John gives Jesus a cosmic birth narrative

Like Mark, John doesn’t get into the Nativity. But rather than skip the matter of birth altogether, he’s got an amazing alternative. He takes us back to the beginning of existence, Genesis 1.1, and shows us Jesus already there, playing an active role in creation.

This Jesus of the Gospels, John reveals, is the word of God made flesh. Jesus therefore becomes a massive deal to the Jews of the time, who revered the word of God, and to the Greeks, who valued thought over everything.

John does without parables

In Matthew’s Gospel Jesus quotes Psalm 78.2, ‘I will open my mouth in parables’ (13.35). Parables are a key feature of Jesus’ ministry, one of the main ways he teaches in the first three Gospels. But in John’s Gospel he doesn’t tell stories and the word ‘parable’ is never used. Here his approach to teaching is much more straightforward.

John loves it when Jesus says ‘I Am’

Jesus’ ‘I Am’ statements are one of John’s standout features. Instead of telling stories, Jesus uses metaphor to teach about his nature. He says, ‘I am the bread of life’, ‘I am the light of the world’, ‘I am the gate’ and ‘I am the good shepherd’. These all come in teaching to crowds, so they function somewhat like parables, but they’re more immediate.

As descriptions of his role or his impact on us, any one of these statements is powerful and provides extremely significant information. But they’re also provocative and challenging. Is Jesus claiming to be God, who in the Old Testament identified himself to his people as ‘I Am’? Or is this his way of introducing his nature to those who don’t know him?

What does it all add up to?

The author of John, writing later and possibly aware of the Synoptics, had his reasons for wanting to draw readers’ attentions to different things. Whatever those reasons were when it comes to the detail, in general he was absolutely in line with the other authors, giving as the ultimate purpose for his book, ‘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, ESV).

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