Throughout this website, you will encounter various terminologies that need a little explanation in order to appreciate the intent behind what is being discussed. One of these terminologies that features frequently throughout is the Word.
A mental image of a Bible typically comes to mind when the Word is used by preachers or writers of Christian literature. However, if we look at the first chapter of John’s gospel, a very different understanding is presented. John 1:1: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The Greek for the Word is Logos, which is a thought that has come into expression.
Since a literal spoken word is the expression of a thought, then before God became the Word, or the Logos, He was Elohim, or the Self-Existing One, who as Spirit dwelt alone with His thoughts. The first thing to come out of Elohim was the Logos, or the Word. Again, we must not think of the Logos as printed letters forming text, because the scriptures tell us differently in John 1:3: All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.
The invisible Spirit of Elohim took on a form when the Logos came out of Him. The form of the Logos (or Word) was that by which the universe was created. Now watch what Paul tells us when he wrote about Jesus in Colossians 1:15-17: Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature: For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: And he is before all things, and by him all things consist.
John wrote that all things were made by the Logos (the Word); but then Paul wrote that all things were created by Jesus Christ. To reconcile these two statements, we must come to the understanding that the Logos which came out from Elohim was Jesus Christ in His pre-incarnate form (before He became flesh). This is confirmed in John 1:14: And the Word was made 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.
It was much later in time that the Logos took on the form of flesh and walked among us as Jesus of Nazareth. It should therefore be obvious to see that Jesus Christ was the invisible Spirit of Elohim expressed as the Logos. If the Logos is Jesus Christ who created all things, then in what form was Jesus before He became flesh? To answer this, we will look back into the Old Testament.
God appeared to Moses in the form of a fire in a bush (Exodus 3:2), and later led Israel through the wilderness as a Pillar of Cloud by day and as a Pillar of Fire by night (Exodus 13:21). In the New Testament, the Spirit of God entered the believers in the form of cloven tongues of fire (Acts 2:3), and then the apostle Paul, whilst persecuting the saints before his conversion, was smitten to the ground by the very same fire we are referring to (Acts 9:3).
When Paul spoke to the Pillar of Fire, desiring to know Its identity, the Voice from the Fire responded in Acts 9:5 with: “I am Jesus whom thou persecutest.” Therefore, the form of the Logos, or Word, that came out from Elohim was Jesus Christ as the Pillar of Fire; and in His form as the Pillar of Fire, Jesus Christ created all things.
The Word is therefore Jesus Christ, not simply as a man, but as the Pillar of Fire. Later, Moses and the prophets would write of the commandments and works of God. Their writings on scrolls were the thoughts of God in print form which we have as the Bible today. But when we trace it all back, everything gathers up into Jesus Christ as the Pillar of Fire (the Logos, or the Word) who came out of Elohim.
In light of this, when you would read of the Word throughout this website, think of Jesus Christ as the Pillar of Fire, as the invisible Person of the Holy Spirit in our midst. The Bible scriptures we have today and that are quoted throughout this book, are the invisible Spirit of God made known to us as Jesus Christ in print form.
This is in much the same way that I as the author of this article make myself known by expressing my thoughts in written form, for the literal text traced backward came from a living being, which is myself as the author. So Elohim made Himself known by becoming the Logos, and who He is as the Logos was later written down and became the Bible we have today.
The Word is therefore first and foremost Jesus Christ! When we refer to the opening of the Word, or the revelation of the Word, we are in effect speaking of Jesus Christ being fully made known through the types and shadows of the Bible. We are not seeing Him revealed in His corporeal (physical) body as a literal man, but rather His divine nature and character manifested in the sublime plan of redemption that runs in perfect continuity from the beginning to the end of the Bible, from Genesis to Revelation.