Did Jesus Exist in the Beginning?

Did Jesus Exist in the Beginning?

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John 1:1-2 simply states this when it says

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

And who was the Word? Just a few verses later John clearly tells us

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.
John bore witness of Him and cried out, saying, “This was He of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me is preferred before me, for He was before me.’” (John 1:14-15)

Who was it that became flesh to dwell among us, the only begotten of the Father (John 3:16)? Who was it that John bore witness to? It was Jesus. Jesus existed in the beginning with God, and not just existing with God, but Jesus was God in the beginning! (He is still God today of course.  )

Isaiah the prophet heard a message from God where God the Father said

Thus says the LORD, the King of Israel, And his Redeemer, the LORD of hosts: ‘ I am the First and I am the Last; Besides Me there is no God. (Isaiah 44:6)

God is the First and the Last, nothing existed before God and nothing will exist after Him, He is the first and the last. In Revelation Jesus identifies Himself as ” I AM the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End, the First and the Last.” (Revelation 22:13) The Alpha and Omega are the first and last letters of the greek alphabet, in English it would be the A and the Z. There are no letters before A, and none after Z. Jesus is the first and last, the beginning, and the end.

How is He that both God the Father and Jesus can be the first and the last? This is only possible because Jesus is God. Remember what John 1:1 said, “The Word was with God, and the Word was God.” Both are God in a complex Godhead( Trinity) , even though they are individual.

I AM ( I AM Who I AM)

I AM WHO I AM 我是（自有永有的)（轉貼）( for further discussions in Chinese, click this link)

In the Old Testament God would refer to Himself as simply “I AM” (Exodus 3:14). That in itself is an awesome statement. Jesus later when talking to the Jews, told them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was," I AM.”” (John 8:58). Jesus is not only saying that He existed since before His physical birth on earth, but He is identifying Himself as being God, as being the " I Am ". Jesus again identified Himself as the "I AM" when He was being arrested in the garden. The soldiers asked if Jesus was “Jesus of Nazareth” and Jesus replied in such a way that the soldiers fell to the ground. “Now when He said to them, “I AM He,” they drew back and fell to the ground.” (John 18:6)

Jesus is the Creator!

When God is creating man He says “Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness;” (Genesis 1:26). Who is God talking to here? Who is God referring to by saying “Us” and “Our”? God is not a single being but three, completely separate beings, three deities that are in the same Godhead. The Word was with God and the Word was God (John 1:1). This is an example of how Jesus did exist in the beginning.

Not only was Jesus with God in the beginning, before creation, but Jesus is the Creator. John 1:3 says “All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.” Jesus did not come only to die for His Father’s creation, but also His own. Isn’t this amazing? Jesus knew what He would have to go through, He knew all of the suffering He would face before He created us, yet He still choose to do so!...

 How unfathomable is His love for us!

 ( *The "only begotten of( from) the Father" applied only to Jesus' unique incarnation--the virgin birth, not Jesus was created by God the Father in the beginning; this insight has just recently dawned on me. 

See John 1:14 below, it was clearly after Jesus became flesh

( incarnation) then we beheld His glory, a glory of an ONLY Begotten from the Father.

In 4th century, Arius claimed "there was a time when the Son was not"; that is incorrect, because Jesus pre-existed His earthly birth as Son of man(God/man).*)

(Berean Literal Bible John 1 :14)
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. And we beheld His glory, a glory as of an only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.)

Who created God?

“If you think God created everything, who created God?” 

“Well, when you work criminal investigations, you’re always looking for the ultimate cause of any crime. So, in the end that, that person who is the cause of this crime is the suspect you’re trying to identify. So I understand the impulse people have when they ask this question.

