In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not made anything that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. There was a man sent from God whose name was John. He came as a witness to bear witness about the light that all might believe through him. He was not the light, but came to bear witness about the light. The true light which enlightens everyone was coming into the world. He was in the world and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to his own and his own people did not receive him. But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. And the word became flesh and dwelt among us. And we have seen his glory, glory as of the only son from the father, full of grace and truth. 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. And from his fullness, we have all received grace upon grace. For the law was given through Moses, grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God, The only God who is at the Father's side, He has made Him known. Moses had gone up the mountain to meet with God, to receive the Ten Commandments, And, well, he was delayed. And what happened as a result, not that it was Moses' fault, of course, but Moses was delayed. He was in the presence of God. He was receiving the law. And the people down below go to Aaron. They are impatient, they are unbelieving, and they demand that gods be made for them. And Aaron, tragically, acquiesces to that, and the golden calf is made, and it is worshiped. Moses comes down, he sees what's taking place, he breaks the tablets, he grieves. What did this people do to you, he says to Aaron, that you have brought such a great sin upon them? And of course, remember how God reacts to this. He tells Moses, I will not go up with this people into the land, or I would consume them. And Moses, in response to that, acting as a type of the Lord Jesus Christ, foreshadowing in his office of mediator who the Lord Jesus would come to be for all of God's people, he intercedes. He intercedes for the people of Israel before the face of God, and God says, Moses, I have heard you, and I have favored you, I will go up with the people. And remember at that point in time, Moses says, hey, this is going pretty well, so I'm going, Moses expresses the desire of his heart. He's in the presence of God, And it's a beautiful thing. The Lord says to Moses, I will do this thing which you have spoken, for you have found favor in my sight, and I know you by name. And then Moses, in response to that, he asks the greatest thing his heart could desire. Wouldn't you do the same thing? God has just declared that he knows you by name. Hey, this is a pretty good time to ask for that one thing that your heart desires more than anything else. Do you remember what Moses asked for? Please show me your glory. And the Lord responds to Moses. We can't go through the whole response, but a key verse I want to read, Exodus chapter 33 and verse 20, the Lord says to him, you cannot see my face. for man shall not see me and live. But he graciously condescends to Moses' request, and you remember what happens, the Lord sort of hides him away in the cleft of the rock and passes by and reveals an accommodated portion, you see, of his glory to Moses. He passes by him in the cleft of the rock, he covers him with his hand, and he proclaims to Moses his name. The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty. visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children to the third and fourth generation. And Moses bows his head to the ground and worships. And then, remember with me what happens next. He comes down the mountain, and what do the people see? They see something absolutely extraordinary. Moses' face is shining. Exodus 34, verse 29, when Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the two tablets of the testimony in his hand as he came down from the mountain, Moses did not know that the skin of his face shone because he had been talking with God. And so remember, of course, Moses would veil his face. This was an alarming thing. He would veil his face because of the glory. But what would happen to the glory as it shone forth from Moses' face? Well, he wouldn't have to wear the veil forever, right? Because that glory was fading. The glory that shone from Moses' face was, you could call it, a borrowed glory. His face shone because he had been in the presence of God. But it wasn't his glory. And so it shone for a time, and then it would dissipate, it would fade, it would end, because it wasn't His glory. Now, in direct contrast to that, when we look to the Gospel of John 1, how does John speak of Jesus and His glory? Verse 14, and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. The glory that shone from Moses' face was temporary because it wasn't his. It was borrowed, it was communicated. He was simply reflecting it for a time. But John tells us of Jesus' glory here. The Jesus who is the eternal word, in whom was life, and the life was the light of men. The only begotten Son from the Father. His glory does very much belong to him. And it is not a fading glory, but it is the eternal glory of the one true and living God. The glory that God's people saw in the face of Moses was a temporary reflection, but brothers and sisters, coming to the Lord Jesus Christ, the glory that we see as we behold him with the eyes of faith, he has no borrowed glory. He does not simply reflect the glory that properly belongs only to another. He is very God of very God. The glory is his, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. Moses' desire was a beautiful one, wasn't it? God doesn't rebuke Moses for his desire to see his glory. But you see, it was not yet the fullness of time. It wasn't time yet for the Son to be sent forth by the Spirit of truth into the world to redeem those under the law. No one has