LOGOS – THE WORD John 1:1 (KJV) 1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. (GW) 1 In the beginning the Word already existed. The Word was with God, and the Word was God. (MSG) 1 The Word was first, the Word present to God, God present to the Word. The Word was God, (TLB) 1 Before anything else existed, there was Christ, with God. The word translated by beginning is the Greek: arche (GSN-) which means beginning, origin, first and speaks of the dateless past. The Word logos (GSN-) refers to Christ and proves His pre-existence. He is an eternal Being as are also the Father and the Holy Spirit. They make the Divine Trinity. Not only was the Word with God, but He was God and always will be as much divine as the other two members of the Trinity The Greek: logos (GSN-) is used 330 times with 3 main ideas of expression: 1. In respect to speech: a word (James. 3:2); saying (Mt. 19:22); discourse (2Cor. 10:10); doctrine (1Tim. 6:3; 2Tim. 1:13); narrative (Acts 1:1); report (John. 21:23); and discussion by which the inward thought is expressed (Heb. 4:2) 2. In respect to the mind alone: the reasoning powers (Heb. 4:12) 3. In respect to a person: the essential living Word of God (John. 1:1,14; 1John. 1:1; 5:7; Rev. 19:13); the embodiment and expression of all wisdom and prudence (Eph. 1:8; 1Cor. 1:30; Col. 2:3) Logos (GSN-) has to do with a concept, an idea; the Greek: rhema (GSN-) has to do with the expression of that idea in proper, intelligent, and grammatical form in words and sentences. The plainest reason why the Son of God is called the Word, seems to be, that as our words explain our minds to others, so was the Son of God sent in order to reveal his Fathers mind to the world. What the evangelist says of Christ proves that he is God. He asserts, His existence in the beginning; His coexistence with the Father. The Word was with God. All things were made by Him, and not as an instrument. Without Him was not anything made that was made, from the highest angel to the meanest worm. This shows how well qualified He was for the work of our redemption and salvation. The light of reason, as well as the life of sense, is derived from Him, and depends upon Him. This eternal Word, this true Light shines, but the darkness comprehends it not. Let us pray without ceasing, that our eyes may be opened to behold this Light, that we may walk in it; and thus be made wise unto salvation, by faith in Jesus Christ. In order to set at rest all controversy the Divine nature of Jesus, John glances, in the first three verses, back to the beginning, recorded in Genesis, and affirms: (1) That He who was afterwards manifest as the Christ existed before creation began; (2) That He was present with God; (3) That He was divine; (4) That He e was the Word; (5) That by or through Him were all things made that were made (John 1:3). The first chapter of Genesis helps us to understand its meaning. God said, Let there be light, Let there be a firmament, Let the earth bring forth, etc., and it was done. God exhibits his creative power through the Word, and manifests His will through the Word. There are mysteries belonging to the divine nature and to the relation between the Son and the Father that we have to wait for eternity to solve. They are too deep for human solution, but this is clear: that God creates and speaks to man through the Word. As we clothe our thoughts in words, God reveals his will by the Word, and when that Word is clothed in flesh, as the Teacher of men, we recognize it as Jesus Christ. The Greek term means, 1. a thought or concept; 2. the expression or utterance of that thought. As a designation of Christ, therefore, Logos is peculiarly felicitous because, (1) in Him are embodied all the treasures of the divine wisdom, the collective thought of God and, (2) He is from eternity, but especially in His incarnation, the utterance or expression of the Person, and thought of Deity. The word here points directly to Genesis 1, where the act of creation is effected by God speaking. The idea of God, who is in his own nature hidden, revealing Himself in creation, is the root of the Logos-idea, in contrast with all materialistic or pantheistic conceptions of creation. This idea develops itself in the Old Testament on three lines. 1. The Word, as embodying the divine will, is personified in Hebrew poetry. Consequently divine attributes are predicated of it as being the continuous revelation of God in law and prophecy. The Word is a healer in Psa 107:20; a messenger in Psa 147:15; the agent of the divine decrees in Isa 55:11. 