¹In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God. ²The same was in the beginning with God… ¹⁴And the word was made 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 1:1–2, KJV)

Here is a verse that Onenessians typically turn to as a proof text for their incarnation-of-the-Father doctrine. But is that what it says? Does this passage clearly and simply say or teach that Jesus is an incarnation of the person of God the Father? For anyone with any sense of open honesty, this passage is far from explaining itself in either a Onenessian or Trinitarian manner. First off, it simply doesn’t say that “God was made flesh.” It doesn’t clearly state the Trinitarian position, nor does it clearly state the Oneness position. It simply says that God’s word was, past tense, with God, and was, past tense, God, but that at some point in time, “the word” was made flesh. Thus, it does not say that “God was made flesh” by any means. Saying that “the word was made flesh” is to say something different than Onenessians interpret it to mean.

So once again, we are faced with an issue of “interpretation” and not an issue of the Bible actually stating something that negates or contradicts what the Bible elsewhere consistently states and reaffirms the Son of God to be!

Since John didn’t simply say, “God became flesh,” let’s consider honestly what he actually did say.

What he did say is, “and the word became flesh.” If we were to say that “your word was you and was with you and then your word became flesh,” would that be saying the same as saying, “you became flesh”? Would that mean an exact clone of you was made? Or would that mean that you, personally, were transformed into flesh (assuming you hadn’t been flesh before)?

If “God was made flesh,” that would have meant that God “was transformed” into something he wasn’t before. And who was it that performed the action of transforming God into something else?

On the other hand, when God’s word/plan/expression was made flesh, His word/plan/expression was transformed into something it hadn’t been before: flesh. And yet that doesn’t mean that there was a “word” that was transformed into something and didn’t remain what it was.

Why is it true to say that about the “word,” but it wouldn’t be true to say about God? It’s because God is an entity, whereas “word/plan/expression” is a concept. If we were to say that you were made flesh, we would be saying you were transformed into something else because you are an entity. When a concept is made into reality, the concept itself doesn’t stop being the same concept it was before it was made real.

This is why John did not say that God was made flesh and why it is so terribly wrong for Incarnationists to claim that’s what he meant.

Besides, the fact is, neither Trinitarians nor Onenessians actually believe that God was made flesh. Quite to the contrary, what you do hear Onenessians say is that the Son is the flesh, and the deity is the Father, so they disprove their own reliance on this verse by their own confession! Since God stayed God, then God wasn’t “made” flesh, was He? That is why they have to change the wording of the Scriptures and conclude by saying that God was joined to flesh or robed Himself in flesh. In this way, you can make the Bible appear to say anything if you redefine what the words mean.

But John also did not say that God joined to flesh or robed Himself in flesh, nor did he say that the word joined to flesh or that the word robed itself in flesh.

It was the word that was made flesh; that is to say, God’s plan and self-expression of Himself was made flesh. Thus it wasn’t God Himself that was made flesh, and that is another reason John did not say it was God that was made flesh.

Furthermore, the Bible actually explains for us how God’s word was made flesh, and it has nothing at all to do with God incarnating Himself as a human. It is written again, that, “…When the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law” (Galatians 4:4).

God’s self-expression was made ofa woman; that is, made flesh from the woman’s humanity. God’s plan was made human by being made out of a woman.

Do you see the difference between jumping to conclusions as opposed to letting the Bible explain itself?

It is the difference between imposing man-made ideas into the Bible to make it say something it never actually says, in contrast to letting the Bible explain something to you so that you take out of the Bible what it is saying. They are completely different approaches. The former is unrighteous, and the latter is righteous. Why? Jesus explained it like this:

¹⁶Jesus therefore answered them, “My teaching is not mine, but his who sent me. ¹⁷If anyone desires to do his will, he will know about the teaching, whether it is from God, or if I am speaking from myself. ¹⁸He who speaks from himself seeks his own glory, but he who seeks the glory of him who sent him is true, and no unrighteousness is in him.” (John 7:16–18)

When we change the Bible’s message from what it is telling us to what we want it to say, or what we think it should say, then we aren’t being righteous; we aren’t being true to the message that we are sent as messengers to deliver.

This Son of God doctrine is not something someone made up after the apostles. This Son of God doctrine is what the apostles taught clearly, completely, and thoroughly throughout the NT.