But I want to offer this: even as an atheist (I wasn’t a theist until I was 35), all of us are looking for the first ‘un-caused cause’. So if I’m an atheist today who believes in a primordial, quantum vacuum from which our universe came into existence, I would be offering the vacuum as the eternal ‘un-caused cause’. All of us believe in an eternal ‘un-caused cause.’ Theists aren’t the only people who are arguing for this. The only question is: is the uncaused, first cause of the universe personal or impersonal?

As a Christian, I obviously believe the cause of the universe is personal: God. And as a Christian, I hold a very particular definition of God. He is the un-caused Creator of the universe. So, to ask a silly question like, “Who caused the un-caused Creator of the Universe” is a bit silly. He is uncaused by definition. And once, again, all of us have the same dilemma. Whether you’re an atheist or a theist, you are looking for the first, un-caused cause of the universe. I would simply argue that, given the nature of our universe (the appearance of design in the universe and in biology, the existence of humans who have minds and free-agency, and the existence of transcendent, objective moral obligations), the best and most reasonable inference for this cause is God.

So, I do think, in the end, the choice is clear. Is the first uncaused, cause of the universe personal or impersonal? If it’s a personal cause, then we’re stuck with a Being very similar to what we see described in the scripture as God. A transcendent, non-spatial, immaterial, a-temporal, intelligent Being who is responsible for the fine-tuning of the universe, the origin of life, the appearance of design, the existence of mind and free-agency and the source of all transcendent, moral obligations. That’s why I believe Christianity is true, and that why I reject the idea that the un-caused, first cause of the universe is something other than a personal God.”

This brief answer was modified from my interview with Bobby Conway. To learn more and watch many other short answers to difficult questions, please visit the One-Minute Apologist website.

J. Warner Wallace is a Cold-Case Detective, a Christian Case Maker, and the author of Cold-Case Christianity, Cold-Case Christianity for Kids, and God’s Crime Scene.

Why Good Friday Is Called "Good"?

Dear friends:

Happy late Easter!

Good Friday probably should be called Worst Friday, right? Jesus the sinless righteous Man was crucified for all human sins on the cross. He was wrongly accused as " the King of Jews", guilty of sedition in a Roman court, Was He a king without even one single soldier?( Indeed He is our King, our Lord but not in the political and secular sense.) Jesus was accused as blasphemous against God in a Jewish court before the high priest because He claims that He is the Son of God. According to Jewish laws, if that claim is not true, then He deserves to be stoned to death. But the Jewish leaders were not allowed to put someone to death, only the Romans had the right. So they brought Jesus to Roman court. The Roman governor Pilate couldn't find Him guilty at all, yet he yielded to the Jewish mob's request to crucify Jesus at the end. All these schemes and other twisted accusations are the culminations of all kind of evils. How then could it be called " Good" Friday? Well, although Jesus' crucifixion is the worst injustice case in human history, yet it has accomplished God's salvation for mankind. Furthermore, the resurrection of Jesus has changed the perspectives of this worst injustice case. Jesus has risen from the death and lives forever!
In a word, Jesus drank the cup of God's wrath for us, so if we accept Jesus' offer of Salvation then we don't need to drink the cup of God's wrath ourselves, thus it is called Good Friday. 
( i.e. the day itself and its crime is horrible, yet we are talking about the accomplished salvation for mankind it brought about; that is surely good.)

However, have you ever wondered what kind of "cup" Jesus had prayed earnestly for God the Father to remove from Him in His last prayers at Gethsemane just before He was arrested illegally ? Jesus knew He would rise from death after 3 days in tomb, so it was not the death and physical pains He feared the most to face. Then what is He really struggled to face? He is totally holy yet was going to be contaminated by human sins, to really be under God's wrath for all human sins and to suffer the unprecedented separation from God the Father which is unbearable no matter how temporary that separation was.

