The Word Pt. 3 - John 1:16-28
The Word III
John 1:16-28
Intro: What is grace? (unmerited favor and goodness, undeserved kindness…)
We are continuing the series a study in the Gospel of John… the beauty of this book is that it introduces us to who JESUS is… John, as a disciple, was writing to Jews and Gentiles to explain to them the nature of Jesus Christ and knowing the nature of Jesus Christ is the most important topic we can ever study.
And I want to remind you of the first truth about Jesus John expresses because it is important and will be the point that John makes throughout… Jesus is WITH God and IS God.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
Jesus is WITH God and IS God… both of these are relevant.
John is making this argument from the first sentence of his book and he will continue to make that argument throughout the book.
And this is important… Jesus being God is important.
It’s important for the authority of the ministry and message that John is about to recount. It's important for the work Jesus comes to do.
And it's important for those who follow the Christ to whom John introduces us.
So this important message about the nature of Jesus, the man John introduces us to, is important and we see it reiterated every step of the way and we see it reiterated in this morning’s reading.
16 For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. 17 For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. 18 No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father's side, he has made him known.
Let’s stop here first and take note of something extremely important… now we see again John making the argument for Christ’s divinity... the NIV captures the intent of John’s words a little better
No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known.
Now as important as the expression of God’s divinity is here there is something as important we have to understand about Jesus as it relates to our walk, our lives, our world… and it is found in verse 16 and 17…
16 For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. 17 For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
Or again how the NIV states it:
16 Out of his fullness we have all received grace in place of grace already given.
The heart of the mission of Jesus Christ is to expand the grace of God to His people… grace upon grace, grace in place of grace already given.
We serve a gracious God, God is a gracious God and the full manifestation of that grace is expressed in Jesus Christ.
Understanding the grace of God is an important theological and personal truth that we have lost too easily and why we have lost it is because we have lost sight of who God is.
Now John steps in and says ‘we have received grace upon grace, or grace in the place of grace already given’.... Bishop Handley Moule, illustrated the meaning of John’s declaration by describing a river. “Stand on its banks,” he wrote, “and contemplate the flow of waters. A minute passes, and another. Is it the same stream still? Yes. But is it the same water? No.” The old water, he explained, had been displaced by new—”water instead of water.”...
God’s grace is extended to us continually but there is a new grace, an overwhelming grace, a replacing grace available BECAUSE of Christ and His work.
What we get here is the fulfillment, the completion of the work of God the Father, started in the OT but brought to fruition through the work of God the Son…
from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. 17 For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
The law was given through Moses, grace and truth came through Jesus… the law given by God through Moses is an expression of God’s grace… provided a pathway to relationship to Him.
BUT it was never anything more then an expression that pointed to the need and coming of Jesus Christ… in the Old Covenant God revealed His holiness and our unworthiness, in the Old Covenant God revealed His capacity of grace and our capacity to fail.
Paul explains this idea in Romans 7… He says, the law shows us our failing, the law establishes what is righteousness, God gave it to set the standard for a relationship with Him BUT in our humanity we kept failing… does that make the law wrong or evil? No he says ‘the law is spiritual but I am unspiritual’... and then he explains the struggle and the PROMISE revealed in the old covenant:
Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. 22 For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; 23 but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. 24 What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death?
This could be the declaration of the people of God following Malachi, the last book of the OT, and proceeding Matthew the first book of the New, what a wretched people we are who will rescue us? The Law has shown us our failing but it hasnt give us our salvation but the answer comes… and Paul declares it in the next verse:
25 Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!
Jesus is God’s grace upon grace to us… the law was given by God, reaching out to His people to show them life and truth, to show them His face and the hope that could be found in Him but we can’t climb that ladder, we cant cross the divide and it was always meant to show us that Jesus was coming, it was always pointing to Him… Jesus makes that statement in John 5 to the pharisees:
39 You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, 40 yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life. (John 5)
The message of John to this point is Jesus is God and He came as GRACE extended to man, to us. A grace not generic in nature but a grace that:
frees us from the separation of sin
that frees us from the slavery of sin
that frees us from the penalty of sin
In closing I want to point something out to you about our text, all that John writes here about the grace of God extended through Jesus Christ in response to the law given through Moses lays the groundwork for John the Baptist’s message as the forerunner of Christ… the account we read was the priests and levites going to John and saying are you the Messiah, john said no, are you Elijah, no, are you the Prophet no… He said…
“I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way of the Lord,’
He said of Jesus…
he who comes after me, the strap of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie.
He said…
I baptize you with water but He will baptize you in the Holy Spirit…
and He said…
behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.
What we know about Jesus because of this first chapter is Jesus is the grace upon grace of God extended to mankind that if we repent of our sins they will be forgiven and we will receive the Holy Spirit to dwell with us providing, by God’s grace upon grace, victory over sin every day.