John 1:6 - Meaning and Application

The evangelist wants to bring in John the Baptist, who gives an honorable testimony to Jesus Christ. Before he does that, he first tells us something about the witness he is about to present. His name was John, which means “gracious.” His life was stern and disciplined, but he was no less full of grace.

First, we are told in general that he was a man sent from God. The evangelist has already said that Jesus Christ was with God and was God, but John was simply a man, though a great one. God is pleased to speak to us through people like ourselves. John was a great man, but still a son of man. He was sent from God, and so he is called God’s messenger in Malachi 3:1. God gave him his calling and his message, his authority and his instructions.

John worked no miracles, and we are not told that he had visions or special revelations. Even so, the strictness and purity of his life and teaching, and the way both aimed straight at reforming the world and reviving God’s kingdom among people, were clear signs that he was sent by God. His whole life pointed to a divine commission.

Second, we are told what his work was, in John 1:7. He came as a witness, an eyewitness and a leading witness. He came for testimony. The old legal system in Israel had long served as a testimony for God in the Jewish church. Through it, revealed religion was preserved. That is why Scripture speaks of the tabernacle of the testimony, the ark of the testimony, and the law and the testimony. But now divine revelation was moving into a new channel. Now the testimony of Christ is the testimony of God (1 Corinthians 1:6, 1 Corinthians 2:1). Among the Gentiles, God had not left himself without witness (Acts 14:17), but no one had yet given testimony to the Redeemer among them. There had been deep silence about him until John the Baptist came to bear witness.

Notice, then, the subject of John’s testimony. He came to bear witness to the light. Light speaks for itself and carries its own evidence. But to people who shut their eyes against it, witnesses are needed. Christ’s light does not need human proof, but the world’s darkness does. John was like a night watchman walking through a town and announcing that morning was coming to those who did not want to see it. He was like the watchman in Isaiah 21:11-12, who answers those asking, “What of the night?” with the news that morning is coming, and says, “If you want to ask, ask.”

God sent John to tell the world that the long-awaited Messiah had now come, the one who would be a light to the Gentiles and the glory of Israel. He was to announce the time when life and immortality would be brought to light. His message pointed people to Jesus, the coming Savior.

Next, notice the purpose of John’s testimony, that all people through him might believe, not in John, but in Christ, whose way he came to prepare. John taught people to look through him and beyond him to Christ. He led them from repentance for sin to faith in Christ. He prepared them to receive Christ and his gospel by awakening them to their sin. Once their eyes were opened, they would be ready to welcome the rays of divine light that were about to shine on them in the person and teaching of the Messiah. If they would accept this human witness, they would soon learn that God’s witness is greater (1 John 5:9). See John 10:41.

The text also reminds us that John’s ministry was meant for all people who would receive it. No one was excluded from the kind and helpful influence of his preaching except those who shut themselves out. Many did reject God’s counsel against themselves and so received God’s grace in vain. John’s work was generous and open, but many refused it.

Third, we are warned not to mistake John for the light itself. He was not the light that had been promised and expected. He was only sent to bear witness to that great and ruling light (John 1:8). He was like a star, even a morning star, like the one that led the wise men to Christ, but he was not the sun. He was not the bridegroom, only the friend of the bridegroom. He was not the prince, but his forerunner. Some people rested in John’s baptism and looked no further, as the Ephesians did in Acts 19:3.

To clear up that mistake, the evangelist speaks very highly of John, yet shows that he must give way to Christ. John was great as the prophet of the Highest, but he was not the Highest himself. We must be careful not to value ministers too highly, and also not to value them too little. They are not our masters, and they do not rule our faith. They are ministers through whom we believe and stewards in their Lord’s house.

We must not give ourselves over to their guidance by blind faith, because they are not that light. But we should listen to them and receive their testimony, because they are sent to bear witness to that light. So we should honor them, and in no other way. If John had claimed to be that light, he would not even have been a faithful witness to it. Those who steal Christ’s honor lose the honor of being Christ’s servants. Yet John was still very useful as a witness to the light, even though he was not that light. People can be of great use to us, even when they only shine with borrowed light.

