Sunday, January 4, 2009

John 1:1-18

Link to text: John 1:1-18

Crushed Ice
1. What was your nickname growing up? How did you get that name? Did it stick?

Discussion
1. Take a look at the first few verses of the other gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke) and contrast to how John begins.
2. Compare to beginning of Genesis. Which sounds like it came first, chronologically, John 1:1 or Genesis 1:1? Or were they simultaneous?
3. Why did John write his book and why did he start differently than the other gospels and similar to Genesis? (hint 1: John was written a generation after the other gospels, after many false teachers had denied Jesus was the Son of God)(hint 2: John 20:31)
4. Just reading verses 1-5, what or who is “the Word”? What can you conclude about “the Word” in v 1-5?
5. Who or what fails to comprehend the light? Why? (v5, 10-11)
6. John the Baptist (not John the disciple, & author) is mentioned in v. 6. What was his purpose?
7. How does being “born of God” relate to or differ from being “born of natural descent” in v. 12-13?
8. Read v 14 in the context of v 1-5. What or who is “the Word”?
9. Read v 17 in the context of v 14, and v 1-5. What or who is “the Word”?
10. Read Colossians 1:15-17. What additional information do you find in Col 1:16 that you do not find in John 1:3?
11. Read Genesis 1:26 in the context of this passage. Who is “us” and “our” referring to?
12. Sometimes “the Word” is used to describe the Bible. Is that the intent here? What is the Bible about?
13. Respond to the C.S. Lewis excerpt below. Do you agree or disagree?

Bottom Line Point(s):
1. As the Word, the Son of God - Jesus Christ, fully conveys and communicates God.

How can you apply what you’ve learned here?
1. If you want to know God – know Jesus.

From “Mere Christianity” by C.S. Lewis…
I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: “I am ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God.” That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the devil of hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon; or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.

Bibliography
1. Barton & others, "Life Application Bible Commentary: John"
2. MacArthur, "John – Jesus, the Word, the Messiah, the Son of God"
3. "Serendipity Study Bible for Groups"
4. “Life Application Study Bible, NIV”
5. Mears, “What the Bible is All About – Bible Handbook”
6. Bible Study Fellowship International, “The Gospel of John”
7. C.S. Lewis, “Mere Christianity”
8. Grudem, “Systematic Theology”

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