John 1:6-18

Let's start with John 1:6-9, which focuses on the witness of John: There came a man sent from God, whose name was Yochanan - The Lord Is Gracious - John. He came as a witness, to testify about the Light, so that all might believe through him. He was not the Light, but he came to testify about the Light. There was the true Light which, coming into the world, enlightens every man.

John, the author of this book, introduces us to another Yochanan, who was sent from God. The last prophet that God had sent was Malachi, who prophesied some 400 years earlier, so John was first prophet in 400 years. 400 years is a long time. It's as if something happened in our day that hadn.t occurred since 1600. A thunderstorm is a powerful and dramatic event, but It's even more dramatic when it comes at the end of a long drought. This long period between prophets made John's arrival on the scene even more powerful and dramatic.

What else do we know about John? We know that his birth was miraculous. Zechariah and Elizabeth were both advanced in years, and Elizabeth was barren and couldn.t have any children. Her conception needed divine intervention, and the miraculous help of God, which was provided.

We know that John was the older cousin of Yeshua through the relationship between their mothers - Mary and Elizabeth. We know that on his father's side, John was a Priest through his father Zachariah.

We know that the great angel Gabriel appeared to Zechariah while Zechariah was serving the Lord in the Temple, and told him that the child's name would be Yochanan - The Lord Is Gracious, because the Lord was going to use John to pour out His grace on the Jewish people in a very dynamic way.

We know that John was filled with God's spirit even before he was born, while he was still in Elizabeth's womb. That helped to make Yochanan the greatest man to ever have lived - greater than Noach, greater than the Avot - Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, greater than David or Solomon, Daniel or Joseph or Moses.

We know that Yochanan was a Nazarite, who would drink no wine or liquor made from grapes, and therefore Yochanan was especially devoted God's service.

We know that he would have the same kind of service to the Lord as did the great prophet Eliyahu - Elijah, turning back many of the Jewish people to God.

We know that Yochanan was sent by God on a very special mission - to prepare the Jewish people for the immediate arrival of the Messiah. He was the Messiah's "advance man," His herald, His forerunner.

We know that John came as a witness, to testify about the Light, so that all might believe through him.

John, the author of this book, makes it very clear that John the Prophet was not the Light. Why did John feel it necessary to clarify that John the Immerser was not the Light? Because John the prophet had made many disciples. Huge numbers of Jewish people listened to John, and continued to follow this great prophet even after John died.

Even some twenty years after he died, Acts 19 records that while Rabbi Paul was in the city of Ephesus, hundreds of miles outside of Israel, he met people there who were still John's disciples. So, John made a tremendous impact on the religious world of his day, but John was not the Light. John came to testify about the Light. Yeshua is the true Light who has come into the world, making light available for every man.

Yeshua is the true Light. Light stands for truth, knowledge, victory, salvation, life. Yeshua is the true Light - ultimate Wisdom, the Highest Truth, Final Victory, Eternal Salvation. Yeshua alone is able to make this light available to every human being.

So, if anyone wants light - wisdom, truth, victory, salvation, life, you must come to Yeshua, believe in Him, trust Him, be confident about who He is and join yourself by faith to the Son of God. If you don.t, you will remain part of the darkness, the chaos, the sin, the death, the alienation, the estrangement, the curse; you will continue to be part of sinful humanity which is at war with the Light, with God, with truth.

John came as a witness, to testify. "Witness" and "testify" are legal terms, used in courts of law and other important situations to attest to the truth. A witness who testifies knows what is true, and speaks what he knows.

Yochanan knew the truth that this was the long awaited time for God to send the Messiah, and so John declared this to all Israel. He did this in order that all - everyone in Israel, and eventually everyone in the whole world - might believe. Remember that "believe" means than mere mental affirmation. It means following, obeying, becoming a persecuted disciple.

Was Yochanan completely successful? Did all believe because of his witness and testimony? Obviously not. Will all believe through our witness, our testimony? No. Should that prevent us from being a witness, and giving testimony about what we know to be true about Yeshua? No.

May I also suggest that God is calling us to be Yochanans - witnesses who give testimony to Yeshua. The world is still very dark - full of evil, and confusion about God, tremendous confusion about the way to salvation. God is calling each one of us, in our own ways, to be a witness, to attest to the truth, so speak what we know about Yeshua, so that all might believe - men and women, boys and girls, Jews and Gentiles, black and white, might believe through us, and join us as persecuted disciples of the Persecuted but Victorious One.

I like ironies. An irony is an outcome of events that is opposite of what might have been expected. Purim is coming soon, and the holiday is full of delicious ironies. Nahafoch - it was turned to the contrary. Last year Aliza was on the girls. eighth grade volleyball team, which was undefeated going into the very last game. The girls. volleyball team of West Hills Middle School hadn.t had an undefeated season for twenty years.

Aliza was the new girl on the team, so she didn.t get to play as much as the other girls. During the final game, which would determine if they were undefeated or not, the first string had a hard time holding their own, and found themselves behind. In the final minutes, with the team losing, ironically enough, the coach sent in the second string - Aliza and a couple other girls. In the last 3 crucial minutes, while all of Aliza's first string team mates were crying, grieving on the sidelines over the expected loss, Aliza scored the winning points that ended the game ... and gave them an undefeated season.

