John 1:1-5 "Christ's Relationship to Everything" - Kent Stainback

no anna you're tired whatever she wants i feel a little echo can you hear me you know i love playing the victim mentality and once again matt and mark have thrown me under the bus by having me do an introduction to the gospel of john and the first five verses so anyway i'm going to get you back this is a monumental day for me i was thinking this is the last message i'll ever teach on the knee i was born with i'm going in a week from monday to give some surgeon the opportunity to cut

my leg in half and put a new knee in so anyway appreciate your prayers for that i invite you to turn to this magnificent gospel the gospel of john and it is a great thrill to start this book to be able to introduce introduce you to the book and to teach the first five verses uh god in his grace has given us this eternal word to study to be able to teach us and to to take each one of us where we are right now in our lives and so i'm really excited about this and

i think you should be too and before we get into this let me go to the lord in prayer our most kind and gracious heavenly father we thank you for another day you've given us that you have given us all these things and unfortunately we sometimes take for granted we take for granted our health our life this country we live in uh we take for granted even the fact that you've saved us you've given us uh this word and we leave it on the shelf uh way too much we we let dust collect on it

while we spend time studying and working on other things and so father we confess that to you we thank you for your magnificent work in your son jesus christ and so father as we come to you this morning we do remember that many are hurting many are aching there are those of us that have difficulties in our lives right now we're dealing with family issues or health issues or work issues and so father we commit that to you and we know that in your power and in your grace you can guide us through whatever we're

in so help us father to lean on you to trust you for those difficulties father there are people here that maybe have been going to church or people watching that believe they're christians and and they're not they've never been saved they know all about you but they don't really know you in a saving way and so father i pray for those and father i pray for this church i pray for each individual in this church and for this church as a whole that you would continue to build it to be a beacon a light in

an ever increasing dark world we live in father we need it more than anything and so father in these next few minutes i pray as i've so often prayed that we could pause from the busy times of life the schedules the stresses and think and ponder and meditate on the word that you've given us so be with us father and guide and direct us in christ's name amen well as i mentioned we're going to [Music] read the first five verses study the first five verses i've entitled the message this morning christ relationship to everything so

if you'll look with me we'll read the first five verses starting in the book of john 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 came into being through him and apart from him nothing came into being that has come into being in him was life and the life was the light of men the light shines in the darkness and the darkness did not comprehend it he was born in oxford england in 1942 he earned his bachelor's degree in

math and physics from oxford and his masters in phd from cambridge and he became a theoretical physicist he proved einstein's theory of general relativity and that the universe has no boundaries abc news called him one of the smartest men on earth and the bbc called him the most famous genius of the modern age his name stephen hawking he received 13 honorary degrees and an untold number of medals and awards most notably in 1989 he was awarded the order of the british empire given by queen elizabeth and in 2009 president obama personally awarded him the presidential

medal of freedom in 2018 time magazine quoted hawking saying that god is the name people give to the reason we are here but i think that the reason is the law of physics rather than someone with whom you can have a personal relationship with and he went on to say it's natural to believe that god created the universe but science offers a more convincing explanation we would know everything that god would know if there was a god he said which there isn't i am an atheist how can someone so smart so knowledgeable of the universe

so intellectual and intelligent and not believe in the existence of god and not understand his love i like what barnhouse said you can't find real love in the forces of nature you cannot put love in a test tube and you can't see it in a telescope and even in a microscope for example we may feel the sea breeze or marvel at a beautiful scenery in nature but when the storms come and the lightning strikes and the hell falls where is love barnhouse went on to say you can look at a family and say well look

at how a mom takes care of her children but then suddenly when one comes down with a sickness and it causes their eventual death where is the love we need to deal with difficulties like this in a fallen world and barnhouse went on to say if the universe around us were our only source of hope or love we would never know that god is love but god has expressed his love to us and we find it in his word and we find it in no greater place than in the gospel of john and right up