Christ Did Not Glorify Himself

Of all of the Scriptures, perhaps the one that is most devastating to the modalistic Oneness interpretation of John Chapter One, is this one:

¹For every high priest, being taken from among men, is appointed… ⁴Nobody takes this honor on himself, but he is called by God, just like Aaron was. ⁵So also Christ didn’t glorify himself to be made a high priest, but it was he who said to him, “You are my Son. Today I have become your father.” (Hebrews 5:1–5)

Here we have a verse that clearly states that the same personal “self” who was made the high priest, whose name was “Jesus” and who was titled “the Anointed One,” could not have glorified himself to be made a high priest. That biblical truth in itself rules out the Onenessian conclusion that Jesus is the same self as the Father. Furthermore, what ties this very same biblical truth straight back to John Chapter One is the very next sentence. God Himself said, “You are my Son. Today I have become your father.” So God Himself, by using personal pronouns, refutes the modalistic Oneness conclusion that He was made into the Son.

This is how the Bible clearly teaches that the Son who was made flesh was very specifically not the same personal individual who said to him, “Today I have become your father.”

The simple, biblical truth is, if Jesus was God Himself incarnate, then by God’s own decree, He was not biblically qualified to be Christ, the “Anointed One.” And that is because in order to be “the Anointed One,” according to the biblical rules of this spiritual race we are in, someone else MUST anoint you, you cannot take the honor of being “anointed” upon yourself. This verse explicitly applied to Christ! And that is exactly what the title “Christ” means every time someone says it! So every time a Onenessian or Trinitarian calls Jesus “Christ,” they are saying he was a man anointed by God who didn’t take this honor upon himself.

That is what the Bible says, and what the God of the Bible says. And that is what the Bible says against the antichristian idea that Christ is the person of the Father incarnate! In order to get around the biblical truth that “Christ didn’t glorify himself” (as the Scripture says), they simply adopted the antichristian “dual nature” doctrine and, without any biblical support whatsoever, redefined Christ’s true “self” into a mere “nature.”

What Was The Plan That Was Made Flesh?

Now let’s look at some Scriptures that actually describe what plan was made flesh.

No one has ascended into heaven, but he who descended out of heaven, the Son of Man, who is in heaven. (John 3:13)

…I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of Him who sent me. (John 6:38)

These Scriptures express the “face,” or the “person” of the “plan” (or logos) that was “with” God. How do we know this? Because John 1:14 said, “and the plan was made flesh.” That plan who was made flesh (human), and became the true Witness after being made flesh, testified to us that he didn’t come to do his own will. In this way he testified for himself that he wasn’t personally God before he was made flesh. That fulfilled and realized plan, when he was in the days of his flesh, said that “the offspring of humanity” was what was in heaven and came down out of heaven. These words, like the word logos, have real meaning. Since Jesus was the firstborn of many brethren, he was not an offspring of humanity until he was actually born in Bethlehem. He could only have been “the Son of Man” in heaven, in God’s mind, as God’s plan, because before creation there was no humanity in existence for him to be an offspring of or that would have been there to parent him! So Jesus was quite clearly referring to the fact that God calls things that are not, as though they were. God’s plan was of Jesus as the “son of humanity” that he would one day become.

In fact, Jesus also testified himself that even in heaven he had a separate and contrary will to that of God. This is more evidence and explanation so that we can know that, even in heaven, in the mind of God, God didn’t plan to incarnate Himself. That is not what He either said He would do or what He claimed to have done. Rather, what this says is that God’s plan was for this man, who had a separate and contrary will to God Himself, to submit himself to this God who planned him. God’s plan required Jesus, of his plan, to not be God Himself, because He planned him to not have the same will as God Himself!

Not only did Jesus describe himself as distinct from God during the time when he was only a plan in God’s foreknowledge, but God Himself also testified to us that He (God) was not the Son of Man. This is more evidence that Jesus was not an incarnation of the person of God in any manner.

God is not a man, that he should lie, Neither the son of man… (Numbers 23:19)

In the Jewish view, as this verse shows us, “son of man” is simply a synonym for “man,” not a technical title. Numbers 23:19 states the complete opposite of what Incarnationists believe John 1:1–2 says. It also stands in stark contrast to these two verses we are looking at:

No one has ascended into heaven, but he who descended out of heaven, the Son of Man, who is in heaven. (John 3:13)

…I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of Him who sent me. (John 6:38)

So, between these two sets of passages, we have God claiming that he is not the son of man, and Jesus claiming that he was the Son of Man (offspring of humanity) in heaven who came down out of heaven not to do his own will. Jesus was not literally the offspring of humanity in heaven before any other human was born; he was planned by God to be the offspring of Eve, Abraham, and David.

