John 1:1-13 - What Was I Made For?
Main Idea: We must intentionally love and learn about the God who came to earth to save us from sin and its consequences.
YOU WERE MADE TO KNOW JESUS PERSONALLY (vs. 1-5)
Jesus is God.
Jesus is your Creator.
Jesus is the Sustainer of your life.
YOU WERE MADE TO MAKE JESUS KNOWN TO OTHERS (vs. 6-9)
God has created you specifically to tell certain people about Him.
God has not made you to hoard Him or ignore His mission.
YOU WERE MADE TO ENJOY GOD AND HIS FAMILY (vs. 10-13)
Christ wants you to know Him personally, not just know about Him.
Christ wants to make you a part of His larger family.
God’s family isn’t merit-based, but grace-based.
Sermon Transcript (Auto-Transcribed by YouTube)
I want to give a little bit of an introduction to the book of John. The Gospel of John was written by the Apostle John, who was one of Jesus' twelve disciples, and one of those that was in his inner circle of three.
That was Peter, and then James and John, the sons of Zebedee. Jesus gave James and John the nickname, the Sons of Thunder. James and John were the boisterous ones.
If there was something audacious to do, they were the ones that did it.
They were the ones that were so bold as to go up to Jesus after he told his disciples, hey, I'm going to be taken, arrested by the chief priests and the scribes, and they're going to put me on trial, and they're going to kill me.
And three days later, I'm going to rise from the dead. So Jesus tells them this, the Gospel. And their response is not, wow, like, why is this happening?
What's the importance of this? James and John go up to Jesus, and they say, hey, when you're like in your kingdom, when you're in your glory, can we sit at your right and your left hand?
Like, can we be, you know, the prime minister and the, you know, chief financial officer of the kingdom? That was their concern. That's what they wanted to do.
When they passed by places that didn't want to hear Jesus' message, as they did in Samaria, their call to Jesus was, hey, can we bring down fire and brimstone on this town that didn't want to listen to us?
And Jesus goes, you have no idea what kind of attitude, what kind of spirit you are talking through. This is the guy that wrote this epistle.
What's interesting about this is John never specifically names himself in this account of Jesus' life, that though John shows up a couple of times through the narrative, he doesn't even say, I did this. He doesn't say, John did this.
He calls himself the disciple that Jesus loved. Through a lifetime of volatility, of self-centeredness, God turned the son of thunder into a person that, as he thought about his relationship with his God, his statement was, Jesus loved me.
My identity is found in the love that Jesus has for me. John was an eyewitness to all of the big events in Jesus' life. His baptism, his transfiguration, his crucifixion, the empty grave, and his post-resurrection appearances.
It was the last of the Gospels to be written, that as we look at Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, Matthew, Mark, and Luke give us a lot of the details about Jesus' life, where he was born, who his parents were, his earliest times, we would read about
the manger, we would read about his flight, his departure into Egypt. We'd read all of that in Matthew and in Luke.
And the other Gospels are very concerned with telling us about all of the miracles that Jesus did, that he healed the sick, he cast out demons, he had power over the wind and the waves.
John, on the other hand, only gives us somewhere around 11 miracles of Jesus. And it's in a book that's about 22 chapters long. He only gives you a miracle about every two chapters.
John's concern is to let us know who Jesus is and why he came. He tells us that at the end of chapter 21.
He says, I've written what I have so that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing, you may have a life in his name. John had two purposes in writing this gospel. Number one, to let you know who Jesus is.
He's the Messiah. He's the promised coming King. He is God himself, God in the flesh.
He wants you to know who Jesus is, and he wants you to know what Jesus came to accomplish.
He came to accomplish salvation for you, that you who were alienated from God because of your sin, because of rebellion against a holy God, that you could be reconciled, that you could be loved by him.
As we study John's gospel piece by piece over the next two years, we'll see again and again that God loves every person, and he calls everyone back into the relationship that he made us for.
We'll see this truth from the very beginning, verses 1-13 of chapter one, where John lets us know that we must intentionally love and learn about the God who came to earth to save us from sin and its consequences.