front in the introduction the first 18 verses which is what people call the prologue john summarizes what he's going to tell us in the whole book he says this is what i'm going to tell you and then i'm going to tell you this and in verse 14 we see the expression of god's love and this is how god communicates his love look down at verse 14 and the word jesus became flesh and dwelt among us and we saw his glory and glory as of the only begotten from the father full of grace and truth you

see god expresses his love for us and has expressed his love for us by sending his son into this world to live 33 years to walk as a human to live a perfect life to die on the cross to take the penalty of our sins and then rise again that's the expression of god's love this is real love this is authentic love this is genuine love and it can't be found any other place and the apostle develops it all throughout the gospel that this is god's love in his son now we all know there's four

gospels matthew mark luke and john but the first three matthew mark and luke have come to be known throughout history as the synoptic gospels have you heard that before the synoptic gospels the word optic obviously means to see and the word sin means together so the first three gospels matthew mark luke and john are considered to see things more together in the same ways and the same stories but john is different the first three gospels interestingly were written 30 years approximately after jesus's resurrection but john was a much older man and he wrote his gospel

10 to 20 years after those three gospels were written in fact the gospel of john was probably one of the last books ever written in the new testament and consequently if we if we think about it john had time to consider everything that was written and what he could add to the gospel message and it's interesting he had the opportunity in a sense to fill in the gaps to conclude the evidence and so john as it were a world-class defense attorney he comes in to seal the deal to conclude the evidence to complete the argument

and it's as if john's gospel added to matthew mark and luke and john everything that needed to be known and now he leaves no doubt that jesus was truly the son of god and so john's approach is unique and it's different i don't know if some of you realize this i'm not sure i did but the early church had symbols for each of the gospels and they came from figures in the first chapter of ezekiel where he had a vision matthew's symbol was a man because it starts with the genealogy of jesus mark's symbol was

a lion because it starts with the beginning of john the baptist preaching like a line disrupting everything he had a turn and burned message tremendous courage and luke's symbol was a bull because of the message that begins in the temple and the sacrifice is there do you know what john's symbol was i love this the symbol for john in the early church was the eagle the eagle and they're known for their tremendous eyesight you know this their power and their strength in fact i was reading this that an eagle can see four to five four

to five times uh better than a human in fact they can see a fish swimming underwater 200 feet they're tenacious and when storms come rather than fly away these birds use the wind to soar higher so like an eagle john takes us higher so that we can see farther and understand more about who jesus really is for example john skips jesus birth he goes back to the description of jesus before the beginning of time in all eternity john seemed more concerned not with what jesus did but the deeper meaning behind it all for example whenever

he speaks of one of the supernatural acts john uses the word sign and the other gospels use the word miracle why because each amazing miracle was actually a sign that was pointing to a deeper truth that john wanted us to see john wanted us to see more than just the miracle he wanted us to understand that this was deity that this was god also in in john we find the seven great i am statements about jesus and this is not in the other gospels this is where jesus in a sense answers the single greatest question

that all of us will answer is who do you say that i am the seven great i am statements john summed up the purpose of his gospel in two verses over in john 20 verses 30 and 31 you don't have to turn there and here's the here's the single purpose he wrote this therefore many other signs jesus also performed in the presence of the disciples which are not written in this book but these have been written so that you may believe that jesus is the christ the son of god and that by believing you may

have life in his name that's the purpose that's what john's doing boyce had it right when he said the gospel of john has probably been the means by which more people have come to know jesus christ as their savior than any other portion of scripture it's been well said also that this is a book that a child can wade in and an elephant can swim in i love this the point is it doesn't matter if you've been a christian for 50 years or for five years or for one minute or two minutes it doesn't matter

if you're at a kindergarten maturity or a phd maturity we all can sit in the same classroom in god's marvelous wisdom this book will give us encouragement no matter where we are it'll strengthen us it'll give us power it'll it'll guide us it is a fantastic book finally martin luther said about the gospel of john it's god's love letter to the world god's love letter to the world don't you love that don't you love that you see we're going to be studying this over the next weeks and the coming months and as we unpack and