God is not the author of confusion, and what a confusion it makes of God to claim that He came down to earth to do His will by not doing His own will! Yet again, Onenessians make God and Jesus out to be liars!

All of this scriptural talk is simply about God’s foreknowledge, about God calling those things that are not, as though they were. This biblical concept completely flies in the face of talk of incarnation, and proves it all wrong and utterly confused and even in denial of the true omniscient power of God! All of that incarnation mumbo-jumbo can be seen in Acts 14:11, which exposed repugnant paganism!

This also explains why John didn’t say that God was made flesh, but that the logos, the thought and plan of God that was to come to be, was made flesh. John didn’t say the “Spirit of God became man.” John didn’t say “the person of God became man.” We just need to learn to weed out such man-made ideas and unbiblical definitions of the words the Bible uses. The Bible calls this “not in the words which man’s wisdom teaches, but which the Holy Spirit teaches; comparing spiritual things with spiritual” (1 Corinthians 2:13). That doesn’t mean making things up; it means not going to the world’s philosophers for wisdom and understanding, but rather letting the words of the Bible teach us!

But What About Melchizedek?

One of the ploys that Incarnationists will reach for is the character Melchizedek. Their position goes something like this: “Well, the same passage that says Christ didn’t take this honor upon himself also says Melchizedek had neither beginning of days nor end of life. So this teaches that Jesus also preexisted.” Here’s the passage they would be referring to:

¹For this Melchizedek, king of Salem… ²…which is king of peace; ³without father, without mother, without genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but made like the Son of God), remains a priest continually. ⁴Now consider how great this man was, to whom even Abraham, the patriarch, gave a tenth out of the best spoils. (Hebrews 7:1–4)

“See there!” they’ll say. “Melchizedek was made like the ‘Son of God,’ ‘having neither beginning of days nor end of life’!” They’ll say, “Aha! See, he was God!” And that is how they get you, and they snag you like a fish taking a baited hook.

But look a little closer. First it says that Melchizedek was “made”; God isn’t “made.” Next, notice that it also says that Melchizedek was without father and without mother. Is that what the Bible says about Jesus? No, in point of fact we are commanded to believe that God is his Father! In fact, if you deny it, you would be antichrist (1 John 2:22). And so the analogy begins to breakdown, as all analogies must, since they are only replicas and not the real thing. Furthermore, according to the Bible, neither was Jesus without a mother like Melchizedek was…

…When the fullness of the time came, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, born under the law. (Galatians 4:4)

So then, in fact, unlike Melchizedek, Jesus was not without father or mother as we are told was the case with Melchizedek. We find throughout Scriptures that the Bible quite clearly and consistently calls Mary, the mother of Jesus! (Matthew 1:18; Luke 2:43; John 2:1,3, 6:42, 19:25).

Do you see what is happening here? We have a tendency to believe that because a train of thought in the Bible leads in one direction, and may even have a common thread with another thought in the Bible, then we are justified in thinking these give us a kind of permission or authority to believe whatever else that train of thought takes us to! This is how people take biblical thoughts too far in a dangerous direction!

Consider how this works with the snake handlers. They have Scriptures they base their ideas on, true enough. But they don’t let the rest of the Scriptures temper or qualify their thoughts. Joining thoughts along any possible “train of thought” works as well as if someone built a train track thinking they could connect the rails to either side and the train would still run along the route just fine!

In reality, joining tracks together like this is a sure-fire way to create a train wreck! And that is what people do who don’t let the Bible lay every step of every rail along the way!

• • Snake handlers join the thought of God’s protection from poisonous snakes together with the idea of purposely taking them up to prove their faith. But the Scripture that says not to tempt the Lord warns us that those train tracks don’t fully join together!
  • Trinitarians see the words Father, Word, and Holy Spirit and claim they must be distinct persons in the godhead, like the pagans understand their god to be. But Scriptures saying that God is one individual, and not to go after the gods of the people around you, warn us that those train tracks don’t join together biblically either.
  • Onenessians see the Scripture that says, “The word was with God and the Word was God… and the Word was made flesh,” and they assume that means God was made flesh. But the Scriptures that we’ve quoted above, that Jesus wasn’t alone, that he could do nothing of himself, that God said to him, “today have I become your father” (Hebrews 1:5), along with many other verses, warn us that the Oneness interpretation tracks simply don’t join together biblically.

