Today’s Passage: John 1:1–5, 14
John does not open his Gospel with a birth in a stable. He opens before the beginning itself, reaching back past Bethlehem, past Abraham, past the very first sunrise, to introduce someone he calls “the Word.”
As you read, hold this: Jesus did not begin at Bethlehem. He has always been God.
Context Echoes of Genesis
“In the beginning” are the very first words of Genesis 1:1, and John reaches for them on purpose, knowing every Jewish reader would hear the echo right away. Genesis opens with God speaking the world into being, and John now tells us who was doing the speaking.
John 1:1–2 (BSB)
¹ 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.
Read verse 1 slowly, for it makes three claims and every one of them matters. The logos, pronounced LOH-goss. Strong's G3056, word, reason, the spoken expression of thought. Greek thinkers used this word for the reason behind everything that exists. John says this Word is not just an idea. He is a real Person, and He was already there before anything was made. already existed “in the beginning,” before anything else came to be. The Word “was with God,” which means He is someone and not merely something. And the Word “was God,” fully God, not almost God or a little like God. John is not softening anything here; he is stating a plain and glorious fact.
John 1:3–5 (BSB)
³ Through Him all things were made, and without Him nothing was made that has been made. ⁴ In Him was life, and that life was the light of men. ⁵ The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
Only the Maker can make everything, so if Jesus made everything that exists, then He cannot be one more thing that was made. He stands on the Maker’s side, not the creature’s side.
Verse 4 tells us that life itself was in Him, not simply given out by Him, and verse 5 promises something our hearts needed to hear: the darkness has never once managed to put that light out, not then, and not now.
John 1:14 (BSB)
¹⁴ The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the one and only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
The Word who was God put on flesh, and He did so without ever ceasing to be God. He became fully human as well, moving in close among real people, in a real town.
“Made His dwelling” points us back to the tabernacle in Exodus, the tent where God’s presence lived among His people in the wilderness. Now God’s presence no longer lives in a tent of cloth; He lives in a body, walking real roads and eating at real tables.
Study notes The same claim, later
Hebrews says the very same thing in its own words, telling us that the Son carries God’s own glory and holds the whole universe together by His word.
"The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of His nature, upholding all things by His powerful word. After He had provided purification for sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high." Hebrews 1:3 (BSB)
Jesus did not begin at Bethlehem. He has always been God.
Personal Application
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If Jesus has always been God, how does that change the way you listen to Him this week?
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What is one doubt about Jesus that you could bring to Him honestly, instead of hiding it away?
Today’s decision: I will say one true thing about Jesus out loud today, even quietly: “You are God, and You came for me.”
Pray to Close
The central truth: Jesus did not begin at Bethlehem. He has always been God.
Give thanks: thank God that the Word who made everything chose to move in close and dwell among us.
Ask: ask Him for eyes to see Jesus as He truly is, and never smaller than He is.
Confess: tell Him about the times you have treated Jesus like a good teacher instead of God Himself.
Worship for Today
What a Beautiful Name · Hillsong Worship
This song opens where John 1 opens, with the Word who was with God from the very start, and then it follows Him as He walks among us as a man. Sing it as your own answer to today’s passage.
Listen: