The Identity Of Jesus

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John 1:1-18

Google the question who is the most famous or popular person in the world for all time and the result returns Jesus Christ. World history has been so influenced by him that his life is the marker for time. So history is documented as AD or BC. AD in Latin Ano Domini (In the year of our Lord) that is anytime from the time he was born and BC Ante Christum (Before Christ) that is anytime or date before he was born. But now some advocates have replaced it with BCE (Before Common Era) and CE(Common Era). But that date label AD and BC tells the extent of the influence of Jesus on world history. But who is he?.

Today, we would look at the Identity of Jesus Christ as our title and attempt to answer a question: Who Is Jesus? Remember last week, we addressed John’s purpose for writing this book which was to prove Jesus as The Messiah and Son of God. And most importantly, that people will believe on him for life (John 20:29-31).

Now Jesus’ identity is the foundation upon which Christianity stands. If you get his identity wrong, you get Christianity and the Good News wrong. Throughout church history, many errors emerged in an attempt to explain who Christ is. And today, many of those errors are surfacing again from people who claim to be preaching deep things of Christ.

There are no new heresies, only heresies dressed up and repackaged for a new generation 

-Albert Mohler.

The word heresy simply is a false teaching that denies essential or fundamental teachings of Christianity. And the person of Jesus is the most essential teachings of the faith that has been attacked consistently throughout world history. Let me quickly share a few of these errors with you, so that when you meet them, you will know it’s an old error

Docetism: Jesus was not fully human. He only appeared to be. His human form was just a fathom or ghost. This is an error (1 John 4:1-2; 2John 1:17).
Adoptionism: Jesus was an ordinary human man who because of his moral and sinless life, God adopted him as his son. This is not true because the Bible declares all are sinners. So if Jesus was an ordinary man, then Scripture is not true in Romans 3:23
Arianism: This is considered the greatest of all controversies about Christ. It’s the error that defines Jehovah Witnesses belief. It basically says Jesus is not God, and that he was the first created being. Arianism argues that Jesus is of similar substance as God. But true Christianity argues that Jesus is of the same substance as God.

Now let’s look at some of the things the text tells us about the identity of Jesus

Jesus Preexisted Time: Pre-Existence (vv.1-2).

“In the beginning” If you are familiar with the Bible, you will know what John is doing. He begins from something familiar with his audience. He begins with the creation story “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep” (Genesis 1:1-2). Look at the beautiful similarity between the creation narration and John’s prologue: Beginning, Creation, Light and darkness… John brings all these things to point to Jesus.

You see, everything in this world has a beginning. We all have dates of birth. There was a time we never existed. And there was a time we were conceived and eventually born. But Jesus always existed. That’s the point of the opening words: “In the beginning was the word”… The word “Word” is referring to Jesus. In Greek philosophy, “word” is an abstract concept such as logic, reason or philosophy that holds the world together. The Greek word is Logos. John and the New Testament writers used the word to point to the fact that the logos is not just a logic or abstract thought but a person, Jesus. It was like Paul in Acts 17 moving from the unknown God, to the known God.

The fact that Jesus is called “the Word” is significant. For the original readers of the Gospel in the first century AD, this was a title that would resonate with Jew and Gentiles alike. Jewish readers were sufficiently familiar with Old Testament descriptions of creation to realise that “Word” and “World” were closely connected. God spoke and the world came into being…For his non-Jewish readers, the Greek concept of Logos, or ‘Reason’ as the cause of all that exists was widely acknowledged. John takes both the Jewish and Gentile understandings of the term on to a different level (Mark Johnston, Let’s Study John).

What is this different level Mark wrote about. Simply that John pointed to this “Reason” or Logic as a person—Jesus. The first thing we note then is the preexistence of Christ. Before the beginning, the Word was: “In the beginning was the word” Jesus didn’t begin to exist at a certain period in history.

Next week we will be entering the Christmas season and celebrating the birth of Christ. But the birth of Christ was not the beginning of Jesus’ life. Jesus has always existed. Before anything will ever come into being, Jesus was.. In fact we see him as the agent of creation. All of Creation owes its existence to Christ: “…without him was not anything made that was made (v. 3b)” Nothing exists outside of the creative work of Christ: “For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities— all things were created through him and for him” (Colossians 1:16). When we trace our path back to the beginning of the Bible, we are told “In the beginning God created…”. Looking at this in light of John’s words, we see Christ as the agent of creation.

