The Word Of Life
THE WORD OF LIFE
1 JOHN 1:1-4
How far do we know true fellowship with other Christians?
There is such a striking similarity between the introduction to this letter and the introduction to John’s Gospel (John 1:1-18) that it seems fairly certain that the letter was a covering document for the Gospel or that it was written shortly afterward to develop certain concepts in it. The Gospel was written “that you may believe … and that believing you may have life” (John 20:31), and this letter “that you may know you have eternal life” (5:13). So the Gospel begins with the Word (John 1:1), and this letter with the Word of life (1:1), because by experiencing him, Christians have come to know the One who has brought life (John 1:4).
1:1 amalgamates John 1:1 and John 1:14. The one controversy in the fourth and fifth centuries that never received a satisfying answer was how God could become man; there should never have been controversy, because Matthew 11:27 gave due warning that an answer would not be found. No one stresses the deity of Christ more clearly than John, but his humanity is as clearly demonstrated. We have to lean back and let the wonder penetrate us. On the one hand, he was “the Word of life which was from the beginning” and on the other he was “looked upon” and “touched” (1:1).
When we think of “eternal,” or everlasting, “life” (1:2) our tendency is to stress its endlessness, but for John it is, above all, what was “with the Father.” The presence of the tree of life in Eden (see also Revelation 22:2) reminds us that humanity was not created immortal, but capable of not dying. Immortality belongs only to God (1 Timothy 6:16), and by giving himself to us in Jesus Christ, he gives also immortality.
“Fellowship” (1:3) means having something in common. Christian fellowship is not based on common doctrine—that is the weakness of the denomination based on a detailed doctrinal basis, though this may be justified in a society which has been formed for a special purpose—but on sharing a common God and Savior (1:3). “We are writing” (1:4): the “we” is emphatic. It is a letter from one who has had contact with the incarnate Word during the days of his flesh (“we” is merely the normal style for letters, now mainly reserved in the editorial “we”, though it is more appropriate here, for John knew that all of his apostolic brothers would have agreed with him). True unity in Christ produces true joy (1:4).