Today, as we
mark the last day of the year of 2011, we hear the very poetic and beautiful
beginning of the Gospel of John. It is
interesting to compare what we hear in the beginning of John’s Gospel to some
of the other Gospels. While Matthew
begins with Jesus' genealogy & Luke starts with the story of the Elizabeth
and Zechariah as parents of the man who would prepare the way for Jesus, the
Gospel of John starts with the theological images of the Word of God, of a
light shining in the darkness, of the Word of God being made flesh. I think the only way to truly understand
& appreciate the beginning of John's Gospel is to approach it as a beautiful
work of poetry that eloquently expresses the truth about God and about the
coming of Jesus into our world.
But, in our
modern, practical, common sense view of things, we may wonder why John the
Evangelist would begin his Gospel with a poetic description of the Word of
God. Well, the “Word of God” was a
common expression among the Jews in ancient Israel. In their Hebrew Scriptures, God's word was
active, creative, and dynamic. John
describes Jesus as God's creative, life-giving, and light-giving word that has
come to our earth in human form. Jesus
is the wisdom and the power of God that created the world, the wisdom and the
power that sustains it. Jesus assumed a
human nature in order to accomplish God's plan of salvation. Jesus is the Son of God who does not cease to
be God and Lord, but becomes a human being and our brother.
If we are
going to behold the glory of God, we will do it through our Lord Jesus
Christ. Jesus is the word of God, the
Logos, the Word that was with God in the beginning, the word that is God's
total utterance, resulting in all that has been created, both the visible and
the invisible.
God is the
almighty, the Father of light. His
eternal word came down from heaven in the silent watches of the night. May we open our hearts to receive this word
of God, to receive the light. May we
increase our vision and our faith with the rising of the dawn, that our lives
may be filled with God's glory and his peace.
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