JESUS: FULL OF GRACE AND TRUTH

JESUS: FULL OF GRACE AND TRUTH

John 1:1-18 (vv.14,16,17)

Dr. Wm. J. Maxwell

First Presbyterian Church, Newport, RI

December 18, 2005

Polls and surveys - they seem to be quite common today. For example, there seems to be a new presidential poll every two or three weeks now regarding the President’s job approval rating.

An interesting poll for me, at least, would be to survey this congregation as to your favorite personal hymns. We might even have a sermon series some day on our favorite hymns and the Scripture or doctrines on which they are based.

My own personal favorites often come from the pen of Charles Wesley. In our hymnal alone, which is not a Methodist hymnal, there are no less than 16 Wesley hymns. The tunes he used for his hymns are often robust and strong, and so it also goes with the texts that he wrote. Robust and strong in their love and devotion to the Lord, they affirm the great truths of the Christian faith, while giving all glory to God.

One good example is our opening hymn for this morning, “Hark! the Herald Angels Sing.” Wesley wrote this hymn one year after his conversion at Aldersgate in 1738. In this lively hymn, we find words that speak of the Christian Faith: of the full deity of God the Son in heaven, and yet in time, as to His also taking on our full humanity, in being born of a virgin. The words also speak of the Good News of the Gospel, of the peace and mercy that come to us in Christ as God and sinners are reconciled; of His coming to give us “second birth,” to raise us into new life, and also into everlasting life. Charles Wesley gives us so much in the brief but utterly significant lines of this beloved hymn.

Likewise, the Apostle John gives us so much in the few lines of his Prologue. There is so much to be found in only eighteen verses, so that we can but hardly touch the surface in the short span of the four weeks of Advent. The glory of Christ is so fully lifted up before us in all these verses, and yet this morning we come now to a close with verses 14-18.

Even still, we cannot even cover these verses in their fullest meaning this morning. So, please bear with me, as I draw our attention this morning to but one of these verses, one that is full of meaning: “The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.”

HERE, WE ARE FIRST DRAWN TO CHRIST’S INCARNATION.

The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us.

We have seen His glory, the glory of the One and Only,

who came from the Father …

We’ve already seen from the first verse that the Word was with God and yet was God. God the Son is different and distinct from God the Father, and yet both are God, as both are part of the Trinity or the “Three-ness” of God: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. They are the same in substance and in essence, and yet they are also different in the sense of their own unique personhood.

In time, however, God the Son became flesh, taking upon Himself our full humanity. At the time of the conception in the womb of Mary, two natures were then to be found in Christ, one divine and another human. Both natures are essential if Christ is to be fully qualified to be the Savior we so desperately need. Sinful as we are, the gap between ourselves and God is far too great for us to bring about any reconciliation on our own. But where as such reconciliation is impossible with us, it is quite possible with God. The Good News is that God has stepped forward in Christ and has made this reconciliation possible.

One of the ways John seeks to get across the divine and human nature of Christ is his use of a word meaning “to dwell” or “to tabernacle” or “to tent.” This points to the time of the Old Testament, when the Tabernacle or Tent of Meeting was the place specially made for animal sacrifices for sin and for the Ark of the Covenant, the sign and symbol of God’s presence among His people.

We are told that upon the completion of this Tabernacle or Tent of Meeting, the glory cloud of God descended and came upon it. We are told in the book of Exodus:

Then the cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the glory of the LORD filled the tabernacle. Moses could not enter the Tent of Meeting because the cloud had set upon it, and the glory of the LORD filled the tabernacle.

In all the travels of the Israelites, whenever the cloud lifted from above the tabernacle, they would set out; but if the cloud did not lift, they did not set out – until the day it lifted.

So the cloud of the LORD was over the tabernacle by day, and fire was in the cloud by night, in the sight of all the house of Israel during all their travels.[i]

So you see, as the Israelites made their journey toward the Promised Land, the glory of the LORD dwelt with His people.

Now, in an even more profound way, John and the other apostles had seen the glory of God dwelling with them in Jesus Christ. They had seen the majesty and splendor of God in Christ in so many ways! They had seen it in His healings, teachings, acts of deliverance, on the Mount of Transfiguration, and in His resurrection and ascension. The glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ had been before them in all these wonderful ways and more!

So it is that we rejoice and sing, again quoting the theologian and poet Charles Wesley:

Christ, by highest heav’n adored; Christ the everlasting Lord!

Late in time behold Him come, Offspring of the Virgin’s womb:

Veiled in flesh the Godhead see; Hail th’ incarnate Deity,

Pleased as man with men to dwell, Jesus our Emmanuel.