John is writing to the Greek speaking Roman world of the first century, where great philosophers like Aristotle and Plato and Socrates had discussed for centuries what the greatest fundamental core of the universe was.
Today, you might talk about the atom or the quark. If you're in science fiction, you might talk about the force that envelops everything. What's the central fundamental character of our universe?
And to the Greeks, they thought it was logos. It was wisdom. It was knowledge.
It was the bare essence of our universe. And that's where John starts off his goth with the logos.
But he gives us a whole bunch of borrowed words from the Old Testament so that we would know what he's talking about when he references the logos, or as you would have in your Bible today, the word. Our passage today says this.
I'm going to read through it, and then we'll look piece by piece at what God's word has for us today, all answering the question that John answers for us, what was I made for?
The answer is a relationship with the God that made you and loves you and has pursued you in the person of Jesus Christ. The passage says this, John 1-1, in the beginning was the word, the logos, the most fundamental part of creation.
And the word was with God. We just went through Genesis 1 where we read, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. And here John tells us there was someone with God in the beginning.
It says, the word was with God and the word was God. There's not some lesser deity here. It is God himself.
It says, he was with God in the beginning. All things were created through him. And apart from him, not one thing was created that has been created.
This God, this most important part of creation, this most important part of our universe, he created everything. Verse four, in him was life, and that life was the light of man.
That light shines in the darkness, and yet the darkness did not overcome it. There was a man sent from God whose name was John. The other gospel accounts would tell us this is John the Baptist.
This is not John the writer of this particular book. This is a different John. This man sent from God whose name was John, he came as a witness to step into the courtroom of our world to testify about the light so that all might believe through him.
He, John, was not the light, but he came to testify about the light. The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world. He, Jesus, was in the world, and the world was created through him, and yet the world did not recognize him.
He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. But to all who did receive them, he gave them the right to be children of God, to those who believe in his name.
These were born not of natural descent, or of the will of the flesh, or of the will of man, but of God.
Today, as we look at John's grandiose look at the history of mankind, and how Jesus stepped into history 2,000 years ago, we're going to see this truth.
We must intentionally love and learn about the God who came to earth to save us from sin and its consequences. Let's take a moment and pray. We'll dive into the passage.
Dear Jesus, thank you. Thank you that though we were far away, we were your enemies, we were estranged, we did not pursue you, we didn't follow after you, that you came for us, that Lord, nothing forced you down from heaven.
You came because you wanted a relationship with us, and you left perfection and glory to step down into time and space, to become a human, to go through every struggle and hardship and heartache that we do, so that you could offer us life.
God, may we experience that new life today. We love you. In your name we pray, amen.
First off today, I want us to see that you were made to know God personally. Why were you made? No matter whether you're 82 or eight months.
I don't think I see any eight months. Eight months old is in here. Whatever your age, whatever your background, wherever you're from, whatever you've done, you were made to know God personally.
We can see this in verses one through five, beginning with the truth, that to know Jesus personally is to know that Jesus is God. Verse number one, in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
He was with God in the beginning. Today, Jesus is God. He is not a lesser God.
He is not just a good teacher. He is the divine being to whom we owe our existence and all of our life and all of our worship. Some people have tried to put Jesus into a box to say he was just a good teacher or a good man or just a prophet.
But the truth of the matter, as worked out in this last century by author CS. Lewis, was this fact. Jesus made some claims that very much narrow who he could possibly be.
Because he claimed to be God. He claimed to be the promised Messiah. And because of those claims, there are only three possibilities.
Number one, that he said those things, truly believed them, but he wasn't. And so he's crazy. He's a lunatic.
Or he knew that what he was saying was false and that he was leading people down a wrong path and knowingly lying to them. That would make him a liar. Or he was right and correct.
In what he said and that he intended to say it. He's either a lunatic, a liar, or the Lord. He isn't crazy as we look at his interactions, as we look at the accounts that we would read, even of the eyewitnesses to his life here on earth.
