Listening to the Multilingual God: John's PrologueSample

 "All things came into being through him."

—John 1:3

John's prologue (John 1:1-18) is deeply steeped in Greek philosophy. In many ways, the prologue may have been the early church's answer to the predominant philosophy of its age and culture. And as we've seen, Logos or the "Word" is presented as the coexistent person with God; later he will be described as the light and the life.

In verse three, John writes that everything which was created was created "through" that Word. This familiar phrase offers a majestic concept, but do we really understand it? Or is it an abstract response to the abstract thinking of the Greek philosophers?

English is very well equipped to express Greek thoughts in a Greek way. After all, Greek is one of the many troughs that watered the English language in its historical development. But other unrelated languages have different ways of expressing this.

Listen to how Uma, a language spoken by 20,000 people in Indonesia, magnificently translates this same phrase: "He is the one God used-as-his-hands to cause-to-be all that was caused-to-be." 

This is gritty, hands-on imagery of Jesus as the one who metaphorically rolled up his sleeves to be God's hands in the world's creative processes. How does this expand your understanding of Jesus' relationship to the Father? As the Logos, God's practical message of love to you? How can God use Jesus as his hands in your life today, to create, to heal, and to restore?