It seems John, the apostle, gets excited in his first chapter as he introduces Jesus and John the Baptizer. He seems to switch back and forth between them, almost tripping over his own feet. There is so much to tell! It is all so important!

That is how I began to feel about this chapter the more I read it. John introduces the Word, who is God and was with God in the beginning. He is the life and Light come into the world. He made everything and everyone… yet is known by none; recognized by no one, rejected by most.

Enter John, sent from God. His task is to announce the coming of this One who is God, who is coming as a man among us. This is no ordinary appearance. We must get ready for Him.

I find it fascinating that, though John (the Baptizer) grew up knowing Jesus (he was a relative), and he had a sense of Jesus being above the need to repent and be baptized (Matthew 3: 13-15), he didn’t know that Jesus was the coming, promised Messiah until he saw on Jesus the identifying sign given him by God. It was when he saw the Holy Spirit, in the form of a dove, “descending and remaining on Him”, John knew and announced “this is the One who baptizes in the Holy Spirit. I myself have seen and have testified that this is the Son of God” (John 1:33-34).

What an exciting moment that was! All John had lived for was folded into that moment, that revelation. The Messiah had come and John was His forerunner, His herald, to tell everyone “This is The One! Get your hearts and lives ready before God to receive the promised King!”

Jesus came and no one expected Him. That is, they didn’t recognize He was the One who would be the fulfillment of all God’s prophecies about the coming Deliverer. Their preconceived notions about their God and His Savior blinded their eyes to the truth.

But there were some who were waiting, looking for the Messiah, and when John announced His arrival, they lit out after Him.

“Again the next day John was standing with two of his disciples, and he looked at Jesus as He walked, and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God!” The two disciples heard him speak, and they followed Jesus….One of the two who heard John speak and followed Him,was Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother. He found first his own brother Simon and said to him, ‘we have found the Messiah’ (which translated means Christ). He brought him to Jesus…” (John 1:35-37, 40-42).

I’ve always loved this about Andrew; I’ve always wished I were more like him. He was spiritually attune, waiting and watching, ready to leave home and family in pursuit of the Messiah, his great heartbeat. He became a disciple of John in anticipation of discovering and following the Messiah. His heart resonated with the message of John the Baptizer. As far as we can tell from this account, he was one of Jesus’ first followers. And he was vocal in announcing he had found the promised Messiah and went to get others to follow too. His first stop was his own family: Simon Peter.

I want to be one who is spiritually attuned to God, to recognize Jesus when He comes. How so, when Jesus already “came”? He speaks in the Word of God, and I need to recognize His voice and obey. He comes into my life in strange disguises; I do not want to reject Him because of my preconceived notions, my spiritual blindness to God and his truth.

Just because I once put my faith in Jesus to forgive my sins and give me eternal life; just because I do all the acceptable external acts such as church attendance and reading of my Bible and even prayer; just because I do these things, doesn’t mean my heart is in tune with God.

Israel, as a nation, did all the right religious acts but broke God’s heart and brought down His wrath on them because they persisted in living a double life, doing abominable things the world around them did and acting like it was nothing; stopping their ears to the voice of God through His prophets.

Today we can be just like that, and I do not want to be like that! Reading the Old Testament is eye opening and instructive. It was given us so we would learn not to act the way others had who called themselves by the Name of God and lived in disobedience to Him.

It is also instructive to learn from reading the Old Testament God loves those who love and fear Him, whose hearts are humble toward God and kind toward other people. The way of God is so pure, clean and refreshing…these are the inner feelings I’ve had often when I read the goodness of His ways in scripture. Those who seek after Him know His goodness and kindness. Being in the word of God helps give perspective and keep my heart attuned to God.

This is where Andrew was. Those who seek after the Lord with all their hearts, like Andrew, will be able to recognize and so follow that Lord.

Jesus went on to gather more disciples, those learners and followers who were with Him for the next three years, and who became the backbone of the fledgling church Jesus left when he returned to heaven and His Father.

He is still gathering those whose hearts yearn for Him, for the living God. He is still saying “Follow Me”, still teaching His disciples, the learners of His ways. He is like that train which runs through my yard and the nearby towns, calling with every blast of the train whistle, “Get on board!”

Get on board.

There came a man sent from God, whose name was John. v6

I love the way God has always reached out to us. He sent a man, this time John. From the time He made the world He had been sending men to speak to other men on His behalf (Hebrews 1). This is not the behavior of an aloof and unconcerned God.

He came as a witness, to testify about the Light, so that all might believe through him. v7

John, not to be confused with John the apostle, the writer of this book, but John the son of Zacharias, a priest, and Elizabeth, a relative of Mary of Nazareth (Luke 1). John, who became known as the Baptizer, knew he had a mission to accomplish. And he set about to accomplish it.