In each of these three cases, a theological train wreck is just as absolutely assured as would happen with an actual train. That is simply because there is no way a train can steer itself without tracks, and certainly not if the tracks aren’t integrally joined together.

But it isn’t this way at all with biblical truth! The Bible is like a train track, and its words are like the rails that will keep us on the trail of truth as long as we follow them and not go off on tangents by laying our own rails toward chaos. If we allow it, the Bible will protect our thoughts from wandering out of the way and will keep us on course.

And so it is with the analogy we are supposed to glean from Melchizedek. What it is actually teaching us is simply that Jesus, God’s High Priest of the New Covenant, did not spring from the tribe of Levi and the order of Aaron. The Bible actually spells out that this is the purpose of the analogy of Melchizedek. It is up to us to learn to listen and hear what the Bible has to say!

⁶As he says also in another place, ‘You are a priest forever, After the order of Melchizedek.’… ⁷He, in the days of his flesh, having offered up prayers and petitions with strong crying and tears to him who was able to save him from death, and having been heard for his godly fear, ⁸though he was a Son, yet learned obedience by the things which he suffered. ⁹Having been made perfect, he became to all of those who obey him the author of eternal salvation, ¹⁰ named by God a high priest after the order ofMelchizedek. (Hebrews 5:1–10)

¹¹Now if there was perfection through the Levitical priesthood (for under it the people have received the law), what further need was there for another priest to arise after the order of Melchizedek, and not be called after the order of Aaron? ¹²For the priesthood being changed, there is of necessity a change made also in the law. ¹³For he of whom these things are said belongs to another tribe, from which no one has officiated at the altar. ¹⁴For it is evident that our Lord has sprung out of Judah, about which tribe Moses spoke nothing concerning priesthood. (Hebrews 7:11–14)

Look at what these passages teach us about Christ! They don’t say Melchizedek is Jesus, they say Jesus’ priesthood was after the order of Melchizedek. Then it says that Jesus, just like us, had to trust in God, who was someone else from himself, to save him! He had to learn by the things he suffered, and by that suffering he was perfected! Is that the case with God? Does or did God have to go through the learning of suffering in order to be perfected? Absolutely not! But God heard Jesus. Was that because Jesus was God himself? No, it’s because he had godly fear! Does God “fear” God? Absolutely not! It is talking about our deep reverential fear, or respect, that convinces us not to want to ever cross God. It’s talking about our respectful fear of God, which Jesus also had!

And then, being made perfect, Christ was raised up by God to usher in a new priesthood that was to replace, and be much superior to, the Levitical priesthood of the order of Aaron.

That is what Melchizedek represents: the priesthood being changed from the tribe of Levi to another tribe altogether, that of Judah, of whom Moses said nothing about a priesthood.

Do you see how they completely hijack the analogy of Melchizedek in order to impose their false interpretation of what it signifies?

Again, the point of Melchizedek clearly wasn’t to prove that Jesus always existed, because this passage (Hebrews 5:1–5), where we are taught about Melchizedek’s similarity to Christ, already had God telling Jesus, “‘You are my Son. Today I have become your father.’” So here we have Jesus born at a certain point in time, and having a father, both traits that were unlike Melchizedek.

The bottom line is, in no way does the Bible ever, ever say that God became a father to Himself and a son to Himself. Not in John 1 or any other passage of the Bible. That is pure, unadulterated hogwash and mythology!

The problem with John 1 isn’t what it says; it is how it is interpreted. Onenessians disobey the Scriptures in order to go after the views of the gods round about them and end up adopting an antichristian view of Christ in interpreting passages such as John 1.

Jesus’ Way of Interpreting John 1

As we’ve said, there are really only two ways to interpret the Bible. There is the devil’s method, and then there is Jesus’ method. Most people seem determined to interpret John 1:1–14 using the devil’s method. One thing that method will produce is a variety of opinions, but opinions do not equal truth.

We will now demonstrate how to apply Jesus’ method, and in doing so, let the Scriptures show us what John was saying. We can know this is what he was trying to say, because he said the same thing in different ways in other places, and so did others in the Bible. So this method is the only one that puts his words in harmony with the rest of the Scriptures.

