The Apostles' Testimony About Christ

Opening your Bible now to John chapter 2. No, John chapter 1.

I don't know why I said 2. We're still in chapter 1. And I don't know if we're going to get out of chapter 1. We may conclude these studies with the conclusion of the prologue of the Gospel of John.

I haven't decided yet whether to go beyond that, but that's where we have been on Wednesday nights that when I've been leading the service for really several months now. This prologue, which is so rich, it is by definition, prologue, it is the introduction to the Gospel of John. But as you know, what it does is introduce to us who Jesus is. This is the Gospel of the Apostle John that he wrote about the life, the ministry, the miracles, the teaching, the crucifixion, the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. But in the prologue, he tells us who this one is, this man, Christ Jesus, that he had come to know as this teacher from Galilee that he came to understand was indeed the Messiah sent of God. But in his prologue, he tells us who he was before he ever came to earth, the eternal God, one with the Father.

But after introducing this one, the last part of the prologue, the part we started looking at last Wednesday night, tells us about those who witnessed to the reality and to the saving power of this one. And there are four testimonies about Jesus Christ in these final verses, verses 15 through 18. There's John's testimony in verse 15 that we looked at last Wednesday. There is the testimony of the apostles in verse 16. The testimony of Moses in verse 17, and the testimony of God the Father in verse 18. Now rather than read the entire prologue as I normally have been doing, I'm going to read verse 1 and then skip down to verse 14.

I flow beautifully and then read verses 15 through 18 that we're going to be looking at tonight. But the prologue begins in verse 1, And the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Verse 14, And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. John bore witness of Him and cried out, saying, This was He of whom I said, He who comes after me is preferred before me, for He was before me. And of His fullness we have all received, and grace for grace. For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.

No one has seen God at any time, the only begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him. Well, just to remind you that John the Baptist bore testimony of who this one was. He did so very effectively. God raised him up for that very purpose, to be the forerunner of Christ, to prepare people for the coming of Christ, and he did so faithfully, fruitfully, effectively, powerfully, but humbly. He didn't become stuck on himself. He didn't become enamored with the influence that he had in Jewish society and the multitudes that flocked to him.

He didn't give him the big head. He always remembered who he was. He always remembered that he was just the forerunner, that he was just the servant, that Jesus Christ was the one who was important, that he, Christ, must increase and I, John, must decrease. And as we saw in verse 15, John bore witness of him and cried out saying, This was he of whom I said, He who comes after me is preferred before me, for he was before me, and I just remind you, without going back over all the things we said last week, but I just remind you, this is an amazing statement, revealing who Jesus is. That first statement, that he says, He who comes before me is preferred before me, or he who comes rather after me is preferred before me, could be understood in fully human terms.

I could say someone who is following me is far more gifted, far more effective, far more able than I am, and that would be a very human statement. And John, we might understand this phrase that I just read to be saying no more than that. He who comes after me is preferred before me, he is greater than I am. But then when you go on to that next statement, that can only mean one thing, because he goes on to say, for he was before me. We say now wait a minute, you were born before he was, so you can't say he was before me in his birth, he wasn't. John, your ministry came first, you had been ministering for some extended period of time before Jesus came on the scene with his ministry, so you can't say that he was before you in terms of his ministry. So what do you mean that he who came after you is before you? And then we say, well, he already told us in the earlier verses of the prologue. In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God.

Yes, he who came after me was before me, is before me, because he is the eternal God. That was John's testimony of Jesus Christ. But what about the testimony of the apostle John and the other apostles? Verse 16, and of his fullness we have all received in grace for grace. This is John now speaking, John the apostle.

Too many Johns, you can get confused. We've got John the Baptist, and John the apostle tells us what John the Baptist said. He said this, he said that, but now when he comes to verse 16, he tells what he said and the other apostles, that's the meaning of that word we. And of his fullness we, all the apostles of Jesus Christ who are witnesses of who he is, we all received and grace for grace. In other words, we received his fullness, and we received an abundance of grace. Two things in particular that John the apostle is testifying about concerning this one that he calls the word. He talks about the inexhaustible fullness of this one and the inexhaustible supply of his grace. Two wonderful things that John testifies.

This is what I know, and this is what the other apostles know. And this is what we can tell you from personal experience, that this one is full of whatever is needed, an inexhaustible fullness. Of his fullness, we have all received.

And if you want to know what I'm talking about, I'll explain it to you in another way. Grace for grace, we're talking about God's grace and the fullness of its supply that comes to us in Jesus Christ. An inexhaustible fullness from an inexhaustible source and an inexhaustible supply.

Let's talk first of all about this inexhaustible fullness, and I want to read the words of Martin Luther as quoted from Lenski's commentary. I used to consult Lenski regularly. He's an excellent commentator. A Lutheran, a Bible-believing Lutheran, back in the era when there were quite a few of those. They are more rare now.

It's not that there aren't any, but they're more rare now. But Lenski's an excellent commentator. The only reason I don't consult him very often anymore is because of the richness of my library. I just can't read and consult everything I have. And I am, by the way, aware that I'm probably at that stage of life where I need to start decreasing my library. I've been spending my whole life building it, increasing it. It's gotten bigger and bigger and bigger, and I've overflowed all my shelves and got books in boxes in closets. I've got two rooms here in the church. I've got books in my office and books in my study, and then I've got a study at home. I've got books in my study, and then I've got books in my den and I've got books in boxes. And I'm overflowing with books, and I need to start finding people who can make use of them.