Before moving on to John’s testimony, the evangelist gives us a further account of Jesus himself, the one John testified about. After showing the glory of his Godhead in the opening of the chapter, he now shows the grace of his coming in human form and his kindness to people as Mediator, the one who stands between God and man. Christ was the true Light, in John 1:9. That does not mean John the Baptist was a false light. It means that, compared with Christ, John was only a very small light. Christ is the great light, the one who truly deserves that name. Other lights are only called that in a loose or borrowed way. Christ is the true light. Since he is the source of all knowledge and all comfort, he must be the true light.

He is called the true light not by pointing us first to the glory he pours out in the unseen world, but by pointing to the rays of his light shining down into our dark world. How does Christ enlighten every person who comes into the world? First, by his creating power, he gives every person the light of reason. The life that is the light of people comes from him. All the insight and guidance reason gives, all the comfort it brings, and all the beauty it adds to human life come from Christ. Second, by spreading his gospel among all nations, he enlightens every person in effect. John the Baptist was a light, but he shone only in Jerusalem, Judea, and the region around the Jordan, like a candle lighting one room. Christ is the true light because he is a light for the Gentiles too. His everlasting gospel is to be preached to every nation and language (Revelation 14:6). Like the sun, he shines on everyone who opens their eyes and receives his light (Psalm 19:6), which is why gospel preaching is compared to the sun’s shining. See Romans 10:18.

Divine revelation is no longer limited to one nation, as it had been before. It is now spread to all people (Matthew 5:15). By the work of his Spirit and grace, Christ gives light to all who are saved, and those who are not enlightened by him remain in darkness. The light of knowing God’s glory is found in the face of Jesus Christ, and it is compared to the first light God commanded to shine out of darkness. Whatever light anyone has, natural or spiritual, comes from Christ.

Christ was in the world (John 1:10). He was in the world as the eternal Word before his incarnation, upholding all things. But here the meaning is that he was in the world when he took our human nature and lived among us (John 16:28). The Son of the Highest came into this lower world, this dark and sinful world. He left a world of joy and glory and entered this sad and miserable one. He came to reconcile the world to God, so he was here to deal with that matter, satisfy God’s justice for the world, and show God’s favor to the world.

He was in the world, but not of it. He spoke with triumph when he said, “Now I am no more in it” (John 17:11). The greatest honor ever given to this small and lowly part of the universe was that the Son of God was once in it. That should draw our hearts toward the world above, where Christ now is. It should also help us accept our own place here, since Christ himself was once here. He was in the world for a time, but Scripture speaks of it as something past, and so it will soon be said of us too: we were in the world. May we be where Christ is when we are here no more.

Notice, first, why Christ could rightly expect the warmest welcome in the world: the world was made by him. He came to save a lost world because it was his own work. Why should he not care to restore the light he himself had kindled, bring back the life he himself had given, and renew the image he had first set in place? The world was made by him, so it should have honored him.

Notice, second, the cold welcome he actually received: the world did not know him. The great Maker, Ruler, and Redeemer of the world was in it, and few people even realized it. The ox knows its owner, but this more brutish world did not. They did not honor him or welcome him because they did not know him, and they did not know him because he did not show himself in the kind of outward glory and majesty they expected. His kingdom did not come with public display, because it was meant to be a kingdom of trial and testing. When he comes again as Judge, the world will know him.

He came to his own (John 1:11). This means more than the world, which was his own, for it especially refers to the people of Israel, who were his own above all other peoples. He came from them, lived among them, and was first sent to them. The Jews at that time were a low and despised people, and their royal honor had fallen away. Yet, remembering the ancient covenant, Christ was not ashamed to claim them as his own, even though they were poor and sinful. The phrase means his own things, not his own people in the fullest sense, as true believers are called in John 13:1. The Jews were his as a man’s house, land, and goods are his. Believers are his as a man’s wife and children are his, in a warmer and closer way.