...Key passages in the Bible connect God’s wrath with the imagery of a cup. Jeremiah 25:15 tells us, “Thus the LORD, the God of Israel, said to me: ‘Take from my hand this cup of the wine of wrath, and make all the nations to whom I send you drink it.’” Then Isaiah 51:17 says, “O Jerusalem, you who have drunk from the hand of the Lord the cup of his wrath, who have drunk to the dregs the bowl, the cup of staggering.” In Revelation 14, an angel speaks, “If anyone worships the beast and its image and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, he also will drink the wine of God’s wrath, poured full strength into the cup of his anger” (verses 9–10).

Jesus confirms this connection in Gethsemane when he prayed, the cross looming just ahead, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will” (Matthew 26:39).

The disciples will drink a cup, too — a cup of suffering (Matthew 20:23). But Jesus’s cup of suffering is different from theirs because Jesus’s suffering is under God’s anger. Jesus drinks the cup of God’s wrath, a cup that has accumulated the fury of God against sins of all types. Heinous crimes, adultery, careless words, dishonoring thoughts, lies — all of it will be punished by God. (None of us is sinless according to God's absolutely holy standard: the cardinal sin could be "Denying our Creator God to be our Father in Heaven", don't you realize that?)

This is the cup Jesus drinks willingly on the cross for us. That shows us how deep His love for us.

Come and Drink This Cup

There, at Golgotha, our Savior drained God’s cup of burning anger down to the dregs. God poured out his wrath, full strength, undiluted, onto His Son. Paul summarizes the meaning of this great event, “For our sake He ( God the Father) made Him( Jesus, God the Son) to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God”
(2 Corinthians 5:21).

Jesus drank the cup of God’s wrath for us so that he could extend the cup of God’s fellowship to us, that is a cup of Salvation offered in Jesus. It might include suffering, but not wrath. We don’t get wrath anymore — now we get God. We get the sweet, satisfying reality of his eternal fellowship in Jesus Christ, through the Holy Spirit.

This is the cup we drink now and forever. This is the cup that we offer to those who don’t know Him yet, imploring them in God’s mercy, Come, drink this cup with us because Jesus drank that cup for us.

( click the link below to read more)

The Cup Consumed for Us | Desiring God

Furthermore,
...God's wrath is not anger out of control. An angry God bothers some so much that they take ever tack possible to remove the obvious meaning of the text. One scholar argued that Paul did not mean to indicate a personal reaction on God's part but the reaction of a "moral universe." All such attempts seem grounded in the idea that anger is inherently wrong and sinful, and so a lot of anger (a fairly common definition of wrath) would really be wrong and sinful. The Bible teaches otherwise. "Be angry, and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your wrath" (Ephesians 4:26). Anger is not always irrational. Jesus was angered at hard hearts (Mk. 3:5; Jn. 2:15-16). What feeling should such callousness as the Pharisees exhibited evoked in our Lord? To see sin ruining lives, both now and in eternity, and not be angry at the devil and foolish people who allow themselves to be taken by him is unthinkable. Righteousness loves light, and hates darkness (John 3:20). Thus, every expression of darkness must be met with righteous indignation or anger.

However, there is an enormous amount of difference in human anger and divine wrath. In a time when child abuse is widely reported it is important that our  Heavenly Father not be portrayed as some sort of raging tyrant, mindlessly and wildly hurting His children. This portrait of God is painted when people decide God's wrath is like man's wrath. "God gets angry like we get angry," our humans mind can think, "only His anger is bigger and more powerful." In reality, most human anger is not righteous anger, and so James affirm: "So then, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath, for the wrath of man does not produce the righteousness of God" (James 1:19-20). We get angry because our egos have been slighted, and because we did not get our way. Further, human anger usually expresses itself in ways that are hurtful to others around us. God's anger in no way resembles our (sinful) anger. God is not angry because He has some gigantic ego that we have failed to gratify. His righteous anger is directed at evil people who refuse to be what He made them to be and thus hurt themselves. He is angry at the senselessness of men and women who send themselves to hell because they will not heed His word. Additionally, as we shall see, Paul develops the critical point that even the expression of God's wrath is not designed to hurt sinful man but bring him to his senses that he will return to his maker and be saved.

