Fed At the Bosom Of God; John 1:1-18

 

Rev. George Miller

Dec 28, 2025

John 1:1-18

 

Christmas Day we shared a sacred meal at the Communion Table; next week as the New Year starts, we return to the Table to be fed again. 

 

To all who made the journey Back to Bethlehem, the Lord’s Table is a sign of welcome. Inclusion.  AGAPE LOVE.  Where those who hunger are fed, those who thirst are quenched.

 

Are you hungry for life everlasting- come to the Table.  Are you hungry for fair play and kind words- come to the Table, where we are nourished, and it is God through Jesus the Son who feeds us.

 

Eat, drink, rest, then after you are fed with our Father’s heavenly food- go and do likewise; nourished.

 

After weeks of making our way back to Bethlehem, we are finally introduced to Jesus.  But John has a different focus than Matthew or Luke.  He does not focus on Jesus the baby, or Jesus the son of Mary.

 

John focuses on Jesus as the Word.  The Word who was with God; is God.  The Word that slips into human flesh to become one of us: Emmanuel.

 

In today’s reading, John does something amazing; gone relatively unnoticed, missed by the minds of men for hundreds of years.

 

In verse 18, John states “It is the Only Son, himself God, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known.”

 

Except, there’s a mistake in the English translation.  The Greek word is not “heart,” nor is it “side” as other Bible’s state.

 

The correct Greek word is “bosom.”

 

“It is the Only Son, himself God,  who is close to the Father’s bosom.”

 

Heart/Side/Bosom.  An important difference;  ask anyone who has breast fed a child.

 

What we have here is not a generic  image of Jesus the son being held by God; we have the image of Jesus the child being breast fed by God.

 

Let that sink in.  John is telling us that Jesus dwells at the bosom of God, where Jesus is nourished by God.

 

This powerful understanding of the original Greek text comes from Professor Karoline Lewis, a teacher at Luther Seminary in St. Paul, MN.

 

In her commentary of John, Dr. Lewis explores the meaning of bosom in John.  Up until 1750, a prevalent image was of baby Jesus being nursed at the breast of Mary, an image used to symbolize the grace of God.

 

Think of the image- Jesus being nursed by Mary representing love, closeness, tenderness.  AGAPE. 

 

It is an intimate experience of a parent feeding her child, holding that child in their arms, looking upon their face, heartbeat near the baby’s ears.

 

This image represented God as provider, sustainer, nourisher.  The image of Jesus being fed at Mary’s bosom was a way to let believers know that God will provide.

 

Isn’t that what God did with bread and quail in the dessert?  Isn’t that what Jesus did with loaves and fishes in the wilderness?

 

All these stories, these images- of God who is Father who feeds us when we are hungry, who feeds the Son.  No wonder in Isaiah 55, the prophet  called all who hunger and all who thirst.  It’s God’s very nature.

 

This image of Jesus being at God’s bosom finds its reflection in the Last Supper.  In John 13 the beloved disciple rests upon Jesus’ bosom.  Chapters 1 and 13 are the only times the word “bosom” is used in John.

 

Who is this BELOVED ONE?  No one knows.  What if…that unnamed disciple is meant to represent you, represent me, meant to represent us?

 

Then we have a deeper image of Jesus, at the very beginning, being nourished at the bosom of God, and us, at the end of his ministry, being nourished at the bosom of Jesus.

 

It’s a shame we lost that image.  Cultural shifts took place,  modern medicine began to see the body as a thing, pop culture sensationalized normal practices.

 

Eventually the universal church  began to take away the image of Jesus at Mary’s breast, to be hidden away and forgotten.

 

Male scholars who translated the sacred texts could not image God having a bosom, nor breastfeeding, so they changed the word to mean “side” or “heart”.

 

In doing so, we lost a delicate  image of God that could have made all the difference.  Imagine if we still had this image of intimacy, nourishment, and tenderness.

 

But here is the Good News- thanks to the work of Rev.  Lewis we know this now, and with this knowledge, we have been granted an opportunity-

 

To see and talk about God as the Heavenly Parent who nourishes.

 

To worship believing this to be so.

 

To share God’s AGAPE love with those who hunger, those who thirst, be it our neighbors or those as far away as Biloxi or North Dakota, or even as close as ourselves.

 

What a joy it has been to journey Back to Bethlehem. 

 

Next week, as we come to the Lord’s Table let us hold onto this image of Christmas nourishment and a parent’s eternal love. 

 

Amen and amen.