Smoodock's Blog

The Son of God[1] who became Jesus is the Word in John 1:1. He was in the beginning with God (i.e. the Father) and was God himself. I have discussed this issue often over the Internet with those who claim that Jesus could not be God. They ask, “How can God be with God?” They are either ignorant of or seek to make light of John 1:1, saying to interpret it as Jesus being God himself is ridiculous, and the Greek word should be rendered divine. Well, this just isn’t so, and one may click on the Studies Menu bar above scroll down to John’s Prologue and click on “And the Word Was With God” if one wished to read my thoughts concerning this Scripture.

In any case the logic of my friends on the discussion forums is not consistent. For example, Adam says in Genesis 2:24 “…they (the two, i.e. husband and wife) shall be one flesh.” Following the reasoning of those who oppose the Trinitarian argument, how can two be one? If I use the reasoning of John 1:1-3 and apply it to Genesis 2:24, I could say something similar about Eve that we claim about Christ. “In the beginning[2] was the Eve and the Eve was with the Adam, and the Eve was Adam.[3] The same was in the beginning with the Adam. All mankind were born through her and without her not one man or woman, who was born, came into this world.” [4]

Scripture claims Adam was created in God’s own image, but he failed to mature into what God had planned that he should become. Jesus said we must be perfect “…even as our Father in heaven is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). The word perfect means that we must become fully mature just as God is mature. We must become wholly what we are, just as a grain of wheat or the seed of an apple must mature into their intended purposes. God is wholly perfect as he is and does not have to become fully God. On the other hand, man must become a mature figure of the image of God. Since Adam did not mature into his intended purpose and rebelled against God’s plan, he led his entire race away from God. This action cannot be undone by man. We are powerless to become who we were intended to be, because man’s spirit, our lifeline to God, has been corrupted through our being disconnected from God. It is like our map of life, our DNA/RNA, has been altered and we are unable to follow the original plan.

In this sense, therefore, the Word became flesh (John 1:14). That is, he became flesh, as Adam had been before he sinned. The Son of God became what flesh was intended to be in Genesis 1:27, showing himself to be the fully mature Image of God:

John 12:45 KJ2000  And he that sees me sees him that sent me.

John 14:9 KJ2000  Jesus said unto him, Have I been so long a time with you, and yet have you not known me, Philip? he that has seen me has seen the Father; and how say you then, Show us the Father?

John 15:24 KJ2000  If I had not done among them the works which no other man did, they would not have sin: but now have they both seen and hated both me and my Father.

2 Corinthians 4:4 KJ2000  In whom the god of this age has blinded the minds of them who believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them. (emphasis mine throughout)

What does this mean and how does it compare with what I have already said concerning Adam before he had sinned? First of all, it means Jesus is the exact representation of God’s character. This is what we are told in Hebrews 1:3 where it is said that Jesus, the Son of God, is “the brightness of his (God’s) glory and the express image of his person…” The Greek word translated express image (G5481 charakter) is the word from which we derive our English word character. Jesus matured into this Image of God. I do not mean to imply that Jesus became God. Jesus was and always will be God. Nevertheless, the One who became Jesus became a man (John 1:14). Luke 2:52 says “Jesus increased in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and man” (KJV). Although Jesus was God, his human mind had to mature and grow in knowledge and wisdom. The Word (John 1:1) clothed himself with humanity (Philippians 2:6-8). Allowance must be made for his humanity, otherwise God may have clothed himself in flesh, but he could not have become man. Man grows and matures, increasing in knowledge, wisdom and strength, and this is exactly what Luke 2:52 says of Jesus. Had Jesus not left his divine form behind, he would have been omniscient and would not have needed to “increase in wisdom and stature and favor…” As flesh, the Word was God without God’s body or form (Philippians 2:6-8; cp. John 1:14).

Jesus matured into his purpose where Adam did not. Jesus went about doing the work of God and claiming it was not he who did the work but God who dwelt within him (John 14:10). Jesus said that he and his Father worked together (John 5:17) and as the Father showed Jesus what he was doing in the spiritual realm, Jesus brought it to pass in the physical realm (John 5:20). The works that Jesus did characterized him as the Son of God, the Christ sent by God (John 10:25, 37–38). Adam failed in this respect. He may have walked with God for years before God formed Eve. Adam was just not maturing as the image of God. He was not living out the character of God in the physical realm as Jesus did.

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[1] In Hebrews 1:2 we are told that God has spoken to us through his Son “by whom he has made the worlds,” indicating that the Son existed before time itself. The idea that Jesus is indeed the Son of God from eternity is discussed in greater detail later in this chapter under the heading “Eternal Generation” and in chapter 8 under his third and fourth claims to deity.

[2] Define “beginning” for Eve as the time when man began to multiply and fill the earth at the births of Cain and Able (Genesis 4).

[3] My use the word Adam is scriptural (cp. Genesis 5:1-2), for God called both the man and the woman Adam. We tend to get used to using a word according to our own traditions or understanding and forget its real meaning. Adam after all means “red clay” and the man, Adam, was taken from the dust of the ground (the red clay) and was formed by God, and Eve was formed by God by taking her out of Adam.

[4] Adam was called flesh in Genesis 6:3, and he referred to himself as flesh in Genesis 2:23. My use of the article “the” is a bit awkward in our English language, but I have done so to parallel the Greek