John 1:1-14 ‘The Grand Miracle’

 

At various times since the seventeenth-century certain theologians have shown a great embarrassment about all the miracles in the Bible.  Some came up with clever explanations to get rid of these miracles.  For example, take the feeding of the five thousand.  There were theologians who said that what happened here is that the gathered crowd saw the generosity of the young boy who offered his pack lunch and they were inspired to share their own lunches.

The virgin birth seems to be a particular embarrassment to some.  I was listening to the radio a few years ago and heard a friend from my Christian Union days, a guy who had studied theology, taking it for granted that this was made up.  I must admit that his attitude confused me.  He is not an atheist, as far as I know, so I assume he believes that God created the world.  If God created the world, is it too much that to believe that He could get a young woman pregnant?

Without the incarnation Christianity makes no sense

C. S. Lewis writes that miracles are essential to Christianity in a way that they are not to other faiths.  If you take any mention of miracles out of the teachings of Buddha, you would still have Buddhism.  If you take any talk of miracles out of the teaching of Mohamad, you would still have Islam.  But if you take the miraculous out of Christianity, it no longer makes any sense.  For example, the apostle Paul says that we are to be pitied above all people if Jesus has not been raised from the dead (1 Corinthians 15:14).  Lewis calls the incarnation—by which he refers not only to Jesus’ becoming a man, but also His resurrection and ascension—as ‘The Grand Miracle’.  Everything else depends on it.

Jesus is the divine creator

In 1961 the Russian astronaut, Yuri Gagarin, became the first man in space.  The space race was really part of an ideological war between the atheistic Soviets and America.  Gagarin couldn’t resist making an anti-god comment upon his return.  He said that when he went to space he found no god.  C. S. Lewis came to the rescue of faith with a brilliant response.  He said that going into the physical heavens expecting to find God is like Hamlet going into the attic of his castle to find Shakespeare.  God is not a part of His creation, He is the creator.  He is not a character in the play, He is the playwright.  As John writes, all things that were created were created by the Word, Jesus (John 1:3).

The playwright becomes a player

During the year we watched Alfred Hitchcock’s film, North by Northwest.  In forty of the fifty-three Hitchcock films we have, he writes himself in as a minor character.  In North by Northwest you get to see a small cameo of Hitchcock as a background character who misses a bus.  It is just a bit of fun.  God the divine playwriter, the creator, steps into the story.

There are certain things that we can know about God the creator and playwright from His creation.  The heavens declare the glory of God (Psalm 19:1a).  We can see that He is great and majestic.  He is a good God who has compassion for all that He has made (Psalm 145:9).  

There certain things we can know through the way God has made us.  He has set eternity in our hearts (Ecclesiastes 3:11).  We rebel against death, often feeling that this cannot be the end of the story.  We search for meaning in a way that none of His other creatures do.

But there are certain things we can only know because Jesus the creator has stepped into His creation.  He reveals grace and truth.  Jesus doesn’t step into the story for a Hitchcock-like cameo role.  He comes as the main character.  He comes as the hero who lays down His life in order that we could become children of God (John 1:13).  Living life without Jesus is like being in a movie where the main character has been removed.

The true fairy-tale

C. S. Lewis’s friend, J.R.R. Tolkien, explained that the good news about Jesus is really a true fairy-tale.  Fairy-tales move us because they speak about several human longings.  In fairy-tales death is defeated, a curse is lifted, little people become significant, a hero comes to the rescue, loved ones are for ever reunited and evil is defeated.  Tim Keller points out that in fairy-tales, ‘there is a beauty who will kiss you in all your beastliness and transform you.  There is a prince who will save us for ever.’ (Keller).  The Jesus story is a true story that should keep thrilling our hearts.