The pre-existence of Christ - Part Three
Let us look in more detail at some verses that seem to say that
Jesus DID pre-exist and see if we can find a way of understanding them
which follows the teaching of the rest of the Bible. Remember the
Bible cannot teach that he did exist and that he didn’t exist. The
Bible is one complete message from God and it teaches that Jesus did
not exist until he was born.
THE GOSPEL OF JOHN
Many
of the confusing verses come from the gospel of John. As we read the
writings of John we see how different he was from the other gospel
writers – he used language that was very difficult. Often he speaks in
words with a very spiritual meaning so we have to think about them a
lot to understand what point he was trying to make. Just like the
parables – Jesus wanted us not just to enjoy his stories about sowers
and lost sheep but to think carefully and see the spiritual meanings
underneath the story. We see in the gospel of John that so often Jesus
would say spiritual things and the people didn’t understand him. For
example, in John 3, Jesus is telling Nicodemus that he needs to be born
again and Nicodemus misunderstands him, thinking that he has to enter
his mother’s womb again and go through the whole birth process to be
saved! In John 4:15, the Samaritan woman asks for the “living water”
of Jesus so that she would never have to go to the well again to fetch
water – she doesn’t understand that Jesus is talking of the water of
salvation. In John 6:52, Jesus is telling the people they must eat of
his flesh because he is the bread of the world. Many of the disciples
stopped following him then because they couldn’t understand him. We
can see that Jesus is not speaking about real things, but using these
real things as pictures to make people think spiritually. So when we
read the gospel of John, let us not make the same mistake, let us
understand what Jesus is really saying.
John explains why he
wrote his gospel in John 20:30,31 – to show that Jesus was the Messiah
promised in the Old Testament. Christ is the Greek word that means
Messiah. John is not trying to show that Christ is God or that he was
in heaven with God before his birth.
God sent Jesus
Firstly
in John, there are many times when Jesus says he is ‘sent’ from heaven
or that he “came from” his Father. Now if Jesus didn’t exist
physically in heaven before his birth, how are we to understand these
verses? Much of John’s gospel records conversation between the
religious leaders of the day (the Pharisees and Sadducees) and Jesus.
The Pharisees and Sadducees didn’t believe that Jesus was the son of
God. Even seeing God’s power in miracles didn’t convince them and
because of envy they finally had Jesus killed. Jesus, in these
conversations, is trying to show them that he is God’s son. That God
has given him power and authority from heaven to do His work and speak
His words and how they must believe this to be saved. So, he keeps
saying over and over again ‘I am sent from God’, ‘I have come from God’.
This may seem strange, but we use the same sort of language today in
English. You may say you come from the tribe of Buganda or Basoga or
you come from your parents but this isn’t talking of a physical
journey. It is just telling someone your origin. In the same way, I
can write to my mother in UK and ask her to go somewhere for me. She
could say she has been sent from Uganda or she has been sent by her
daughter, even though she hasn’t physically been with me in Uganda. In
the same way, Jesus says he’s been sent by his Father or sent from
heaven, even though he has not physically been with God in heaven.
My friend Mary says that she is from Tanzania because her parents were
born there, but she was born in Uganda and has never lived in
Tanzania. Her origin is Tanzania. Jesus says he is from heaven
because his Father is in heaven and even though Jesus had never been
there before he was born, his origin is heaven. So Jesus never
physically came down from heaven, these verses are saying that his
origin was heavenly.
We read in John 1:6 that John the Baptist
was also sent by God but we would never say that John the Baptist was
in heaven with God and that he physically left heaven to come to
earth! (see also Isaiah 6:8, Psalm 105:17, John 1:9 and Jeremiah 7:25
– all verses that say someone was sent by God but we don’t think that
Isaiah, Joseph, “all men” or Jeremiah were in heaven). The Bible also
says that wisdom and good gifts come down from heaven in James 1:17 and
James 3:17 but we would never say that our job or clothes or food were
in heaven before we got them. We just understand that they are
provided by God, that He is the one who has given them to us. Read
Matthew 21:25. Again, this doesn’t mean that John’s baptism came down
from heaven, it just means that it was something commanded by God who
is in heaven.
