Eternal God

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 

He was in the beginning with God.

John 1:1-2

When we pull out the Christmas ornaments each year, so many memories come flooding back of the many beginnings and endings we’ve had over the years.  We have an ornament from our first Christmas together, one for our first house, another for each child as they were born.  Then we have ones that we chose specifically to remind us of our loved ones that have passed, or the gifts given by teachers and friends that we don’t stay in touch with anymore.  Christmas can bring such stark reminders of the brevity of this life. 

It’s hard to grasp eternity when things change so quickly in our lives, yet Jesus Christ has always been and always will be.  While He was born in human form on a specific day in a particular place, Jesus existed before this world was even created.  When creation was spoken into existence, Jesus Christ is the very Word that creation was spoken through. 

When John introduces us to Jesus, he makes sure the first thing we see is that Jesus Christ is eternal.  Any assumption we may want to make that Jesus was a good teacher or political leader or community activist can’t hold past the first verse of John’s Gospel.  Jesus is God.  He always has been God, He always will be God.  There is not a day in the history of all creation that Jesus hasn’t seen.  He knows the end from the beginning, everything we will ever face or walk through, Jesus Christ is already there.

One of our favorite movies to watch during advent is The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe from the Chronicles of Narnia.  I love when Aslan rebukes the witch saying, “Do not cite the Deep Magic to me, Witch!  I was there when it was written.”  It gives me chills just to read that, and a deep sense of humility knowing what a short time I’ve lived on this earth and that our eternal God would choose to walk among us and call me His friend.

“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God,

“who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.”

Revelation 1:8