As we look at what was written by Jewish historians and Roman historians from the first and second century, we know that he genuinely believed what he had said and that he was so persuasive in what he said that people believed it.
He wasn't just a crazy person. We also know that he wasn't a liar. There wasn't anything that he gained from it.
He, by his own words, didn't have a place to sleep at night. There was no guaranteed bed where he could lay his head. He did not gain financially from what took place.
Instead, he, just like anyone else, paid taxes both to Rome and to the local religious places. He wasn't a liar. He had nothing to gain from it.
When people wanted to give him political authority, he refused it and said, My kingdom is not from this world. He's not a liar. He's not a lunatic and he's not a liar.
He is the Lord that he truly claimed to be. As God, Jesus knows all that he wants to know. He's omniscient.
He can do everything that he wants to do. He is omnipotent and he is present wherever he wants to be. He is omnipresent.
He is perfectly holy, just, righteous, kind, gracious, loving, and patient. Whatever God is, Jesus is, because Jesus is God. Today, maybe you are new to the church scene.
Maybe you came along with a family member and you don't really know a whole lot about Jesus or about Christianity or what the Bible says. Maybe you've thought that Jesus was just some sort of lesser God or lesser being or a good teacher.
Realize today who he truly is, who scripture proclaims him to be, who history confirms that he was, and give him your obedience, your worship, and your devotion. Claim him as your Lord.
Not only is Jesus God, but if we're to know Jesus personally, we must know that Jesus is our creator, as we can see in verse number three. All things were created through him, and apart from him, not one thing that was created, that has been created.
Jesus is the originator of all things. He is not subservient to them or lesser than them. Any angel, demon, star, planet, animal, or element in creation, everything has been created by Jesus Christ.
He is not as some religions purport, the brother of Satan or other spiritual beings. He is not a little G type god. He's not a good prophet or just an example of what it means to be human.
He is the author of everything. As Colossians 1 would tell us, he is the image of the invisible god, the preeminent one over all creation. He is the first, the last, the one who is the point of it all.
He is before all things, and by him everything consists. It has its being through Jesus. So Jesus is God.
Jesus is your creator, and Jesus is the sustainer of your life. God didn't just create the world and then go hands off with it. He is involved right now in your very existence.
We see this in verses number four and five. In him, in Jesus, was life, and that life was the light of men. That light shines in the darkness, and yet the darkness did not overcome it.
You are upheld every moment by Jesus' active love and care for you. He gives you each breath, every beat of your heart. He has provided every meal and article of clothing and place of shelter that you have ever had.
And he has given you the health to be here today and given you the transportation necessary to be able to get here.
Despite Jesus' love and care, both while he was here on earth and in general, he was and is the object of hatred and rejection from the religious and political elite.
And at times here on earth, even his own family or disciples rejected him or distrusted him. However, their rejection of him was not enough to counter his work, and he overcame the darkness.
Do you know that Jesus can overcome the darkness in your life as well? He can still defeat sin. He can still restore broken relationships.
He is still able to work miracles, as even I've heard from so many of you of hearing how God has worked personally in your life in ways that maybe people said there's no way that could happen, and you are living testimonies of the grace of God and
what he has done in your life. But Jesus doesn't just want to work in your life. He doesn't want to just do stuff for you. He wants to know you.
He calls you to make him the center of your life as your God and your Lord. Do you know Jesus personally today? Do you know that he lived a perfect life here on earth, a life completely in line with God's character and commands in the Bible?
Do you know that when he died on the cross as we celebrate at Easter, he took all of our sins, our failures, our imperfections and our mistakes every way that we have rebelled against God and his design, and he paid the price that justice demanded.
And because he died in your place, not just in someone else's place, he died in your place, he made it so that you could be restored to God despite the fact that you aren't holy enough or good enough in and of yourself to restore a relationship with
God. He calls you to recognize him as your God and Lord and to turn from your own way to him alone, receiving the free gift of a relationship with God and eternal life with him. Have you ever made that decision?