Here is a good example. In John 6:32,33,38,51,58
Jesus compares his coming down from heaven with the manna or angels
food that came down from heaven to feed God’s people in the desert.
But when we look back in the Old Testament we can see that the manna
did not really come down from heaven, it appeared on the ground in the
morning when the dew went. It ‘came down’ from God just like all good
gifts come down from God – it just means it was provided by God. Jesus
was the greatest gift that God has given us.
John 8:56-58 This is
another verse in John that may confuse us. A mistake many people make
with this verse is they think it says “Before Abraham was, I was ” –
meaning that Jesus existed before Abraham. But if we read carefully,
it doesn’t say this. It says, ‘before Abraham was, I am’ . Now,
remember that God had promised to Abraham that Jesus would be his
descendant, that he would come in the future, so this verse can’t mean
that Jesus existed before Abraham. Jesus was only in the plan of God
when Abraham was alive. This verse could mean that even before Abraham
was alive, Jesus was in the plan of God. Jesus was the centre of the
promise made to Abraham, so without Jesus, none of the promises could
ever have been kept. Jesus was more important than Abraham. It was
Jesus who would bring salvation and blessing, not Abraham. Before God
made the promise to Abraham, He had to have Jesus in His plan because
the promise was about Jesus. Jesus was the “seed” or descendant
promised to Abraham. Abraham understood about the gospel, or good
news, of Jesus Christ (Galatians 3:8) and he was happy when he realised
what the promise really meant. So, when it says in verse 56 that
“Abraham rejoiced to see my day”, Jesus is saying that Abraham
understood that one day Jesus would come and bring blessings to the
world, keeping the promise that God had made to Abraham.
Colossians
1:15-18 These verses seem to be saying that Jesus was the first one
born before anything else was created and that then he created the
world with God. Now, if we believe Jesus existed before he was born by
Mary, how was he born before creation? Notice it doesn’t say he was
the first created of all creation, but the first born of all creation.
So, did Jesus have a birth before his birth by Mary? Of course he
didn’t. Let’s look at these verses more closely.
Verse 18 says
that he was the firstborn from the dead , not the first one born at
creation. He was the first man to be born again (raised from the dead)
who would never die again. Many people were raised from the dead
before Jesus, like Lazarus and Jairus’ daughter, but they died again.
Jesus was raised and given everlasting life. Revelation 1:5 says the
same and 1 Corinthians 15:20 says “But Christ has indeed been raised
from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep”. What
is a firstfruit? It is the first fruit that you see on a tree. It
tells us that the rest of the tree will soon be covered with hundreds
of fruits. Jesus was the first one to be raised and given eternal
life, but wonderfully there will be many, many more who will also be
raised from the dead when Jesus returns and given everlasting life.
When we are baptised into Jesus, we enter a relationship with God
through Jesus, where we can be raised from the dead and given
everlasting life. When we are baptised we are born again and it is as
if we have been created again, this time not created as part of the
world but as part of the church. Jesus created the church – he is the
head of all the members (Ephesians 4:15,16). So we can be a part of
the New Creation (church) when we accept and believe in Jesus and are
baptised (Ephesians 2:10, 2 Corinthians 5:17).
Come back to
Colossians 1 and look at what Jesus has created. It’s not trees,
mountains, animals and plants that Jesus created. They were created in
the first, physical creation by God as we read in Genesis. Jesus has
created “thrones, dominions, principalities and powers”. This is the
creation that Jesus was the beginning of and the creation that he is
now in control of. It is the church. The people that are part of this
new creation will sit on thrones and have powers in the Kingdom to
come. You should read the whole of this wonderful chapter to see what
Jesus has really done for us.
To be continued
Bro John and Sister Sally Palmer
