Anchor My Faith

Title: Grace Upon Grace (John 1:15-16)

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God . . . And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us . . .” (John 1:1, 2, 14a ESV). Through a virgin birth the Word took on flesh as the man we call Jesus. Jesus is God and he is man. John tells us that in Jesus was life that we need for obtaining spiritual life and that life produces light that can remove our spiritual darkness. Even though the world was created by him, when he came into the world the world rejected him, but anyone who believes has the right to become children of God.

This summary brings us to the last two verses of this section of our single story through the four gospels. John the Baptist also gives a summary at this point: “(John bore witness about him, and cried out, “This was he of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me ranks before me, because he was before me.’”” (John 1:15 ESV). Jesus was born after John was and he also began his public ministry after John started his, but since Jesus is the Word, he existed in eternity past before John.

Jesus was described as full of grace and truth and now we learn that “. . . from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace” (John 1:16 ESV). Jesus continues to pour out his grace on those who believe and as we continue to receive grace upon grace, one blessing after another, we are filled up with the fullness of God. We are being conformed into the likeness of Jesus, “. . . and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:2 ESV). The blessing of the kindness of his grace; we sure don’t deserve it.

This brings us to the end of the material contained in this section of our journey. In the next section we will look briefly at Joseph’s side of the genealogy of Jesus.

Prayer

Father, how thankful we are to have the opportunity to have and to develop a relationship with Jesus Christ. He was and is unique and as a result of his love and sacrifice for us, we can be set apart with him to enjoy his benefits in our lives for an eternity. Father, thank you.