He (John) was not that Light but came to testify about the Light….John testified about Him, and cried out, saying, “This was He of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me has a higher rank than I, for He existed before me.’” vv 8, 15

John pulled no punches. I think he was a “what you see is what you get” kind of guy. And he was a sight to see. He was not your conventional next door neighbor type. He may have been a little scary (Matthew 3: 4). But what he had to say was riveting. He called people to repent--oh that nastiest of words! “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 3:2).

But people by the score came to him, scary or strange or not, repenting of their sins and as a sign of their repentance, were being baptized by John. But what was it all about? The kingdom of heaven is near. So what? Does that mean anything to us? The promised Deliverer, the Christ, was about to appear, that’s all! Get ready! They couldn’t receive the Christ, the King, in their “dirty clothes” of life. They had to change, wash up in baptism.

Does sin matter to us? I read these verses and go “yea!” for the ones who came repenting, seeking to make their hearts and lives ready for their King who would rule the coming Kingdom. They knew they were sinners and needed to change the way they lived.

Of course, there were also those who came skeptically and even scornfully, acting a part but with no intention of changing their lives. John had some choice words for them, let me tell you. No, he wasn’t a guy who pulled punches or suffered hypocrites well (Matthew 3:5-12). And if they couldn’t fool John, how in the world did they think they could fool the coming King of the coming kingdom?

So when these same men questioned John about who he thought he was to be doing all this preaching and baptizing--was he the coming king, or a prophet? John was clear, he was not the king to come, the Christ; he was a ‘voice’ announcing Him, getting the roadway prepared for His appearance.

This is the testimony of John, when the Jews sent to him priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, “Who are you?” And he confessed and did not deny, but confessed, “I am not the Christ”….”I am a voice of one crying in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way of the Lord,’ as Isaiah the prophet said.” vv. 19, 20, 23

John knew his calling, his mission. He pointed to the coming Christ, the King of the kingdom coming upon them. He, the Christ, was greater than John and John acknowledged it.

John answered them saying, “I baptize in water, but among you stands One whom you do not know. It is He who comes after me, the thong of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie….I did not recognize Him, but so that He might be manifest to Israel, I came baptizing in water.” vv26, 27, 31

So who was this Christ, this King, the One no one recognized?

(All scriptures NASB)

John, the apostle, was a poet, an artist with words. Once known, along with his brother James, as a Son of Thunder, a man of explosive passions, he later expressed himself, not without those same passions, but controlled, directed. In imagination-capturing words he unpacks “The Word” before us.

John had that gift for expressing truth in that delicate yet powerful form we call poetry. If John were here today he might be heard presenting his poetry as “spoken word”, the currently popular presentation of the truths of God’s word in poetical form in what we call “rapping”. It can be a powerful means of telling the truths of scripture.

Listen, and hear, what John is telling us. I read it slowly and thoughtfully to let the words sink in, representing it by spacing out the phrases.

In the beginning

was the Word,

and the Word was with God,

and the Word was God. Jn 1: 1

The Word…what is a word but the spoken expression of a thought in the mind? This Thought was in the mind of God. The thought takes on form when it is spoken into the atmosphere. The hearer can then experience the thought which was in the mind of the speaker. Not only is this Thought-into-Word spoken from the mind of God, this Thought-now-Word, is God Himself.

He was in the beginning with God. v 2

The Thought is the Word. And this particular Word was spoken by God Himself and, in fact, this Word is God. He always was with God because He always was God.

All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. v 3

It was by His Word that God created. “And God said…” (Genesis 1). The Word is God the Creator. Of all things. Of us.

In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men. v 4

In this Word is life itself. This life was breathed into us in Adam (Genesis 2:7). So we all live by the breath of God. There is no other life from which to draw our life.

And this life-in-the-Word shines out as Light into the darkness of our existence. I feel the darkness. Our existence in the world depicted as “darkness” is right, is true. There is a world of truth wrapped up in this word, Darkness. But I want to look at the Light.

The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overpower it. v 5

Light, by its nature, cuts through darkness, changing darkness to light. This is such an amazing truth! I flip on the light switch at night in a dark room and Voila!, I can see! I do not have to stumble over anything in the dark and injure myself. I am much more aware of such injury these days. The light reveals what is in the darkness. So I can then avoid those little tripping monsters.
Tremendous relief in this phrase: “and the darkness did not overpower it (the Light)”. Darkness has no power to extinguish or overpower light—or the Light. On the contrary, Light will always show up darkness. I know walking around in the darkness is dangerous, so I turn on the lights. How much more dangerous is walking, that is, living, in the darkness which the Light came to shine into?

So we have the ever-existing Word of God, the spoken expression of the Thought of God, which Word is God Himself, creating all that is, giving us His life. And in that life the Light which illumines our darkness, our far-away-from-God-ness. This Light gives us the Hope of God-nearness. Restored.

For once, long ago, there was no darkness.

Just a few words, unfolding, unwrapping truth upon truth, so simply, so beautifully, so powerfully.

But how do we know, how can we personally know this Light, this Word, this God?

John has only begun.

(All scriptures NASB)