If you'd like to talk with someone about it, I'd be happy to have that conversation with you today or sometime this week. There is no more important decision than if you know Jesus.
Not only were you made to know Jesus personally, obviously you're all here in a church on a Sunday morning, you have at least some passing familiarity with Jesus, but you weren't just made to know Jesus personally.
You were also made to help others to know him. They're called to make Jesus known to others. We can see this in verses six through nine, and we can see first that God has created you specifically to tell certain people about him.
We can see this as we look back at the life of John the Baptist, who was just another human. He wasn't divine. He wasn't the son of God like Jesus is.
He was just a regular, everyday person. But in Jesus' cosmic scale, he decided he wanted to use a person to tell others about him. And that wasn't just John the Baptist, by the way.
He has that same goal for you. Verse 6 says, There was a man sent from God whose name was John. He came as a witness to testify about the light so that all might believe through him.
John the Baptist was Jesus' relative that his mother Elizabeth was family members with Mary, the mother of Jesus. And John was the one that God designated to be the forerunner, the pre-announcer of Jesus' coming. Luke 3 tells us what he preached.
He preached to repent, to turn from your sin, and turn to God's forgiveness. It tells us where he preached. He preached in the wilderness, away from all of the cities and crowds.
He wasn't in it to try and make himself look good. He simply encouraged people, whoever came, whoever interacted with John the Baptist, was going to hear God's message. He was going to hear about the coming Messiah, Jesus.
And Luke 3 also tells us how he preached, that he preached boldly, and he was unafraid to offend the religious or the sinners or the politicians. And it didn't matter who John was talking to, he was going to give them what God had said.
Do you know today that you have the same mission as John the Baptist? That you were called to testify about the light of Jesus, so that people would believe in Jesus because of you.
If you are saved today, if you've received Christ, then you are a witness to the power of God. And in the courtroom of your life, you are called to step up to the stand to testify about what Jesus has done for you.
Roger, I think of even you proclaiming, hey, 35, almost 36 years ago, that's what God did in your family.
And maybe some of you, you might never do that from a lectern or a pulpit, but you have people in your life that you are called to share Jesus with.
This week, the people of Tabernacle Baptist Church will interact with thousands of people, the vast majority of which I may never meet. How will these people know about the God who made them and loves them and sustains them and wants to rescue them?
They will know through their daughter sharing Jesus faithfully. They will know through their loving co-worker giving them a church invite or a gospel track. They will know through their classmate having a Bible study after school.
As Mordecai told Esther, who knows if God placed you in this position for such a time as this? That statement, who knows if God puts you in this place for such a time as this?
It is true of your house, of your family, of your friend group, your job, and even your hobbies. Wherever you are, realize that God has a mission for you and specific people he put you on earth to witness to.
You will never be called to share the gospel with my cousin Bailey. She lives far away. You will never be called to share the gospel with her.
You will never share the gospel with my old coworker Miranda or my friend Hannah. But you are called to tell your circles about the God who knows you and who loves you. So God has created you specifically to tell other people about him.
Nothing about you is an accident. You were specifically created and you've been specifically sustained through each portion of your life so that where you are is where God has planted you for a purpose.
And God has not made you to hoard him or to ignore his mission. See this in verses number 8 and 9 of the passage. He was not the light.
John the Baptist was not the light. He wasn't Jesus, says, but he came to testify about the light. The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world.
John the Baptist didn't try and gain glory for himself through his preaching, through his proclamation. He pointed people to Jesus. He didn't say, watch me for a picture of what real holiness looks like.
He didn't say, I'm so much better than all of you, so you should listen to me. Instead, he said, behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Jesus' light is intended to go to every person.
Not every person will receive that light, and God knows that, but his desire is that the light of his love and free salvation would be shined out to everyone.
As it relates to your witness, as you enter your family conversations this week, as you go to your job, as you enjoy time, I don't know if we have any pickleball players in here, but as you participate in your hobbies, the things that you enjoy, and
you think about, okay, how does God want me to witness, to talk to other people about what God's done for me? Know this, God knows from all eternity past who will be the ones to accept his light.
