I invite you to open your Bibles to the Gospel according to John, chapter 1. John, chapter 1, we're going to be looking at verses 1 through 18. We're going to primarily focus on verse 14, so note that as we read through, but I'm going to read the whole passage and pray to write in the sermon. Hear now the word of God. All things were made through him, and without him was not anything that was made. In him was light, and the light was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness does not overcome it. 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 flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. The Word became flesh and dwelt amongst us. And we have seen His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father. Thus ends the reading of God's holy, inerrant Word. May its truth be of origin in our hearts. Let us pray. Dear God, we thank you that you are a God who speaks, that you speak truth, so as to reveal yourself. Reveal yourself to us today in this reading, that we may see Christ and find ourselves in Him. If you have been following along with us over the last few weeks of Advent, we have been looking at the idea of Emmanuel, God with us, throughout the Old Testament. And this week we put the pieces together to see what all of that in the Old Testament has been leading us to. In Genesis 1-3 we looked at how God made us to be with Him, but sin separated us from God. This showed us God's design, the way things were meant to be, is that He wants to be with us. His design from the very beginning was for people to dwell with their Creator and God to be with His people. So he chose a people for himself, the Old Testament people of Israel, and he gave them instructions to build a tabernacle, a tent, where he would dwell with them. And in the tabernacle, we saw that God dwells with his people on his terms. But then later on, we saw last week that the people of Israel built a temple, a big, beautiful building. The temple is the iconic way that God dwells with his people throughout the Old Testament. If you are thinking of how the Old Testament related to God, it primarily had to do with the temple before that category. But that wasn't exactly how God always meant it to be. And finally, today, we are going to see that God decides to give his own version of what it means for God to dwell with his people. The first 18 verses of the Gospel of John are kind of a poetic prologue to the narrative. You see, if the whole Gospel of John is kind of a biographical sketch of who Jesus is, just like all four of the Gospel testimonies in our Bibles are, then this passage is ultimately about Jesus. And even though Jesus is not mentioned until verse 17, Jesus spoken of throughout this whole text. If you look at verses 6 and 7, it says it is not John, meaning John the Baptist, but the one who John came to bear witness about. Who did John the Baptist come to bear witness about? Well, if you don't remember, take a look at verses 29 and 30 later in this chapter. Before this, you see John the Baptist in the wilderness John the Baptist saw Jesus coming toward him and said, Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. This is he of whom I said, After me comes a man who breaks before me, because he was before me. When John the Baptist sees Jesus, he says, This is the one whom I was speaking of. He goes on to say the same line that is quoted for us in There is one who is referred to as true light. Later in John 8, 12, Jesus says, I am the light of the world. In John 14, 6, Jesus says, I am the way, the truth, and the life. You see, what John is saying here in this prologue are things Jesus says of himself later on. And lastly, just to prove the point, in verse 14, And if you look down at verse 17 in our passage, it says that grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. I could keep going, but the thing I want you to see here is that this prologue, verses 1 through 18, are meant to show us something about who Jesus is. You see, the prologue is set apart from the rest of the narrative of John's Gospel, but it sets the stage for everything that is to come. In these verses, there are a number But these verses don't just set the stage for the Gospel of John, they set the stage for Christmas. At some point, I hope to take these 18 verses as an Advent series all on their own. Lord willing, one day I'll even preach through John. But today, I want us to focus on one verse. We'll look at the whole passage for context, but there's one verse word is capitalized. It is a proper noun. So, what is the word speaking of here in our text? Well, Jesus. I would love to get into the Greek word Logos here, and how Logos is the embodiment of wisdom according to Greek philosophy, and this goes back to Proverbs chapter eight, but time doesn't allow that. Rather, I want us to look back together at verse one. Verse one, read it with me. It says, in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was what? The Word was God. So when verse 14, But what then does it mean that God became flesh? The word became flesh does not mean that God somehow changed from being a spirit and somehow changed into being flesh, to being human. But rather it means that God Philippians 2 says it like this, Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped. He emptied himself by taking the form of a servant being born in the likeness of man. The eternal God emptied himself by taking on flesh. So God did not become flesh in the sense that he somehow changed but somehow he stopped being God in order to become a human, but he took flesh upon himself, remaining fully God, but now also flesh. This is what we in Christianity call the incarnation. Can you all say that, incarnation? Incarnation. Think about that word incarnation real quick. The prefix in is the same thing as like going into ability. It's to enter into something. And the root word carn means flesh. It's where we get words like carnival or carnival. It means flesh. In the suffix ation just means an action So when we talk about the incarnation, we are saying that the God of the universe entered into humanity, that God took on flesh. This is the miracle of Christmas. Christmas isn't just a nice story of a baby born in the barn. The miracle of Christmas is that the God who created us became one of us. That the one who we sing against took on sinful flesh in order to forgive us. That in Jesus, God became flesh. That God dwells amongst us in the person of Jesus. The Reverend Dr. Sinclair Ferguson said it like this, if your intellect has never been staggered by the reality of the incarnation, don't know what the Incarnation means. It doesn't mean Jesus was a little baby. It means the eternal, infinite, divine One, worshipped by Cherubim and Seraphim, the Creator of all things, the Sustainer of all things, infinite in His being, wisdom, power, majesty, and glory, who in a word could dissolve the world that had sinned against Him, was willing That's the great thing about the gospel in the book. Brothers and sisters, this is the gospel. The good news is that God Himself came into this world and took on flesh in order to become our Savior. He became like one of us so that He could do what we could never do for ourselves, so that He could save us dwells amongst us. The word dwells here in verse 14 is significant because the original Greek word eskimoson is not used anywhere