Deity of Christ - John 1:1-14

John i. 1-14. Why the higher nature of Christ is called ho logos and why John used that designation, are different questions. As the word logos does not occur in Scripture in the sense of reason, it should be taken in its ordinary meaning. The question why the Son is called "The Word" may be answered by saying that the term expresses both his nature and his office. The word is that which reveals. The Son is the eikon and apaugasma of God, and therefore his word. It is his office to make God known to his creatures. No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him. The Son, therefore, as the revealer of God, is the Word. The reason why John selected this designation of the divine nature of Christ, is not so easy to determine. It may indeed be said that there is ground for the use of the term in the usage of the Old Testament and of the Jews who were contemporaries with the Apostle. In the Hebrew Scriptures the manifested Jehovah is called the Word of God, and to Him individual subsistence and divine perfections are ascribed. (Ps. xxxiii. 6; cxix. 89; Is. xl. 8; Ps. cvii. 20; cxlvii. 18.) This is more frequently done in the apocryphal books and in the Targums. It was not therefore an unusual or unknown term introduced by the Apostle John. Still as he only, of the New Testament writers, thus employs the word, there must have been some special reason for his doing so. That reason may have been to counteract the erroneous views concerning the nature of God and his Word, which had begun to prevail, and which had some support from the doctrines of Philo and other Alexandrian Jews. It is, however, of less importance to determine why John calls the Son logos, than to ascertain what he teaches concerning Him. He does teach

1. That He is eternal. He was in the beginning; i.e., was before the creation; before the foundation of the world; before the world was. Compare Prov. viii. 23; John xvii. 5, 24; Eph. i. 4. These are all Scriptural forms of expressing the idea of eternity. The Word then was (en), He did not begin to be but already was. The en of ver. 1 stands opposed to egeneto ver. 14. "He was the Word, and became flesh."
   
2. The eternal Word existed in intimate union with God. "The Word was with God;" as Wisdom is said to have been with Him in the beginning. (Prov. viii. 30; John i. 18.)
3. He was God. The word theos clearly the predicate, as it is without the article (compare John iv. 24, pneuma ho theos, God is a Spirit), and because logos is the subject in the whole context. That theos is neither to be taken for theios, nor rendered a God, is plain from what is immediately said of the logos in the following verses, and from the analogy of Scripture, which proves that the logos is theos the highest sense of the word. In this connection ho theos en o logos would be equivalent to saying, "The Son is the Father." Theos without the article occurs frequently in the New Testament when it refers to the supreme God.
   
4. The logos is the creator of all things. All things were made by Him. di' autou. The dia. here does not necessarily express subordinate instrumentality. All things are said to be dia theou as well as ek theou. The Father operates through the Son and the Son through the Spirit. All that the preposition indicates is subordination as to the mode of operation, which is elsewhere taught in relation to the persons of the Trinity. That all creatures owe their being to the Word, is made the more prominent by saying, "Without him was not anything made that was made;" pan ho gegonen is through Him. He therefore cannot be a creature. He was not only before all creatures, but everything created was by Him caused to be.
   
5. The logos is self-existent. He is underived. "In him was life." This is true only of God. The Godhead subsisting in the Father, Word, and Spirit, alone is self-existent, having life in itself.
   
6. The life of the Word "is the light of men." Having life in Himself, the Word is the source of life in all that lives, and especially of the intellectual and spiritual life of man; and therefore He is said to be the light of men; i.e., the source of intellectual life and knowledge in all their forms.
   
7. The logos, as the true or real light, shineth in darkness (en te skotia = en tois eskotismenois) in the midst of a world alienated from God. The men of the world, the children of darkness, do not comprehend the light; they do not recognize the Word as God, the creator of all things, and the source of life and knowledge. To those who do thus recognize Him, He gives power to become the sons of God, that is, He raises them to the dignity and blessedness of God's children.
   
8. This Word became flesh that is, became a man. This use of the word flesh is explained by such passages as 1 Tim. iii. 16; Heb. ii. 14; Rom. viii. 3, in connection with Luke i. 35; Gal. iv. 4; Phil. ii. 7. As to the glory of the incarnate logos, the Apostle says of himself and of his fellow disciples, "We beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father"; such as could belong to none other than to Him who is the eternal Son of God, consubstantial with the Father.
   

(Hodge v 1 p 505-506)

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Good stuff in Hodge tonight. Greek fonts do not display correctly but still understandable (skip the Greek if you do not know the language)

1. Work: Testing our WIFI 2 utility. Remote installation supposed to deinstall WIFI 1 and install WIFI 2. In our test today, it deinstalled WIFI 1 and stopped. Needs work
   
2. Work: We are down to 3600 systems that need upgrading. So close yet so far!
   
3. Life: My nephew got a job with Cargill in Georgia. We had been praying for him.
   
4. Life: About 2" of snow this morning. I plowed my driveway and 2 others after work. I did not have my heavy gloves on and that was a mistake. Kathee put a blanket in the dryer and got it nice and warm for me. I am enjoying its warmth now!
   
5. Life: Kathee and I read Lev 17 & 18 tonight
   
6. Life: Am watching an old western on Turner tonight