ever seen God. And remember, that's exactly what God says to Moses on the mountain, no one can see me and live. And so John repeats that same veritable truth here. No one has ever seen God, but now the fullness of time has come. and the only God, the only begotten God who is at the Father's side, He has made Him known. God had reserved it for the fullness of time, for the glory of the Trinity to shine forth in time and in history to its fullest degree, at least in this present age, in the incarnation of His beloved Son. And the Son comes to us, brothers and sisters, as Himself, the only begotten God, to make known to us the glory of our Creator. And in this sense, the whole Bible can be summarized as the drama of humanity's relationship to the glory of God. We've been thinking about the book of Genesis, chapter one, and I know we haven't quite made it to the creation of man yet, but man is created for glory, as a divine image bearer, to have fellowship with God, to dwell with him, to reflect his glory to all of creation. But we rebel, we sin, and in our sinful state, again, remember the Apostle Paul in Romans, we have fallen short of the glory. We are created for glory, but we have fallen short of the glory of God. But in the Lord Jesus Christ, we have now the hope of glory. We are restored to the beauty of that final end. And coming is the day that we will be confirmed in that glory. And here at the beginning of John's gospel, he is eager and he is anxious for us to know that as we are restored to the glory of God, we are beholding the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. This is who our Savior is. He is the one who redeems us by his blood, who heals us by his Spirit and restores us to fellowship with God, and he is the one who reveals God to us, in whom and through whom the glory of God can be known, to the extent that it is possible for human beings to know the glory of God. It is in and through Christ that we are restored to that glory. And amazingly, What John tells us in the prologue to his gospel is that he does all of this because of who he is in eternal relationship to the Father. How is it that the Son can make God known? It's because He is the Father's eternal Word. It is because He is the only Son from the Father. And it is because In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The glory that we see in and through Jesus, it's not like the glory that people saw in Moses' face, which was just a reflection. It is his glory, the glory that he had with his father from before the foundation of the earth. This is expressed beautifully And we can't spend more than a glance here, but in the book of Hebrews, remember how Jesus is introduced? In these last days, he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world, who is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature. Everything that God is, the Lord Jesus Christ has come to show us and to reveal to us. Which is why also, and we've thought about this verse for the last couple of weeks as well, that the Apostle Paul can say, just as God said, let light shine out of darkness, so he shone into our hearts the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. The Son, brothers and sisters, is the revelation of the Father. And again, this is jumping a little bit forward in the book of John, but remember at the Last Supper in the upper room, the disciples are rather confused by a few things that Jesus said. And Philip finally says, and you can almost hear a little bit of exasperation in his voice, Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us. And Jesus said to him, have I been with you so long, and you still don't know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, show us the Father? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? Again, Jesus comes as the fulfillment of this drama of humanity's relationship with the divine glory. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Do you know that, brothers and sisters, about your existence, you were made to see Him? That is the highest goal and the greatest glory of the image-bearer, to see God. But again, we have fallen short of that glory. Sin has utterly blinded us to the glory which is the true and proper end of our existence. But John proclaims to us here at the beginning of his gospel, this is why the Son has come, to restore to us the greatest blessing we could ever imagine to attain as image bearers, to see God with glorified eyes and to behold his glory. Now, I do want to be careful here because we are not to think of the Father as the invisible God, and the Son as the visible God. That's not what John is talking about, and that's not this dynamic at all. God dwells, God as Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, dwells in unapproachable light. But you see, who more fitting than the Eternal Word, who more fitting than the Only Begotten of the Father, could come to us and take on flesh, that in setting the eyes of our faith upon the God-man, we might truly see the glory as of the Only Begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. As the Son, as the eternal Word, He is the perfect, utter, complete expression of everything that the Father is. He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of His character. Now, to better understand this, I want us to think about a verse that could otherwise be a little confusing in these opening verses of John. Look with me at verse 17. And we need to think carefully here. For the law was given through Moses, grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. Now, when we think of truth in normal conversation, more often than not, that is contrasted with what? error, falseness, right? So what are we saying here? That the law is false? That the law is untruth? So that it is contrasted against Jesus Christ who came with grace