Supreme

 

After a few days looking at specific names given for Jesus in the Scriptures, I want to take a step back and look at another passage that is just jam-packed with details about who Jesus is.

“He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For everything was created by Him, in heaven and on earth, the visible and the invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him. He is before all things, and by Him all things hold together. He is also the head of the body, the church; He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He might come to have first place in everything. For God was pleased to have all fullness dwell in Him, and through Him to reconcile everything to Himself by making peace through the blood of His cross – whether things on earth or things in heaven.” Colossians 1:15-20

I read this passage and there is one word that just kind of jumps from the text—supremacy, but what does it mean to be supreme? Merriam-Webster defines supreme like this, “highest in rank or authority; highest in degree or quality; ultimate, final.” Jesus is supreme in anything and every way we might think of. He is once again identified as creator; this time not only of the world we can see and touch but also of the world that we cannot see. But Paul takes it even farther, for Jesus is not just the creator of all things, but all things were created for Him. If that wasn’t enough, there is yet another layer to Christ’s supremacy as creator since our very continued existence- in fact the continued existence of all things- depends upon Jesus. He “holds all things together.” As the creator for whom all things were made and through whom all things hold together, Jesus has the ultimate control over everything else. That gives him the highest rank and the ultimate authority, and that makes Jesus supreme.

We could stop there and have an excellent argument for why Jesus is supreme, but the passage doesn’t stop with Christ’s supremacy as creator. Jesus is the beginning, the firstborn, the head of the church. God wanted Him to have first place in all things.  I have one child that always, always, ALWAYS wants to be first in line- whatever we’re doing, even when there isn’t a line. She wants to be in front. There have been a few times though when she found out that it wasn’t always best for her to be at the front- like those times when we’re headed somewhere and she doesn’t know which way to go. She can make a decision and feel strongly about it, but no matter how much she believes in her choice, it may not be the correct or best way to go. In those moments, she often finds that by the time she sees her error, she has lost her position and is now at the back of our group and racing to catch up. We don’t have to worry about that with Jesus. As our creator and an eternal being who is eternally present throughout all of time as we know it, Jesus is the best suited and the only one who can perfectly lead us along the right and best path. He doesn’t make the wrong choice. He won’t find Himself suddenly at the back of the group because of an error on His part. He and He alone- as part of the trinity- can be the first in everything without mistake or uncertainty. Jesus is supreme in His leadership and His knowledge.

These first truths about Jesus’ supremacy make the last one all the more incredible. For with Jesus’ obedience to death on a cross and later victory over death, Jesus became the supreme atonement for our sins. He was able to do what no sacrifice before could ever have attempted. He provided reconciliation for everyone who ever had or ever would live. Because of Jesus’ actions on the cross, no other sacrifice will ever be required of us. His atonement is complete and perfect; it is the ultimate and only one needed.

He is amazing; He is supreme, and He invites us to join Him, leave all of our burdens with Him and find rest in Him. How else can we respond than to choose to dwell at His feet?

Verses to contemplate:
Hebrews 1:1-3, Isaiah 43:11-13, John 5:21-23

Praise God from whom all blessings flow.
Praise Him all creatures here below.
Praise Him above, ye heavenly host.
Praise Father, Son and Holy Ghost.

All this and more Lord, we lay at Your feet. You alone are worthy of our praise. You alone deserve the first place in our hearts, lives and world. May we live each day for You, bringing glory and honor to Your name.

Light

 

“Then Jesus spoke to them again: ‘I am the light of the world. Anyone who follows Me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.” John 8:12

Have you ever been on a cave tour where they turned off all the lights? It is quite an experience. I never truly knew complete darkness until I experienced it in that way. The dark was thick and almost oppressive, but all it took was one small light from a candle or a small flashlight for that to dissipate. That’s because darkness does not overcome the light. The light always dispels the darkness, and with it, the light is able to cast out fears and illuminate the truth of a situation. So it is with Jesus, the Light of the World. If we believe in Him, His presence can remove fear as He helps us to clearly see reality and understand truth.

We must be careful though not to think of light and darkness as equal opposites. They are not. For darkness cannot exist in and of itself. It is not autonomous; it exists only in the absence of all light. Darkness is completely dependent upon the reality of light. Whereas light exists within itself. So it is with Jesus, the Light of the World. Jesus, as part of the trinity, is autonomous. He is dependent on nothing and no one. He exists within and because of Himself. Everything else is dependent upon Him. This does not mean that He intentionally and maliciously chose to force darkness upon those who don’t believe in Him, but the Light is only found in His presence. If one chooses a life without Him, they will naturally be in the dark because they will have chosen for the Light to be absent in their lives.

