“In the beginning was the Word….”

So starts the sublimest of the Scriptures.  For me there is no greater writing than the Apostle John’s in all of the Scriptures.  In this Gospel he explains the deepest of truths in the simplest of terms.

The first 12 chapters of John’s gospel consists of a series of vignettes and cameo appearances.  Every chapter contains one or two.  There is the calling of the disciples, John the Baptist’s declaration, the wedding feast at Cana, Nicodemus coming at night to see Jesus,  the woman at the well, the centurion’s servant, the invalid at Bethesda, the feeding of the five thousand, the great day of the feast, the woman caught in adultery, the man born blind, the parable of the Good Shepherd, Lazarus rising from the dead and his two sisters different reactions.   Then there is the wonderful teaching passages of chapters 13 -16, washing the disciple’s feet, behold I go to prepare a place for you, the True Vine and  the Comforter.  The prayer of chapter 17.  The crucifixion, death, burial and resurrection of chapters 18 – 21.

In all the Gospel of John it is Jesus that we see in ways He cannot be seen anywhere else in Scripture.  There is an intimacy and level of detail about this Gospel that is not found anywhere else.  Jesus’ response to people and events is brought out in all sorts of ways, wonderfully expressed.  For example, Jesus supplied abundance at the wedding feast of Cana, taught Nicodemus spiritual truths in depth, gently elicited the truth from the woman at the well, explained a blindness to the disciples,  wept at the difficulties death had brought to people’s lives.

Jesus is declared to be wonderful things in this gospel:  the Word of God, the Bread of Life, the Resurrection, the Way, the Truth and the Life.

This gospel is wonderful because of its main character purely and wonderfully expressed in its pages – Jesus.