Big Picture: Supremely, the Prologue summarizes how the ‘Word’ which was with God in the very beginning came into the sphere of time, history, tangibility—in other words, how the Son of God was sent into the world to become the Jesus of history, so that the glory and grace of God might be uniquely and perfectly disclosed. The rest of the book is nothing other than an expansion of this theme.

1.   The Word: God’s self-expression (1:1)
   • “In the beginning was the WORD” (God’s own self-expression) 
   • “and the Word was WITH God” (the Word is God’s own fellow, God’s own peer)
   • “and the Word WAS God” (the Word is God’s own self)

Carson: “God's “word” in the Old Testament is his powerful self-disclosure in creation, revelation, and deliverance. The personification of that term makes it appropriate for John to apply it to Jesus, God’s ultimate self-disclosure.”  

2. What John says about the Word (2-13)
   • the Word creates us (3)
   • the Word gives us light and life (4-8)
   • the Word confronts and divides us (9-13)

3. The Word becomes flesh (14-18)

   What is the significance of the truth that the Eternal Word became a human being?

   • tabernacle and temple
   • glory
   • grace and truth (love and faithfulness)
   • grace and law
   • seeing God 

This sermon owes a tremendous debt to D.A. Carson’s commentary, “The Gospel According to John”, as well as his book, “The God Who Is There.”