Beethoven’s Last Blues (John’s Gospel in D-minor)

🎹 Turn the lights down low.
Grab your oldest headphones, your darkest room, and the heaviest heart you’ve got.
Play “Beethoven’s Last Blues” once—at the volume you’re scared to use.
Let it crawl inside the silence you carry.
When the final low D fades into nothing, don’t move.
Stay there in the dark until you feel something rise up that has no sound.
That’s the Word becoming flesh in you.
That’s joy breaking through deafness.
Now pass it on.
Send it to the one who’s lost their music.
Tell them: the conversation hasn’t ended.
The Ninth is still coming.
And it’s coming for them.
Play it loud enough for the deaf to hear.
Because joy was made to outrun silence.
#BeethovensLastBlues #TheWordBecameFlesh

Woke up this mornin’, world gone black as coal,
Ears full of silence, Lord, it done swallowed my soul.
Fingers still dancin’ on keys that don’t speak no more,
Hammer and string keep lyin’, like a lover walkin’ out the door.
Sat at the piano, tears fallin’ like rain,
Tryin’ to birth me a joy, but all I hear is pain.
Then a light cut through the dark, brighter than a Ninth chord,
A voice without sound said, “Listen, Ludwig… hear the Word.”
It said:
“In the beginnin’ was the Word, child, the Word was with God, oh my,
That Word was God His own self, been singin’ ‘fore the sky.
He was in the beginnin’ too, right there from the start—
And that Word… He put on flesh, wrapped glory ‘round a beat-up heart.”
I said, “Lord, I’m stone deaf, how can I hear this song?”
He said, “Boy, I became flesh, I know where you belong.
I pitched My tent in sufferin’, I walked where sorrow trod—
I turned the water into wine, and the silence into God.”
Well, the conversation ended, no more words in the air,
But somethin’ started burnin’ deep down in my prayer.
My hands got to movin’, though I can’t hear a sound,
Joy came runnin’ like a freight train, tearin’ up holy ground.
Now I’m laughin’ in the darkness, got a choir I can’t hear,
But I feel ten thousand voices wipin’ away my tears.
That Word done moved in with me, camped inside my bones—
Turned my midnight into music, turned my groans into home.
Yeah, the world thinks I’m finished, say the man done lost his prime,
But Joy done broke the silence, and she’s singin’ outside time.
I can’t hear the hallelujahs, but I feel ‘em in my chest—
The Word became flesh, brothers, and He’s givin’ deafness rest.
So strike up the Ninth, children, let them timpani roll,
I’m deaf but I’m dancin’, ‘cause Joy done saved my soul.
In the beginnin’ was the Word… and the Word ain’t never gonna fade—
He’s still singin’ through this silence, in the joy that He made.
(slow, trembling piano fade… then one final triumphant chord that rings forever)
=
### The Text (NKJV)
**John 1:1–2, 14**
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
2 He was in the beginning with God.
…
14 And the Word became 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.

This is one of the most famous and theologically rich passages in the entire Bible.

### 1. Historical and Literary Background
- **Author**: Traditionally the apostle John (the same John who wrote the Gospel, the three letters of John, and Revelation). Most scholars date the Gospel to c. AD 85–100, probably written in Ephesus.
- **Audience**: Primarily written to a mixed community of Jewish and Gentile Christians, but with a strong apologetic purpose toward Greek-speaking Gentiles and against early forms of Gnosticism (which denied that God could truly unite with physical matter).
- **Literary Style**: The opening verses are a prologue (John 1:1–18) written in elevated, poetic Greek. It deliberately echoes Genesis 1:1 (“In the beginning God created…”) to present Jesus as the divine agent of creation and the ultimate revelation of God.

### 2. Key Greek Term: “The Word” = Logos (ὁ λόγος)
- In Greek philosophy (especially Heraclitus, Plato, and later Stoics and Philo of Alexandria), **Logos** meant the rational principle that orders the universe, divine reason, or the intermediary between God and creation.
- In Jewish Wisdom literature (Proverbs 8, Wisdom of Solomon, Sirach), God’s **Wisdom** (Hebrew *ḥokhmah*, Greek *sophia*) is personified as being with God before creation and active in creating the world.
- John takes both concepts and radically identifies the Logos with a historical person: Jesus of Nazareth.

### 3. Verse-by-Verse Meaning (NKJV with explanation)

**Verse 1**
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”

- **“In the beginning”** → Eternal pre-existence (before creation itself).
- **“was the Word”** → Continuous existence in the past (imperfect tense ἦν, not “became”).
- **“the Word was with God”** → Personal distinction from the Father (relationship, fellowship; Greek πρός implies face-to-face intimacy).
- **“the Word was God”** → Full deity, same essence as the Father (not “a god” as some cults translate). No definite article before “God” (θεός, not ὁ θεός) emphasizes the qualitative nature: the Word is everything that God is.

**Verse 2**
“He was in the beginning with God.”

- Reinforces both eternal existence and personal distinction within the Godhead. This is foundational for the doctrine of the Trinity.

**Verse 14**
“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us…”

- **“became flesh”** (σὰρξ ἐγένετο) → The eternal Logos took on full humanity without ceasing to be God. This is the doctrine of the **Incarnation**.
- **“dwelt”** (ἐσκήνωσεν) → Literally “tabernacled” or “pitched His tent” among us—echoing the Old Testament tabernacle/temple where God’s glory dwelt (Exodus 40:34–35).
- **“we beheld His glory”** → Eyewitness claim (John and the apostles saw it). The glory is that of the “only begotten” (μονογενοῦς) — better translated “unique, one-of-a-kind” or “only begotten Son.”
- **“full of grace and truth”** → Grace (χάρις) and truth (ἀλήθεια) are the two great attributes of the New Covenant, replacing or fulfilling the Law given through Moses (see v. 17).

### 4. Major Theological Implications
- **Deity of Christ**: Jesus is fully God, co-eternal and co-equal with the Father.
- **Trinity**: Distinction (“with God”) and unity (“was God”) in the same verse.
- **Incarnation**: God entered human history as a real human being.
- **Rejection of Gnosticism**: The physical world and human flesh are not inherently evil; the divine Logos willingly assumed flesh.
- **Superiority of the New Covenant**: Moses gave the Law, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ (v. 17).

### 5. Historical Application and Use
- Early church councils (Nicaea 325, Constantinople 381, Chalcedon 451) heavily used John 1:1–14 to formulate the doctrines of the Trinity and the two natures of Christ (fully God, fully man in one person).
- It is the classic proof-text against Arianism (“there was a time when He was not”) and later Jehovah’s Witnesses teaching that Jesus is “a god.”
- Liturgically, John 1:1–14 is read on Christmas Day in many traditions because it is the most profound biblical explanation of the Incarnation.

In summary: John 1:1–2, 14 declares that the eternal, divine Logos—who is personally distinct from yet fully shares the essence of God—entered human history by becoming flesh in Jesus Christ, revealing God’s glory in a unique and final way. It is the theological cornerstone for understanding who Jesus really is.