So let's start at the beginning of the book.

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."

John 1:1

Verse one stresses the importance of one God. This is important because it reinforces the foundational principle that the worship of God in Israel was founded upon one God. Since John's readers knew this, it is important that we know it too. This very important precept is what separated Israel's worship from all other nations – Israel only had one God. This is pivotal-key-foundational. And you can't miss it. One God. One. There is a word that describes this concept: monotheism. Mono = one. Theism = God.

We must begin reading John with the right understanding of who the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is. If we don't get that, the whole rest of the gospel will be seen in error. So verse one is establishing that the Messiah would lead Jewish believers; a Jewish sect if you will. The Jews never thought the Messiah would be God. The Jews believed the Messiah would be sent by God and that he would be a man. Certainly a man could never be God! (See Numbers 23:19)

So here in verse 1, chapter 1, John is getting ready to introduce the Messiah. He realizes that first he must establish the present truth. He must state the obvious – that there is One God- to the audience he is trying to reach ..." Hear 0 Israel, the Lord our God is one" (Deut 6:4).

So we read - in the beginning was God. We begin with God. God is the word. God is a spirit. John is establishing that God's word is in fact God, and that his word is creative. After all, saying "Let there be light" was a creative act. John is setting us up for Jesus' language -his discourse, his teaching. The words that Jesus speaks are the words of God. It's not the man speaking, it is God speaking. This word was first. All of this meaning in this one little verse.

Perceptions

Oh, it seems obvious that the man, Christ, with the fullness of God inside, the visible image of the invisible God, would be just like him. But what about our perceptions? Certainly even Matthew, Mark, Luke and John had different perceptions, and as we read through our male and female lenses, our different personality lenses, we all see a different Jesus. I admit my propensity for what is right and wrong, from my perspective, overrides any feeling of mercy or compassion. Not saying I don't have any, but I would be merciful, patient, and compassionate if it were acknowledged that you were wrong and therefore needed grace. However, whenever I point out that someone is wrong, immediately someone else feels the need to tell me I was wrong (or have a bad attitude or was rude) to tell someone that he was wrong. So often we spend more time evaluating another's behavior based on what we would do, which in turn is based on what present society and political correctness dictates to us how we should speak, behave, etc. Jesus chased people with a whip, calling them children of satan. He called Peter satan himself and told him he had little faith. He said to his mother "what is that to me or you, that they've run out of wine?" All these statements would be politically incorrect today. My compassion and mercy? My patience? What about His?

There may be no excuse for my bad attitude in traffic or the grocery store line, but there is a right and a wrong way to express my frustrations. Should we always be silent like sheep led to the slaughter, or do we have a responsibility to point out wrongs? At the checkout, if someone has twenty items in the 10-item express lane, why is it such a social insult to say "Hey, you're in the wrong lane?" Some things are just wrong. The decision is not IF it is wrong, but whether it is worth bringing up, or even arguing about. It's wrong to go over the speed limit but law enforcement officers do it all the time for non-emergencies. They give courtesy to selected people by not writing tickets and even allow us to go over the speed limit, depending arbitrarily on their mood, the time of the month or whatever else they may have to do. What about those who are abiding by the speed limit? Other drivers will honk, flash their lights and give 'sign language' if you don't get out of their way, even if it involves breaking the law. Wrong. But nothing will ever be done about that. We learn to accept what we think will never change. Even in the so-called serenity prayer – I would change "accept" to endure.

We also learn to accept our religious beliefs, whether they are right or wrong, because of political correctness, in the name of being human and tolerant. We have been taught to accept all religions and be tolerant of all lifestyles. Should we? Is there a right and a wrong way to worship? Is there a right and a wrong gospel? And then the question changes to "Who died and left you in charge? What makes you think you are right?" But these questions don't probe the facts and sift information. They are hormonally- charged feelings to defend one's self and side step the real issue.

"The bible says" is the initial opening statement for many well-intentioned but ill-informed preachers who care more to speak than to hear. We should eliminate "the bible says". It doesn't mean anything. The bible is a collection of many different writers with many different personalities from many different time periods in many different cultures, all inspired by the same God. We should be careful to say "God said." Clearly I can say that in the New Testament - what Jesus said is what God said. All the rest is subject to agreement with what He said. After all, He is the only one who spoke in God's personality. But even Jesus' words must be heard in context. When he said "Destroy this temple", he was speaking of his body – but no one knew that until after he rose from the dead three years later (John 2: 21-22).