And that directly leads us to one final conclusion. Jesus is the Light of the World. He is not a light or one of the lights of the world; He is the Light of the World. There is no other light for the world. “If there is going to be a light for the world, it will be Jesus. It is Jesus or darkness. There is no third alternative. No other light.” (John Piper, I am the Light of the World) Jesus is singular; there is no one- no other god- who can bring light to your soul and banish the darkness.

I pray you take some time today to dwell in the presence of the Light of the World. Allow Him to weed out your fears and open your eyes to the truth. Open your heart to His calling and dwell in the Light.

Verses to help us along the way:
John 1:4-9, Psalm 27:1, Psalm 119:105, Isaiah 9:2, Luke 1:78-79, Matthew 5:14-16, Ephesians 5:8-10

 

Lord,
Thank you for being the Light. Thank you for making your Light available to all of the world, doing what no other could do. Help us to be good stewards of your light and do all that we are able to share it with the world around us.

Essential

 

“Jesus said to them, ‘I assure you; Moses didn’t give you the bread from heaven, but My Father gives you the real bread from heaven. For the bread of God is the One who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.’ Then they said, ‘Sir, give us this bread always!’ ‘I am the bread of life,’ Jesus told them. ‘No one who comes to Me will ever be hungry, and no one who believes in Me will ever be thirsty again.’” John 6:32-35

Our culture seems to have a kind of love-hate relationship with bread. We almost all love the idea of bread – the crunchy crust, the soft interior, the warmth… they’re all most satisfying- and yet there are many diets out there that are built on the premise of removing/limiting bread (carbohydrates) from one’s eating. I myself no longer eat gluten after seeing a direct and significant correlation between gluten and the chronic migraines I had suffered from for years, which means my own relationship with bread has become far more uncertain. However back at the time the book of John was written, and even for many parts of our world today, bread was one of the main food staples available and likely one of the most accessible. For many, bread has been the one thing that sustained them when other food sources had run out (mariners, Lewis & Clark, etc.), and here we see Jesus describe Himself as the Bread of Life. As such, Jesus satisfies all of our needs and longings in a way nothing else can. For unlike the bread and food we eat at our next meal, the satisfaction found in Jesus is eternal. It is not a physical satisfaction but one of the spirit. If we remain in Him, we will never know spiritual hunger again.

This reference to bread would also cause the Jews listening to remember when their ancestors wandered in the desert and the manna which God provided for them each day. God provided exactly what was needed for everyone for that day and the Israelites learned to trust God to faithfully provide for them in this way. As the Bread of Life, Jesus is the physical embodiment of God’s providence for His people and a reminder of His faithfulness.

For most of humanity, bread has been essential for life, and with this statement, Jesus draws a direct connection to Himself- letting us all know He is essential for life eternal. May we dwell with the Bread of Life, knowing He alone is the source of our true satisfaction, spiritual well-being and life eternal.

Verses for further study:
John 6:37-50, Exodus 16, Matthew 26:26-29, 1 Corinthians 10:16-17, John 1:4

 

Lord,
Thank you for faithfully providing even when we doubt or try to do it on our own. Thank you for giving us the gift of life eternal and providing the way. You satisfy as nothing else can. May we live in that reality and never forget.

Logos

I said John 1 was jam-packed with good stuff and I meant it. We will look at another three names for Jesus with ties to John 1 before we branch out more, and we’re finally going to look at the name given to Jesus in John 1.

“In the begin was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. All things were created through Him, and apart from Him not one thing was created that has been created. Life was in Him, and that life was the light of men. That light shines in the darkness, yet the darkness did not overcome it. … The Word became flesh and took up residence among us. We observed His glory, the glory as the One and Only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.” John 1:1-5, 14

Now most of the time when I have heard someone discuss Jesus’ name the Word, they have referred back to Genesis and the creation story, particularly how God spoke the world into being. God’s Word was the vehicle of creation. This thought nicely coincides with what we see in the first few verses of John 1 as well as what is written in Psalm 33, “The heavens were made by the word of the Lord, and all the stars, by the breath of His mouth. He gathers the waters of the sea into a heap; He puts the depths into storehouses. Let the whole earth tremble before the Lord; let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of Him. For He spoke, and it came into being; He commanded, and it came into existence.” (verses 6-9) So Jesus as the Word is clearly marked as the active force in creation.