as other men unpack this inspired narrative will we keep that in mind will you keep that in mind that this is god's loving words to you it's god's loving words to me and even as we open up and we look at these first five verses will you consider with me that this is god's love letter to you okay that's my introduction condensed let's go to the first five verses i've cut it up into four sections if you've got a pen or you're taking notes i want you to look at it this way number one christ

relationship to time christ's relationship to time verse 1a in the beginning was the word christ's relationship to time number two christ's relationship to god you'll start in one be and go through two and the word was with god and the word was god and he was in the beginning that's christ's relationship to god number three christ's relationship to the universe that's verse three all things came into being through him and apart from him nothing came into being that was has come into being and lastly number four christ's relationship to men verses four and five in

him was life and the life was the light of men okay so here's where we're going to start christ's relationship to time christ's relationship to god christ's relationship to the universe and christ's relationship to men all right number one in the beginning was the word i want you to notice these first three words in the beginning what does that remind you of anybody thinking of anything that's right the first three words of the book of genesis in the beginning god created the heavens and the earth and you might ask the question the beginning of what

and the answer is before the beginning of everything as we know it it was before the earth before universe before an atom or a molecule or the tiniest particle it was before anything existed that's what this means john starts his gospel narrative before time began before the beginning of creation now this is beyond our comprehension we're we're finite we're bound in time we're each created with limited amount of time and so no human can really get their brains around this we just have to accept it and so john is taking us to a realm that

is timeless so if you want to make an argument that can't be debated then start an eternity past before anything existed and go beyond anyone's existing knowledge and that's what john does he stretches us to ponder and consider that before time began what look what it says was the word before time began was the word notice it doesn't say before the beginning of time the word was made no john is saying before the beginning of time was the word before the beginning of time before any creation the word was existing the word transcends time now

that's amazing that's amazing i mean that's beyond us that's what he's saying the word transcends time before the beginning of anything now our word word here in greek means logos it's the same word in english in the english language and it's how we express ourselves it's it's how we communicate and so john's description for jesus is the word now think about that i was i was sitting here in the coffee shop this week and i was looking at all the people and they were all talking two here two here four here and they were all

communicating through their words and they were all expressing their thoughts their desires who they were what they liked what they wanted through their words and that's how we express ourselves through our words we speak or we write them well you might be able to guess what i'm thinking but you really don't know who i am until you hear my words that right our words convey what we have on our mind and john is saying that jesus christ is god's word it's how god communicates with us he does it through his son a real person when

jesus lived here on earth as a man he communicated what was going on in the mind of god he told us the thoughts of god think about that for a minute jesus is god's word he is an expression of all who god is so since god is invisible naturally people say well i wish somebody would tell me what god is like and john's point is that the invisible has come and become visible god is telling us what he wants us to know in his son the word in other words jesus is god's word and how

he expresses everything on his heart and his mind john 14 9 you know this he who has seen me has seen the father and so jesus came to explain to us very simply what is on god's mind so it stands to reason that's the most important communication that we will ever have and it comes from where comes from jesus what god thinks is all that matters isn't it in your life in my life to not do business with jesus then is to not do business with god to ignore the message of jesus listen is to

ignore the communication from god so when we think of jesus in his relationship to time we've got to go back to a time before time he's eternal he's always existed and although he lived within time as a human being he is not bound by time jesus predates time and creation there never was a time that jesus didn't exist now that's the first brick that john lays down in his argument the magnificent deity of jesus first brick second brick number two christ's relationship to god 1b and the word was with god and the word was god

now i don't want you to miss this point the word jesus christ is distinguishable from god the father right up front he's saying there's the word and then there's god the word was with god there's two different personalities jesus isn't a mold of god's existence no there's two separate persons two separate personalities the word was with god now that literally means in the in the language face to face or towards each other it conveys a meaning of fellowship the word was face to face with god in intimate fellowship before the beginning of everything as we

know it in eternity past and it was close and it was intimate and it was a communion between jesus christ and god the father so the word jesus christ was coexistent with god but not only that notice this the word is co-equal with god read on and the word was with god and the word was god the word was with god and the word was god now john is stretching our brains i mean this is an amazing statement uh he is stating that in no uncertain terms jesus christ is god maybe there's a better way