And as you read the Old Testament, you will see many glimpses of Jesus’ existence. He is eternal. He transcends time and history. Jesus told the Jews he lived before Abraham (John 8:56-57) and they didn’t take it lightly at all. Look at something interesting in v.15. John says Jesus was before him, that is to say Jesus existed before him. But we know that John was conceived and born before Jesus. So how can Jesus be before him? Simple like the Abraham example. Jesus has pre-existed before John The Baptist.

Jesus Is The Second Person Of The Trinity: Co-Existence (v.1a; v.18)

The Trinity, is another essential doctrine of the Christian faith that explains the essence or nature of God. The Trinity defined is “One God in Three distinct Persons.”. The hymn Holy, Holy, Holy, sings: “God in three persons.” This doesn’t mean Christians worship three Gods, but to say God has revealed himself to us as One yet in three persons. And one of the clearest places we see this in the Bible is during Jesus’ Baptism

And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him; and behold, a voice from heaven said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased (Matthew 3:16-17).

In John 1:1, we notice “The Word” was not alone. The word was with ‘Somebody’. This means the word “co-existed with someone”. And this “someone” Scriptures tells us was God. Christ is eternal and he exists with God. Further, we are told Jesus shares attributes with that person, i.e., He Jesus was God. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” Look at v.18. It points us to a Father. So you see clearly that we are looking at two distinct persons. In John 17:5, Christ spoke of the glory He had with the Father before the world existed. So in here we have seen Father and Son. Shouldn’t we be asking where is the Spirit? Look at v.32-34.

Jesus Is God—Self-Existence

All I have said from the previous points presents us to this one important doctrine about Jesus. His divinity. Jesus is God. The opening words clearly tell us this:” and the Word was God.” He must be God to exist before creation. The Jehovah Witnesses have misinterpreted this on the technicalities of a definite article and so translate this as “a god”. But the context of their own translation shows an inconsistency. If there is only one true God, then what kind of god is Jesus as translated by JW? A false god? Then why must he be worshipped? These questions are worth dealing with.

But the NT authors clearly understood Jesus to be God. Jesus himself told his disciples “If you have seen me, you have seen the father”. A clear distinction between himself and at the same time the Father (John 14:8).

He Is Life And Light Of The World

If all things were made through him (v.3), then it follows that all creation holds their existence to him. That’s the point of v.4: “In him was life and the life was the light of men.” You see the creation narrative showing up again? We are told in Genesis 1 that the earth was dark. God said let there be light and light sprung forth. Jesus then is the source of life and light for darkness. Jesus is the Sustainer of all lives. “He upholds the universe by the word of his power” (Hebrews 1:3). Jesus is both the natural source of life and the spiritual source of life.

Spiritually, all human beings, without a saving knowledge of Jesus are in darkness, that is, living in sin and separated from God. This interpreted to mean they are dead without the light of Christ. But when we turn to Jesus from our sinfulness, he brings light and life into our dark, sinful world. This is really the argument from vv.4 up to 13.

He came to his own people to save them that’s the Jews. And more broadly he came to humanity purposely to reconcile us back to the father after human sinfulness. In v.10, we are told “He was in the the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him” (v.10). The question we will ask is, “Why” didn’t the world know him? It is because the world is dead spiritually and separated from God. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 2:14 that “The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned”. To know Christ and receive Him requires spiritual work. One has to be regenerated by the spirit to come in faith. When this happens, we are brought into God’s family by faith in Christ: “But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God” (vv.12-13).

He Is The God-Man

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth (v.14).

Another of the most contested doctrine of Christianity is the nature of Christ —his divinity and humanity ‘fused’ together in One person. This is called the hypostatic union. Jesus is fully God and fully human. God took on human flesh in Jesus Christ. He became the God-man among His creation: He “dwelt among us”. He became man and lived among His own people (1John 1:1-2). God walked among humanity in Christ and manifested His glory: “we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son” Jesus is superior over all others and the book of Hebrews describes Him as “…the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature”(Hebrews 1:3). In His glory, Christ reveals to us “grace and truth”. His coming to earth was to show us the grace of God towards humanity and lead us into the truth of God’s word.

Our Response

I have just provided you with a list of information about Jesus Christ and his identity. You will be right to ask me, and so what? What do I do with the information?

This is what you are to do with the information. The information demands a response. If Jesus is God, then a response is demanded from his people. And what’s that response? That we may believe in him. He is a King who offers his rebellious subjects a truce. He calls you to reconciliation. He calls you to faith in him (vv.11-13)