The first string is suppose to be the best, but they were the ones who were losing. The second string was made up of the ones who were suppose to be inferior, but they ended up winning the game. That's irony. That brings us to verses 10-11, which I have always considered to be the Greatest Irony of All.

He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and those who were His own did not receive Him.

The One who make the universe, with its millions of galaxies with their billions of stars, came to this little planet that He made. The One who brought the universe into existence was born within the universe as a human being, but instead of being admired, welcomed, worshiped, as He deserved, the Lord of Glory was unrecognized, unknown, and unappreciated.

He came to His own - that which belonged to Him - the world of men, and particularly the Jewish people, the Chosen People, the ones who should have known Him best, but even the majority of the Chosen People did not receive Him. They didn.t know Yeshua was our great Rabbi and prophet, they didn.t believe that He was the Messiah, the King of Israel and the Son of God. They didn.t understand that He was the Word made flesh, the Light of God, the Lamb of God, and the Savior of the World.

But as many as received Him, (and we receive Him by believing in His name, trusting that He is who the Word of God says He is, the Messiah, the King of Israel, the Son of God, the eternal Word made flesh, who was with God, and who was and is God, the Light, the Lamb of God, and the Savior of the World. We receive Him by joining ourselves to Him by having faith in Him) to them He gave the right - the authority, the ability, the incredible privilege - to become children of God (a son or daughter of God - think of it. God becomes your Father - who knows you, who loves you, who accepts you, who considers you to be part of His eternal family. A child of God is a higher calling than being the President of the United States. It's more honorable than being the CEO of one of the Big Three. It's more glorious than being an angel or archangel), even to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.

And who can become a child of God? How can this great thing be accomplished? What can I do to become one of God's beloved and eternal sons and daughters? John makes it abundantly clear that becoming one of God's beloved sons or daughters, who will live in glorious splendor for eternity with the Lord of Glory, can't be accomplished by human beings on their own, or anything connected to human ability or desire. There is absolutely nothing that anyone can do to merit or deserve or make themselves a child of God. There is nothing connected to human works or activity - anything connected to being human, that will enable you to become a child of God.

Impressive heritage, like being part of the Chosen People, won.t do it. Your grandparents and parents don.t have the power to make you a child of God. The church baptizing you as an infant, or your synagogue circumcising you, does not give you the right to become a child of God. Your rabbi can.t bestow this gift upon you. The source is God, not man. It is the will of God that enables us to become children of God. We can only become a son or daughter of God, and be born by God, when God wills it, and we receive the indwelling, eternal-life-giving presence of the Spirit of God, by simply receiving Yeshua, and believing in His name, and welcoming Yeshua into our lives, and following Him, and obeying God, and becoming a persecuted disciple.

1:14 And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.

The Word - the Logos, the Logic, the Reason behind the order in the universe, the final Communication of God to mankind; the ultimate Messenger, the Greatest Prophet, the Living Torah, the personification of all that God the Father wants to say to mankind, who made the universe at the command of God, who was in the beginning with God, who always was, who always existed, who was with God in eternal association, and who was God, who is to be fully identified as God - with God, and yet distinct from God, this Divine Word, became flesh - He took on a human body, He became incarnate - He "enfleshed" Himself, and joined Himself to humanity. The Word - fully God, became flesh - fully Man.

And He dwelt among us. He joined Himself to a human body as if He was on a camping trip, pitching a tent to live in, so that He could dwell among us. Just as the Lord pitched a tent in the wilderness, so that He could better manifest His presence among the Jewish people, so Yeshua was like the Mishkan - the Tabernacle - the tent which contained the dwelling presence of God among Israel, which later became the Temple in Jerusalem.

In Yeshua we have an even greatest manifestation of the dwelling presence of God - greater than the indwelling of God in the Mishkan, superior to the manifestation of God in the Temple in Jerusalem. The Son of God, who was with God from eternity, and who was and is God, came to Earth, and enfleshed Himself in a human body by being born to a wonderful Jewish woman.

He became the embodiment of the dwelling presence of God. In Him the fullness of God dwelt in human, bodily form. The coming of the One who is rightly called Immanuel, God with us, is the fullness of God's desire to be with us, and dwell among us.

"And we" John writes, "not just Yochanan, but we - we apostles, we specially chosen emissaries, men of Israel sent by God to be with the Messiah, and know Him, and love Him - we saw His glory. Not just Yochanan, but we too are witnesses. We too can testify, because we too have come to know the truth about Yeshua. Peter and Matthew and the others, and I, we caught a glimpse of His glory - the honor and splendor emanating from Him, the glory and honor and splendor and magnificence that flows from the only begotten from the Father, God's special Son.