and truth? Well, we certainly do not want to say that, do we? So whatever John is saying here, when he says the law was given through Moses, grace and truth came through Jesus Christ, he's not saying the law wasn't true. I would add to that, he's also not saying that under Moses there was no grace, because there was. Moses preached grace to the people of God. No, there is grace in the Old Covenant. There is truth in the Old Covenant. But again, it's this question of the fullness of time. It was not yet the fullness of God's revelation. And we could enlist a little bit of help here from Paul's letter to the Galatians. Remember what Paul says about the law. Now before faith came, we were held captive under the law, imprisoned until the coming faith would be revealed. So then the law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian, for in Christ Jesus, you are all sons of God through faith. And it's not too long afterwards. Remember what Paul does there, he contrasts the old covenant church with the new covenant church as a matter of maturity, of development, that the old covenant people of God were as a child under age, being watched over by the law as a guardian. But when the fullness of time had come, Paul says, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law so that we might receive adoption as sons. The law was not ungracious or untrue in some sort of absolute sense. The law was preparation. The law was a guardian. keeping watch over God's people until such time as the fullness of time had come and God's Son was sent forth. Grace and truth came through Jesus Christ because he's the only one that came from above. Remember how John the Baptist testifies about Jesus. I am from below, he is from above. He's the only one who testifies as to the things that he has seen in heaven because he comes from above. That's the grace and truth that John speaks of here. The fullness of time and the revelation of the fullness of God's redemptive purposes in the sending forth of his only begotten Son. Or to use a comparison from the book of Hebrews chapter three, Moses served God's house as a servant. but Christ as a son, Christ as the builder of the house. Moses serves in the house as a servant. Jesus built the house because he's the eternal word of God and the only begotten son of the Father. It's not diminishing Moses as untrue. or not gracious, but simply recognizing that Moses was just an instrument in God's hand. But Jesus comes to us as the only begotten of the Father. Truth here means fullness. You know, another comparison here from the book of Hebrews is, remember the Old Testament temple. What was it? It was just a little picture. I think it's Hebrews chapter eight, where the author of Hebrews describes the temple as a copy of the heavenly sanctuary. The real thing was in heaven, but there was a copy on earth. The copy was true, and the copy was good, and the copy was given by God for his gracious purposes. But it was, at the end of the day, it was only still a copy. So also here, Moses served truly and graciously, and by God's purpose and design, was an instrumental aspect of God's shepherding of his people through redemptive history. But he didn't come from above. Moses couldn't testify of things he saw in the bosom of the Father. Jesus can. Again, Moses could only reflect the glory of God. Jesus is the glory of God. Law was given through Moses, that is preparation, anticipation, promise. but grace and truth, that is the fullness of God's redemptive purposes for the restoration of humanity, that, that grace, that truth came through Jesus Christ. We can see this in John the Baptist's testimony later on in chapter one, verse 30. John the Baptist said, this is he of whom I said, after me comes a man who ranks before me because he was before me. And that's exactly in the prologue of John, the line that John chooses to quote there about the Lord Jesus, verse 15. It's the same thrust of later on in John chapter eight when he's speaking to the Jews and says, before Abraham was, I am. The glory of the incarnation is it's not just another wonderful theophany like the burning bush. It's not just God temporarily appearing in the form of some earthly thing. It is the Eternal Son, the Eternal Word Himself become flesh and dwelt among us. And what has He come to bring? Remember last week, again, the two wondrous becomings, the Word became flesh so that we might become children of God? Well, having become the children of God through the Only Begotten Son, What have we received? We have received, verse 16, from his fullness, grace upon grace. Grace upon grace. You see, the Christian life begins with grace. The Christian life begins with God reaching out to us, giving us faith, raising us to new life on the basis of nothing that we had to offer in ourselves. And just as the Christian life begins with grace, so too it ends with grace. We neither merit the first grace of faith nor the final grace of glorification by anything that we have to offer from ourselves. And this is why God came. Because this salvation, this grace upon grace, could only be secured and achieved and given to the people of God by the only begotten Son of God. And so fear not. beloved flock of the Lord Jesus Christ, because you stand in the grace of the only begotten Son of God. There's an absolutely beautiful line from Romans 5. John speaks of the grace upon grace that is ours in him. And Paul speaks this way, that since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand. You are standing in grace. The Christian life begins in grace, it ends with grace, and right now, wherever you find yourself, as you stand before the face of God, trusting in the Lord Jesus, you stand in grace. And just to tease that out a little bit more, you can close your eyes, you don't have to, but imagine yourself standing in