If we stick to our beliefs as Christians, we will be intolerant of other religions. If we stick to our particular denomination (or non-denomination, which is denominational in practice) then we are intolerant. If we are Calvinists or Arminians, then we are intolerant. If we believe and teach a different gospel, we are heretics and intolerant. So who's right or wrong? Or are we all just trying to get along and not have any dogma or doctrinal disagreements?

I think we should hear the words of Jesus first. Everything else must meet that litmus test. I am a follower of Christ. I believe that's what Christianity means. But it has come to mean many other things in the past 2000 years – things that don't have anything to do with God's character.

In the beginning - Chapter intermission

Ok, before we go on, I have to pause with some explanations. You know how we talked about the difference between how we think and how the people to whom John was writing think? Let's look at that again. The people that John wrote to were Jewish. Jesus was Jewish. By that, we mean culturally as well as biblically. He was raised in Nazareth in the Jewish culture and Jewish religion by Jewish parents. This cultural setting was different than that of Moses in the Wilderness, but also different from that in Jerusalem in 30 A.D. By this time, Palestine had become Hellenistic (Greek influenced) and under Roman rule. The Jewish people–Israel- were no stranger to having others rule over them. In some instances, God makes reference to these countries as her adulterous lovers and husbands. Egypt, Assyria, Babylon, Media-Persia and Greece had all ruled over Israel and now Rome ruled her. She had had five "husbands" and the one she now had was not her "husband".

Many of the Israelites - Jews - were scattered in the diaspora (dispersion) and lived in Egypt and Greece and other countries. The common language was Greek in the land of Palestine, although in rural areas it was generally Aramaic, a form of Semitic language borrowed from Syria. Jesus probably spoke Aramaic and Greek. The bible (scriptures) used in Judaism was the Greek version called the Septuagint. You may notice that Old Testament verses quoted in the New Testament don't exactly match the reference in the Old Testament that we now have. This is because the New Testament writers were using the Septuagint as scriptures. The educated had become western in their thinking: linear, analytical, concrete, concerned with facts, figures. This is what we now call left-brained. Jesus was eastern in his thinking; conceptual, abstract, fluid, flexible; now we call this right- brained. He was raised a Hebrew in an Aramaic rural culture. We can only understand the principles of Jesus through this lens.

The scriptures were given to Israel as God's word, but they were flexible - a living organism. There were laws and rules and ordinances but they were given for man's good. A good example of this is in one of the history books of the Jewish people. It tells the story of David and his men who were on the run. They stopped briefly at the temple. He and his men were famished and needed food. He knew there was food at the temple, but he also knew that common men were not to eat the bread, only priests. Nevertheless, he ate the bread and gave it to his men. This was okay with God. You can find this story in 1 Samuel 21:1-6. The Word said that the food was "reserved" for priests. The spirit of the matter is that the Jewish people were to provide for the priests.

In the time of Jesus there was a sect of Jewish people who were called the Pharisees. These people represented a hierarchy of Jews, which was a mixture of Judah and Idumeans; Herod, the ruler at that time was an Idumean, meaning that his heritage was from the region of Edom, which was given to Esau by God. The Pharisees were the rulers of Israel. Not necessarily the political rulers, although they were political, but the rulers of the Jewish people. They ruled with strict rules. They turned the living, good, Holy scriptures into a law book that only they could interpret. They imposed laws on others that were not in the scriptures that God had inspired. This is the setting into which Jesus was introduced.

In the beginning ...

The ruler, the Creator made himself a body (Heb 10:5). He then created everything through this body. He said "Let us make man in our own image" and he made man, male and female. Later he took the female part (side, rib) out of man and woman was formed. God is a spirit and has never been male or female. He is both, not separate, not either/ or. He said "us" referring to male and female, but not two entities, just one. There is one God. God desired fellowship. He created man to have a love relationship with him.

But in order to have a love relationship there had to be the possibility of rejection, which means man would have to have free will and God would have to be vulnerable - a requirement of a love relationship. God was willing to limit himself for his relationship. He knew what would happen. He planned to redeem man from his separated state. God has no plan to redeem any other created beings. The fallen angels have no salvation. He didn't create angels for a love relationship. They were for worship. We were created for love. We love him because he first loved us. We worship him because we love him because he first loved us. This is all going on -

In the beginning....

It is important from the beginning to understand that God is Spirit and not a man, nor the son of man (Numbers 23:19). God was in Christ reconciling the world unto him. God is one (Isaiah 42:3, Deuteronomy 6:4). God made himself a body, but the body was not God. The body was God's body, made in heaven. He reduced the body to a single cell and planted the seed in Mary and she conceived and birthed this body into the natural world. Everyone in the beginning of Jesus' life believed that Jesus was the son of Mary and Joseph.

Most Christians believe that Jesus was not Joseph's son but still want to make him a descendent of fallen Adam by saying he is from Mary's egg. There is no evidence of that. We only have the words written by people who thought Jesus was the son of Mary and Joseph. He was from Mary's womb, but not her egg. He is not a hybrid of God and man. He is God and his body is from heaven. Son of David, son of Man, son of Joseph: these terms were used, but Jesus was not a descendent of fallen Adam. He had no sin. He was from above. No one in the earliest church had ideas about a virgin birth, not until Matthew and Luke 30 years after Jesus died and rose. The earliest followers of Christ had no requirement to believe in a virgin birth in order to be born of the spirit. We now know of the virgin birth, but isn't it ironic that those who push the virgin birth think Jesus is a descendent of Adam through Mary's egg! Certainly Joseph and Mary were Jesus' parents, just not biologically so. He was born into the line of David, and therefore fulfilled all the prophecies concerning the throne of David, but Jesus was from above. We will see many times in many ways in John's gospel how Jesus makes it clear that he is not of this world. However, many thought he was. Being "not of this world" is a concept totally inconceivable at that time, and even now takes faith to understand.

Mary knew he was not from Joseph or any other man. Joseph knew he was not from him and believed the angel that he was not from any other man, but no one else knew. No one knew until 60 or 70 AD when Matthew and Luke wrote about it, and we don't know how they found out. Perhaps Mary in later years shared the secret. Mary's cousin Elizabeth knew that Mary was carrying the Jewish Messiah but didn't know that he wasn't Joseph's biological son. We will see later that the earliest of apostles announced to each other "We have found the Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph." Even Paul thought Jesus was the son of David, according to the flesh (Romans 1:1). No one knew that this was a virgin birth until after he died and rose from the dead.

So why is this so important? What difference does it make? The Bible says that "eternal life is to know the only true God and Jesus Christ, whom he sent" (John 17:3). That is probably the most important clue to life in the whole bible: Eternal life, one God, God in Messiah, the sent one. If we understand this, the rest will bear fruit in our lives. If we don't, at best all we have is another religion with more rules and regulations and requirements to achieve nirvana. It's important to know who died for our punishment. Without his death and resurrection we are still dead. We must know from the start, the beginning, and the inception of this discourse that the scripture cannot be broken; The Tanakh (Torah, Nevi'im and K'tuvim) is the Hebrew bible, what we call the Old Testament. It is the law and Jesus came to fulfill the law, not to destroy it. We must know, in order to follow this Jewish Messiah and become a Jewish disciple in a Jewish sect of Nazarenes, that God is a spirit. He is one, and he is not and never will be a man, nor the son of man, nor share his glory with any flesh.

"WHAT? How can you say that and call yourself a Christian?" I know, Christian means Christ-follower; Christ is Greek for Messiah; the Messiah is a Jewish-delivered promise to the Jews. Jesus said salvation is of the Jews (John 4). We don't need to become ritualistic, traditional, and law-abiding to achieve salvation, but we need to know who Jesus Christ or Yeshua the Messiah is.

His testament paid for our release. His suffering, as predicted in Isaiah 53, paid for our freedom. His punishment paid for our wrongdoing and by his torture we are not tortured for our sins. He bought our way into this kingdom of heaven. We must understand who he is. Since God is one, is spirit (of course the holy spirit - one) then who is Jesus?