Declassified: The Gospel of John

By Dan Franklin, Pastor of Teaching

The 2012 movie “Argo” was based on the true story of a creative CIA rescue mission when six Americans were in danger in Iran in 1979. The movie was only possible because, after years of keeping the details of the mission secret, the CIA declassified the mission. Finally the full story was able to be told. What once was clothed in secrecy was now made transparent.

Many things in life seem mysterious to us. Were we given our wishes, we would certainly declare many things to be declassified. We would love to have the mysteries of life, clothed in secrecy, laid bare so that we could finally understand them.

Is there any mystery that is more important than the mystery of God? Every other mystery pales in comparison. After all, God is more important than any other reality, and nothing could be more important than knowing the truth about God. Yet many lament that He is shrouded in mystery and we can never know anything about Him.

In his gospel, John acknowledges that, in the past, God has been shrouded in secrecy. Near the beginning of his book he says, “No one has ever seen God.” He is invisible. He is mysterious. The evidence of His existence is clear, but He still appears to remain hidden behind the curtain of the world. Many people have posited theories about Him, and most of them contradict one another. It seems like a cosmic guessing game. John’s statement seems to reflect the despair that many have begrudgingly accepted: No one has ever seen God.

But that is not the end of John’s statement in verse 18 of his opening chapter. Here is the full verse: “No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and is in closest relationship with the Father, had made him known.”

Let me paraphrase what John says in this verse. God has remained hidden from us all our lives. But then God’s Son, who is intimately connected with the Father, came and made God known to us. This is why, in the opening verses of John, Jesus is referred to as “the Word.” He is God’s final statement about Himself. 

Jesus did not come simply to sacrifice Himself and rise from the dead. If this was the case, he could have swept down from heaven, died on the cross, and then ascended right back to heaven. Instead, He spent 33 years on the earth. This is because Jesus’ mission of eternally saving people is bound up in His mission to reveal the truth about God. Jesus came to make clear what was once hidden from us. He came to declassify God.

For much of 2014 at Life Bible Fellowship Church, we will be studying through the Gospel of John. Over and over again we will be presented with the reality that Jesus has come to declassify God for us. We will see Jesus perform signs that reveal profound truths about God’s power, knowledge, and grace. We will see Jesus speak truths that will unveil God’s heart and 

His modes of working. We will see Jesus freely sacrifice himself for His people, and thus reveal God’s grace and truth in unthinkable ways. Over and over again we will have God disclosed to us through His Son.

As you prepare your heart for this study, consider spending some time reading John on your own. And read it through the grid of Jesus’ mission to declassify God for us. As you listen to the sermons and study the book in your LIFE Groups, continue to ask how the truths that Jesus reveals impact your life right now.

The truth about God is always the most relevant fact in any situation. Thankfully, we don’t have to wonder about Him. After seeming to remain hidden for ages, God now has declassified Himself through His Son.