He came to his own to seek and save them, because they were his own. He was sent to the lost sheep of the house of Israel, because the sheep belonged to him. Yet most of them rejected him. His own did not receive him. He had every reason to expect a welcome from those who were his own, since they owed him so much and had such good opportunity to know him. They had the words of God that told them beforehand when and where to expect him, and from what tribe and family he would come. He came among them himself, with signs and wonders, and he himself was the greatest sign of all. So it is not said of them, as it is of the world in John 1:10, that they did not know him. Rather, though his own could not help knowing him, they still did not receive him.

They did not receive his teaching, did not welcome him as the Messiah, and instead hardened themselves against him. The chief priests, who were in a special way his own, since the Levites were God’s tribe, were leaders in this contempt. This was very unjust, because he was their own Messiah and so could rightly claim their respect. It was also very unkind and ungrateful, because he came to seek and save them and so to win their respect. Many who call themselves Christ’s own still do not receive him, because they will not give up their sins or let him rule over them.

Yet there was a remnant who owned him and stayed faithful to him. Though his own did not receive him, some did receive him (John 1:12). Though Israel as a whole was not gathered, Christ was still honored. Though the nation as a body stayed in unbelief and perished in it, many were moved to submit to Christ, and many more who were not of that fold also believed.

This is the true Christian’s mark: he receives Christ and believes in his name. The second phrase explains the first. To be a real Christian is to believe in Christ’s name, that is, to agree with the gospel’s message about him and consent to the gospel’s offer of him. His name is the Word of God, the King of kings, our righteousness from God, and Jesus, which means Savior. To believe in his name is to confess that he is all these names say he is, and to rest in that truth for ourselves. Believing in Christ’s name is also receiving him as God’s gift. We must receive his teaching as true and good, his law as just and holy, his offers as kind and helpful, and we must receive the likeness of his grace and the marks of his love as the guiding power of our hearts and actions.

The true Christian’s dignity and privilege are twofold. First is adoption, which brings them into the number of God’s children. To them he gave the right to become children of God. Up to this point, adoption belonged to the Jews alone, as in “Israel is my son, my firstborn.” But now, through faith in Christ, Gentiles also become children of God (Galatians 3:26). They have a right, an authority given by the gospel charter, for no one takes this honor to himself unless the gospel authorizes it. To them he gave this right, this high honor. This right belongs to all the saints.

It is a priceless privilege for all true Christians that they have become children of God. By nature, they were children of wrath and children of this world. If they are God’s children, then they have been made so. People are not born Christians, but made Christians, as Tertullian said. “See what kind of love this is,” (1 John 3:1). God calls them his children, and they call him Father. They are then entitled to all the rights of children, both in their conduct here and in their home with him.

This privilege of adoption comes entirely through Jesus Christ. He gave this right to all who believe in his name. God is his Father, and so he becomes our Father too. It is by being united to Christ, joined to him as his bride and body, that we come to belong to God as a Father. We were chosen in Christ for adoption from the beginning, and from him we receive both the standing and the spirit of adoption. He is the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. The Son of God became a Son of man so that the sons and daughters of men could become the sons and daughters of God Almighty.

The privilege of regeneration, or being born again, is just as important (John 1:13). “Which were born” means that all God’s children are born again. Everyone who is adopted is also given new life. This real change always goes with that new family status. Wherever God gives the dignity of children, he also creates the nature and character of children. Human adoption cannot do that.

Here John explains where this new birth comes from. First, it is not passed down by natural birth from our parents. It is not from blood, nor from the desire of the flesh, nor from mortal seed (1 Peter 1:23). We are called flesh and blood because that is where our earthly life comes from, but we do not become God’s children the way we become our parents’ children. Grace does not run through the bloodline the way sin does. A sinful man brought forth a son like himself (Genesis 5:3), but a renewed and holy man does not naturally produce a child in that same spiritual likeness. The Jews took great pride in their family line and noble descent, saying, “We are Abraham’s seed,” and they thought adoption belonged to them because of that birth. But New Testament adoption does not rest on natural birth or family rank.

Second, this new birth does not come from the natural power of our own will. It is not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor is it of the will of man. Human will is morally unable to choose what is truly good on its own. So the beginnings of divine life are not planted by us. It is God’s grace that makes us willing to be his. Human laws or writings cannot make a soul holy or new. If they could, then the new birth would be by the will of man.

