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John 1:1–18

“These things are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in his name” (John 20:31).

This year we will scale a great promontory, the highest peak in the Bible, which is the Gospel of John. John is Slide Mountain in the Catskills, Mt. Marcy in the Adirondacks, Pikes Peak in the Rockies, Mt. Everest in the Himalayas, the Matterhorn in the Alps, Mt. Fuji in Japan. John is the bride, the Synoptics are the bridesmaids; John the groom, the others the ushers. John is the gospel for which the others were made. Before John, the rest is prelude.

The Gospel of John is a story of dislocation and disappointment. Your life is such a story, too. In fact, these are the two battles of salvation, the two great battles of the salvation we work out daily in fear and trembling, are battles with dislocation and disappointment. The Gospel of John brings grace for dislocation and freedom in disappointment, and hence is great and good news!

The Battle for Identity

A freshwoman sat last week between her mom and dad, having a sandwich at the Colgate Inn. They were tightly seated, mom and dad and daughter, although the room was not full. They huddled together, like geese heading for the water. Mom and Dad drank coke and spooned soup, wordless, mute, silent. They never dared to catch each others’ eyes, so filled were each others’ eyes. They spooned and listened, and waited, for that last trip to the room, coming (you could tell) after dinner, and that last hug and that last gift and that last goodbye. There are no atheists in foxholes, and all parents pray when they leave the freshman dorm.

She roamed the world by cell phone while her parents spooned soup. A friend in Milwaukee, was it? Can you hear me now? High school sweetheart in Boston. Can you hear me now? Sister in San Diego. Can you hear me now? I could not hear her then, but I can hear her now. She was not about to let her geographical dislocation become a matter of relational disorientation. By Glory, she was carving out her own virtual dorm, her own telephonic suite, her own cyber city. What they faced in despair, she addressed in anxiety. The dislocation would come soon enough.

The great and surprising good news of Jesus Christ, in this Gospel, is that grace may be found, may especially be found, in the upheaval of dislocation. Students or parents, hear it well; future students or grandparents, hear it well: “All things were made through him and without him was not anything made that was made.”

You can do it. You will get through it.

Oh, prayer will help, and reading of the scripture and a church family and the habits of generosity and service. All will help. But it is largely and lastly Grace that will see you through.

Out they walked, the dislocated trio, arm in arm, into a dark and unforeseeable future. Is that not grace, the faith to walk into the dark?

Today’s text is from the first chapter of John, and there is bitter hurt in this sublime chapter, caused by a break with the first identity, a cutting of the umbilical cord, a leaving home, a separation from the family, a dismissal from the synagogue.

The religion of origin said, “In the beginning, God. . .” Replies John, “In the beginning was the Word.”

Inherited religion said, “In the beginning God created. . .” Rejoins John, “All things came into being through Him.”

Old time religion said, “God created the heavens and the earth.” Retorts John, “In Him was life.”

Inheritance said, “God said, ‘Let their be light.’” Rebuts John, “In Him was life, and that life was the light of all peoples, which shines in the dark.”

Old time religion said, “We are his people, the sheep of his pasture.” John retorts, “He came to his own people and his own people did not accept him.”

This Gospel is born in dislocation. The Gospel of John is written in the pain of dislocation. In John we overhear the bitter pain of the church being thrown out of the synagogue.

The community that formed this Gospel has been given the heave-ho, shown the door, given the bum’s rush, given the wet mitten by their former community. You are listening to a family feud, nineteen centuries old.

I return from summer vacation to find a thriving church community, and growth, and dislocation. A growing service to the hungry—and some dislocation. A new ministry to the homeless—with a little dislocation. A new baroque organ—did some of you sense dislocation? A completely re-colored Sunday School—laborious dislocation.

Dislocation visits every age and place. The past decade of dislocation in Rochester has yet to find full expression. Corporate dislocation: I thought this job was for life! Medical dislocation: Were we not the pride of the country in health care? Economic dislocation: Someone threw a recovery party and forgot our upstate invitation! Geographical dislocation: I left two generations to the west or east to come here; now what? No wonder we think of Ma Joad now and then.

The Gospel of John is not focused on ethics. There is only minimal ethical teaching here. One looks in vain for a sermon on the mount or plain. One searches without result for a parable with a point. One hungers without satisfaction for a wisdom saying, an epigram, a teaching on virtue. In John we have the teleological suspension of the ethical. Only the command to love remains.

Instead, the Fourth Gospel focuses on your need to become who you are.