There is no person that God has foreknown that will not be saved.
And so when you witness, you are participating in an incredible game of hide and seek to find those that God has written in the Book of Life from the foundation of the world, as Revelation 13 puts it.
The old British pastor of the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Charles Spurgeon, once said, if God would have painted the yellow stripe on the backs of everyone who would believe, I would go around lifting shirts.
He says, but since he didn't, I must preach whosoever will, and then whoever believes, I know that they are the Lord's.
Knowing that you're not on a mission to convince people, God hasn't called you to be the world's greatest arguer or debater or salesman for the gospel, but realizing that God is the one that changes hearts, God is the one that works in people, and
you're simply called to testify, to say, here's what I saw, here's what I heard, and I'm telling you that you can believe it too. This is what I've received. Will you have boldness to invite someone to church this week?
Realize if they say no, it's not that you're a failure. It's not that you didn't try hard enough. It's not that you didn't love enough.
Realize that we are on a sacred mission from the Lord to find his sheep from every tribe and tongue and nation and to welcome them into the family of God.
Will you be courageous enough to talk to the person that's coming to your mind right now about who Jesus is and the difference that he has made in your life? So we were made to know Jesus personally. We were made to make Jesus known to others.
But then lastly today, we were made to enjoy God and his family. We can see this in verses 10-13. First, Christ wants you to know him personally, not just know about him.
Verse number 10, he, Jesus, was in the world and the world was created through him, and yet the world did not recognize him. They didn't grasp who he was. He came to his own and his own people did not receive him.
As we've been walking through the Gospel of Mark in our Tabernacle Talk Bible study over the past month, we've seen again and again that although Jesus called himself by a Messianic title, the Son of Man from Daniel 7, who would rule over the whole
world, even though Jesus performed miracles, forgave sins, and explained God's words' deepest meaning, the people of Israel did not understand who he was. Even his disciples were told on three or four separate occasions, at least, that Jesus would be
crucified and buried and resurrected, but they didn't understand either. Everyone was too concerned about their own pursuits of power, self-righteousness, and personal gain to care about Jesus himself, knowing him, understanding his mission, his
purpose, why he came. However, throughout Mark's Gospel account, we see demon-possessed people, lepers, a foreign syrophoenician woman, children, and even blind men being able to see who Jesus was and proclaim it to others.
Today, do you see Jesus as a stepping stone, just one part of your life for an hour on Sunday or a prayer before a meal? Or is Jesus your whole life? Do you talk to Him every day?
Do you spend time reading His word, His commands, His thoughts, His actions? Do you tell others about Him? Do you intentionally try to treat others the way that He's told us to in the Bible?
Jesus wants to know you. He's not just concerned about you getting saved, and once you're saved, all right, have a great Christian life.
He wants to be with you each and every day through His word and through prayer and through you spending time with Him. But not only does Jesus want you to know Him personally, Christ wants to make you a part of His larger family.
Verse number 12 says, But to all who did receive Him, He gave them the right to be children of God to those who believe in His name. Here this word right, it's exusia, it's power. It is the authority to make something happen.
A king, a ruler has exusia. And here Jesus doesn't just say, I guess you can be a child of God. He says it with authority.
Everyone that believes on the name of Jesus has the right, the authority, the power to be a child of God. What an incredible truth.
The right to be a child of God does not come through having the right family heritage or the perfect sinless life of your own. The right to be a child of God is for anyone that will believe in the name of Jesus.
It's the most open invitation in the world, it eschews all human righteousness, great things that we think you would need to do in order to earn it.
But it's also the most exclusive claim in the world that only those that believe in the name of Jesus are children of God.
Despite the beautiful tune of the song, The Prayer, made popular by Celine Dion, Josh Groban and others, fact is we are not all God's children in a salvific sense. Only those that believe in the name of Jesus are children of God.
And that's what John invites us to. He doesn't want to keep us in the dark on that.