A look into the history of the Greek word logos (which translates to “word” in the passage in John) gives even greater context to what John may have meant when he called Jesus the Word. The basic historical definition of the word logos is “to pick up, collect, count up, give account” and most directly refers to the act of bringing items into relation with one another. Early philosophers began to make the connection between the word logos’ meaning “to give account of something” and the order and balance found in the universe, eventually referring to this force as the cosmic logos. Heraclitus (ca. 535-475 BC) “understood logos as a principle of universe coherence and saw the world as a collection of unified things all kept in order by logos.” (Hillar, Logos to Trinity) Like others before him, he believed in a singular principle that unified and ordered the world and identified this principle by the term logos. Other philosophers would add to this- particularly as logos applies to the spoken word- but it is John who would give a name to this cosmic unifying principle- Jesus. (If you’d like a more in depth read on the history of the word logos, I found this article most interesting. https://blog.logos.com/2-ways-jesus-is-the-word-of-god-revelation-and-logos/)

But this name holds even more for us. “John calls Jesus the Word because he had come to see the words of Jesus as the truth of God and the person of Jesus as the truth of God in such a unified way that Jesus himself- in his coming, and working, and teaching, and dying and rising- was the final and decisive message of God.” (John Piper, In the Beginning Was the Word) Jesus is the message of God. From the first sin in the garden, God had a plan and it was Jesus.

Jesus is the manifested revelation of God’s message of love, redemption and justice. Take some time to be still and hear the Word of God.

Verses to help us on our way:
Genesis 1, Isaiah 55:10-11, Hebrews 11:3, Hebrews 1:1-3

 

Lord,
May we never forget the power of your word and the power in your son, the Word. All we know, and even that which we do not, exists by your will and through your Word. More amazing is that this same creator would come down to earth to live amongst us and experience all that we see and feel. We celebrate that this Christmas season and we worship you for your vast creativity and beautiful message of love, redemption and justice.

Unchanging

The name I have dwelt upon today builds directly upon the one from yesterday.

“Jesus said to them, ‘I assure you: before Abraham was, I AM.” John 8:58

Now if you read that and aren’t familiar with Exodus 3 or are new to the Bible in general, that statement may just sound like bad grammar, but it is so much more than that. In Exodus, we read of a conversation where God shares His personal name with Moses. “Then Moses asked God, ‘If I go to the Israelites and say to them: The God of your fathers has sent me to you, and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what should I tell them?’ God replied to Moses, ‘I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: I AM has sent me to you.’”Exodus 3:13-14 This personal name of God was treated with such great care by the Israelites that they never spoke it out loud so that they would never unintentionally break a commandment by using it in vain, and here we find Jesus, not just using the name, but applying it to Himself. This was no mistake and this was no simple declaration. With this statement, many would view Jesus as a heretic because in so doing He was claiming not just to be like God or be a son of God; He was claiming to be God. Jesus affirms what would later be written in John 1 “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God.”

I AM WHO I AM. What insights into Jesus does such a name give us? I have read much on this name and can tell you it is a deep and rich name that alludes to the fact that Jesus is eternally present in all moments- past, present and future. It also shows us that no reality exists beyond Him, that He is unchanging, and that He is all that is needed. I AM WHO I AM also serves to remind us that truth rests in Jesus and Jesus alone. He is who He is and He alone can tell us who that is. Human thoughts and opinions about Him will not change things one iota. In a 1984 article I Am Who I Am, John Piper expresses it this way, “When God says I AM WHO I AM, He summons us to human objectivity. He puts an end to the notion that everybody’s view of God is as good as everybody else’s. God is who He is and nobody’s opinion of Him makes any difference. Therefore, our calling as His creatures is to strive to know Him for who He is, not for who we would like Him to be.”

At a time when it is not uncommon to hear those in our world say “everyone has their own truth / live your truth,” I AM WHO I AM calls us to something higher. He sets the standard and nothing we say, think or feel will change it. So as you take time today to sit and dwell at the feet of the Great I AM, still your thoughts and wait for Jesus to reveal the truth of Himself to you.

Verses to help us on our way:

John 4:25-26, Revelation 1:8, John 8:31-32, Psalms 102:27, Malachi 3:6, James 1:17

 

Lord,

I stand in awe of who You are. You are more than I could ever imagine or wish for. You are a steadying rock amongst shifting shadows and the standard by which we can guide our life. Thank you for Your constancy and the peace, comfort and assurance that comes with it.

Timeless

I cannot think of a better place to start than a passage that literally begins with the words, “In the beginning.” Kind of screams, “Start with me,” doesn’t it?

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. All things were created through Him, and apart from Him not one thing was created that has been created. Life was in Him, and that life was the light of men. That light shines in the darkness, yet the darkness did not overcome it.

There was a man named John who was sent from God. He came as a witness to testify about the light, so that all might believe through him. He was not the light, but he came to testify about the light. The true light, who gives light to everyone, was coming into the world.

