We can learn a lot of things from John 1.1-5. One of the big takeaways for me is that, since Jesus was with God from the beginning, there is no way He could be a reaction to our sin. There’s no way He could be some kind of cosmic Band-Aid stretched over the problems we caused, still cause, and have yet to cause because it would mean that He didn’t foresee the total disaster that sin and death would become. I mean, hello, God is the one who planted that tree in Eden. Why would He do that? Why would He place the means of our own total destruction within our grasp if He didn’t have a plan beforehand to deliver us from the consequences? And what does that mean about who God is?
For a kickoff, it means God isn’t joking around when He tells us that none of us has ever even imagined or thought of all that He has planned for those who love Him. His wisdom is so vast as to be unsearchable.
God knows all, and He doesn’t have a panic mode. Also, it is absolutely crucial that we lay down all our feigned outrage about what is supposedly good or bad—especially as it pertains to God’s plan of salvation—because we don’t have all knowledge, we are not innocent, and we therefore cannot possibly be just, impartial judges.
This is a stumbling block indeed. If God knows everything, He knew about the fall before it ever happened. And that would mean that He either caused it or allowed it to happen, on purpose. And whatever myriad problems you might have with that thought all boil down to one question: Why? Why would God do that? Why would He write creation's story that way?
A caution. For the mature believer, why is a question best left unasked. It is certainly permissible but really, instead of asking why, we do better to declare Whom. When we do this, we are much closer to the truth.
For the Glory
God’s glory is the best thing for us. It is the cure for what ails us. It is the answer to the question. It is the reason why, and it is the song in the night. We must start here and reckon with this fact before we can go any farther. In fact, God’s glory is the best thing in the universe. He doesn’t share it with anyone, yet He reveals Himself in ways that allow us to get our arms around the wonder.
He always gives us what we need, whether He shows it it in the way that He told Thomas to “put your hands in My hands,” or how he told Gideon that if he was afraid to go down to the Midianite camp, he could take his servant with him (and he did). It is never too hard for us to bear.
Paul recognized Him in the creation. He said that God has revealed Himself in all that He has made, and that there is therefore no excuse for unbelief. This is why it’s so crucial that we do all we can to dethrone man’s thin and godless theories about how everything that is has come into being. Man’s explanations are tortuous and require so many trillions of years that, for some, time itself has become God. Only brute ignorance could have the temerity to fail to perceive why everything in that worldview is so very futile and harsh. There is a better way.
God made what He made so that His glory could be revealed—so that the light would shine in the darkness—and so that, in beholding, we are transformed. Love is not only the motive but the source and the destination, and this is the whole point, as I hope you will see.
To Crush Him
Most Christians see Jesus as God’s plan B. This is a big mistake. It places failure on the throne, renders grace impotent and meaningless, and enkindles lies about the character and Word of God.
The Bible isn’t linear. It’s wonderful. The more you take it in, the more astounded you become at the wisdom of God to simultaneously hide and reveal Himself everywhere you turn. Genesis does indeed contain the account of the creation at what we might call “the beginning,” but God is everlasting; He has neither beginning nor end. There is no time when He was not. This is why He is both beginning and end, both source and destination. Time is a created thing. God simply is, and all that He is will certainly outlast even time.
What He’s saying when He says that He is the beginning and the end is essentially I AM. Time is irrelevant. He is not subject to it, it is subject to Him. This and all our other measurements are irrelevant and meaningless. Beginning? End? Those are not things time can measure or put into place. God is well beyond the reach of time. The beginning is as eternal as the end, and just as immutable.
Therefore it cannot be possible that Jesus should be a reaction to our sin.
Can you imagine God walking through the garden searching for Adam and Eve and not knowing where they were, why they were hiding, and what they had done? No, creation was subjected to futility in the hope that it might be saved. If it were never subjected, love’s full meaning, the weight of glory, would never have been shown.
Isaiah 53 exists so that God could begin to explain this to us. The prophet says, “…it pleased the LORD to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief…” and in the same breath, “when You make His soul an offering for sin, He shall see His seed, He shall prolong His days.” See, these things only make sense if there is a resurrection. These things only make sense if there is more to the story than what’s on the surface. These things only make sense if it turns out God knows precisely what He’s doing with what He has made.
That I Was Afflicted
In Psalm 119.71 the psalmist said, “It was good that I was afflicted.”
Here lies an insight into the wisdom of God. Part of it speaks to the waking effect tension has upon us. When it is used properly, it moves us into position for good works. The purpose of light, for instance, is to shine in the darkness. The purpose of sin is to be shown to be utterly sinful. The purpose of affliction, as a consequence of sin, is to provide an opportunity for humility to germinate so that revelation can occur, repentance can break through, and reconciliation with the Father be sealed.
Affliction also doses us with the proper perspective about where our treasure lies. It’s not that what we do down here doesn’t matter; it does. It’s just that grace is so transformative and faith is so powerful that they make the natural world seem like the mist that lingers after having woken from a bad dream. God is Master of all: every (seemingly) loose thread finds its source in Him and is bound to return to Him, acknowledging Him as Lord of all. There is but one way that leads to Him, and we can either run from Him or run for Him. Affliction is training, and its function is a little like the bit in the horse’s mouth; under the touch of the Master’s hand it steers us in the way.
No Surprises
Not only did God lay all this out before He said, “Let Us make man in Our image,” He purposed that His life would be the One Thing at the center of it all.
Not only did Christ form us from the dust of the earth that He had spoken into existence, He breathed life into our nostrils.
He did it again and again on earth as He fulfilled Isaiah 53, being wounded for our transgressions, taking on and becoming our sin, giving life for death, and He saw it through to the end, having seen “the labor of His soul,” and He is satisfied with His work. That can only mean that it, like Him, is perfect.
The blood sacrifice that He Himself required, He Himself provided. He is the eye for an eye, He is the death we should have died. He is the life we grasp at and gasp for, even if we don’t know it. It is true that perfect love casts out all fear. What further evidence do we need that love has been perfected? Why do we fear? I think it’s because we do not believe.
He breathed life in us again before He ascended, breathing into His Church the gift of the Holy Spirit, who has taken up the role of Emmanuel—God with us—until the end of the age, and Jesus said it's better this way, even to our advantage. And it is finished in the heavens, make no mistake, because God Himself is right where He wants to be: indwelling His Church.
Yet time still ticks
Until the last moment, God suffers long, waiting, hoping in hope that all would yet turn to Him, behold the glory, and be transformed by the revelation of a love so deep and wide that words fail to describe it.
And this is the essence of the gospel: that we who behold all this wonder and wisdom should surrender to Him utterly and be transformed by the encounter, not once but continually as we go from glory to glory. There is so much more to life than what we define it as! For now it includes death, but only as a passage, not a destination. This is because Jesus took its sting, having suffered it for us. This vicarious hammerblow to death is His free gift to us, and even its cost—faith in His grace—has been given. All we need to do is activate the gift by bringing faith to life with a word.
The Word was God and was with God in the beginning. We, having been made in His image, can bear witness to how amazing grace really is with a simple confession, with the words of our own mouths: that He is precisely who He says He is.
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