The Battle for Imagination

I believe it is very difficult for us to appreciate the courage in John, the theological courage of this writing. One of the most precious beliefs of the earliest Christians resided in the confidence that very soon the world would come to an end and the Lord would return for his people. This expectation of the end governs the letters of Paul and the first three Gospels. It was, if you will, the bedrock belief of the primitive church. Had not Jesus preached, “There are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven”? Yes he had. And he was wrong. Had not Peter left nets, family, homeland, and life itself on the expectation of the apocalypse? Yes he had. And he was wrong. Had not Paul predicted, “We the living, the remaining, will be caught up together with him in the clouds”? Yes he had. And he was wrong.

Only John faces this grave disappointment with utter honesty. The others hold onto the old religion, the expected return. John admits delay. John has the guts to say to his people: “What we once believed is clearly not true. Let us look about us and see what this means.” And behold! In place of parousia, we find paraclete. In place of cataclysm, we find church. In place of speculation, we find spirit. In place of Armageddon we find artistry and imagination! When finally we stop chasing what is not to be, and wake up to what is, we may be utterly amazed.

Seasoned Religion said that the end was near. John says the beginning is here.

Old Time Religion saw the end of the world. John preached the light of the world.

Inherited spirituality waited for the coming of the Lord. John celebrated the Word among us, full of grace and truth.

Old Time Religion feared death, judgment, heaven, and hell. John faced them all every day.

Traditional Religion clung fiercely to an ancient untruth. John let go, and accepted a modern new truth, and hugged grace and freedom.

Our inheritance, and Matthew and Mark and Luke and Paul all looked toward the End, soon to come. John looked up at the beginning, already here. They said with Shakespeare, “All’s well that ends well.” John replied, “Gut begonnen, halb gewonnen!” (Well begun is half done.)

John alone had the full courage to face spiritual disappointment and move ahead. So we memorize John 8:32: “You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free!” Copernicus knew that truth. Galileo knew that truth. Darwin knew that truth. And Robert Lee caught that truth on the lips of Clarence Darrow: “The Bible is a book. It is a good book. It is not the only book.” All faced the need to change from inherited untruth to new insight and imagination.

Perhaps our greatest present disappointment is 9/11. We face new truth: The world is smaller and starker than we wanted to believe. We have not yet found our way out of the psychic rubble of that dreadful day. We are trying, and we are moving, but the almost unspeakable disappointment of that moment remains. Here is why: We have to change our understanding, our philosophy, our theology even. We have to face the hard fact, that the future is open, freely open, both to terror and to tenderness. And here is John. He who wrote in the ancient rubble of dislocation and disappointment, telling us something wonderful and good: The Word became flesh and dwelt among us. It is in the spirit of the Fourth Gospel that we affirmed three years ago on this Sunday: “Terror may topple the World Trade Center, but no terror can topple the World Truth Center, Jesus the Christ.”

The World Trade Center, hub of global economies may fall, the economy of grace still stands in the World Truth Center, Jesus the Christ.

The World Trade Center, communications nexus for many may fall, but the communication of the gospel stands, the World Truth Center, Jesus Christ.

The World Trade Center, symbol of national pride may fall, but divine humility stands, through the World Truth Center, Jesus the Christ.

The World Trade Center, legal library for the country may fall, but grace and truth stand, through the World Truth Center, Jesus the Christ.

These things are spoken that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in his name.

Faith is personal commitment to an unverifiable truth. It involves a leap.

Faith is an objective uncertainty, grasped with subjective certainty. It involves a leap.

Faith is the way to salvation, a real identity and a rich imagination. But it does involve a leap.

Tomorrow morning, which will it be? “In the beginning. . .” What? Creation or Grace? Covenant or Freedom? Law or Love? An eye for an eye or the second mile, the coat and cloak, the turned cheek? “In the beginning. . . was the Word.”

All of us are better when we are loved.

Now is the time to jump.

Notes from Raymond Brown’s Lectures on John

Union Theological Seminary

Spring 1978

April 27, 1978: John 1

The prologue was a hymn of the Johannine community. There are similar hymns to be found in Philippians, Colossians, and Ephesians. All of these hymns were highly Christological, and carried a high Christology. They typically begin with something prior to the material world, and they tend to move from creation to redemption. 1 Timothy 3:16 is one other example.

The prologue came from the life of the community. Perhaps it was written by the evangelist, and perhaps it was not. It certainly came from Johannine circles.

