Food for Thought by David Jackson

Beginning Again

The accumulated wisdom of the ages is that it is best to start a project from the beginning. That advice is similar to “when all else fails, read the instructions,” because the natural human tendency is to start without taking the time to prepare. We prefer to “get on with it,” and remember that “it doesn’t matter how you start, but that you end well.”

Alice in Wonderland asks the king about where she should begin. He answers her very gravely, “Begin at the beginning, and go on till you come to the end: then stop.” “Which way should I go?” He says she needs to have a goal in mind, but she says, “I don’t much care where.” He answers reasonably, “Then it doesn’t matter which way you go.”

As a new year begins, what thoughts come to mind as you learn to write a new date or as you start to fill in the pages of a new calendar? Do you like to make resolutions? Do you have important dates scheduled already? What events will make this year stand out from the previous ones? What does the future hold?

The Gospel of John opens with thoughts about “the beginning,” and these words take us all the way back to the first words of the Bible in Genesis 1. There Scripture says, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” It is the starting place, the beginning of everything. “The heavens and the earth” is a way of describing all that is, everything that exists.

John says, “In the beginning was the Word.” He is also starting at the same place as Genesis. But the apostle is going to talk about Jesus as the Word who “became flesh and made his dwelling among us.” If we are to understand the meaning of Jesus’ work “among us,” we must begin at the beginning of everything, where God is. He is God, the instrument of creation, the “in the beginning” figure who shows us God whom “no one has ever seen.”

The story could hardly be more exciting or important than that! The infinite, eternal God became flesh, all of him in one human body at one place on the earth at one specific time in history. This story is called “gospel,” meaning “good news.” It is the most important news for every person who lives on the earth.

However you begin this new year, whatever you plan to do in the coming days, remember that you are a part of the continuing story that began “in the beginning,” and that story, your story, is even more significant because he has included you in his story. The Word who was “in the beginning” continues in the present to work God’s will in the world, and he will continue to the end. We can walk with him in the confidence of his continuing presence no matter what the new year brings. 

The beginning of this new year is all the better for knowing that the enduring Word is in it. Thanks be to God for his abiding assurance.