John 1:6-13

TJ Girt

The Gospel of John • Sermon • Submitted 7 months ago • Presented 7 months ago

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Welcome

Yall look good this morning all bundled up

Im not sure if these windows open but this im thinking could find out

its such a beutiful morning

wow!

Turn with me please to the Gospel of John

This mornign we will continue our great journey through Johns very special account of Jesus’ life and his purpose here on earth

This is our second week in this series for those that missed last week

Last week we learned that Jesus was there in the beginning

that he was the word of God and that he was God and that he was with God

Jesus is the agent in which all things were created

And we know that Jesus is the life and light for all of man

One of the great things about Johns prologue, which is were we are still this morning

is that he does such a great job of highlighting main point of the bible, here in just this introduction

see last week we leared about creation thorugh Christ

and this week we will learn of the witness, the fall, and the redemption of christ

all within these few verses

Turn to John 1:6–13 “There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. He came as a witness, to bear witness about the light, that all might believe through him. He was not the light, but came to bear witness about the light. The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.”

Illusustration - The Greatest gift

Your presense - this means making it a priority to spend time with them if they are truely important you can make the time

Your Love

our time,

and that is exactly what we will talk about today

A Voice

see the greatest gife came down, and gave him self to us

so that we may be in relationship to him

Your belief in them

Witness and message of Christ

6 There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. 7He came as a witness, to bear witness about the light, that all might believe through him. 8 He was not the light, but came to bear witness about the light. 9 The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world.

Here we are introduced to John the baptist

The man sent from God to bear witness about the Christ

As we see profisyed in Isaiah 40:3 “A voice cries: “In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord; make straight in the desert a highway for our God.”

What are some things we know about John the Baptist

Well, he was Jesus’ second cousin

And John was sent from God, on a special assignment if you will

an assignment he took very seriously

an assignment that was destined to him from the beginning

they had a special relationship, John the Baptist and Jesus

A relationship set in motion while even in their mothers wombs

See John was sent to witness about the Christ and we are told that when his pregnant mother Elizabeth was visited by the pregnant Mary (pregnant with Jesus)

John the Baptist lept in her belly

So we see that even in the womb, John couldnt wait to share news of Christ

And just as John the Baptist thought very highly of Christ, so Christ thought very highly of John the Baptist

So much so that in Matthew 11:11 Jesus says “Truly, I say to you, among those born of women there has arisen no one greater than John the Baptist.

Well what made John so great?

See John was the forerunner for Christ,

John was the bridge of the profits

John broke the 430 year silence we find between the OT profits and the NT

It is said that John the Baptist preached with such power that he was equiated with the Great profit Elijah

And in fact Jesus says in Matthew 11:14 “and if you are willing to accept it, he is Elijah who is to come.”

So yea, John the Baptist is special, But remember Christ also said, that even the least in heaven is greater than he..

So why did John the Baptist come?

It is said that he came as a witness, to bear witness about the light

This word witness has a two fold meaning, much like the word Logos had for us last week

Here we see John the baptist as the witness to the christ

See later we will see that we are given the right to be Gods children or we are adopted into the family of God.

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Using almost a law and order type of vernacular

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And that is the same here, see according to Jewish law to pronouse a certain truth one must have 2 or more witnesses

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and here, John is prescibed as the witness of Christ

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Not only that but what to we call it when we share christ with other

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We refer to it as witnessing correct

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and that is exactly what John is doing, he is witnessing or evaglizing the light or the Christ to the people

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Which shows us the importance of our own personal witness to others

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It’s a great reminder that people are saved through our witness of the gospel. Now, let me be clear, it is not us that saves. However, it is through the proclimation of the gospel that the Holy Spirit uses in order to provide his saving grace

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After all Romans 10:14–15 “How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!””

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Now we are not talking about preaching here as I am preaching. We are talking about the gospel, the message of hope for a lost world. And that message is Jesus Christ

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And this is exactly what John the Baptist is doing here he is preaching gospel

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He is witnessing that Jesus is the light, the logos, the savior of the world

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That is why John the evangelist says so that all may believe through him

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the him here is John the Baptist, the agent of which the belief is spread while

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Christ is the object of that belief

‌But John the Baptist is quick to point out that he is not the messiah

Even though John the Baptist began to gain populairty and obtain followers

he made qualms about his purpose, his purpose was not to increase followers for himself,

but to pave the way, then to fade away, and clear the path for the true light

So in retrospect, John the Baptist was like the moon to the sun

in that he reflected the light of world onto all that would listen to him

Now this light was true

lets focus on that word true for just a moment

see in context, to the 1st centurey hebrew or greek

the word true means genuine, authentic, one of a kind

so this light, which gives light to everyone, was one of a kind

And it was coming into the world

the very world that it created

to illuminate us to father, so that everyone can be saved..

Now folks, I am not preaching univesalism here, which means that everyone will be saved

Or at least everyone would have the opportunity

Because we know full well not all will be saved

Because not all turn to Christ,

And that leads us to our last point this morning

The rejection of Christ

10 He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. 11 He came to his own and his own people did not recieve him.

Never the less, the light entered the world anyway

remember last week we learned that Christ was present at creation

He was there and served as the word, the logos, the agent in which all things were created by God

we learned and now know that each and everyone one of us was created and known from the beginning of time by our creator and redeemer Jesus Christ

And now, the very one who made the world

is coming into the world

to save the world, from itself

That is what happened then, and it is exactly what is happening now.