to phrase it the word was being god the word was being god now let me stop there this is heavy this is hard to understand and there may be some people say look you've already lost me but if we were able to connect all the dots if we were really able to understand everything about god he really wouldn't be god would he how can we have much confidence in a god that we understand everything about him i don't want a god that i can understand everything about it as believers in christ we will always be

growing in our knowledge of god i don't forget lewis johnson telling me this i thought when you died and went to heaven we'd know all about god and he said no you will always throughout all eternity continue to grow in your knowledge of god because he is so far past us and we now look through a glass dimly and john is stretching us to help us understand just a tiny fraction of what we have here so back to our text the word is equal with god and all attributes jesus is all that god is and

god is all that jesus is he's equal in nature in character and in essence jesus is deity john 10 30 i and the father are one jesus is distinctly and emphatically god manifest in the flesh if the word was with god before time began and if god's word is part of the everlasting plans of god then it is crystal clear that god has always always been with jesus and jesus been with him now the world looks at these things all differently and and a matter of fact even as christians we think well god's the one

with the heavy hand god's the one that is getting ready to deal with me but jesus somehow comes in and changes him and corrects him and softens him up a little bit that's not what the bible teaches they are one they're exactly one they're on the same page together jesus is god and the divine son of god jesus is equally god as god the father jesus is equally holy is god the father jesus is equally powerful as god the father he is equally loving as god the father jesus is equally sovereign as god the father

jesus is god in every way though he is a separate personality from god now this is essential this is this is where the rubber meets the road if you miss this you miss everything this is the heart of christianity and you can imagine if this is the heart of christianity that satan has been focused on this throughout eternity and throughout history trying to twist up people he knows that if he can get you to not believe this he can take more people to hell with him if you can believe that jesus isn't truly god if

he can get you to think that then you're on your way to hell it's permeated the religions everywhere for example the christian science believed jesus was the son of god but not god the jehovah's witnesses say jesus was a god but not god and not equal with god the muslims believe that jesus was just a prophet a mortal man the jews obviously don't believe jesus was god the unitarians teach that jesus christ was not god at all but a good man the hindu religions believe jesus is a god but not the god and on and

on and on that's satan that's evil that leads you straight to hell john is telling us right up front that the word jesus christ is co-equal with god and fully divine even from birth and someone summed it up like this i like this with this one sentence john sweeps away and abolishes every heresy by which satan has harassed the church of god from the beginning jesus christ is god was god and with him he is co-equal with god there is no salvation no forgiveness without understanding that why because there's no one worthy to substitute there's

no one worthy to take our sins there's no one worthy to satisfy the wrath of god unless he's fully god so the first brick that john lays down is christ's relationship to time he pre-dead's time and existence he's always existed and second christ's relationship with god is jesus is all that god is and god is all that jesus is third christ's relationship to the universe read with me verse three all things came into being through him and apart from him nothing came into being that has come into being wow now wait a second what john

just is taking us deeper and deeper he wants us to understand more that jesus is deity and he broadens his argument that says this eternal word jesus christ who predated creation is the one who created all there is it's john way it's his way of saying that's the proof in the pudding you want evidence that jesus is god look at his deeds look at what jesus has done read it read it right in front of you all things came into being through him let me say it another way the word jesus christ was god's agent

in creating everything to make sure we understand the power of this john puts it in the negative and he goes on to say this all things came into being through him and look what he says and apart from him nothing came into being that has come into being wow and so just like in genesis everything that came into being did so by god's spoken word eight times in the first chapter of genesis god spoke you'll remember here's a few god said let there be light god said let there be an expanse in the middle of

the waters god said let the waters be gathered in one place in the land in another god said let the earth sprout vegetation and it continues and it continues the point is this that the word jesus christ was speaking into existence all that the father had planned is the maker of all that exists listen to this jesus spoke the universe into existence he created everything out of nothing nothing exists that jesus didn't create nothing came into being on its own including me and including you now let me give you some quick facts to help you

