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John's profound opening title for Christ — 'In the beginning was the Word' — identifying Jesus as God's eternal self-expression.
John's Gospel opens with the most theologically dense five verses in the New Testament: 'In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.' The Greek term is logos — a word with extraordinary resonance in both Jewish and Greek thought. In the Old Testament, the 'word of the LORD' is God's active, creative presence. 'By the word of the LORD were the heavens made' (Psalm 33:6). When God says 'Let there be light' in Genesis 1, the word does the work — it accomplishes what it says. The 'word of the LORD' comes to prophets not as information but as event. In Greek philosophy, logos was the rational principle ordering the universe — the divine reason animating all things. For both audiences, John's claim that 'the Word was God' is staggering. Whatever logos is — God's active creative speech in Jewish thought, divine rationality in Greek thought — John identifies it with a specific person. 'The Word was made flesh' (John 1:14). The creative speech of Genesis 1 is the same Word that took on human nature and dwelt among us. The divine rationality ordering the cosmos walked dusty roads in Galilee. John 1:1-14 makes four interconnected claims. First, Christ is eternal: 'in the beginning was the Word' — before creation, the Word already was. Second, Christ is personally distinct from the Father: 'the Word was with God' — distinguishable, in relation. Third, Christ is fully God: 'the Word was God' — not merely 'godlike' but God. Fourth, Christ is incarnate: 'the Word was made flesh' — the eternal God truly became human. Revelation 19:13 brings the title to its climax. At his return in glory, Christ is named: 'The Word of God.' The Word that spoke creation into being now speaks judgment. The Word that took on flesh now returns in triumph. The title binds together creation, incarnation, and consummation.
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”
“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.”
“He was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood: and his name is called The Word of God.”
“That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes... of the Word of life.”
“The word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword.”
To call Christ the Word of God is to confess that God has fully expressed himself in him. There is not a hidden God behind the visible Christ who is different from what Christ revealed. 'No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son... he hath declared him' (John 1:18). What you know of God in Christ is what God is. There is no further revelation behind this revelation. To know Christ is to know God.
'The Word' translates the Greek logos — a term loaded with meaning in both Jewish and Greek thought. In Old Testament Hebrew thought, God's 'word' is his active creative presence (Genesis 1, Psalm 33:6). In Greek philosophy, logos was the rational principle ordering the universe. John 1:1-14 identifies both with Jesus Christ. Christ is God's eternal self-expression — the same divine speech that created the world, now made flesh among us.
Jesus is called the Word of God because he is God's full self-expression — what God 'says' about himself in a person. As a person's words reveal their thoughts and character, Christ reveals God's. 'No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son... he hath declared him' (John 1:18). The title also connects Christ to creation (the world was made by God's word) and to revelation (Christ is the final word God speaks to humanity, Hebrews 1:1-3).
Logos is the Greek word translated 'Word' in John 1:1. It means more than 'utterance' — it carries the sense of rational speech, ordered expression, the principle of meaning. In Greek philosophy, logos was the divine reason ordering the cosmos. In Jewish thought, the 'word of the LORD' is God's active power. John identifies Christ as this Logos — the eternal divine reason and creative speech, now incarnate.