( click the link below for the whole article)

"The Cup our Savior Drank" (Matthew 26:42) -

Is Truth Dead Too ?

Dear friends:

Friedrich Nietzsche declared "God is Dead!" long long time ago, guess who is long dead now?

Amazingly, God is not dead even after centuries of stone throwing by many atheists, philosophers, theologians...etc.

Here below is an article worth thinking deeply.

God and Truth. Time Magazine Sees Connection (Sort Of).

BY JOHN STONESTREET AND G. SHANE MORRIS

TIME magazine is running out of things to declare dead. But their latest obituary is a worldview lesson on a silver platter.

(Photo: Time magazine)Time magazine covers from April, 1966, "Is God Dead?" and April, 2017, "Is Truth Dead?"

You may have seen the bumper sticker that says "Know God, know peace," (both with a "K") and then, "No God, no peace," (with just an "N"). This kind of pun usually draws a groan from the kids these days, but it really is accurate. And it remains accurate if we replace "peace" with "truth."

In 2017, our world is a living demonstration of the fact that no accurate understanding of reality can prevail when God is thought of as irrelevant.


In 1966, the cover of TIME magazine asked in giant red letters: "Is God Dead?" Evoking the famous quote by German atheist Friedrich Nietzsche, the accompanying article discussed the way science, technology, modern philosophy, and even some theologians had rendered God more or less obsolete.


Well, fifty-one years later to the week, TIME mirrored that cover except for one word, and many Christians are struggling to not say, "We told you so."


The latest issue, using the same bold, red letters, asks, "Is Truth Dead?". The article, written by Michael Scherer, is far more narrow, aimed specifically at President Trump and what one of his GOP primary opponents called his "tenuous relationship with reality."


Scherer hits the president for his "alternative facts" about the inauguration crowd size, his accusation that President Obama wiretapped him during the campaign, and his claim that three million illegal immigrants voted."Trump," he writes, "has discovered something about epistemology in the 21st century. The truth may be real, but falsehood often works better."

Now of course, there is a direct connection between God's existence and truth. And perhaps I should be grateful that TIME is seeing the connection between God and truth at all. But the irony of reading an elegy for truth in a Magazine that last month featured a second transgender individual on its cover is almost too much.


"Beyond he or she," read the teaser, "How a new generation is redefining the meaning of gender."


It should be blindingly obvious to anyone with two eyes that TIME, itself, has a tenuous relationship with reality. The idea that a man can dye his hair, put on lipstick, and somehow become a woman by sheer will is a much more obvious falsehood than anything the president has claimed thus far. Of course, no falsehood is okay. But for TIME to bemoan the demise of truth mere days after claiming male and female are concepts up for redefinition is unbelievable.


But they're not alone. As I explained recently on my other daily commentary, The Point, National Geographic has launched a social media campaign calling potential subscribers to — and I quote — "Stand behind the facts. Stand with science. Stand for the planet." Once again, the irony was somehow lost on this magazine, which just a few weeks prior ran a cover story featuring a nine-year-old boy with dyed pink hair and leopard print tights declaring, "The best thing about being a girl is that I don't have to pretend to be a boy."


Look, we often say it here on BreakPoint that ideas have consequences. And bad ideas have victims. Without God, we have no grounding for truth. And without God, we lose sight of what it really means to be human. For more details, see Psalm 135: 15-18.


But let's be clear about this: When TIME asked half a century ago whether God was dead, the answer then was a resounding "no." And the answer to the question they asked last week about the truth is the same. Though decades ago certain quarters of our culture gave up on God and then truth and then a coherent sense of the human person, the attempt to replace reality with sheer will and feelings is futile.


Like God's existence, the truth about the world and humanity is not subject to our feelings or our opinions; nor is it changed by academic or political fashions. God is. Reality is. Truth is. Amen.


Originally posted at breakpoint.org.