It’s easy to forget how strange the story of Jesus’s resurrection is, or how it might sound to someone hearing it for the first time. The broad strokes — God became human, taught and healed, was crucified by those he loved, and then rose from the dead — might cause a curious alien to tilt his head and squint.
The “Good News” of Jesus’ resurrection — a term Christians subversively borrowed from Roman military proclamations — has always been difficult to explain. The task grows more complex in today’s age of breakneck technological development, which scatters our shared cultural narratives like the tongues at Babel.
Since the 18th-century Great Awakening, American Christianity has emphasized the saving power of Jesus’ resurrection, captured by the phrase “Jesus saves.” But in contemporary culture, the idea of “salvation” has little purchase. Today, many U.S. adults, including many Christians, do not believe in the doctrine of original sin, without which the idea of salvation is moot.
To effectively communicate the Easter story in contemporary America, a different entry point and rallying cry — one rooted in a cultural narrative that remains universal — is needed for Christians and non-Christians alike.
One such vital entry point is found in the prologue of the Gospel According to John. This Gospel account, known for its theological richness and poetic language, features heavily during the Easter season in Christian churches due to its vivid resurrection account and its emphasis on Christ’s divinity. It is regarded not only as a theological but also a literary masterpiece, summing up the whole of Christian theology in a tidy 18 verses.
It’s impossible to capture the sum of its insight here. For the purposes of reframing the Easter story for contemporary America, we will focus on the first five verses.
“In the beginning was the Word: the Word was with God and the Word was God.
He was with God in the beginning.
Through him all things came into being, not one thing came into being except through him.
What has come into being in him was life, life that was the light of men;
and light shines in darkness, and darkness could not overpower it.”
Familiar to many, these verses narrate the story of the cosmos from a Christian perspective from creation to the resurrection, capturing foundational truths about Jesus and setting the stage for the story to come.
We begin by learning that Jesus is the “word,” translated from “logos” in Greek, meaning that he is God’s self-expression. Just as our speech reveals our identity, Jesus reflects God’s. This is crucial to understanding Christian theology because it reveals Jesus to be not simply a good and wise teacher — though he surely was both — but a divine being, God himself made flesh. In our fragmented age, this “word” speaks to the longing for a unifying truth that transcends scattered narratives, and which remains etched on every heart.
The second and third verses, “He was with God in the beginning, Through him all things came into being, not one thing came into being except through him,” confirms Jesus’s divine authority, not as a created being but as the creator himself. Jesus, Christianity asserts, is not simply one created being among many, nor even one God among others Gods. He has total power over creation because he is creation’s author, and everything within it.
In the fourth verse, “What has come into being in him was life, life that was the light of men,” we see the emergence of human life, the emphasis being, once again, that Jesus himself is the source. But as theologians have noted over the centuries, John refers not only to physical but spiritual life; Jesus is the light that illuminates the human spirit and counters the forces of darkness and death, stemming from human sin.
Here we arrive at the verse that perhaps sums up the heart of Christianity better than any other in scripture: “and light shines in darkness, and darkness could not overpower it.” Skipping over vast stretches of time to distill the story of creation, John reveals that Jesus, who is God, who created all things, came before all things, and illuminates humanity’s path, is the unconquerable light. The darkness of sin does not and will not prevail against him.
At the crucifixion, the darkness did its very worst. More than physical brutality, Jesus endured the emotional suffering of betrayal, mockery, and spiritual desolation. “My God, my God,” he cried on the cross, “why has thou forsaken me?”
PALM SUNDAY AND AMERICA’S CALL TO HUMBLE GREATNESS
But in the resurrection, the unconquerable light of Jesus shines in the darkness of death.
John 1:1-5 offers truth that transcends our fragmented age and allows modern minds to enter into the Easter story with fewer hurdles. Christians should embrace this universal narrative and proclaim the “Light Unconquered” to every corner of the world.
