John 1:16

John 1:16 A. The Apostle John had just spoken of John the Baptist who bare witness of Christ. JOH 1:15. 1. John, as prophesied, cried (Proclaimed by crying or loud calling, announced) of Christ. c/w ISA 40:3. 2. O.T. prophets cried aloud to shew the people their transgression. ISA 58:1. 3. John did this but also cried to shew the people their Savior. The denunciation of sin without a declaration of the Solution is an incomplete message. a. Law without gospel is a message of futility, hopelessness, condemnation. b. Law is gloomy tidings but the gospel is glad tidings. ROM 10:15. B. The Apostle John then returns in vs. 16-17 to the Incarnate Word full of grace and truth of Whom he wrote in v. 14, the One Who John the Baptist said “...is preferred before me: for he was before me” (v. 15). 1. The Apostle John is not saying that John the Baptist is the one whose fulness we have all received, but that Christ is that One. 2. John the Baptist himself never implied he was himself the “One” and he needed the fulness of Christ to perfect him from his own Adamic sin and moments of doubt. LUK 7:19. 3. John the Baptist also declared, “...A man can receive nothing, except it be given him from heaven. Ye yourselves bear me witness, that I said, I am not the Christ, but that I am sent before him” (JOH 3:27-28). C. Believers may especially claim they have received of Christ’s fulness, their faith showing they are “...sons of God...Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God” (JOH 1:12-13). They have a spiritual birth. JOH 3:6-7. 1. Adam was the first human “son of God” (LUK 3:38), made in God’s image (GEN 1:27): immortal, innocent, a complete man. But Adam’s sin corrupted that image so that his children could only be made “...after his image...” (GEN 5:3), incomplete and under the bondage of corruption, sin and death. ROM 5:12. 2. That fulness is only restored by and in Christ Who creates in His children a “...new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness” (EPH 4:24). 3. God’s foreknowledge and predestination conforms the called of God to Christ’s image, the perfect Son of God, in their resurrection fulness. ROM 8:28-29 c/w 1CO 15:49. 4. “Adam’s likeness now efface; Stamp thine image in its place...” (from Hark, the Herald Angels Sing) 5. (1JO 3:1) Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God... D. “And of his fulness have all we received...” (v. 16). 1. His fulness was by the exclusive pleasure of the Father (COL 1:19). No other was ever thus bestowed: not Noah, Abraham, Moses, Levi, David, Mary or any other. 2. (COL 2:9) For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily. a. He only is God manifest in the flesh. 1TI 3:16. b. He only is “...the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person...” (HEB 1:3). Express = Truly depicted, exactly resembling. c. To see him is to see the Father. JOH 14:8-10 c/w JOH 1:14. d. Paul prayed that believers would be spiritually strengthened to perceive how they are rooted and grounded in His love so as to fully partake of His fulness according to His power working in them (in spite of their weakness). This is our working out the salvation which He has wrought within us. EPH 3:14-21 c/w PHIL 2:12-13. 3. (COL 2:10) And ye are complete in him, which is the head of all principality and power: a. Bless God: we ARE complete in him! All that we lacked and needed to fit us for  God, He has been made unto us, and we cannot boast. 1CO 1:30-31. b. Though our persons are now deficient, the completion is guaranteed by our God “...Who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were” (ROM 4:17). c/w 1JO 3:2. 4. Consider some vanities which cannot complete/perfect us as Christ does, and which too often are substituted in men’s hearts as sufficiencies. a. Moses and the Law, indifferent of Christ, or in foolish conjunction with Christ (as the Judaizers have ever promoted) are futile. The Law made nothing perfect. HEB 7:19. b. Sacrifices of Levi’s code could never perfect us since they were under the bondage of corruption themselves, but Christ perfected us for ever by His own offering. HEB 10:1, 4, 14. c. Mortar-boards of pretended temples of the wisdom of this world cannot perfect us. 1CO 1:19-20. d. The most successful businessman can lose his own soul. MAR 8:36. e. Relationships like marriage do not complete us. At best, they should remind us that Christ completes us. EPH 5:25-27. f. If any glory, let him glory in the LORD. JER 9:23-24. 5. “...and grace for grace” (v. 16). a. The grace which saves from death in trespasses and sins cannot be earned. By definition, we did not deserve it and could never work our way into it. We had to be elected unto it by God. ROM 11:6 c/w EPH 1:3-7; 2:1-9. b. For those saved by Christ’s grace, additional grace is uniquely available. HEB 4:16; JAM 4:6. c. “Note, All true believers receive from Christ's fulness; the best and greatest saints cannot live without him, the meanest and weakest may live by him. This excludes proud boasting, that we have nothing but we have received it...” (Matthew Henry) d. Was Zerubbabel’s rebuilt temple a cause for crying, “...Grace, grace...” (ZEC 4:7)? How much more so should we declare the same for Christ Who makes us His temple! 1CO 3:16. John 1:16 3-8-26 Page 2 of 2