Jesus Our Creator

One of the most significant declarations in that creed though is,

who for us men and for our salvation came down and was incarnate and was made man.

Behind the creed is a simple, clear principle. If Jesus is not God, we are not saved. If Jesus is not God, we are not saved. Salvation is the heart of this confession. Because we have sinned against God, we need to be restored by God, and the creed is emphatic that we must confess the full deity of the son because our salvation depends upon who he is.

If you're new with us, we've been walking through the book of Matthew. Here at Advent, we're gonna take the next four weeks to walk through John's prologue. That's chapter one, verses one to 18, what we've just heard read. It is a robust theology of the Father and the Son, God and the Word. If we go back to Matthew, if you remember, this is the book of genealogy. Jesus, the son of Abraham, son of David. That also is alluding back to Genesis. The beginning, the one who's promised to Abraham, the one who's promised to David. All the gospels proclaim and confess the same Jesus. Different angles, different emphases, but the same one true savior of us all. And it goes back to the history of Genesis through Malachi.

John tells us at the end of his gospel that he writes these things so that we might believe. Our goal is we Think about and meditate upon this prologue, this rich theology that John presents in 18 verses. Our hope is that it helps us believe. It encourages our faith in Jesus.

There's three points from the first five verses we'll be looking at this morning. First, Jesus is eternal. Second, Jesus is creator. Third, Jesus is life-giving.

Jesus is eternal

Our first point, Jesus is eternal. Here, the words again, verses one and two.

In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God. He was in the beginning with God.

John's gospel opens in this wonderfully provocative way. It's a clear allusion back to Genesis 1 that we heard read earlier. In the beginning, God. Now, in the beginning was the word. It's a strong tie and allusion back to make it clear Jesus is God who was in the beginning.

John chooses the word, the reference to Jesus as the word for many reasons. We know the word is the second person of the Trinity. Properly named the only begotten son, the son of God. We know him as Jesus, the Yahweh saves. The word was in the beginning. He's the word because he's also the perfect revelation of God. We'll see this at the end of John. We heard or just read,

no one has ever seen God, but he has made him known.

But the reference in verse one, in the beginning was the word, is a reference to his eternal nature. He is not having a beginning or an end. He is before the time-space continuum was created. He is before the heavens and the earth. He is not a creature bound. to this earth. He is eternal.

Now those next two phrases we have to understand together. The word was with God and the word was God. That first declaration is relational. The word was with God. And it's an unusual word for with. It actually means toward. Nearness is what's emphasized. The second declaration in the word was God is a nature declaration. What he is, what kind of being he is.

The relational declaration. The word was with God. That is emphatic a little bit later in the prologue in John 117, the one who comes from the father's side. And the word side is better translated bosom. The one who is so near to the Father. The one who is near in relationship. You can't think about one without the other. As their proper names reveal, Father and Son are near one another.

The nature declaration and the word was God. This is important as we need to know how to categorize different things. You all, before you sat down, categorized that thing you're sitting in as a seat that would hold you. We know how to categorize certain things, and we read from Genesis earlier. We know how to recognize a monkey, a zebra, a blue jay, a sea bass. Okay, God gave us a duck-billed platypus. We don't know what that is. Here, the Word was God. It's declaring the nature of the Word. There's many kinds of creatures. mammals, birds, fish, reptiles. There's many kinds of humans. There's two kinds of humans, mainly in God's image, male and female. There's two kinds of humans, male and female. There are heavenly creatures, those without bodies, angels, and there's earthly creatures that have a body.

But the biggest and most significant distinction we can make is creator, created. God, not God. eternal God creator in every other temporal created being. The word is eternally God by nature. The word is eternally God and he's also with God. And that is how that verse two wraps up these four declarations together. He was in the beginning with God. There's a timestamp that's important. eternal outside of time. Now, the word was with God.

A few rules for reading scripture that I hope are helpful for you. There's times where it's just clear Jesus is God, and there's declarations we'll look at later to consider that. There's also when Jesus is next to God, and here, the word was with God, that's a relational idea, just like whenever Jesus is next to the Father, it's the Son and the Father, Jesus is next to God, it's the Son and the Father. There's a way in which we have to learn how to read the rest of scripture according to the Great Commission, because we're baptized into the one name, the one God, who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

The significance of Jesus being eternal, and he is not bound to this world by nature. He is not dependent upon this world by nature. He stands outside of this world and yet descends down and enters into it. The word is independent. Let's be clear, by nature, he does not need this world, but by promise, he has entered into it. It is only because God promised salvation that the independent word has come to be with us and like us and therefore as a human depend upon the very son he created. The word is not distant or disinterested. He has come down desiring the good of his creation. He has come down to reverse the curse that we have set this world into. He is the promise of Abraham and the promise of David to be the forever king, to bring about the right and good rule of God. John starts out way before that in the beginning. We understand he is divine. He is eternal. So the principle behind the Nicene Creed, if he is not God, we are not saved. It was written over against Aryans who denied the full deity, and if you wanna understand their simple mantra, their simple phrase,

there was a time when the sun was not. There was a time when the sun was not.