water. Let's say four or five feet of water. That might be treading water for some of the kids. A couple feet of water, a couple feet of water, and you fall. What have you fallen into? If you stand in grace, brothers and sisters, you fall into grace. This is the grace upon grace that we receive from the Lord Jesus Christ. provided that we receive Him, provided that we truly believe in His name, provided we come to Him not as just the giver of gifts or the giver of certain benefits we find attractive, but if we come to Him as the only begotten of the Father. with hearts yearning to see God, receiving Him, being united to Him by the Spirit. We stand in grace, and it is grace at the start, and it is grace at the end. And as we survey these things, brothers and sisters, we see the depths, but we cannot see the bottom. I can only stand and wrestle with these things together with you as the sower of seeds. Each one of us must pray against the birds that would snatch them away, against the thistles that would choke them out, and go to God and pray earnestly for a harvest of truth and holiness in our own hearts. as we meditate upon the glory of His Son, that these things would not be in vain in our lives, but that the Spirit would illumine the eyes of the heart and heal the eyes whereby we may see God and rejoice in Him and abide in Him? What is it that should thrill our hearts beyond anything else in the whole of the universe? Is it something that can be seen with the eyes of sight? It's not. John unveils it for us here. What should thrill our hearts beyond anything else is that God has given us His Son, and as we look upon Him with the eyes of faith, we see the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. Do not love God because of what you get out of it, or for what he can do for you. Love him for himself. Remember Moses. God has proclaimed his favor to Moses, and Moses just sort of bursts forth with almost a reactive statement of the inner desires of his heart. Please show me your glory. And may it be so too for us, brothers and sisters, that we love God for Himself, that He Himself is our greatest reward. And as we do this, as we do this, we are actually aligning the deepest desires of our heart with the highest prayers of our Savior for us. John chapter 17, this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you sent. I glorified you on earth, having accomplished the work that you gave me to do. And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed. And then how does Jesus pray for us? Verse 24, Father, I desire that they also whom you have given me may be with me where I am to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world. Moses didn't quite understand the fullness of what he was even asking for at that time. although he knew great and wonderful things about the Lord, but Jesus reveals to us the fullness of what Moses was actually asking for, and the fullness of what Christ has promised to us in the gospel, that we might be with him where he is, to see his glory, the glory that he has had with the Father from before the foundation of the world. There's the beautiful psalm where David says, one thing I have asked, Lord, and one thing only, that I may gaze upon your beauty in the holy place. If you had only one thing to ask of the Lord, what would it be? What would you pray for? What would you desire? And in this regard, David and his son Solomon were two very different people, weren't they? Solomon was told by the Lord, ask me anything and I will give it to you. Solomon asked for wisdom, but David asked for glory. Now they're two different men with their own life before the face of the living God, but what about you and I this afternoon? That one thing that you will ask of the Lord, what is it? Well, let us pray for this and long for this and treasure this, for it is the prayer of our Savior. Father, I desire that they also whom you have given me may be with me where I am to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world. That is the end for which God has both made us and has saved us, brothers and sisters. And may our hearts long and beat and pant for that glory, glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. Let's pray. Gracious Father, This world has lied for us. Every day we are told from a thousand different angles, your life is meant for this. Your heart wants this. You are to desire this above all else. And they are all lies. Because the God of this world has blinded unbelievers from the glory of the one true and living God. But you, Father, as you said, let light shine out of darkness so you have shown in our hearts to see the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. And so let us resist the voices dragging us down to worldly pleasures destined to pass away. And Lord God, each and every day, may the Spirit stir us up with affection toward the Lord Jesus and hearts that long for Him, to wait patiently for Him and to see His glory as the greatest possible reward and inheritance that we could ever desire or imagine. We praise you for your grace. How could we ever merit the glory of the only begotten in our own strength and power? Never, Lord God, never. But as a free gift of your grace, you have given us faith by which we have received the Lord Jesus and in whom we have been filled with the spirit of adoption and are now the children of God. May your children long for that heavenly glory, and may we wait patiently for our Lord Jesus, and endure the struggles of this age, and resist the lusts of the world, and put to death the deeds of the body. and serve you with gladness and willingness, Lord God, as true disciples of your Son. We pray this, that we would walk by faith and not by sight, in the strength of your Spirit, despising that of the flesh. We pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen.