Chapter 1.
Jesus!
The Long-Awaited Messiah!
Jesus Existed in Eternity Past.
The full story of the heroic life of the Lord Jesus Christ has no start date, and it will never end. Reach as far back in time as your mind can imagine and Jesus is there. Dream of a moment, light-years in the future, and He is also there.
One day, when Jesus was teaching in the Treasury Chamber of the Temple in Jerusalem, He proclaimed ...
Verily, verily, I say unto you, If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death.
(John 8:51 KJV)
Many of those gathered about Him believed that He was their Messiah. They rejoiced, understanding that when their bodies died, their souls would remain alive and ascend into Heaven.
But, some wicked men were also listening to Jesus. They had come to gather evidence against Him. They were determined to prove He was a false prophet and have Him put to death. They protested, vehemently exclaiming, “Now we know you have a demon in you! Abraham and the prophets are dead, and you say, ‘If a man keeps My sayings, he will never taste of death.’ Are you greater than our father Abraham? He is dead! The prophets are dead!” (John 8:52-53 paraphrased)
Pausing briefly, Jesus rehearsed in His mind the many, pleasant visits He and Abraham had enjoyed in Paradise where Abraham was dwelling at that very moment. Jesus smiled warmly and replied jubilantly, “Abraham rejoiced to see Me come down from Heaven to enlighten mankind!” (John 8:56 paraphrased)
His enemies scoffed bitterly, hooting, “You are not yet fifty years old! How can you say you have seen Abraham?” (John 8:57 paraphrased)
Solemnly, Jesus stung their souls with these words ...
Verily, verily, I say unto you, before Abraham was, I AM! (John 8:58 KJV)
Jesus’ adversaries were enraged. “This is blasphemy!” they reasoned. They had come to incite the crowd to violence -- to trigger the stoning of Jesus. Thinking this was their moment of triumph, they rushed Jesus, planning to drive Him to a stoning field outside the city walls. But, Jesus numbed their minds and strolled out of the Temple. When they awakened, they were thoroughly abashed. They slinked away in defeat.
That day, Jesus revealed, He is not anchored to time. Unlike us, He never says, “I was in the past -- I am in the present – or, I will be in the future.” No! He says, “I AM in the past -- I AM in the present -- and I AM in the future.” Jesus floats above the flow of time. All of history is an open book to Him. Turn to any page, and Jesus is there.
John, one of Jesus’ Apostles, highlighted this amazing attribute of Jesus in the prolog to his Gospel tract. As he did so, he used an intriguing title for Jesus. He called Him “The Word”. John penned ...
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. (John 1:1-3 KJV)
So, Jesus was in Heaven “in the beginning”, before our planet was formed. And, in fact, He made our planet and everything else in our Universe. Why did John call Jesus Christ “The Word”? Because, he knew that Jesus had come from Heaven to Earth to proclaim a Message from God to mankind. That Message is commonly called the “Gospel”, an ancient term meaning “Good News”.
The three verses opening the Gospel written by John remind us of the opening verses of Genesis ...
In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. (Genesis 1:1-2 KJV)
Some say there is a discrepancy here. Genesis says God created the heaven and the Earth, and John says Jesus made both of them and everything else. How do we de-conflict these assertions? We do so by expanding our conception of our Creator.
God Has Three Personalities.
Jesus Is One of the Three.
The aforementioned verses from John and Genesis point to an ineffable “Supreme Entity”. It was He who existed “in the beginning”. He ruled eternity past. He rules the present. And, He will rule eternity future. Christians call this Supreme Being “The Trinity” or “The Triune God”, because, unlike us, He has three personalities: God, the Father, and God, the Son, and God, the Holy Spirit.
Yet, these Three are One. Long ago, Moses wrote ...
Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord.
(Deuteronomy 6:4 KJV)
Even so, throughout the Bible, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit –- all three of them -- are revered as God. It is impossible for our intellects to have a precise understanding of the Trinity, because God is so different from us –- so complexso much higher than us.
Yet, it is useful for us to contemplate God’s nature, so, consider the following logic. Since Father God “created the heaven and the Earth” and “all things were made by” Jesus, His Son, we must conclude that the Father and the Son are One. Also, note Paul’s writings about the Trinity in his letters to the Church in Corinth. He asserted that when an individual becomes a Christian, he or she is indwelt by the Triune Deity. In one letter he referred to this Presence of God as Christ Jesus, the Son of God; in the other, the Holy Spirit.
Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you ... ?
(1 Corinthians 6:19 NIV)
and,
... Do you not realize that Christ Jesus is in you? ... (2 Corinthians 13:5 NIV)
So, since the title, “Christ Jesus, the Son”, and the title, “Holy Spirit” -- both of them -- are used as names for the Holy Essence that comes to live within those who become Christians, the Son and the Holy Spirit are One. And further, since the Son and the Father are One, the Father and the Holy Spirit are also One. Dozens of other Bible passages confirm this conclusion. For sure, our God is the Triune Entity which made the heavens, the Earth, and everything else.
When pondering the nature of the Trinity, it is helpful to review the triune nature of Earth’s most abundant molecule, H2O. We are all familiar with its three primary forms: ice, water and steam. These three substances are quite different, yet they are all manifestations of the same molecule. They are one essence expressed in three forms. Likewise, the Triune God is One Essence expressed in three Personalities.
Briefly, Jesus Lived Among Us
As a Man.
Early in his Gospel, John announced, “Jesus became a man!” How astonishing is that? The One who created the Milky Way and all the other galaxies, the Earth, and mankind clothed Himself in human form and lived among us! And, John gave us an impressive description of Jesus, the Son of God. He wrote ...
... the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth. (John 1:14 KJV)
Note: Here, “begotten” does not imply that Father God fathered a Son. It denotes that Jesus was the only Son who could “be gotten” from Heaven. There is no other Son of God.
In the final days of March, B.C. 5, “The Word” became flesh. It was a unique occurrence. The Holy Spirit miraculously planted an Embryo who would become known as “The Son of God” into the womb of a young, Jewish virgin named Mary. And, Jesus was born in December in Bethlehem of Judea. He grew up in Nazareth of Galilee, and began to preach the Gospel to the residents of the Holy Land when He attained the age of 30 –- the age at which most Jews of that era believed a man could become a teacher of religious and spiritual matters. John met Jesus in A.D. 26. Jesus had come to Earth to found the Christian Church, and John joined His Ministry team. John knew he was wonderfully blessed to have become a close associate of Jesus while He lived among us as a man.
Why Did Jesus Come To Earth?
The Apostle Paul told us why Jesus left Heaven and came to live with us. In a phrase tucked into his first letter to a young minister named Timothy, he declared ...
... Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners ... (1 Timothy 1:15 KJV)
The key word in this verse is “sinners”. We humans have a “knowledge of good and evil” and the “free will” to choose to do “right” or to do “wrong”. We have an innate conscience that warns us when we contemplate wrongdoing. And, in the Bible, God has given us codes of proper conduct to sharpen and amplify our consciences.
Every time we break God’s Laws, as we all often do, we sin. And, our souls are defiled by an ugly stain. These besmirchments signify that we are unfit for residency in Heaven. So, where will we go when we die? We must go somewhere. The Bible says that we all live forever. Where will we spend eternity future?
God lets us decide. We can walk through life on either of two paths. One leads to eternal bliss. The other, to eternal torments.
· The path to bliss has as its foundation a way by which we can cleanse our sin-stained souls. This process is activated by faith in Jesus. If we come to believe that He is our Savior and let Him be the Lord of our lives, He will cleanse us and fill us with righteousness. Our souls will be made “whiter than snow”. We’ll pray along with King David, who pleaded ...
[Lord] purify me from my sins, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow. (Psalm 51:7 NLT)
And, frequently, we’ll do that which was recommended by John ...
If we confess our sins, he [Jesus] is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:9 KJV)
Men and women who choose to walk on the path to bliss will be welcomed into Heaven when they die.
· The path to torments ends in Hell. The path is very wide and Hell is huge. Most men and women go there when they die. It’s horrible. Once there, you can never leave. It’s a place of remorse. Jesus often spoke of Hell. He was keenly aware of its nature. He doesn’t want anyone to go there. But, those who reject Him and refuse to stay on the path to eternal bliss will soon find themselves there.
So, Jesus came to Earth to save sinners from going to Hell. Those of us who worship an serve Christ are “saved” from endless torments.