The first thing to point out is the similarity in language between the prologue of John’s gospel and John’s epistle:

¹ In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God. ²The same was in the beginning with God… ¹⁴And the word was made 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 1:1–2, KJV)

¹That which was from the beginning, that which we have heard, that which we have seen with our eyes, that which we saw, and our hands touched, concerning the Word of life ²(and the life was revealed, and we have seen, and testify, and declare to you the life, the eternal life, which was with the Father, and was revealed to us); ³that which we have seen and heard we declare to you, that you also may have fellowship with us. Yes, and our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son, Jesus Christ. ⁴And we write these things to you, that our joy may be fulfilled. ⁵ This is the message which we have heard from him and announce to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. (1 John 1:1–5)

Using John’s epistle is actually the proper way to interpret John’s gospel. While many assume that “in the beginning” in John 1:1 referred to eternity past, that is supposition. John’s epistle, on the other hand, leads us to the idea that “the beginning” had more to do with the beginning of the gospel message. For right here he explained what he meant by “from the beginning”; namely, “that which we have heard… seen… touched, concerning the word of life… which we… declare to you…” In fact, this idea (that beginning has to do with the beginning of Jesus’ ministry) was shared with other NT writers. For example…

Even as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word delivered them to us. (Luke 1:2)

¹ The beginning of the Good News of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. ²As it is written in the prophets, “Behold, I send my messenger before your face, Who will prepare your way before you. ³ The voice of one crying in the wilderness, ‘Make ready the way of the Lord! Make his paths straight!’’’ ⁴John came baptizing in the wilderness and preaching the baptism of repentance for forgiveness of sins. (Mark 1:1–4)

In Mark’s gospel, the beginning of the good news of Jesus started at John the Baptist. This same idea was also given to us by Luke…

In the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John, the son of Zacharias, in the wilderness. (Luke 3:1)

When we join the above with what Luke wrote in Acts, we see he again started at the beginning, which was the beginning of Jesus’ ministry…

The first book I wrote, Theophilus, concerned all that Jesus began both to do and to teach. (Acts 1:1)

This consistency is more than mere coincidence; it is the harmony of the gospel message.

Now notice how similar the language is in the opening of the Book of Hebrews…

¹God, having in the past spoken to the fathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, ²has at the end of these days spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, through whom also he made the worlds. (Hebrews 1:1–2)

This passage was another way of saying that Jesus was God’s word made flesh. In the past, God’s word was spoken by the fathers; i.e., Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, the prophets, and so forth. But now it’s different; God speaks to us through His Son. This implies God didn’t speak through His Son prior to the Son’s birth, at least not like He does now. When we start to listen to the Son, we find that not only are his words the words of the Father, but so also is everything he did!

The words that I tell you, I speak not from myself; but the Father who lives in me does His works. (John 14:10)

The word which you hear isn’t mine, but the Father’s who sent me. (John 14:24)

He who sent me is true; and the things which I heard from him, these I say to the world. (John 8:26)

…I do nothing of myself; but as my Father taught me, I speak these things. (John 8:28)

For I spoke not from myself, but the Father who sent me, he gave me a commandment, what I should say, and what I should speak. I know that his commandment is eternal life. The things therefore which I speak, even as the Father has said to me, so I speak. (John 12:49–50)

Now they have known that all things whatever you have given me are from you, for the words which you have given me I have given to them, and they received them, and knew for sure that I came forth from you, and they have believed that you sent me. (John 17:7–8)

It doesn’t seem as though Jesus could have been clearer, or more consistent. This was such an important theme that it was reiterated in many ways. The words that Jesus spoke were, not his own words, but God the Father’s words! Even John the Baptist, Jesus’ forerunner, said the very same thing:

For he whom God has sent speaks the words of God; for God gives the Spirit without measure. The Father loves the Son, and has given all things into his hand. (John 3:34–35)

For those who have ears to hear, these are the passages in which John himself describes and defines the “word” he was referring to in John 1. The words that Jesus spoke were not his words, they were the words that God gave and commanded him to speak. They were words that taught us about God, but were more than just words: the same words became commandments to us, because they are God’s words to us. It is in this way that the words are “God” to us. These words were with God, and these words were God, and then the Son was born and spoke these words to us. John’s words fit perfectly with what John had been explaining, through Jesus’ words, which were actually God’s words.