He was in the world, and the world was created through Him, yet the world did not recognize Him. He came to His own, and His own people did not receive Him. But to all who did receive Him, He gave them the right to be children of God, to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood, or of the will of the flesh, or of the will of man, but of God.

The Word became flesh and took up residence among us. We observed His glory, the glory as the One and Only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.”
John 1:1-14

This is a long passage and I’m not going to look at it all today, but it is too good to cut into pieces. So I’m going to leave it all there but only focus on the first two sentences today. We’ll get to a lot of the rest later.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning.” Oddly enough although these two sentences identify a name of Jesus, that is also not where I want to sit today. There is something even greater that we need to know about Jesus before we can consider and appreciate who He is. Jesus- who is referred to here as the Word- was with God at the very beginning. As we enter into this Christmas season when we remember Jesus’ birth, it may be easy to lose sight of the fact that Jesus had no beginning. He has always been and will always be. In fact as far as we are concerned, He is the beginning.

More than that, Jesus was not just with God at the beginning, Jesus is God. They are one and the same. Now that can be confusing and I’m not going to even start to dive into the concept of the trinity. No explanation I’ve heard has ever fully explained how it works. They are separate and yet one. Unique in their missions and roles but still- one. But this I know and trust, in John 10:30, Jesus states, “I and the Father are one,” and in John 14:7-9, “If you really know me, you will know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.” Philip said, “Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for us.” Jesus answered: “Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’?”

Later this month, we may celebrate a newborn baby laid in a manger, but we praise and worship One who was not created but has always been. He was there before the world was created. He knows how it was intended to be and He knows what has gone astray. He knows every step along the path that has brought this world to its present day, and He will be present for all that is yet to come. The eternality of Jesus cannot be underestimated or overlooked. A.W. Tozer in his book The Knowledge of the Holy explains it this way, "The idea of endlessness is to the kingdom of God what carbon is to the kingdom of nature. As carbon is present almost everywhere, as it is an essential element in all living matter and supplies all life with energy, so the concept of everlastingness is necessary to give meaning to all Christian doctrine. Indeed I know of no tenet of the Christian creed that could retain its significance if the idea of eternity were extracted from it." How does the reality that Jesus is eternal- with no beginning or end- change the way I look at who He is? How does it affect how we view His sacrifice, His mercy, His grace and His justice?

To be outside of time is so foreign to us, we may avoid thinking about it all together. Instead take this time to rest at the feet of Jesus and dwell on the fact that He was and is and is to come.

A few verses to help us on our way:
2 Timothy 1:9-10; 1 Timothy 6:15-16; Colossians 2:9-10; 1 Timothoy 3:16 (HCSB)

Lord,
It can be so hard for us to understand the idea of immortality or eternality. Our lives here are so bound to time with a distinct beginning and an all too final end, yet we are so thankful that You are not bound by those same constraints. You are above and beyond all we could ever know. Help me to hold fast to this truth and may it influence and guide my thoughts in the days ahead. Jesus, You are timeless.

Dwell

 When my parents first received my mom’s cancer diagnosis, my dad shared with us all that they were focusing on the passage in Hebrews 12:2-3 “Keeping our eyes on Jesus, the source and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that lay before Him endured a cross and despised the shame and has sat down at the right hand of God’s throne. For consider Him who endured such hostility from sinners against Himself, so that you won’t grow weary and lose heart.” In the weeks that have followed Eyes on Jesus has become our families’ battle cry, and often in our communications (updates on Mom, etc), you will see EOJ at the end- a reminder for us all whatever we may face. And so for many weeks, I have been reminded to keep my eyes on Jesus.

Then this past Sunday, our associate minister spoke on the difference between doing for God and being with God. He looked at the passage about Mary and Martha and noted that though Martha’s actions were good- after all she was fulfilling a command for hospitality- Mary’s choice was better. Mary chose to sit and listen at the feet of Jesus, and I knew that was precisely where I wanted and needed to be. This message built upon the reminder to keep my Eyes on Jesus and called me to even more. So I have decided to embark on a journey this Christmas season to do just that- to dwell at the feet of Jesus.

Dwell- it’s such a beautiful, rich word. It suggests settling down, residing permanently, and that is exactly what I wish- not just to visit briefly with Jesus, but to make my home at His feet. I cannot think of a better way to approach this then to spend the days leading up to Christmas focusing on who He is- what was prophesied about Him, how He identified Himself and who the apostles and disciples worshiped and praised in the New Testament letters.

I share to help keep me accountable in the days ahead but I also invite you all to join me if you wish. Sit at the feet of Jesus and take in all that He is and find your home with Him this holiday season.