by whom the Father’s will is expressed and accomplished.
My favorite line is verse five. John is a poet here because he states that the light that first shattered the darkness at God’s command came through Christ. In translating this in seminary, my colleagues and I rendered John 1:5 as, “The light devastated the darkness, and the darkness could not comprehend the light” (a translation closer to the Greek than “the darkness could not overtake it”). The idea is that the darkness cannot grasp, fathom, or truly understand the light—much like a two-dimensional being trying to comprehend three dimensions. It was Christ who established the order that emerged out of chaos. Every realm, every creature, every star flung into space bears witness to His power and authority.
So, when we confess that “all things were made through Him,” we are affirming that the baby in the manger is the very Author of creation, the divine Word who spoke the cosmos into existence. Likewise, if we confess that “all things were made through Him,” we must also confess that the evil of this world does not expose a weak Creator but a wicked creation. In our sin, we have vandalized what Christ made very good. (Genesis 1:31)
Yet in sovereign wisdom, God has not abandoned us. The eternal Word who spoke the planets and stars into being entered this fallen world in flesh, to bear its curse, to conquer sin and death, and to renew all things. At Christmas, we do not worship a sentimental baby; we bow before the crucified and risen Creator, who even now upholds this broken world. Rest assured that, in His time, God will bring it from groaning to glory.
Our worship, then, must not be casual or sentimental. We approach Jesus Christ with certainty and conviction, bowing before the One through whom God has always acted and spoken. This is the Good News: The Christ of Christmas is the eternal Word of Genesis—the Creator, Sustainer, and Lord of all.
Building on the metaphor of Jesus Christ as the source of all life and as uncreated, incomprehensible Light, Christ reveals the sin and emptiness of the world while simultaneously giving life to those who seek his grace. The light of Christ is not merely moral instruction or inspiration, but the very self-revelation of God. It breaks into the blindness of human hearts that are deadened by sin. To paraphrase John, “The darkness may resist and reject this light, but it can never extinguish it.” It is this truth that calls us to live in the light of Christ.
In the light of Christ, we reject sin, unbelief, and despair. We walk confidently in His light, which worldly powers cannot overcome. Living in His light means trusting God’s finished work, submitting to God’s Word, and resting in God’s grace, as our hope and righteousness. The hope that John gives in his gospel is powerful.
John, the Gospel writer, notes that John the Baptist was a divinely appointed herald whose task was to point away from himself to Christ alone. And just like John the Baptist’s ministry, we too are called to bear witness to the Light. Like John the Baptist, we are called to faithfully and humbly direct all glory to Christ, proclaiming Him boldly to a world still in darkness. Trusting that faith comes through hearing the Word, we speak the truth in love, confident that the same incomprehensible Light who once said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” is still shining in human hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
Illustration about the Word -
John is not writing his gospel with rose-tinted glasses. He tells us that Christ is the very One through whom the world was made, the world did not know Him, and even His own people did not receive Him. This sober truth confronts us with the depth of human depravity and self-centeredness. But God is good, and God gives grace.
It is indeed in the midst of this rejection that there is a glorious promise: to all who come to know Him and believe in His name, He gives the right to become children of God. Here, “adoption” must not be read through modern assumptions, as if we were merely “like” or “as” His children, or simply bonus, additional, or even specially chosen children. In the first-century Hebrew-Greek setting, adoption meant full and permanent inclusion in the family—treated as truly belonging, even blood-related, with the same status and inheritance as natural-born children. When Joseph took Mary as his wife and Jesus as his son, Jesus was forever the son of Joseph. Likewise, when John says we are “children of God,” he is making a strong, literal claim. The language of “like” or “as” in some renderings is a technical mistranslation that weakens his point. When you are received as an adopted child of God, you are once and for all time God’s child, brother or sister to Christ, and heir to all that His title carries. There is hope in the chaos, there is hope in the Word.
This adoption is not a human achievement, nor is it grounded in natural descent, human effort, or the will of the flesh. It is the gracious work of God alone—regeneration and new birth by His sovereign will. Therefore, we rest in God’s sovereign grace, rejoicing that our salvation is initiated, sustained, and accomplished by Him. We live as His beloved children in humility, assurance, gratitude, and obedience.
In John 1:14–18, he shows us the wonder of the Incarnation: the eternal Word became flesh and dwelt among us. In the fullness of time, according to the eternal counsel of God, Christ—fully God and fully human—took on flesh and lived among His people, revealing the very image and glory of God in grace and truth.
This made the suffering of the cross, rejection, and crucifixion even more tragic because they were not mere historical accidents but the divinely appointed means by which God achieved our redemption, as foretold throughout the Old Testament. In John’s Gospel, these themes are intertwined to show that Jesus completely fulfills God's promises.
John’s Gospel is uniquely different from the other gospels. Still, his theology and majestic rewording and interpretation of the Genesis story belong in the New Testament canon as a profound, Spirit-inspired witness to Christ. Rather than contradicting the other Gospels, John complements and deepens our understanding of Christ’s person and work as the visible image of the invisible God.
From Christ’s fullness we receive “grace upon grace”: while the law through Moses prepared the way, grace and truth come fully through Jesus Christ, who fulfills and surpasses the law. John states no one has seen God except the Son, who reveals the Father. Christ’s sinless life shows us who God is, making Him the definitive revelation and the only way to know God in Heaven. We must seek God in Christ alone, focusing our faith, study, and devotion on Jesus, who reveals the Father. John urges us to behold the eternal Word made flesh, trust in Christ’s grace, and receive Him by faith.
As Christ has shown God to the world, so we are called to show Christ to the world. United to Him and led by His Spirit, we reflect His character when we live as servant leaders—loving others, serving others, and leading others to Christ.
Conclusion
In light of these truths, let us renew our faith through earnest prayer and active obedience. Like John the Baptist, may we decrease that Christ may increase, pointing others away from ourselves and toward the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. And like our Savior, may we walk in self-giving love, sacrificial service, and steadfast faithfulness, that our lives might bear witness to the Light until He comes again in glory. I will leave you to contemplate and discern God’s will in deliberate, prayerful action this new year.
I was just wondering the other day why, with John 1 making such a big deal about the Word being there in the beginning, the Word is not mentioned in Genesis 1.
Then I scrolled down. “And God said”, over and over. Oh.