John3 - glory, grace and truth

The second part of the Introduction to John’s first-century eye-witness biography of Jesus (John2) climaxed with an amazing message to all human beings: “But whoever received him, he gave to them authority to come to be children of God—the ones believing in his name. These - not from blood, nor from the will of the flesh, nor from the will of a husband - but from God were born.” 

Yes. Children of God, born again into the family of the Almighty. Then John penned the words in red in bold above in order to start to explain the how of this caterpillar to butterfly transformation. “The Word” (see John1) is the eternal pre-Big Bang creator of everything.  That Word “came to be flesh” in Jesus. That Word “dwelt in us”. 

It was that Jesus – that human being – who enabled the first-century AD people in Galilee and Jerusalem to perceive the “glory” of the eternal “Word”. Jesus made known “the Word” just as a perfect only son displays his father.

That "perceived" “glory” was not the glory of the White House, Buckingham Palace or Downing Street. It was “full” of something very different: “grace” and “truth”.

 

What is “truth”? In what way was Jesus “full of truth”? Jesus spoke and lived the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth – about human beings and the holiness and justice of the eternal Almighty.

The “John” in this sentence is not the writer of this biography but John the Baptist – the first-century prophet in Israel. He was unequivocal in witness.

John (the writer) continues his explanation of how he and others became “children of God”. When Jesus came, that “glory” of his, that “glory full of grace and truth” was imparted to them. They “all received” some of that “fulness”. They “received” stuff from him which changed them deep inside. 

“Grace against grace”? What on earth? The word for “against” is anti in the original Greek. This seems strange. How can grace be anti-grace - oppose grace? It seems to me that John is faithfully and correctly recording that the grace they “all received” within themselves - the unmerited, undeserved steadfast love they were given by Jesus by “the Word made flesh”  - became the source of the "grace" they showed to all others.   

Moses “was given” the Ten Commandments around 1350 BC – along with what is known as the Mosaic Law which was to guide God’s people. 

That was well and good. The Ten Commandments became global as the basis of law in most people groupings. But what is "law" compared with “the grace” and “the truth” which Jesus brought down to earth from above? 

 

Have you “at any time” seen Almighty God the creator of everything that is? No. But you can know him because the one who “has made known” came from “inside” God. Jesus “was made flesh and dwelt among us”.