John 1:14 introduces us to a profound mystery. He who is fully God, he who was with God in the beginning, he who made heavens and earth, became flesh.
When John uses the word flesh
in this sentence, he is not using it in the same way that the apostle Paul does. Paul often uses the term to refer to our sinful nature. But John is using the term flesh
to emphasize the human nature that the Word took upon himself. Body and soul, the Word who is God became fully man. And by taking on human nature, the Word did not cease to be divine. God became what he had never been but he did not cease to be who he had eternally been.
Jesus Christ the baby, even as he cried out for milk and searched for his mother’s breast, continued to be the Lord who rules over all creation. Throughout his life he had human needs for friendship, food, and sleep but that did not prevent him from sending rain and causing the sun to rise. He did not take a break from being God during his time one earth. His expressions of grief, sorrow, and anger were not the responses of his human personality divorced from the divine. No, they were the emotions and responses of one person who is fully human and fully God at the same time.
This teaching really is a mystery. How can one person have two natures? Surely there is some way in which we can reconcile Jesus’ humanity with his divinity.
Some have suggested that Jesus only appeared to be human. In reality he was fully God, but he took on the appearance of a man. This was one way in which some people tried to understand the Bible in the early centuries of the church. But in response, we must point out that John is very clear: the Word became flesh. There is no room for this idea of an apparition or a temporary inhabiting of a human body. The rest of the Gospel is full of details affirming the humanity of Jesus Christ. Docetism, the idea that Jesus only appeared to be human, might be a means of rationalizing what the Bible teaches, but it is a denial of biblical truth.
The incarnation is truly a mystery. How can one person be fully God and fully man at the same time? It simply does not make sense to us, yet that is what Scripture teaches and therefore that is what we believe.
9 The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world.