The best is yet to come

John 1:14 part 3

There is still more in this verse.

“We have seen His glory…” Jesus is not a myth. He is not a story. He is real – people saw Him. John says “we”; more than one person saw Him. The disciples saw Him (and Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 15:6 that more than 500 people saw Him after His resurrection). So, you are not believing a tradition, something that your parents taught you or your church taught you – you are believing something that is true. Jesus DID come. He is real. He was seen.

“We have seen His glory, glory as of the One and Only from the Father.” They saw Jesus the man, but they also saw something else. They saw His glory. This is more evidence that He is God in the flesh. Glory is referring to the glory of God. When they saw Jesus, they saw the glory of God. Yet, if you read the gospels, they only saw the physical glory once, at the transfiguration.

So what did they see? They saw the glory of God in who Jesus was, in what He said and in what He did. “Glory” is a theme of John’s gospel. Jesus shows His glory in His miracles, He shows His glory in His teaching, He shows His glory on the cross (John 13:31-32) – and then He is finally, fully glorified again when His work is done and He ascends to the Father (John 17:4-5).

This Christmas, let’s not just think about the baby in the manger, but let’s focus on who the baby is. He is God in the flesh. He is the One who truly came, who was seen, and who proved that He is God through His teaching and miracles, and who defeated death and the devil, and is now glorified at the Father’s right hand and is preparing a place for us, that where He is we may be also (John 14:3).