But nobody can have any of my commentaries yet. I'm going to hold on to all the commentaries, but I've got lots of other books that I probably will never read. In fact, some of them I have read and some of them I haven't. I probably, I would be embarrassed to say how many books I have bought over the years that I have either not read at all or only read in part. And it's just because I get interested in one, then I see another one, and I buy that. And I start dipping into that one, and then I see another one, I want that, and I buy that.

And pretty soon I'm just overwhelmed in all the books. But anyway, Lenski, quoting Luther about this inexhaustible fullness. Here's what Luther said, I'm going to have to hold this a little closer to read it carefully. The spring is inexhaustible. It is full of grace and truth from God. It never loses anything, no matter how much we draw, but remains an infinite fountain of all grace and truth. The more you draw from it, the more abundantly it gives of the water that springs into eternal life. And then he gives three illustrations of this, and of course none of them fully exhaust the reality of God's grace because like so many things that belong to God, there's really no perfect analogy that describes it in its completeness, but nevertheless it's helpful. And so he gives three illustrations.

So he says, just as, oh wait a minute, I started to, I skipped something here so I need to back up. Yeah, just as the sun is not darkened by the whole world enjoying its light, and could indeed light up ten worlds. That's a thought, isn't it? This is a pretty big planet, and yet all the light from the sun shining on our planet and on other, who knows how many other bodies in space also receive light from our sun. The earth can soak up, soak up, soak up all that light, that energy from the sun. It doesn't matter how much we receive on earth, it doesn't diminish the supply one bit. It still has as much. Our receiving it doesn't diminish it, doesn't use it up in any way, does it? It's not like so many things on earth, if you have a bank account and you dispense out of it, it diminishes the amount that's there.

It now has less than it had before. And most things in the world are that way. If you have a water supply and you start supplying water to people who need water, pretty soon your water supply has decreased, of course. We have problems in parts of our country now with too many people tapping into the same river, tapping into the same lake, and those sources are not sufficient. They're in danger now because too many people are tapping into them, and whatever they take out diminishes the original source, but not so with the sun and its light.

We can take all of it we can get, go out there and get that sunlight, go get that energy, go get that vitamin D. Seven billion people on earth can all take advantage of it, and all the billions and billions of crops that are growing on earth can all receive, and trees and plants and so forth can all receive the benefit of it, and it doesn't dent the supply of the sun one teeny little bit. And that's the way it is with Jesus Christ. Of His fullness, said John, we have received in grace for grace, and everybody in the world, if they would, could apply for that grace and receive it without diminishing the supply that much.

It wouldn't dent it at all. That was Luther's first illustration. What's his second illustration? Now this one makes sense in his world.

I'll have to explain it in hours. But he says just as 100,000 lights might be lit from one light and not detract from it, he of course is talking about candles or lanterns or flame. And he says you can take one candle and you could light 100,000 candles from that one candle, and the original candle wouldn't be any less bright. The flame wouldn't be any dimmer for having shared with all those others, for having become the source of light for all those others. And that's the way it is with the fullness that comes from this one.

And what else does he say? The more he gives, the more he has, so is Christ our Lord, an infinite source of all grace, so that if the whole world would draw enough grace and truth from it to make the world all angels, yet it would not lose a drop, the fountain always runs over full of grace. Now I said there were three illustrations, and I must have skipped one because I've only given two. One was the sun, one was a candle.

Oh, here's the one I skipped. He says, just as a learned man is able to make a thousand others learned, and the more he gives, the more he has, so is Christ. That's an interesting illustration, isn't it? All of those of you who do any teaching have found that to be true. The more you teach others, the more your own capacity increases. You can give and give and teach and teach and give out the knowledge that you have. It doesn't diminish your knowledge. In fact, teaching it more or less cements, solidifies the knowledge you have and makes it clear to you and gives you insights you didn't have before. So you're giving out without diminishing your supply one bit, and that's another illustration of the fullness of grace that comes from Jesus Christ.

Isn't that good? So this is John's testimony. Of his fullness, we have all received in grace for grace, or grace upon grace is another way of translating that. In other words, wave after wave of grace. God's grace comes to us not so much in a steady stream as more like the waves on the ocean shore. Here comes a wave, God's grace, and if you're down there where the wave is coming in, particularly if it's any size, that's a pretty big event. It can grab you and wash you up on shore or pull you out into the ocean. And you escape from that one if you're inclined to do it.

You may rather just enjoy it if you can swim well and enjoy the water. But it kind of ebbs and you say, well, I guess that's the end of that. No, here comes another one. Bang. And after that one, here comes another one. Bang. Here comes another one.

Bang. And that's not too dissimilar from the way God's grace operates in our lives. As that song says that I love, He giveth more grace as the burdens grow greater. He sendeth more strength as the labors increase. To added affliction, He addeth His mercy. To multiplied trials, His multiplied peace. His love has no limits. His grace has no measure. His power has no boundary known unto men. For out of His fullness, out of the... The what? I've lost my train of thought and I'm hearing, but I can't hear.

Are you saying? Out of the infinite, He giveth and giveth and giveth again. That's what John is describing here. And that's his testimony of the grace of God. That's his testimony of what he has received from this one, this Word who was in the beginning with God and the Word who became flesh and dwelled among us. John told us what his experience was. John the Baptist, John the apostle tells us what his experience is and that of the other apostles as well. And that's the second testimony.