He says, realize that it is through believing in Jesus, in his work that he accomplished for us on the cross and realizing that he is God and he wants to be the one in charge of your life, your Lord, your God, is in that realization that we find
redemption, salvation, the life that God made us for. There is no one that will ever come to Jesus who will be turned away or thrown out. For those of you with difficult pasts or with sinful, flawed present lives, come to Jesus.
He will not throw you away. He will welcome you in. He will heal you of your sins, and He will bring you into new, meaningful life with Him.
But also, Jesus didn't adopt you as an only child. If you notice in the verse, it says, He gave them the right to be children of God. Do you know that you have spiritual brothers and sisters?
And the love and forgiveness that Jesus gave to you, He wants you to give to them. Do you love your spiritual family? Do you attempt to support them, to spend time with them, to pray for them?
I'd encourage you today, just a simple application of this truth. Look around the room. See someone that maybe you don't know particularly well.
Intentionally make an appointment this week, next week, to have coffee, to share a meal, to have someone over, to play some games with someone in this room that you don't know that well. I see Kathy and Kathy talking. You guys don't count.
You guys know each other. You got to pick someone else that you don't know. God made you a part of his larger family.
And he calls you to, because he has his lavished love and grace for all of your spiritual siblings, he wants you to get in on that action too.
And because he's your God, your creator, your sustainer, your Lord, the one that you get redemption and salvation through, you've got a responsibility to do what he asks. Lastly today, I want us to notice that God's family isn't merit based.
It's grace based. Verse 13. These children of God were born not of natural descent, that is not from human lineage.
They were just born into God's family physically. It says they were not born of the will of the flesh, that is through human capacity or performance.
It's not, I want to be a child of God, so I'm going to work and work and work and do and do and do until I can become a child of God. And it says they were not born of the will of man. It's not through human purposing, it says, but of God.
They were born of God. Your relationship with God is not earned. It is received.
It cannot be bought or demanded. It can only be freely received. Romans 6, verse 23, the wages, the earnings of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Or Ephesians 2, 8 and 9, for by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not from yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.
Fully reject those false gospels that state that God's family relationship must be maintained through sacraments or earned through your baptism.
Jesus is the one that brings us into the family, and only belief in His work, not our own, makes us family members.
If your good works didn't get you into God's family, then don't believe Satan's lie that your bad works should isolate you away from God's family.
When you are fighting sin or doubt or discouragement or hurt, that's when we need our church family the most. Don't think that you'll be looked down on for your failures or unbelief. We have all experienced those dry times in our faith.
God loves you right in the mess that you're at right now. And we love you too. Don't give up.
Realize that God's family is grace-based. The loving favor and empowerment that we can't earn, but that is lavished on us from our God all the same.
Today, we've seen from John 1, we've got to intentionally love and learn about the God who came to earth to save us from sin and its consequences.
We can learn about him by knowing him personally, realizing that we were made to help others to know him, and realizing that God made us to enjoy him, to enter into his family, and that includes our brothers and sisters in Christ.
This week, will you choose to spend time every day in the Bible? It might be something small. It might be that as you're trying every day, all you can do is five minutes.
It might be something that you tune in to our Church's Bible Study Podcast on Facebook or wherever you listen to podcasts, and just try and learn a little bit from God's Word every day.
But will you choose to spend time every day in the Bible getting to know Jesus? Will you pick at least one person to invite to Church next Sunday? It might be a scary task.
I promise you it's worth it. We've got invite cards on the back table there and on the back table there. Take the challenge.
God puts you where He has, when He has, with the people that He has, for a reason. It was not an accident. Will you connect over a meal or coffee with someone in this room this week or next week that you don't know well?
Will you make a solid choice, a concrete choice, to love your brothers and sisters in the Lord?
And perhaps today, if you don't know Jesus, if maybe you've attended, but you do not know Christ as your Savior, have you accepted His payment for your sin and made Him your God? There is no greater choice that you can make in this world.
Don't put it off. Life with Jesus, a relationship with Him, living the life He made you for, is far too valuable to put off. However God spoke in to you today, I want to encourage you to respond to Him.