They deny his eternal existence. They deny the word was in the beginning.

They'll elevate Jesus. They want to make Jesus great, just like many other religions today. They want to exalt him in some way, but he can't be fully God. They're not reading John correctly. Again, if the word is not fully God, you are not truly saved. The word was in the beginning, and now he has come to provide us with eternal life. Jesus can give what he has. The most well-known verse in John's gospel, probably the most well-known verse in the New Testament.

God so loved the world that he sent his only begotten son so that whoever believes in him would not perish but have eternal life.

He is able to give eternal life because he is eternal. He is able to give us what he has. He never has not existed. He has always existed, but he will give us the blessing of having eternal life with him. We have a beginning unlike him, but he will give us life with him forever.

John ties this all the way back to creation, I believe, because we have to understand Jesus is a new beginning. Christmas is supposed to be celebrating God's blessing of a new beginning. This is why we speak of hope at Christmas. The God of grace and the God of glory sent his son, sent his word to become with us. to join with us, to add to himself humanity, so that we would have hope that we can have a new beginning. Just as there was a beginning with creation, a whole new form of existence, with Christ, he enters into our world to give us a new beginning, a hope that we do not have to live in sin.

The Christmas season is supposed to be of good cheer, hope, peace, and joy. For many, sadly, it stirs up depression. Despair. Some of that is because we made Christmas something it's not ought to be. We bought into the lie of consumerism and sentimentality. If you're worried about the next few weeks because of what it's supposed to bring, all the promises of joy and peace, let me tell you, there is a way in which you can receive that joy and peace. Believe in Jesus Christ, the eternal God who entered into our world. so that he could die for your sin, so that you could repent of the sin that hinders you, that entangles you, that ensnares you. He has come to give new and eternal life.

I believe John in this prologue in verses one and two, he introduces important concepts for us. They're gonna introduce what is gonna be even more challenging later on because Well, John is an Israelite, and he's writing to Israelites. And one of the key verses in the Old Testament is,

Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is one.

But if you're doing the math in verse one, that one God is God in word. If you're doing the math in John 17 and 18, that one God is Father and Son. He's setting up the categories. There is one God by nature. But there's relations in that one God of father, son, spirit. Or here, God and word. Jesus can make it very clear he believes he's God. He calls himself the I Am, referring himself to even Yahweh. He calls God his own father, making himself equal with God. He will claim to have the same authority as God. John is setting up the rest of his gospel with these categories. He is by nature God. He is eternal. and he is in relation with God as the Word.

Again, that reference is chosen for a couple of reasons. Jesus is the perfect revelation of God. We can appreciate that because we remember John 14, Philip says,

show me the Father

, and what does Jesus say?

When you've seen me, you've seen the Father.

He's the perfect revelation of God.

The word is our creator

The second, The word is drawn from Genesis one because he is the creator. Let's look at verse three. Our second point, the word is our creator. Listen to the two statements that go side by side.

All things were made through him and without him was not anything made that was made.

Let us take a moment and ponder how those two statements relate to each other. Don't look at me, ponder how those two statements relate to each other. Notice the grammar. They're significant. They're saying the same thing. Kind of proverbial in that way. They parallel each other. He's writing this statement because it's the most important statement you can understand about Jesus. And he's saying it in the most absolute robust way. He's making an affirmation and he's making a denial. All things were made through him. And in case you're confused about what he means by all things, he comes back and he makes it clear there is nothing without him that was made, that was, nothing was made, that was made without him. Everything that's been made is made through him and he made all things. That is the crispest way to tighten up a theological declaration. The affirmation of what it means or the denial of what it doesn't mean. Jesus, the word, the son, is the creator.

Now we, this is gonna build up a little bit of an argument here. We read earlier from Hebrews one. If you go back to Hebrews 1,

through Him, He also created the world.

Who's He there? Well, it's God the Father. God created the world through Him. Key operative word, through. God the Father created the world through Him, according to Hebrews 1. They're both creating, they're both creator.

Colossians 1, the grand Christ hymn that Hume preached on a couple of Wednesdays ago. It praises him as the creator of all things and then the head of the church, the new creation. And in that first declaration, that hymn proclaims, by him, Jesus,

all things were created, heaven and earth. He is before all things.