kind of comprehend just the magnitude and i know you know this but let's just take a couple of seconds here i want to talk to you about the stars one million earths can fit into the sun which is the only star in our solar system one million but it is one of over 100 to 400 billion stars in our milky way they're not even sure you read 100 billion stars in the milky way and someone says well there's 200 billion somebody said there's a 100 to 400 billion stars in our milky way and there are

estimated to be a hundred billion more galaxies okay you with me and each of them have a over a hundred billion stars so let's assume that all the galaxies have a hundred billion stars that's a hundred billion trillion stars in the observable universe and if that isn't hard enough to grasp according to a group of researchers at the university of hawaii there are an estimated 7.5 quintillion grains of sand on our earth somebody tried to add that up and there are 5 to 10 times more stars in the observable universe then grains of sand on

our earth psalms 147 4 he counts the numbers of stars and he gives names to all of them he spoke it into existence like that you see what john's doing this is beyond us but this is truth this is who the word is adrian rogers said it great jesus created all things that are in heaven that are in earth visible invisible whether they be thrones or dominions or principalities or powers colossians 1 16 all things have been created through him and for him verse 17 he jesus is before all things and listen to this and

in him all things hold together all things hang together you see without jesus it would all come apart jesus is the glue of the galaxies and he keeps all the stars in their place because all things were made by him and all things were made for him and he holds them all together you see if we take jesus out of our lives our lives fly apart if you take jesus out of your marriage your marriage will not stay together if you keep jesus out of your home your home will not stand all things in the

universe are made by him and it is only through him that things hang together and so the first brick we learned that john lays down is the case the deity of christ is his relationship to time he existed before time second his relationship to god he was god and he was with god third his relationship to the universe he created it all last point his relationship to men in him was life look at verse four in him was life now let's go back to the opening of john remember the first three words in the beginning

john's using the exact same words as genesis why because the same god who created the universe and all that's in it is about to create a new creation think about it the first creation began with the earth and the stars and the planets in the universe and it ended with the pinnacle god's crown jewel man then sin entered the world adam sinned and we fell and it ended the entire human race and it separated us from god and now we find god himself returning back to his crown jewel who he made in the first creation

and he begins a second creation now in his souls this word life used 36 times in john's gospel more than any other book in the new testament and and and john is using it as spiritual life but also physical life dual meaning and so what we see is that god comes back to the most important part of his creation man and he restores what was ruined by sin in the first creation in his second creation and john's wanting us to understand the second creation is internal the second creation is in the soul it happens in

our cold dead hearts where we're ruined by sin and god is recreating us and he's given us new life that is spiritual now the first physical creation was through his word and the second spiritual creation is through his word in our hearts you see jesus christ is the only source of life physical or spiritual so the power that god uses is his word to all who believe you see he recreates us by reconciling us through the work of jesus on the cross if anyone is in christ he is what a new creature old things passed

away and behold new things have come this is salvation this is christianity this is god's amazing love do you see that and it's all linked together it's all linked from genesis all the way through the bible it's linked together because it's the same god and it's the same jesus the same word and it's god creating because of his amazing love well some may be asking what are you talking about this spiritual life well it's it's a personal relationship with god it's it's what we lost in adam's sin it's what we lost we're spiritually dead now

god comes to make us spiritually alive john 17 3 this is eternal life that you may know that they may know you that the only true god and jesus christ whom you have sent and now john shifts metaphors he says goes from light to life in him was life the life was the light of men to say it another way jesus christ illuminates he enlightens fallen men the life of jesus is the light of the world look our world is dark that's the fallen world that's the evil and we see it more and more every

day don't we the light is opposite the light is the love and the truth of god the light is salvation the light of the knowledge of god the light is of holiness of god the light is the wisdom of god the light is our guiding light of god and he came into this dark world verse 5 continues the light shines in the darkness it's not that the light shone or the light has shown the light is continuing to shine in fallen mankind and in this darkness when jesus came to shine in the dark world that's

what john's saying and the darkness didn't comprehend it read that potentially two meanings that the darkness didn't comprehend it or the word comprehend could mean overcome or conquer meaning darkness will not overcome the light i heard just the other day that the president of india has said he was going to try to extinguish christianity in two years can i tell you something the darkness will not extinguish the light or it could mean the darkness didn't comprehend it didn't take hold of it mentally that could be the meaning too which is true a natural man does

not accept the things of spirit of god for they're foolish to him can i give you just two examples real quick how dark our world is you know this in the cafeteria of the carillion elementary school in oviedo florida a five-year-old girl bowed her head to pray before she ate her lunch moments later a school employee bent down beside the little girl and told her it was wrong to pray at school and she must never do it again in memphis an elementary school teacher gave a writing assignment asking her student to write about their heroes

ten-year-old aaron wrote about god when she turned her paper in the teacher refused to accept it told her to take it off school property immediately some students overheard the teacher and joined in rebuking the little girl and mocking her for believing in god the darkness is here my friends and it's getting darker and darker and we need the light more and more tozer said this the human intellect even in its fallen state is an awesome work of god but it lies in darkness until illuminated by the holy spirit the good news is the light is

continuing to shine and the darkness hates it let me conclude with this the greatest brain of the modern age as i mentioned earlier stephen hawking died 18 months ago at the age of 76. he was a paraplegic because when he was 21 years old he was inflicted with lou gehrig's disease so for 50 years he wrestled with that it was a total looked horrible tells you his heart heart in his final book brief answers to the big questions he wrote there is no god and no one directs the universe he went on to say he

believed the brain is like a computer that will simply shut off there is no heaven or afterlife for broken down computers it is a fairy tale story for people who are afraid of the dark that's a hard heart that's darkness you can't have more brain power than this man had but it won't save you it won't teach you about god's love it won't remove the sin and reconcile you with god this is god's love letter to us because it tells us it's the only power that can save us and it alone comes from jesus christ

he is the only one that can save you from your sins it's the only power that creates something out of nothing it's the power that existed before time it's the power that's co-equal and coexists with god it's the power that created all things and in him nothing was created and it's the power of light that can expose darkness in your heart and mind and this power is available to you and to me think about it is that amazing the power we possess in and of ourselves doesn't even register on the scale with the power of

jesus and god we have access to it through the same word that created the universe the word jesus christ he alone can create in you a new heart and give you a new life and if you're here this morning and believe yourself to be a christian because you've always gone to church and you're you're doing everything you can to measure up as a good person but deep down in your heart you realize you've never been born again and you're restless and you know you don't have a new heart you need to ask this jesus to

create in you a new heart you need to know that jesus can take away your doubts come all the way to jesus maybe you're wrestling with sin and and you can't seem to overcome it this power that created the universe is available to you to defeat it jesus has more than enough power perhaps you think this christian thing isn't for intelligent people it's only for the weak intellectually can i tell you that you're no match for an infinite god maybe you're in turmoil you're anxious you can't relax your life is is running in a mess

jesus has the power to remove the anxiousness and give you peace john 4 9 by this the love of god has manifested in us that god has sent his only begotten son into the world so they might live through him you see no one can ignore this gospel it demands a decision you can't put it in neutral and put it in a time out zone it's not a wait and see if it's a wait and see then it you don't believe john has built a case that can't be argued with you can't be a fence

sitter you either all in for jesus or you're a son or daughter of the devil our lord is infinitely powerful and you can't walk away from it you can't put that off place your trust in him repent of your sins and find his amazing love for your life it's an exciting book it's it's an exciting book it's it's it's tremendous don't let the darkness of the world don't let this fallen world discourage you we have access to the power of god and let's show the world let's pray father these are amazing verses we thank you

father for stretching our finite brains to try to get a glimpse of who you are and father just for the few minutes we think about it it's it's beyond us but father we are thankful it is beyond us we are thankful that you are the god of all god you are the god very god of very god and your son jesus has come into the world to save us father thank you for that if there's anyone here this morning that doesn't know you father please bring them to know you and if there's people here that

maybe know you that have been not walking with you bring us back bring us back to a closer walk so that we can tap into and love you magnificent loving amazing power in jesus christ amen