O, we know that we are sons of God, and that the angels are also rightfully called 'Benay Eloheem. - sons of God, and that in a sense, all human beings, redeemed or unredeemed, are sons of God - we know that! But Yeshua is the Father's only begotten. Yeshua is a Son of God in a class all by Himself, different from all the other sons of God. He is unique, and has a special relationship, and a place of choseness with God that no one else has. When the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, we saw the glory of God's only begotten Son, full of grace and truth."

We testify, we are witnesses to the fact that Yeshua was full of grace and truth. During His time on Earth, the Son of God was characterized by grace and truth.

Grace is unmerited favor, goodness done to one who is not deserving, kindness shown to the undeserving. Truth is what is really real, the way things really are, that which is reliable, faithful to the facts, accurate when it comes to reality. Yeshua is the perfect revelation of divine reality.

Yeshua constantly acted graciously toward others, even when they didn.t deserve it. He was kind, He was generous, merciful, loving, good to all. Oh, there were times when He could be firm, when He exhibited tough love, when He would rebuke, admonish, correct, bring discipline, but that is part of genuine grace too.

Grace without truth can degenerate to an overly generous, mushy, spoiled kind of love. Truth without grace can be debilitating, even crushing. But Yeshua was just the right mixture of grace and truth. And He was full of grace and truth. There was a constant, continual, unending supply of grace and truth emanating from Him. He was always constantly, continually, graceful and truthful - full of grace and truth.

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.."

John, this great prophet sent by God, knew better than anyone else in Israel, who Yeshua really was. He knew much truth about Yeshua, and so he testified - he attested to the truth, by crying out - not ashamedly, not quietly, not thinking about the cost to himself, but he cried out and testified that this One, who was born six months him, was greater than him, and had a higher place in God's hierarchy, because Yeshua existed before John. You see, Yochanan knew about Yeshua's pre existence, that B.re-sheet - In The Beginning, Yeshua forever and always existed. "This is He" my Jewish people, "the one that I.ve been telling you about for a while, the promised Messiah, our Savior, who is greater than I am, because He comes to us from eternity."

For of His fullness we have all received, and grace upon grace.

The grace and truth that characterized Yeshua, so that John could say that Yeshua was full of grace and truth, is not limited to Yeshua. Out of His fullness, out of His abundance of grace, unmerited favor, undeserved goodness and blessing, there is enough grace available for every human being who comes to Him, so that there is an unending reservoir of goodness, love, mercy, kindness, provision, blessing, grace, for millions upon millions of human beings, like the endless supply of living water that Yeshua offered to the Samaritan woman.

For the Torah was given through Moses (All of the Torah was given through Moses - not bits and pieces, and not through the JEPD writers like the higher critical heretics claim. The Torah was given through Moses - and that's a good thing. We need the Torah. It has a very important place in the life of Israel and for Messiah's Holy Community of Jews and Gentiles, and has many things to teach us. It teaches us that the God of Israel was always full of chesed - gracious love, and emet - truth and faithfulness. Thank God for Moses and the Torah); grace and truth were realized through Messiah Yeshua.

I don.t believe that John is "dissing" the Torah, or rejecting Moses when he writes, the Torah was given through Moses; grace and truth were realized through Messiah Yeshua. I like what the IVP commentary has to say: "This is sometimes read as a rejection of Moses and the Law. But the relation here between Messiah Yeshua and Moses and the Law is one of fulfillment - the graciousness of God revealed in Scripture has now been perfectly manifested in Yeshua. The significant contrast in John is not of the Law over against grace and truth, since it is the same graciousness of the same God that is revealed in both ... "grace and truth" were manifest at the giving of the Law (Exodus 34:6) ... The same graciousness has now been manifested in an entirely new mode: the Word became flesh ... there is a contrast here, but it is one of degree. The grace received in Yeshua is added upon the grace that came through Moses and the Law. The association between the two is basically one of continuity, of the partial contrasted with the full. While there is continuity it is, nevertheless, a quantum leap that has occurred in Yeshua.

The Torah is full of truth, and reveals who God is, but that revelation is incomplete, which brings us to our last verse this morning, verse 18: No one has seen God at any time; the only begotten God who is in the bosom of the Father, He has explained Him.

The Torah is good. It teaches us about God. Moses is good, but not even Moses was able to ever really see God. Oh, he caught glimpses of God, partial manifestations of God, which I believe were really Messiah Yeshua, but how could Moses see God, who is Spirit, and infinite, bigger and greater than the entire universe, and invisible? Invisible? Yes, invisible. Yeshua is the image of the invisible God, the Supreme Being who is immortal - not subject to death, eternal - not subject to time, and invisible - not subject to human sight. Apart from Yeshua, the unveiled essence of Deity has never been given to mortal sight.

The "only begotten God", which means the "one of a kind God" "unique God," Yeshua, who is in the "bosom of the Father," close to the God's side, in the Father.s heart, in a union of divine nature, sharing perfect love and understanding and being, Yeshua is the One who can reveal God to us that way we need God revealed, and explain to sinful man what we need to know about the invisible God. Yeshua will most clearly reveal the way back to God, the way to be reconciled to our Creator, the way to end our estrangement and alienation from the Holy One. Yeshua will reveal God and God's way of salvation to us, better than Moses and the Torah ever did.