Now, Hewitt showed us that Colossians to him is very important. Because as soon as you start thinking Jesus is less than he is as God, you start adding to him your own religion. As soon as you start reducing Jesus to anything less than almighty, perfect, absolute God, before all things, you will end up adding to him your own false Religion. You need to know who God is to know how to properly worship him.

The third text. 1 Corinthians 8, 6.

For one God, the Father, from whom all things, and for whom we exist, and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and through whom we exist.

Notice here, we've got a wonderful theological interpretive text to give us a key. All things are from the Father through the Son. They are both creator. They are both necessary for creation. It's wonderfully consistent. There's a creator-creation distinction. There is God creator eternal, there's everything else temporal created, and the Son, the Word, is on the side of creator.

But we see a distinction in that relationship. All things are from the Father through the Son. That helps us understand how John 1 and 2 relate to John 3. God spoke this one to existence. If you heard earlier, Genesis 1, if you read it over and over again, how did everything come into existence? God said, God said, God said, that the very word of God is the means by which he creates all things. It's not an impersonal word. It's the second person of the Trinity.

Significant. God creates ex nihilo. That's Latin for out of nothing. God creates ex nihilo. He doesn't have a design. He doesn't have pre-made parts. He speaks and that which he declares exists. The son is that very power of the word of God that makes things exist that once did not exist. And again, that tight theological assertion and negation, all things were made through him. He is not made. In case you're missing that, without him was not anything made that was made. He is creator.

Only God can save you

Now why does this matter to you? One, he's your creator, you depend upon him. He's your creator, he's worthy of your worship. He spoke everything into existence that exists He's not a mechanic. He doesn't need things to build something. In his perfect power and his goodness, he created what was good. The word being the creator, having the power to create, being the one through whom all things create, is the foundation for the Nicene principle, if he is not fully God, we are not saved. Only God can save you. And while we normally talk about how only God can forgive you, I'm gonna talk about it in a different way based upon John 1 through 5 here.

It's God who originally made us in His image. It's God who spoke those incredible words in our likeness, in our image. What an incredible designation and duty. What an incredible privilege among all His creation to reflect Him and His glory and His goodness. God created us in that declaration by His word that we would be His glorious creatures, to spread His glory, to proclaim His glory, to exercise the dominion of His glory. But we decided we were gonna do the one thing God told us not to do. Eat of that one tree, of all the trees. We rebel against him. We would choose our own way rather than gladly and happily recognize the wonderful position he's given us. In a desire to become greater than God made us, which is impossible. Oh, please believe that. God gives you what's best. In a desire to be like God, We lost the likeness he made us in. The very word that created us in that likeness has come with the same power to renew us. That's significant because you cannot repent your way out of your own sin on your own. You can't clean yourself up enough. to become like God again. You can't clean yourself up enough to reflect Him in the glory of His image. You can't, in your own strength, repent your way back to God. No, we're defiled and corrupt within. The sickness we have, it destroys us. We have a defilement dilemma. We must be made new by the same power that made us in the beginning. If He is not fully God, you are not fully saved.

That nature He created us in, to be good, to be for His glory, to even be glorious because we reflect Him, we've defiled it. We've corrupted it. And we can't repent our way out of that on our own. But God, who spoke us into existence, sent his word into this creation. So the very power with which he created us, he renews us and restores us so that we can grow back up into that image. I don't normally tell you how I'm plagiarizing someone, but I'm gonna go ahead and confess it. I basically am preaching to you from Athanasius on the incarnation. What I am calling our defilement dilemma because we were made so good and so glorious for God, that's our defilement dilemma. But what he calls, what he points out in his book is the divine dilemma.

Because after we've sinned, what God created for his glory is now defaming to God. What God created for his goodness and reflection of him is now defaming him. And there's a way in which if we can continue in this way, if his image ends, it's to the detriment of his glory. If we were to continue in this way in disillusion, because the way Athenaeus argues, the more we sin, the more we move away from being that image. The more we deny who we truly are. So we are ultimately killing our own selves in sin, defaming God, growing, sadly, in sin.

So the dilemma would be letting us just deteriorate, not his image. The other part of the dilemma is that God must keep his word. He said we must die if we sin. And when Athanasius considers this, he says it's a monstrous idea that God would lie. If he destroys us, he failed at making us in his glory. If he does not, he fails to keep his word. And Athanasius says,

what is God in his goodness to do?

He sends his word to renew us. He sends his word so that whoever believes in Jesus is restored to that image. He takes the defilement away by putting it upon His Son. He takes the defilement away by giving us a new life by His Holy Spirit.

Athanasius says,

He alone has the natural fitness to recreate everything, and by taking on our nature is worthy to suffer on our behalf.