Read in this way, in the light of these other Scriptures bearing on the subject of the “word,” John 1 has nothing at all to do with the pagan idea of an incarnation. Rather, it has everything to do with the truth that God is the source of authority of all the words spoken by and through Jesus:

For Moses indeed said to the fathers, “The Lord God will raise up a prophet for you from among your brothers, like me. You shall listen to him in all things whatever he says to you. It will be, that every soul that will not listen to that prophet will be utterly destroyed from among the people.” (Acts 3:22–23)

Why is this so hard for us to understand? Because we have been spoiled by philosophy!

I recently listened to part of an online debate among some Oneness theologians. They were apparently trying to come to a consensus on how they should view the “incarnation” of Jesus. It was a live broadcast. Suffice it to say, they offered several different possibilities, each according to his own opinion. Not one did, or could, provide an “it is written” quote that spelled out their view of the incarnation. One speaker even went as far as to say he really didn’t mind having to resort to a little bit of philosophical metaphysical language if it would help explain things the Bible didn’t go into.

The reason that neither Onenessians nor Trinitarians can find such words or concepts clearly spelled out and explained in detail in the Bible is simply because that isn’t what the Bible teaches! To begin with, according to the Bible, Jesus was born (Matthew 1:18, 2:1; John 18:37), not “incarnated,” period. So they are both trying to impose a pagan concept upon the biblical message, and it just doesn’t fit!

That is exactly the reason why they can find the words and concepts in pagan views to describe their view of an incarnation: it is because paganism is the ultimate source (Acts 14:11) of their incarnation view. No matter how it entered their heads, it originated in paganism, not the Bible! And having been spoiled by worldly philosophy, they just can’t shake the idea from their minds! The only way out of such spiritual deception is to open your mind and heart to what these Scriptures are actually saying and describing and to “receive with meekness the engrafted word, that is able to save your souls” (James 1:21).

These words, in which Jesus says he doesn’t speak from himself, are the words of God, which God gave Jesus to speak. That doesn’t mean Jesus simply repeated God’s word verbatim. God could never say, “I do nothing of myself.” Rather, they were words that God gave Jesus so that Jesus could explain to us how it was between himself and God. In this way, under direct inspiration from God, Jesus speaks directly against the Onenessian idea that “at times he spoke as God, and other times he spoke as man.” That is not what Jesus said he did, ever! Those who jump to conclusions (of an incarnation) to the contrary, are simply not hearing God or Jesus and are implying both are liars… just like the devil does! But we have the Scriptures that state and explain what we believe. We don’t need to look to pagan philosophers for words or concepts to explain our position. We rely on the “it is written again” Scriptures, such as those above, to define our position and bring it into line with the words of God in the Bible! “For man does not live… but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4).

Now, the really radical and awesome thing John wanted us to know is that it wasn’t just the words that Jesus spoke that are God’s words to us; rather, that “word” is now Jesus himself, including his whole life! Let’s look at 1 John 1:1–3 again in this light:

¹That which was from the beginning, that which we have heard, that which we have seen with our eyes, that which we saw, and our hands touched, concerning the Word of life ²(and the life was revealed, and we have seen, and testify, and declare to you the life, the eternal life, which was with the Father, and was revealed to us); ³that which we have seen and heard we declare to you , that you also may have fellowship with us. Yes, and our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son, Jesus Christ. (1 John 1:1–3)

John interprets his earlier words here, saying that instead of the “word” being with God, now it is “the life” that was with God the Father and was “revealed” to them. And in turn, they are “declaring” that life to us! So Jesus isn’t just the “word” made flesh. He is also the “life” made flesh.

¹God, having in the past spoken to the fathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, ²has at the end of these days spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, through whom also he made the worlds. ³His Son is the radiance of his glory, the very image of his substance, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself made purification for our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high. (Hebrews 1:1–3)

As we can see, this passage in Hebrews conforms completely to our theme, and it adds to our understanding. When we add these last two passages to all the others, we can conclude that Jesus’ words, because they are God’s words, are speaking “God” to us! For example, Acts 3:22–23 puts it this way: “that every soul that will not listen to that prophet will be utterly destroyed from among the people.” It is in this way that we can confidently say, “the word was with God and the word was God.” The “word” is none other than God’s communication to us. God’s word to us is God actually communicating Himself to us! And this word/communication to us is through His Son, now that His “word” has been made into a human being!

But that doesn’t mean that His “word” doesn’t also carry the significance of being God’s “plan.” In these next verses, we can see that this word to us is the “plan” for us.

