Written by Justin A. Schell |
Friday, July 12, 2024
Jesus’s mission, according to John’s prologue, is to reveal God the Father. John 1:18 seems to imply that humanity needs the incarnation, not only to make possible the sacrifice of the Lamb of God but more fundamentally because humanity needs to see the Father: “No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known.” How can humanity come to the invisible God? In the Old Testament, the Lord appeared in fire in the bush and at night, in smoke behind the veil, and in lightning on the mountain. He may even have taken on angelic or human form as the angel of the Lord (e.g., Gen. 18, Judg. 13), but he was always veiled. But now the Son has revealed the Father. “He is the image of the invisible God” (Col. 1:15), his “exact imprint” (Heb. 1:3).
Theology of Mission
Let’s zero in on the aim of God’s mission. Why did he create the world? What is his plan for humanity? Why send Jesus? We must start with these foundational questions before exploring how God accomplishes his mission and what role the church may have in it. Doing so will be a safeguard for us, ensuring that our theology of mission has God as its foundation. And to do this, let us turn to the Gospel of John.
The Revelation of God
John’s Gospel helps us understand God’s mission because he is writing it in order to advance that mission. John says he has “written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name” (John 20:31). John is writing so that men and women would be drawn into relationship with God. How does John go about that evangelistic work? By revealing the character, the very glory, of God.1 For John, revelation is the only thing that makes communion possible.
John’s prologue prepares the reader to see how God’s revelation opens the door for divine-human communion (John 1:1–18). Jesus is the Word, the Logos, of God (John 1:1), the one who will help us understand (the logic of) God. The very God who “in the beginning . . . created the heavens and the earth” (Gen. 1:1) is now being revealed by the one who was “in the beginning with God” (John 1:2). Jesus is God and was with God, and he is now revealing the glory of God to the world in his incarnation.
In this way, Jesus is the true light coming to help humanity see God (John 1:4–5, 9). We read that the Word took on flesh in such a way that men could “see his glory” (John 1:14). It is likely that John expected his readers to know the book of Exodus, for this enfleshed one came and “tabernacled among us” as the one who is “full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). Indeed, Jesus is “the Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness” (Ex. 34:6).
Jesus’s mission, according to John’s prologue, is to reveal God the Father.