Christian, we must believe something. We're a new creation because Jesus as was raised from the dead. He united himself with us in covenant. He took upon our human nature so that he could create us anew. He could make us born again. Christian, Christmas is a time to realize you have new life, resurrected life. You're called now to follow Christ and grow up to be like him because of his divine power.

Jesus alone can pay your sin debt because he suffered for you as an innocent, good man. Praise God. But forgiveness, but you can be forgiven because of Christ's death. Praise God, you can be forgiven because of Christ's death. But it gets even better than forgiveness. Christian, if you're living a life where you're constantly going into sin and asking for forgiveness, that's not the life Jesus died for you to enjoy. He died and rose again so that you could put off sin and put on His new nature, so that you could resist that sin that's entangling.

If our gospel just stops at forgiveness, and it always starts with forgiveness, but if the gospel stops at forgiveness, we lose the gospel that says you're a new creation, born again by the power of the Holy Spirit, renewed within with new desires, being transformed in your mind. You're forgiven and restored by the very power that spoke the word into existence. You have been declared forgiven and renewed.

Christian, if you're weary of worry about repeated sin and failure, left asking forgiveness upon forgiveness. Turn to him who richly forgives you and turn to him to walk in his new creation power. He is risen from the dead. That is the new life we get to enjoy. Meditate upon Romans 6.11.

Consider yourself dead to sin and alive in Christ Jesus.

Church, may we learn to walk in that newness together. Later in Jesus' gospel, or John's gospel, we'll see how this creation power is represented. John's gospel is separated in two halves. First half is the first three years of his ministry. The second half is one week, the Passion Week.

The last sign given before he goes into Jerusalem one last time is He understands and hears that Lazarus, his friend, has died. And as he hears, he waits that he's sick, and then he waits, and he comes to the funeral site where people are crying. And he speaks. Lazarus, come out. He who has the word and power to create everything out of nothing. He who has the word and power to simply speak to a dead man in the grave, Lazarus, come out.

He's with us today. He speaks. He invites you to believe in him. And the very power that created everything out of nothing, the very power that raised Lazarus from the dead to come out of the grave, He gives you eternal life. He gives you new life, not to keep falling into sin and practicing sin, but to enjoy Him, your Creator, as a new creation, to be changed in your thoughts, desires, and practices.

He is life-giving

The last two verses, I'm going to be short, because that's what Daniel gets to start with next week. I know none of you believe I'll be short about anything. He is life-giving. Verse four,

and him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

We've already discussed, he is life, he gives life, he speaks life. The word was in the beginning, the word is divine, the word is with God, he's the son of the father, the word created all things, and now the, in him was life. Now life is light. He who designed you, he has come again to give you the life he intended for you.

That life, it means we must depend upon him. There is no life without Jesus, there's only destruction. There is no life without Jesus, there's only death. There is no life without faith in Jesus who gives new life to all who believes in him. Again, this is why John wrote the book. So that you would believe in him and in him you would have eternal life.

He restores us from our destructive ways. His life is equated with light. That light shines the darkness. And there's two things here I want us to consider about darkness. There's a darkness of the world. All the evil all over the place that we know way too much about. His light shines that darkness and the darkness does not overcome it. His light has come to renew all of creation.

The second way I wanted to think about that darkness is the darkness in your own sinful heart. We can too often just think about that darkness way out there that is terrifying, the evil we hear about over and over again, how will God restore this whole world? But man, if we look inside, that's also terrifying, isn't it? the sin and corruption and deception that resides here.

Praise be to God. His light enters in and our darkness doesn't overcome it. His light enters in and produces the power we need to conquer the evil desires we have, to put away the sin that so easily hinders us.

Christian, I'm curious, this is a conversation over lunch, which one's harder for you to believe? That God would actually overcome all the evil out there or God would actually conquer the evil in here? Which one's harder for you to believe? Both must be true. We trust him because he is our savior. We worship him because he is our God. We obey him because he is our creator. I pray we would see he has the authority to forgive us of our sin as our creator. I pray we see he has the power to renew us as the very word by which all things are created and created new. I pray we see that we can repent and know his grace in turn to be closer to him.

Will you pray with me? Father, we thank you that you promised to save your people and that you are true to your word, that you cannot lie. We thank you that in the power of the gospel and the clarity of your word, we can see that you kept your word, even though it was costly. We thank you that by the very word you created all things, by that same word who became flesh, you are renewing all things.

Protect us from fear, anxiety, despair. Pray that we would have great hope because we know you and your great work of salvation. I pray for those who are in the terrifying, spin cycle of Satan, of temptation and guilt. Lord, may they look up to you, the creator. May they know the power of Christ who makes them a new creation. May they learn how not only to ask for forgiveness, but to walk in the newness of Christ.

Thank you for not leaving us in our own corruption. but making us renewed in Christ. In his name we pray, amen.