Positively, the new birth is of God. The word of God is the means of it (1 Peter 1:23), and the Spirit of God is the great and only author of it. True believers are born of God (1 John 3:9; 1 John 5:1). This new birth is necessary for adoption. We cannot expect the love of God if we have nothing of his likeness, and we cannot claim the privileges of adoption unless we are under the power of regeneration.

“The Word became flesh” (John 1:14). This states Christ’s incarnation more clearly than what came before. By his divine presence, he had always been in the world, and through his prophets he had come to his own people. But now, when the fullness of time had come, he was sent in another way, born of a woman (Galatians 4:4), God shown in the flesh, as holy Job hoped: “Yet in my flesh I will see God” (Job 19:26).

Notice Christ’s human nature, which was hidden under a veil, and this is shown in two ways. First, “the Word became flesh.” Since the children who were to become sons of God shared flesh and blood, he also took part in the same nature (Hebrews 2:14). Some taught that Christ was God and man, but said he was a man who was made into a god, like Moses (Exodus 7:1). That is the opposite of what John says here. John says, “The Word was God” in verse 1, and here, “the Word became flesh.” This means not only that he was truly and really man, but that he willingly took on the sorrows and weaknesses of human life.

He was made flesh, the weakest part of human nature. Flesh reminds us that man is weak, and Christ was crucified in weakness (2 Corinthians 13:4). Flesh also reminds us that man is mortal and dying (Psalm 78:39), and Christ was put to death in the flesh (1 Peter 3:18). More than that, flesh can point to man as touched by sin (Genesis 6:3). Christ was perfectly holy and harmless, yet he came in the likeness of sinful flesh (Romans 8:3), and was made sin for us (2 Corinthians 5:21). When Adam sinned, God said to him, “Dust you are.” That was not only because he had been made from dust, but because sin had brought him down into dust. His fall turned him, as it were, into something wholly earthly. So the one who was made a curse for us was made flesh, and sin was condemned in the flesh (Romans 8:3).

Marvel at this. The eternal Word became flesh, even though flesh had come to carry such a low and shameful meaning. He who made all things was himself made flesh, one of the least honored things, and he submitted to a condition far beneath him. The voice that announced the gospel said, “All flesh is grass” (Isaiah 40:6), making the Redeemer’s love even more amazing. To redeem and save us, he was made flesh and withered like grass. Yet the Word of the Lord, who was made flesh, remains forever. Even when he became flesh, he did not cease to be the Word of God.

Second, “he dwelt among us” here in this lower world. After taking human nature, he placed himself in the place and condition of other people. The Word could have become flesh and lived among the angels, but instead, after taking a body like ours, he came and lived in the same world we live in. He dwelt among us, among us frail and worthless people, among us who had no claim on him, who gave him nothing, and who were corrupt, ruined, and turned away from God. The Lord God came and lived even among the rebellious (Psalm 68:18).

He who had lived among angels, those noble and excellent beings, came and lived among us, a generation of vipers, among sinners. That was harder for him than David’s dwelling in Mesech and Kedar, or Ezekiel’s dwelling among scorpions, or the church in Pergamum dwelling where Satan had his seat. When we look at the upper world, the world of spirits, this flesh and body we carry seems small and low, and this world where our lot is cast can seem hard to accept. But the fact that the eternal Word became flesh, took a body like ours, and lived in this world as we do, has given honor to both body and world. It should make us willing to remain in the flesh while God still has work for us to do, for Christ lived in this lower world, as bad as it is, until he finished the work he came to do here (John 17:4). He dwelt among the Jews, so that the Scripture would be fulfilled: “He shall dwell in the tents of Shem” (Genesis 9:27). See also (Zechariah 2:10).

Though the Jews were unkind to him, he still lived among them. Even if, as some early writers say, King Abgarus of Edessa invited him to better treatment, he did not move to another nation. He “dwelt among us.” He was in the world, not like a traveler who stays only one night, but for a long stay.