²Beloved, now we are children of God, and it is not yet revealed what we will be. But we know that, when he is revealed, we will be like him; for we will see him just as he is. ³Everyone who has this hope set on him purifies himself, even as he is pure. (1 John 3:2–3)

For whom he foreknew, he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. (Romans 8:29)

Now if we are “ predestined” to be conformed to an “image,” and that “image” is Christ, then that “image” before Christ was born was God’s “plan”; that is, God’s “word,” which is to say, God’s logos! From this perspective, we could even say that God’s word to us is God’s set of “blueprints” for making us in Christ’s image!

Since we are intended to be like him, we can know that Jesus Christ isn’t any more of an incarnation of God than we will be when we are glorified to be like him! For it isn’t only Jesus who is supposed to speak the words of God, but so are we:

If any man speaks, let it be as it were oracles of God. If any man serves, let it be as of the strength which God supplies, that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belong the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen. (1 Peter 4:11)

¹⁹But when they deliver you up, don’t be anxious how or what you will say, for it will be given you in that hour what you will say. ²⁰ For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you. (Matthew 10:19–20)

So then, as the firstborn of many brothers, as our image to whom we should conform, Jesus set the pattern that we also may be the mouths that speak the words of God!

All of these Scriptures testify that John had something else completely in mind than the pagan doctrine of an incarnation of deity, which neither he, nor any other biblical writer, ever clearly expounded for us.

The Snake-Handler Factor:To say that because God’s word was made flesh can and must only mean that God Himself was made flesh is to jump to conclusions and impose a pagan, preconceived idea of an incarnation of deity. It is to ignore and negate many, many Scriptures that define Christ to the contrary as being made human in all respects. To teach or imply that John would introduce such a radically extrabiblical, pagan concept (as the incarnation of God) in such vague, unclear terms and then leave the body of Christ to work out what he meant is to accuse him of being utterly irresponsible at best and willingly misleading at worst.

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For extra reading, following is more from Adolf von Harnack. These passages will help support the biblical concept of God’s foreknowledge of Christ (that is, Christ as God’s “plan”), and how John’s language would fit very well within a Jewish view of a foreknown, yet not actually yet existent, Messiah.

According to the theory held by the ancient Jews and by the whole of the Semitic nations, everything of real value that from time to time appears on earth has its existence in heaven. In other words, it exists with God, that is God possesses a knowledge of it; and for that reason it has a real being… Adolf von Harnack, “On the Conception of Pre-Existence,” in History of Dogma, Vol. I, Appendix I. The entire text of von Harnack’s History of Dogma is available at: http://www.ccel.org/ccel/harnack /dogma1.ii.iv.i.html, and http://www.archive.org/details/historyofdogma01harnuoft, accessed 10/14/2009.

Earthly occurrences and objects are not only regarded as ‘foreknown’ by God before being seen in this world, but the latter manifestation is frequently considered as the copy of the existence and nature which they possess in heaven, and which remains unalterably the same, whether they appear upon earth or not. That which is before God experiences no change… so the Tabernacle and its furniture, the Temple, Jerusalem, etc., are before God and continue to exist before him in heaven, even during their appearance on earth and after it . This conception seems really to have been the oldest one. Moses is to fashion the Temple and its furniture according to the pattern he saw on the Mount (Exod. XXV. 9. 40: XXVI. 30: XXVII. 8: Num. VIII. 4). The Temple and Jerusalem exist in heaven, and they are to be distinguished from the earthly Temple and the earthly Jerusalem… Most Jews… conceived the Messiah as a man. We may indeed go a step further and say that no Jew at bottom imagined him otherwise; for even those who attached ideas of pre-existence to him, and gave the Messiah a supernatural background, never advanced to speculationsabout assumption of the flesh, incarnation, two natures and the like. They only transferred in a specific manner to the Messiah the old idea of pre-terrestrial existence with God, universally current among the Jews. Before the creation of the world the Messiah was hidden with God, and, when the time is fulfilled, he makes his appearance… Nowhere do we find in Jewish writings a conception which advances beyond the notion that the Messiah is the man who is with God in heaven; and who will make his appearance at his own time.” Adolf von Harnack, History of Dogma, http://www.ccel.org/ccel/harnack/dogma1.ii.iv.i.html .

For an excellent video teaching about the Jewish view of conceptual preexistence versus literal preexistence, please check out “John and Jewish Preexistence” by Dr. Dustin Smith (www.youtube.com/watch?v=vZE4Ihjv0Wc).

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