Opening with “In the beginning,” John deliberately echoed the first words of Genesis. The “life” and “light” images also echoed those “beginning” stories. Coming to earth, Jesus the creator was creating anew. John’s prologue connected Hebrew and Greek thought worlds when he wrote of “the Word.” Many Greek thinkers identified “the Word” as the great Idea behind the world. For Hebrews, meanwhile, Genesis 1 said God created by speaking
(cf. Psalm 33:6), by “the Word.”

• John’s prologue, grounded in reality, was splendid philosophical poetry. Which is more “true”: a geologist’s precise technical report on the Grand Canyon’s sediments and rocks, or a poet’s imagery evoking the Canyon’s awe and grandeur? When have you had an experience that took you “out of yourself” or helped you “get “in touch” with depths in yourself, aware of realities that went beyond your ordinary day-to-day life?
• “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness doesn’t extinguish the light” (verse 5). Have there been times when it felt to you as though darkness was trying to put out God’s light in your life? What spiritual practices keep the windows of your soul open, so that God’s light can keep shining in and through you?