SECONDLY, WE ARE DRAWN TO THE FACT

THAT JESUS IS NOT ONLY “OUR EMMANUEL,”

HE IS ALSO “FULL OF GRACE.”

“We have seen His glory,

the glory of the One and Only,

who came from the Father,

full of grace …”

Grace is the unmerited love, favor and kindness of God. We cannot earn this favor and we are undeserving of His love. Oh, we could possibly try to earn God’s love, and some attempt to do this every day. But it is futile to do so, as the reality of our sinfulness and our own acts of rebellion have made this impossible.

But the Good News of the Gospel is that in Jesus Christ we have the fullness of God’s grace. Though undeserving and unworthy of such kindness from that high and holy Throne, it is yet bestowed on us in unparalleled mercy and love.

Charles Swindoll tries to help us understand the nature of God’s grace in one of his books, The Grace Awakening. He asks us to suppose that our 6 year old son, whom we have loved dearly, is suddenly and tragically murdered, and his murderer is eventually caught. Swindoll then puts before us a number of choices we could possibly make.

If you used every means in your power to kill the murderer for his crime, that would be vengeance. If, however, you’re content to sit back and let the legal authorities take over and execute on him what is proper – a fair trial, a plea of guilty, capital punishment, that is justice.

But if you should plead for the pardon of the murderer, forgive him completely, invite him into your home, and adopt him as your son, that is grace. [ii]

Swindoll goes on to say that few if any of us would do this … and yet God does this every day! God provides the believing, remorseful, repentant person with the multifaceted diamond of His grace. Turning that beautiful diamond slowly, we discover the facets of forgiveness, then acceptance, then reconciliation and adoption, and then life, abundant and eternal!

This grace comes to us all because of and through Jesus Christ, God the Son, Emmanuel, in His fully obedient life, His sacrificial death, His triumphant resurrection, and His glorious ascension. The fact of this amazing grace of God in Jesus Christ should then leave us in absolute wonder:

I wonder as I wander, out under the sky,

How Jesus the Savior did come for to die

For poor, orn’ry people like you & like I;

I wonder as I wander, out under the sky. [iii]

III

JOHN TELLS US 1 MORE THING IN THIS VERSE,

AND THAT IS THAT JESUS IS FULL OF TRUTH.

He “came from the Father, full of grace and truth.”

In this Gospel, the Apostle John reminds us repeatedly how the fullness of truth is to be found in Jesus Christ. Jesus, as God the Son, is the very embodiment of truth. “No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father’s side, has made Him known.” (v.18) Jesus came to show us the truth regarding God by showing us exactly what God is like. For this reason, He could proclaim that He is “the Way, the Truth, and the Life.” [iv]

Jesus is also the master Teacher whose teachings continue to set people free. “You will know the truth,” He said, “and the truth will set you free.” [v] His truth sets us free from our separation from God and from one another, from fear and despair, from helplessness and hopelessness, from a dead-end in life to the great end in life, glorifying and enjoying God.

Jesus is also the One who sent the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth, according to the Father’s promise. This is the same Spirit who inspired the authors of Holy Scripture to give us the written Word of God. Oh, yes, Jesus is “full of … truth.”

A Presbyterian pastor, Dr. Craig Barnes, tells of the time when he discovered the power of all this. It was the Christmas after his parents got a divorce and his father had disappeared forever from their lives. Just before this, his mother had left. Craig and his brother were in their late teens at the time and they rightly felt abandoned.

He and his brother decided to go visit their mother. They had no money for a bus, so they hitchhiked, only it got very dark and then it snowed – hard. Fewer and fewer cars went by, as the snow and the darkness enveloped them.

At one time, their father had been a pastor, and he made his sons memorize Bible verses. He quizzed them regularly, and they had those verses down by memory, though not in meaning. In the harsh cold of winter and in the darkness of the night, those boys kept busy quizzing each other with memory verses, such as Proverbs 3:5,6, Romans 8:28, and Jeremiah 29:11.

And it was in that moment, for the first time, that he really heard those verses, because he needed to hear them. He writes:

I was confused, frightened and grieving over the loss of everything that had once held my world together. I needed a savior. … (This) allowed me to step out, walk forward and give more of my life to Jesus. What else was I going to do with it?

That is the great advantage of abandonment – it makes it easier to hear God’s words of love and purpose for us. [vi]

And so, in a most difficult time and in a most significant way, Craig Barnes surely discovered the reality of the One who is “full of grace and truth.”

So much is given to us in John’s Prologue, verses 1 – 18. There is far more than we’ve been able to cover during this Advent season. But it should not surprise us that there is always so much more to learn, so much more to see in Him. Such a passage as this, in fact such a verse as this, is most wonderful, for the reason that we have such a wonderful Lord.

Yes, “the word became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.”