RB thinks that the gospel originally opened with John the Baptist, and with those materials. The term Word presents a realization of a problem. If one wants to present a pre-history of the earthly Jesus, one faces difficulties, trying to speak of the human Jesus before time. How do you do it? Christ Jesus is one way. Son of God is one way. Word is used in John. In the fourth century, the councils of the church decide that the Son existed from all eternity (but Jesus did not). Early on, as here, there was no such sophistication.

The Word is of course a direct connection to Genesis, though of course in a different sense. This beginning is an earlier beginning. The verb is “to be,” not “to become.” The reference is to the great IAM, which is translated “o ov”—“the existent.” The word Word has a two-fold directionality—to God, from God. The Word thus has community with both God and Man. There is a staircase parallelism here.

The last “God” in the opening has no article. Why? Because you still cannot say that the Word is the Father. This same struggle was to continue for centuries later. And there is even some struggle along the way here. This may also be simply a predicative use. (In the later New Testament books, God is predicated of Jesus Christ, but the usage is not common). There are growing Christological tendencies as the New Testament develops.

This Word must tell us about God. The Word that was God is spoken—to you. This reflection is not strange to Judaism. What is strange is the personification. Isaiah 55: God’s Word has its own reality. Both word and thing are expressed in dabar (Hebrew). The Word spoken is eternally existent. “My Word shall not return to me empty” (Habbakuk 3:5). Dabar can also be pestilence. Some read: before him went his word. This is tied into divine wisdom, a female figure. This figure is personified with God from the moment of creation. Both Proverbs and the Book of Wisdom give evidence of this. The Word is an emanation of God through which God creates. Wisdom creates things by God’s wisdom.

There is an increasing resistance to the use of the divine name. The Aramaic translation spoke of God’s “memra.” It became eventually a technical term (like Logos for us). To what degree did people sense this play on words?

Word is a term understood both in Greek and Judaic communities. The Word creates. The Word is the coming into being of life. Life here (verse 4) must be a reference to Genesis—God sharing his life with his creatures. And this life is the light of human beings. Verse 5 carries a question: Should it read “receive” or “overcome”? Or does the verse mean both?

Where does incarnation occur in this hymn? Not until after John the Baptist’s entrance. In verse 9 we hear of the coming of Jesus. With this comes a kind of pessimism of judgment. When John speaks of world, he speaks of those who do not receive Jesus. But those who accept him became God’s children. Light vs. Darkness. From then on he is speaking to his own.

Introductory Material: February 15, 1978

The author’s hope is to lead people to the light by bringing his own community to the truth. “And believing you may have life.” He has an almost unique purpose for writing: Is its thrust “come to faith” or “continue in faith”? It is probably the latter. John’s purpose is Christological. He is exploring the identity of Jesus Christ. This has come in part out of the community history. The real problem is the claim to divinity, which is rejected by the synagogue. John’s community is caused to suffer for its Christology.

Hence the Gospel becomes quite different. Jesus comes to tell of God and of God’s demands. There is no mention of the kingdom of God. In John, Jesus is the kingdom of God realized. Jesus is the mirror of God. So, we see the logic of the early church: Kingdom of God talk gives way quite early to Jesus talk. The act of faith centers on Jesus, not on the kingdom. This probably reflects outside interests, but also inner Christian questions as well. John is not satisfied to identify Jesus as the foundation of the community. Rather, Jesus is the vital principle of the community. Here the church is taking over the role of salvation. Jesus is the principle of life, the vine and the branches. If you are not a branch, you do not have life. Thus John has thrown out foundational language, in order to connect things to Jesus’ life rather than to his directives. John wants to mold, of words and deeds, the living truth for community life.

This must be a voice of warning, and complaint, as the institution grows. The Spirit is the presence of Jesus. Thus an abiding presence through spirit is affirmed, unperturbed by time and space. In his teaching, Jesus speaks of the most simple, temporal ideas for eternity.

Life is the term John gives to Jesus’ gift of God’s own life, and this life is the nature of the Christian message. For him, the natural life is not as real as the life Jesus gives. Real love is God’s, as with life. John talks quite realistically about eternal things. We receive God’s eternal life and nourish it with water and with food. This is not abstraction. It is concrete language about Jesus and as such it is a somewhat dangerous message.

John’s Christology brings him into conflict with other Christians. His pre-existent Logos is tough for people to swallow. Jesus’ followers never really understood Jesus fully. There is no mention of pre-existence in other books. Here there is a different sonship. Christology is not a matter of conception, but a matter of incarnation, based on the pre-existent principle.