2. The personified wisdom (Job 28:12; Proverbs 8, 9). Here also is the idea of the revelation of that which is hidden. For wisdom is concealed from man: “he knoweth not the price thereof, neither is it found in the land of the living. The depth saith, It is not in me; and the sea saith, It is not with me. It cannot be gotten for gold, neither shall silver be weighed for the price thereof. It is hid from the eyes of all living, and kept close from the fowls of the air” (Job 28). Even Death, which unlocks so many secrets, and the underworld, know it only as a rumor (Job 28:22). It is only God who knows its way and its place (Job 28:23). He made the world, made the winds and the waters, made a decree for the rain and a way for the lightning of the thunder (Job 28:25-26). He who possessed wisdom in the beginning of his way, before His works of old, before the earth with its depths and springs and mountains, with whom was wisdom as one brought up with Him (Proverbs 8:26-31), declared it. “It became, as it were, objective, so that He beheld it” (Job 28:27) and embodied it in His creative work. This personification, therefore, is based on the thought that wisdom is not shut up at rest in God, but is active and manifest in the world. “She standeth in the top of high places, by the way in the places of the paths. She crieth at the gates, at the entry of the city, at the coming in at the doors” (Proverbs 8:2-3). She builds a palace and prepares a banquet, and issues a general invitation to the simple and to him that wanteth understanding (Proverbs 9:1-6). It is viewed as the one guide to salvation, comprehending all revelations of God, and as an attribute embracing and combining all His other attributes. 3. The Angel of Jehovah. The messenger of God who serves as His agent in the world of sense, and is sometimes distinguished from Jehovah and sometimes identical with him. As Logos has the double meaning of thought and speech, so Christ is related to God as the word to the idea, the word being not merely a name for the idea, but the idea itself expressed. The thought is the inward word The Logos of John is the real, personal God, the Word, who was originally before the creation with God. and was God, one in essence and nature, yet personally distinct; the revealer and interpreter of the hidden being of God; the reflection and visible image of God, and the organ of all His manifestations to the world. He made all things, proceeding personally from God for the accomplishment of the act of creation, and became man in the person of Jesus Christ, accomplishing the redemption of the world. The name Word is most excellently given to our Savior; for it expresses His nature in one, more than in any others. Therefore John, when he names the Person in the Trinity (1Jo 5:7), chooses rather to call Him Word than Son; for Word is a phrase more communicable than son. Son hath only reference to the Father that begot Him; but Word may refer to Him that conceives it; to Him that speaks it; to that which is spoken by it; to the voice that it is clad in; and to the effects it raises in Him that hears it. So Christ, as He is the Word, not only refers to His Father that begot Him, and from whom He comes forth, but to all the creatures that were made by Him; to the flesh that He took to clothe Him; and to the doctrine He brought and taught, and, which lives yet in the hearts of all them that obediently do hear it. He it is that is this Word; and any other, prophet or preacher, he is but a voice (Luk 3:4). Word is an inward conception of the mind; and voice is but a sign of intention. John was but a sign, a voice; not worthy to untie the shoe-latchet of this Word. Christ is the inner conception in the bosom of His Father; and that is properly the Word. And yet the Word is the intention uttered forth, as well as conceived within; for Christ was no less the Word in the womb of the Virgin, or in the cradle of the manger, or on the altar of the cross, than he was in the beginning, in the bosom of his Father. For as the intention departs not from the mind when the word is uttered, so Christ, proceeding from the Father by eternal generation, and after here by birth and incarnation, remains still in Him and with Him in essence; as the intention, which is conceived and born in the mind, remains still with it and in it, though the word be spoken. He is therefore rightly called the Word, both by His coming from, and yet remaining still in, the Father. SCRIPTURE REFERENCES Genesis 1:1; 16:7-13; 32:24-28; Exodus 23:20-21, Job 28; Psalm 3:4; 33:6; 45:6-7; 90:1-2; 119:105; Proverbs 8:22-31; Isaiah 7:14, 9:6-7, 40:8-11; Hosea 12:4-5; Micah 5:1-2; Malachi 3:1; Matthew 1:23; John 1:1-5; 1:9, 14-18, 10:30-33, 14:9-11; 16:28, 17:5; 20:28; Acts 1:1; Romans 9:5; 1Corinthians 1:24; Philippians 2:6; Ephesians 3:9-11; Colossians 1:17, 2:2-3; 2:9; 1Timothy 3:16; Titus 2:13; Hebrews 1:3, 8-13; 7:3, 9:14, 13:8; 2Peter 1:1; 1John 1:1-2, 5:7; 5:20; Revelation 1:2, 1:8, 1:11, 2:8, 19:13, 21:6, 22:13-16;
Posted on: Sat, 17 Jan 2015 11:30:57 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015