Besides Jesus Christ, the most important thing to a Christian is the Bible. Apart from the Bible, we would hardly know God or His eternal purpose. But by reading the Bible we can know what God wants and what He intends to accomplish.

From a babe you have known the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise unto salvation through the faith which is in Christ Jesus. –2 Timothy 3:15

However, the Bible itself is a big book. Weighing in at 66 individual books, 1189 chapters, and just over 31,000 verses, it’s easy to get lost between Genesis and Revelation, wondering WHERE exactly and WHAT exactly that purpose is.

Here’s the good news.

Certain chapters in the Bible act as guides, road maps. More like Google maps fully zoomed out. If you can grasp the main points in these chapters you will have a bird’s eye view of God’s purpose and won’t get lost in the details. John chapter 1 turns out to be just such a chapter.

In these 51 verses, the entire purpose of God is distilled in six points.

Creation, Incarnation, Redemption, Regeneration, Transformation, Building

This summer, Christian Students on Campus is studying John 1 with incoming freshmen at orientation. This ties into and kicks off our summer reading challenge– “21 in 30”, where we read the entire Gospel of John in 30 days to stay connected over the summer break.

What better way to start college, than with a road map of God’s purpose and traveling companions for the journey!

Kyle Barton
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