Inhaling the Eternality of Christ

An old man had a story to tell. Unbelievable--yet eternally true. Compelled by the Spirit of God he learned to rely on in youth he penned events crucial to his contemporary audience and to those who would desperately need to know the truth centuries later. It wasn't his autobiography he wanted to share but rather his encounter with Messiah. 

The man's name was John and he would write the fourth and final gospel describing what God in the flesh was like. Language would strain to fulfill this task as God's truth seems to dance beyond articulation. John would later refer to Him as Light, Lamb of God, Rabbi, Messiah and Jesus Christ.

But in the beginning was the Word. 

Eternal means to be without beginning or end, both lasting forever and always existing. Perpetual. Ceaseless. Endless. Existing outside time. 

•   In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. -John 1:1

•   He was in the beginning with God.  -John1:2

• All things came into being through Him and apart from Him, nothing came into being that has come into being. -John1:3

•   In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men.  -John1:4

• But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name. -John1:12

•  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. -John 1:14
• John (the Baptist) 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.' " -John1:15

•  No one has seen God at any time; the only begotten God who is in the bosom of the Father, He has explained Him. -John 1:18

• This is He on behalf of whom I said, 'After me comes a Man who has a higher rank than I, for He existed before me." -John 1:30

• And He (Jesus) said to him (Nathaniel) , "Truly, truly I say to you, you will see the heavens opened and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man."  -John1:51.  (Jesus was referring to Jacob's dream of angels moving from Earth to Heaven on a ladder and God standing above it--identifying himself as I AM and YAHWEH, promising an inheritance for Jacob's multitude of descendants.) 
• He (Jacob) had a dream, and behold, a ladder was set on the earth with its top reaching to heaven; and behold, the angels of God were ascending and descending on it. Genesis 28:12

​John the Apostle reveals why he wrote this gospel "... 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." -John 20:31

Or put negatively, outside of His name--there is only lifelessness. 

Jesus Christ, the eternal second person of the trinity, the "Begotten God" is He who possess all life which is our light. It is He alone who gives the right to become His children. 

Life-giver. 

Right-giver. 

Always existing. Revealer of the Father. Spirit who became flesh and stepped into time. Future predictor. Affirmed by the Holy Spirit. Served by Angels. Begotten. Existing before His earthly introduction. Creator of the world and unknown by the world. Exploding with grace. Dripping in truth. Eternal. 

John expends enormous effort to show--in chapter one, the eternality of his savior and his friend. 

It is entirely unimaginable that the Son of God would leap from His heavenly dwelling, cross the chasm from Holiness to brokenness, don the flesh of the depraved, assume the DNA of His own creation, submit to the shackles of time and geography and emotions and cravings and pain and live a perfect life--die a perfect death to give His eternal life to His children. 

But there's no need to stretch imaginations--because this isn't make-believe, but rock-solid reality. John wants readers to know this fact because both in this story and in our own--it's going to look like Jesus isn't eternal. He will seem humiliatingly mortal. Painfully irrelevant. Entirely indifferent. Deaf and blind to our suffering or unable and unwilling to do anything about it. 

 But He isn't.

To receive this eternal life--there is a grasping of Christ on a soul-level with claws of faith. Holding tightly and guarding rightly the preciousness of Christ all the while resting in the reality that it's He who really holds us. 

The contrast of heavenly and earthly things--of spiritual and physical realms, is a major theme of John's Gospel. And time-eternal exists first. 

 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

Finish Well,
Dionne