Recognize

Finally read my Bible today. First time in, oh, four-ish months. A friend of mine is in New Zealand and happens to be currently making me look foolishly silly in the spiritual realm (Props K-dog!), kicking it Jesus-style (props to DC Talk for that one), and generally experiencing God with the intensity of Isaiah 6 (read it yourself, lazy). Anyway, she mentioned that she had read through John, so I thought I might start on my own venture into the great mystery Gospel of John, perhaps I would might even find a similar encounter as well.

Interestingly, my first foray into the Bible in several months (I still can’t believe I let it go this long. I’m an idiot.) revealed an interesting picture from the opening poetry of John’s story. In verse 3 John is talking about this Word (Greek logos) that was both God and with God in the beginning, meaning that the Word has been around for a freaking long time, like, you know, forever. John says that through “Him” all things were made and that without Him nothing that is could be. If it is then it finds its is-ness (not to be confused with Izzy-ness, which can only come from listing to Iggy Pop albums) in the fact that it (whatever it is) was made through Him, the Word.

Move on down to verse 10. This very world, which finds its is-ness, its being, in having been created through Him, fails to recognize its own agent of life moving among them. He becomes his creation and his creation, not only fails to recognize him, they don’t even receive him. Read: He was in the world, and though the world was made through him , the world did not recognize him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.

The thought struck me as I was reading this: how tragic would it be for my son to fail to recognize me. How disheartening from the perspective of Christ, to know in the core of your being that it was you through whom all things were made, every person that he came into contact with, and to have those people fail to see you for who you were. Or worse, to see you and fail to receive you. It seems to me that this passage could be seen through the lens of a grieving parent whose own children don’t acknowledge them as creator, as the life-giver. Notice what John says in the next verse. Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become (their whole is-ness being transformed) children of God. 

shalom, matt