The word used here is worth noticing. It means that he “dwelt in a tent” among us. This suggests, first, that he lived in very humble circumstances, like shepherds who live in tents. He did not live among us in a palace, but in a tent, for he had no place to lay his head and was always on the move.

Second, it suggests that his life here was like a soldier’s life. Soldiers live in tents. He had already declared war on the serpent’s offspring, and now he came into the field himself, raised his banner, and pitched his tent to carry on that fight. Third, it shows that his stay among us was not meant to last forever. He lived here as in a tent, not as one at home.

The patriarchs, by living in tents, showed that they were strangers and pilgrims on earth and looked for a better country. Christ did the same and left us an example (Hebrews 13:13-14). Fourth, as God once dwelt in Moses’ tabernacle by the shechinah, the visible sign of his special presence, so now he dwells in the human nature of Christ. That humanity is now the true sign of God’s special presence. So we must come to God through Christ and receive God’s messages from him.

Then come the rays of his divine glory that shone through this veil of flesh: “We saw his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.” The sun is still the source of light even when it is covered or hidden, and Christ was still the brightness of his Father’s glory even while he lived in this low world. However little the Jews thought of him, there were some who saw through the veil.

Notice who these witnesses were. “We” means his disciples and followers, those who lived most closely with him, among whom he dwelt. Other people often see a person’s weaknesses best when they know him closely, but it was not so with Christ. The ones who knew him best saw most of his glory. As with his teaching, where the disciples learned the mysteries while others heard only parables, so it was with his person. They saw the glory of his divine nature, while others saw only the veil of his human nature. He made himself known to them, not to the world.

These witnesses were enough in number, twelve of them, like a full jury. They were plain, honest men, with no sign of plotting or clever schemes. And what evidence did they have? “We saw it.” They did not depend on hearsay. They saw the proofs themselves and built their witness on what they had personally observed, that he was the Son of the living God. The word means a steady, lasting sight, one that gave them time to observe carefully. John later explains this by saying that what he declares is what he has seen with his eyes and looked upon (1 John 1:1).

What was this glory? It was “the glory as of the only begotten of the Father.” The glory of the Word made flesh was the kind of glory that belongs to God’s only Son, and to no one else. Jesus Christ is the only begotten of the Father. Believers are children of God by adoption, which means God freely receives them as his own, and by new birth, which means he gives them new spiritual life. In that sense they are like him and bear his image, but Christ is of the same nature as the Father and is the exact image of his person. He is the Son of God by eternal generation. Angels are also called sons of God, but God never said to any of them, “Today I have begotten you” (Hebrews 1:5).

He was clearly shown to be the only begotten of the Father by the glory seen in him while he dwelt among us. Though he appeared in the form of a servant in outward life, in grace he was like the fourth man in the fiery furnace, like the Son of God. His divine glory showed itself in the holiness and heavenly power of his teaching, in his miracles, which forced many to confess that he was the Son of God, and in the purity, goodness, and kindness of all he did. God’s goodness is his glory, and Jesus went about doing good. He spoke and acted everywhere as God in human form.

The writer may especially have in mind the glory of Jesus’ transfiguration, which he himself saw (2 Peter 1:16-18). God’s voice at his baptism, calling him the beloved Son in whom he was well pleased, pointed to his being the only begotten of the Father. But the full proof came at his resurrection.

Those who lived among him gained a great benefit from this. He dwelt among them, full of grace and truth. In the old tabernacle where God dwelt was the law, but in this one was grace. In that tabernacle were shadows and pictures, but in this one was truth. The incarnate Word was fully fit for his work as Mediator, that is, the one who brings God and sinners together, because he was full of grace and truth, the two great things fallen people need most. This also proved him to be the Son of God just as clearly as the divine power and majesty seen in him did.

First, he had a full supply of grace and truth for himself. He had the Spirit without limit. He was full of grace, fully pleasing to his Father, and therefore able to speak for us. He was full of truth, fully aware of all he was to reveal, and therefore fit to teach us. He had full knowledge and full compassion.

Second, he had a full supply of grace and truth for us. He received in order to give. God was pleased with him so that he might be pleased with us in him. And this was the true meaning of the old sacred symbols.