We’re going through the NT trying to come to a deeper understanding of the doctrine of the Trinity. Right now, we’re looking at the prologue of John. Each day, we’ve been looking at one verse with the exception of the first verse that we spent three days analyzing each part. Today, we are going to be looking at verse 10.
He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him.
It is written in a tragic sense and we should see it as a tragedy. This is the first note of sadness that has entered the prologue. One would think that seeing all the good that was spoken of this figure that there would be great acceptance of him, but indeed there wasn’t. While he created the world, the world did not know him.
Note that man can know his creator. It is simply that man does not choose to know him. Why? John has told us earlier. It is because his deeds are evil. We see in the gospels that man’s deeds are so evil that they try to extinguish the light. I believe there are some atheists out there that are atheists because of a desire to extinguish the light of conviction. When a heinous sin takes place and one becomes an atheist shortly afterwards, you wonder if the cart is really pulling the horse.
This is what happens with Christ. Christ came and revealed the nature of the world. He showed people who they really were and they did not like it. He showed the Pharisees that they were not as righteous as they thought they were. The leading populace could not put up with him and the best way to deal with him since they could not deny the message was to eliminate the messenger.
It is important to note that the text says that the world was made through him. The Bible is quite consistent with this terminology as we will see as we go throughout the New Testament. Why does this matter so much? One only needs to think back to the Wisdom motif that is in Proverbs 8. Christ, being the Wisdom of God, was the instrument through which the universe was created.
Of course, that does not deny his deity at all. He eternally was and did not need to be created seeing as he is God’s Wisdom and there has never been a time when God has been without his Wisdom. That there are different roles within the Trinity does not deny the different persons of the Trinity nor that each of the persons is fully God. As we see more the consistency of this kind of position, we will gain a strong respect for how the biblical writers phrased their terminology so beautifully and were already even in the time of the apostolic writings working out the doctrine that would come to be finalized in the Trinity.
For now, let us note the tragedy. The world did not know him. While we can condemn those who did evil back then in crucifying the Lord of Glory, let us not make sure that we are crucifying him anew today by denying who he is.
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