Getting Bright in Light of Revelation
Currently immersed in the book of John, I am refreshed. When I use the word refresh, I mean renewed: my thinking, my attitude, my reasoning lighter—cooler, like an angry burden lifted.
The book of John, at this season of my Ezer journey, has become a respite, a finding my way back to the comforts of home after that last battle; that last, grueling test.
In Just A Few Words
The first five verses of this awe-inspiring book make daring declarations of not just who Christ is, but why He is. The opening verse says: In the beginning was the Word …”
Background
In midlife, my husband Steve returned to graduate school to become a linguist so he could work in Bible translation for the Fang people of Equatorial Guinea (EG). It’s a wild story, but while our family moved to EG, because of a family trauma, we returned to the US. It was during these years of Steve’s mission that I found the shallow and sometimes muddy pond of Scripture I’d been wading in was really an ocean of endless and thrillingly blue waters. I could do more than laps around the Bible. I could take deep dives into treasure troves beneath the surface waves.
I’m not trying to be poetic here, I’m trying to describe what it felt like when I discovered that the English language does not host enough words to adequately describe all of God’s truths found in His Word. I turned to the original Greek and Hebrew to uncover concepts beyond the familiarity of my heart-language—English.
My Hope
I hope looking at the way language is used to express the truths of creation and God’s plans—His passion—will give you the same refreshment whether it’s a dip in cool waters or the comforts of being in your own comfy space after a long day’s battle on the field of life.
The Logos
I love how plainly the Apostle John writes. He opens his eye-witness account of walking in and with the Light of the World with the facts all humans will seek at some point in life: where are we from and why. John states plainly, In the beginning. He takes us further back than Genesis and into the spiritual existence before the material world was made. Our English language translates this pre-material world existence as the Word.
For the biblically literate Christian, the Word is synonymous with Christ, the Living Word, and also the Bible, the written Word. This is profound and not always easy to grasp, but thankfully, the Holy Spirit helps us sort out some of the complexities.
But when we look back to the original language John used (Greek) for the word Word, we find he uses Logos. The word logos might be the most debated and most discussed word of the Greek New Testament. But I like to lump all the meanings together and come out with a Laurie concept. Here are a few definitions linguists and theologians have used:
- The appeal to logic; reasoning
- A plan; a decree; a mandate or order
- To purposefully put chaos into order
- The controlling principle in the universe
- An accounting; a reasoning of existence
- To argue or defend a thought or position
- A discourse of reasoning
In a recent podcast linked here, I used the angle of plans, mandate, purposes, and order in place of Word and reread the first five verses of John inserting these definitions where our English versions use Word. New revelation jumped out for me (I’m not sure about the listeners) as I began to hear myself speak of Jesus as not only the second person of the trinity, but the eternal plan. He’s a plan–a blueprint of salvation.
Here is roughly what I said, starting with verse one. “In the beginning was the plan, motive, and purpose—bringing order out of chaos, and the plan and purpose was with God, and the plan, purpose, was God—a mandate. He [the purpose] was with God in the beginning. All things were made through the purposeful plan of order and without this mandate, was not any thing made that was made. In the purposeful mandate and order, was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it.”
Whoa–What Just Happened
This deepens the meaning. Or at least, by translating into my own vernacular using some of the accepted definitions of Logos, we unearth new revealation. Not because Word isn’t a significant word, but because by translating Logo from an original meaning (several), we have a fresh view of what this Scripture conveys.
In this deep scriptural dive, verses four and five take on a greater meaning. I’ve always read these verses as Christ was and is the light shining in a dark world. I had a He shines for us mentality. But, when I read the verses from the perspective that Christ is all in all and made all, but is also the manifestation of not just God, but the manifestation of God’s plan and purpose, I come to understand that the plan is for me to shine in the darkness.
Amazingly, in John’s introductory verses of Christ, he reveals Christ’s coming, death, and resurrection were the plan from the beginning and that plan included/includes the commissioning of women and men to bear Christ’s light. And by saying, “the darkness has not overcome,” the light is to say that the light goes into dark places. The light of Christ (you and me) are not lit for the purposes of our own pleasures with God, but for the purpose of expelling darkness.
Co-laborers
This is Great Commission language, ya’ll. This is God’s original mandate to go multiply and subdue. This is Christ’s mandate to go into every nation. This is about you and me being used by God not just occasionally, not just on a whim, and not just because God desires to work with us in fellowship. All of this is true, but these verses reveal our purposes with the Lord. His plan, from the beginning, was/is to work in and through His own, making us true co-laborers with Christ.
As the Apostle Paul wrote:
For we are God’s fellow workers. – 1 Corinthians 3:9
Before the very first God-made human, Our Lord drew up a blueprint and that structure included you–you being a light that would shine in the dark areas of God’s planet. That, my friend, is miraculous. That our all-knowing, all-powerful, sovereign creator planned, before your birth, to use you as His agent in the battle of good and evil; darkness and light means you’re a powerful conduit of God’s truth.
Oh my. How’s that for some spiritual inspiration?
Bright Defines You
Is an eternal light dawning in you now? Can you feel the sun rise in your heart as you realize the love that you were made from and for wants you to spread that love in authoritative ways?
Ponder with me!
I think of the song, This Little Light of Mine and I want to change the words. If our lights are lit with and by Christ, then they are certainly not little lights.
Think stars sparkling lights years away. Think rising sun.
You reflect the sun. You light up dark corners.
May the light dawn in you, but then, in the most glorious way, through you.
That’s all for not and thanks for reading my rant.
For more ranting, check out my podcast.
If I perish, I perish,
Laurie
Not that it’s important, but just incase you need some evidence buying one of my books might not be a bad idea, here’s a humble list of awards:
Third place, Bible Study--God’s Will, CPI, 2023
Finalist, Writer of the Year, 2021
First Place, suspense, FWC 2019
Won Feature Author, in top 8 books of the year, publisher, 2010
Next Blog here.