‌See the light is there, the savior is there, yet so many turn away from Him

‌Turn away from His grace, so that they can continue living thier lives the way they want to

‌Now we see the word world 4 times in just these 3 verses

‌John the Evangelist likes this word‌

in fact he loves it so much that he uses that word 78 times just in this gospel alone, and another 24 times in his other 3 epistles or letters

‌thats quite the number considering it is only used 185 times througout the entire New Testament

‌What does John the evengelist mean by world here

‌well, i can tell you the overwhelming majority of times it has negative conotations

‌Sometimes its used to describe the broad created order, and most of the time it is used to describe humanity, in its open rebellion against God and of which is hostile to Christ

‌So to recap, this word, this logos, this Son of God that was present at creation and was actually the agent in which all was created

‌watched as his creatoin became more and more corrupt as it followed its own will and not the will of the creator

‌He came here as the light, and was rejected. Now its one thing that the world did not know who he was

‌right, most gentiles at this time did not know of a coming messiah

‌other than maybe what they had heard from the nation of israel

They may have even pondered and wondered about a God that created all things

‌Becasue, well God puts that common grace on all of our hearts

‌no, it doesnt surprise me that the world didnt recognize his

‌what must have hurt though is that his own people did not recieve him

His own people, rejected him

The word as accepted

12 But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.

But.. God is Good

See in a sweeping contrast to verses 10 and 11 where Christ is rejected

verses 12 and 13 give us hope

See within the rejection by the world and by the Jews stands a remnant

And that remnant - those few - who received him

became children of God

recipients of the greatest gift one could imagine

Remember when we were talking about the legality that comes with Jewish law and how John the baptist was a witness of Christ.

Well here we have some legal talk as well

See we are all born seperate from God, when we are living as unbelieivers, we are living outside the family of God

But, when we put our faith in Christ, when we believe in his name. We are adopted into this family. And this is something the apostle Paul really developed.

Its called the Doctrine of Adoption

And isnt there something beutiful about adoption

I know of many families that foster to adopt or that have adopted etc

and the love they show for those children is no differant that the love the show for their own

See they took the childred out of whatever situation they were in

They didnt care who thier parents were, didn’t care what color their skin was, didnt care about anythign that happened previusly

Those kiddos were given to their adoptive parents with a clean slate

Legally and in love

And this is precisely what God does for us

Those of us that belive in his name

He adopts us into his family

Here are 4 things we know about adoption

Adoption means placing us in a family to which we did not naturally belong

Adoption means complete freedom from former relationships, particulaly to the law

Adoption is possible only because of the voluntary act of the one doing the adopting

And adoption means we have full rights to all the priveledges of being in Gods family

Now, let me clear something up quickly as we move to complete this message

There are often 3 misconceptions about who is to be saved

and that is adressed here in v 13

it says who were born

not of blood - see a person is not saved or adopted due to their ethnic background

nor of the will of the flesh - a person is not saved or adopted because they are sincere or passionate about spiritual things

nor of the will of man - a person is not saved because of their own effort - no amount of work or human effort can bring you into the family

We are saved but of God - Because God chose to save us, God chose to adopt us, God chose to love us

We are saved beacuse of the greatest gift anyone of us could comprehend

The person of Jesus Christ, Gods only son

came into this world, this dark world, to grant us forvigness, to give us himself as a sacrifice

So that great gift is grace, through faith, in our Lord Jesus Christ

Let me leave with this story i found during my research of this topic

Shannon Brown, a good friend of mine, found himself in China on Mother’s Day, 2006.

He and his wife were there to pick up the newest member of their family—a ten-month-old girl who had been abandoned the day after she was born. A few months before they went overseas to meet her and bring her home, he had written about their decision to adopt: I think within a nanosecond of deciding to adopt we knew what our daughter’s name would be. In fact, I don’t really ever recall discussing it that much. Perhaps it’s because of why we chose to adopt. Our driving motivation was to rescue a little girl and give her a family with hope for the future. This helpless little girl who lives on the other side of the earth will receive all of the benefits of being my child. I will clothe her and feed her. She will take on my name and receive my deepest affection. She will be the object of my love. My energies will be directed towards helping, instructing and training her to be happy, with a secure knowledge that I will never leave her. I will pour out my heart to introduce her to the Savior of the world who can take away all her sins and give her eternal security. Of course, all of this is done as we completely depend on God and his strength. Where would we be without the love of God? Where would we be without him revealing himself to us in Scripture? Where would we be without him divinely sacrificing his own Son and seeking us out to rescue us? So for us, and what this adoption is a reflection of, we only had one name to choose from … Grace. (Used by permission) Is there a better word than grace to describe the adoption of this little girl? She could do nothing to become part of this family. No desire on her part would have connected her with this man and woman who would become mommy and daddy. Her adoption into this loving family was the result of someone outside of herself choosing to love her, to receive her, and to give her the right to be called their child. Someone had to do for her what she could not do for herself. That’s grace, and that’s exactly what happened to us who have believed on the name of Jesus. Like this little girl, we were helpless and hopeless until someone did for us what we could not do for ourselves. God chose to love us. He received us to himself, and he gave us the right to be called his children. This is grace.

Carter, Matt, and Josh Wredberg. 2017. Exalting Jesus in John. Nashville, TN: Holman Reference.

Are you ready to receive grace?

Have to given yourself fully to the only one that shine light in your dark world?

If not I would love to talk to you after this

If you have, if you have recieved this great gift of grace and life through Jesus Christ

Then do as John the baptist did, and witness to others about the light

Lets pray

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