Today: John 1
In the Beginning Was the Word
John opens his Gospel with the same three words that open the whole Bible: in the beginning. Matthew begins with a family tree and Luke with a priest in the temple, but John begins before time itself. Before Bethlehem, before the first morning of creation, the Word already was.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.John 1:1, KJV
The Greek word behind this verse is Logos. To a Greek reader it meant reason, the hidden order that holds the universe together. To a Jewish reader it recalled the word God spoke when He said: let there be light. John takes both meanings and says something neither world had imagined. The Word is not an idea and not a force. He is a Person, He was with God, and He was God.
In this one verse the Church has always heard the mystery of the Holy Trinity. The Word is distinct from the Father, because He is with God; and He shares fully in the one divine nature, because He is God. Centuries later the Council of Nicaea would confess Him as God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, and John is the deepest root of that confession. All things were made through Him, and nothing that exists stands outside His hands.
In him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.John 1:4,5, KJV
Life and light belong together in this Gospel. Darkness is real, and John never pretends otherwise, but notice the order: the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness cannot master it. Then a man appears, sent from God, whose name was John. The Baptist is not the light; he is the witness who points to it. And here comes the first sorrow of the Gospel: the Word came to His own, and His own received Him not. Yet the sorrow is answered at once by the offer.
But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:John 1:12, KJV
We do not become children of God by birth, effort or family name. It is a gift, received in faith. The Church teaches that this new birth is given in Baptism, where we are made adopted sons and daughters of the Father. Then comes the verse that stands at the very centre of Christianity.
And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.John 1:14, KJV
The Word was made flesh. The eternal Son did not appear to be human; He became truly human, without ceasing to be God. The word translated dwelt literally means pitched His tent. Israel remembered the tabernacle in the desert, where the glory of God came down to live among His people. Now that glory has a human face. This is why Catholics bow at the words of the Creed that speak of the Incarnation, and kneel at them on Christmas and on the feast of the Annunciation. Everything else in the Gospel flows from this moment.
The rest of the chapter moves from heaven to the banks of the Jordan. Priests and Levites come from Jerusalem to ask John who he is. He refuses every title: he is not the Christ, not Elijah, not the Prophet. He is only a voice crying in the wilderness, as Isaiah foretold. The next day he sees Jesus coming toward him and speaks the words the Church has repeated ever since.
The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.John 1:29, KJV
Every Jew knew the lamb of the Passover, whose blood saved Israel in Egypt, and Isaiah's suffering servant, led as a lamb to the slaughter. John points to Jesus as the fulfilment of both. At every Mass, before Holy Communion, the priest lifts the Host and repeats these very words. The Lamb is no longer only foretold; He is given.
The chapter ends with the first disciples. Two of John's followers walk after Jesus, and He asks them what they seek. His answer is an invitation, not a lecture: come and see. Andrew finds his brother Simon, and Jesus gives him a new name, Cephas, which means rock. Philip finds Nathanael, who doubts that anything good could come out of Nazareth, until Jesus tells him He saw him under the fig tree. Then Jesus promises more: heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man. Jacob once dreamed of a ladder joining earth to heaven. Jesus says that ladder is Himself.
That is the whole first chapter: the eternal Word, the Light no darkness can master, the Lamb who takes away sin, and a simple invitation. Come and see. Today, that invitation is for you.