This message is the first in a series of several on the First Epistle of John.
The writings of John have a unique position in the Bible. He wrote one Gospel, three Epistles, and the book of Revelation. The New Testament writings as a whole can be similarly categorized: the Gospels, the Epistles, and Revelation. It is noteworthy that each of these three sections concludes with one of John’s writings. The final word, even in conversation, is generally the decisive word. Thus, in the writings of John we have the final word of the whole revelation of the Bible.
The Gospel of John deals with the matter of life and building. Life is wonderful and profound, but it is not the goal. It is the way to reach the goal, God’s building.
The first two chapters of the Bible deal with creation. The last two chapters picture for us the holy city, New Jerusalem. This city is a building. By considering the beginning and the ending, we can see that the goal of God’s creation is a building. In creation God called things not being as being that He might have the materials for His building.
In between the beginning and the ending the theme is life. You recall that on the final day of creation God created man (Gen. 1:27, 31). God was pleased with everything He had made, and He blessed man. In 2:8 we are told that God planted a garden in which He put the man whom He had formed. This garden was part of God’s creation; as yet, no city had been built. In the midst of this garden, among many other trees, there was the tree of life. What the fruit of this tree looked like we do not know. We can identify a peach from a peach tree, but to know what life is is not easy. Nonetheless, we know that we have life; describing it may be difficult, but in our experience we know what it is. Let us rejoice that there is the tree of life, even though we cannot precisely define what life is.
Even our human life is too mysterious to be defined. A table has no life, but a man does. How to explain this mysterious element we do not know. The life referred to in the tree of life is far more mysterious than human life. As most of us know, in Greek there are three different terms for life. The physical life is called bios. In addition we have a psuche, a psychological life. The third kind of life is called zoe, the life of the tree of life.
In John 10:10 the Lord Jesus said, “I came that they may have life and may have it abundantly.” The Greek word for life used here is zoe. In the next verse He said, “The good shepherd lays down His life for the sheep.” Life here is psuche. The Lord Jesus laid down His psuche life to accomplish redemption for us and thus to make the eternal zoe life available to us. Nothing can destroy the zoe life. Jesus as a human being died on the cross, laying down His human psychological life in our stead, in order to impart to us the zoe life.
This life, denoted by zoe, is the divine life; in actuality it is nothing less than God Himself. It is not simply matter, but the very divine Person, the eternal Being. “For the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and show unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us” (1 John 1:2). This very life was looked upon and handled by the apostles (v. 1). From the context it is clear that the life is Jesus Christ, the Son of God. In the first verse the life is called the Word of life and in verse 2 “the life” and “that eternal life.”
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