else in the Greek language as far as we know. The only time you can find it anywhere else as far as my research goes is in places where people are preaching on this passage, which means John likely made up this word. John took the Greek word skene, which means tabernacle. That's the same thing we talked about a couple weeks ago in Exodus. John took the word for tabernacle, the place where God dwelled with his people, and added a past tense verb ending to it. To put that in English terms, he took the word tabernacle from the Old Testament, Think about what John is saying here. This is absolutely amazing. Just like God dwelt amongst humanity in the tabernacle, so too God dwelt amongst humanity in the person of Jesus. God came to be with us in Jesus. You see, there's something about this Jesus guy, this wandering rabbi from 2,000 years ago, that when John sees him, he says it's like looking in the tabernacle. Just like God dwelled with us in the garden, just like God dwelled with his people Israel in the tabernacle, just like God dwelled in the temple, so too The glory of God filled the human body in the person of Jesus. Just like going to the tabernacle meant entering the presence of God, when we go to Jesus, we enter the very presence of the Almighty. In Jesus, God dwelled within us. down at verse 17, this is where the law was given through Moses and grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. When we look at Jesus, we see something of the glory of God, of the grace and truth of God that is not revealed in the law of Moses. If you think back to Exodus, you will remember that God revealed himself in the giving of the law But after he gave the law, he gave the tabernacle, the place where he would dwell with his people. And it shows us a different type of glory in the tabernacle. We see grace in truth. We see the glory of God's grace of God's grace and the fact that he is willing to dwell with his people even when they don't deserve it. And we also see God's truth. In the tabernacle stood the covenant, the promises of God, the truth of God revealed. And we see in the tabernacle that God made just judgments, that people could come to God for his authoritative ruling. Truth and grace abounded in the tabernacle. And now, in Jesus, they see that all the more. For He, being the eternal Son of God, shows the His kindness to us, His willingness to accept us at such great a cost. At the price of the cross, God paid the penalty that we deserve. And in Jesus, we see the fullness of truth. That is what John 1.14 is about, the Word, God, tabernacled amongst us in Jesus. God dwells with us in Jesus. So what does that mean for us today? I mean, why does this matter in the foot of this place? Well, for starters, it means that you or anyone really want just like the Israelites during the days of Moses had to go to the tabernacle in order to be with God, and just like in the temple, they had to go to the temple to be with God. If we want to be with God, we have to go to Jesus. To simply believe that there is a God out there in the universe and to not believe that that God is revealed fully and completely in the person To reject Jesus is, in fact, to reject God. And if you reject God, it shows you are not a part of the household of God. Look with me at verses 9-13 real quick. It says, The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming in the world. He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. 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 low flesh, nor of the little man, but of God." So just based off this passage, did everyone accept Jesus? Did everyone receive Jesus as God? No. Certainly not. It says in verse 11 that 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 what? He gave the right to become children of God. Does that mean, according to this passage, that everyone, by nature of being human, by the nature of being alive, is a part of the children of God? No. It is only through belief in Jesus Christ as the eternal God in human form that one is given the right to become children of God. You see, if we really want to be a part of the people Have you trusted in Jesus Christ, not just as a good teacher, but as the God of the universe, who you worship, who saved you, and who all your delight and joy is found in? Brothers and sisters, if Jesus really is in fact God, then he is worthy of all our worship, and he is worthy of our praise, he is worthy of our trust and our obedience and our service in every element of our lives. If Jesus is God, then to talk about God and not be talking about Jesus is idolatry. It is false religion. And it is a sad reality that in a 2017 report gathered by LifeWay, in partnership with Ligonier Ministries, after surveying 20,000 Christians in America, people who were church attenders, they found that over half of American Christians did not actually believe that Jesus was God. If that is not what we believe, then who are we? If that is not what we believe, then what do we worship? When I talk to my Jewish friends and family, this is the dividing line that separates Christians and Jews more than just about anything else. Jews are generally okay saying Jesus is a good teacher, a good religious leader. In fact, he is perhaps the most well-known Jewish rabbi in history. I even know some Jews who are totally fine saying Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah. But the line they cannot get past is Jesus being God. This is the line that divides Jews and Christians. It's the line that divides Muslims and Christians. It is the line that God dwells amongst us in the person of Jesus. It is this line that separates Christianity and almost every other religion. who are born again. Look with me again one more time in verses 12 and 13. 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 flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. You see, this is showing us that when we believe in Jesus as God, we are made to be born again. When you truly come to believe in Jesus, that He is actually the Christ, the Son of God, you will have life everlasting in His name, says John 20, 31. And in that, you are born again, not of blood, not of your will, not of the will of flesh or the will of man, but of the will of God. You are born again, not because of anything we do, but because of what God, because God chooses This is the mystery and the only way you can truly comprehend who God is is by being born again. God dwelt with us in Jesus. God loved us in Jesus. God came down and took on flesh in Jesus. And we can get to know God through him. Verse 18, no one has ever seen God but only God who is at the Father's side. He has made him known. We can know God to be with us, and I pray that leads you to have hope and love and joy and peace everlasting. I pray this leads you to a heart and mind full of worship of the one true God, not just on Christmas, but every day. Because God dwelt with us in Jesus, so that you can be with Him forever. Amen? Let's pray. Dear Lord God, we thank you, Lord, for this time. We thank You that You show us who You are and that You revealed Yourself completely and fully in Jesus. Help us to turn our hearts and minds to Him, to worship Him, to love Him as our Creator, as our Maker, as the One who came to save us, to give us grace and truth. Lord, guide our hearts to truly worship You, You who came to be with us in Jesus.