The prologue of the Gospel according to John is probably one of the best known parts of the bible. And right in the middle of this brilliant introduction to the fourth Gospel is the seminal v. 14, which reads, “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.” (NIV)

The Greek text for the phrase ‘and made his dwelling among us’ is καὶ ἐσκήνωσεν ἐν ἡμῖν (kai eskenosen en hemin). The verb σκηνόω (skeno-o) literally means ‘to pitch a tent’ and John’s choice of it is no coincidence, especially given the contents of the rest of the verse.

The latter part of v. 14 focuses on the idea of glory and if we were to search the scriptures for a link between pitching a tent and glory, we would have to go back to the book of Exodus, where, at the end of the book, once the tabernacle is set up, the glory of Yahweh filled the tabernacle. That was the occasion in which the glory of God was associated with a pitched tent.

What John is intending the reader to conclude is absolutely clear in the prologue. He is linking the en-fleshed Word with the glory of God. He is not going to spring things on his reader. By making this link between Jesus, in whom the Word pitched his tent, and the glory of God, John is telling us that his Gospel will be demonstrating how Jesus actually replaces the Temple. John declares that the Word became flesh and pitched his tent in our midst. By saying this, John is telling the reader that in the incarnation the Word has rendered the Temple obsolete.

This is why in John’s Gospel, Jesus’ actions in the Temple, erroneously called ‘the cleansing of the Temple’, are placed at the beginning of the narrative. The conflict between the Temple and Jesus is central to the narrative of the fourth Gospel and we miss much of its meaning if we do not see this.

As mentioned earlier, John also links the idea of glory to the pitching of the tent. By doing this, he is telling us that his Gospel is going to describe how John himself perceived Jesus’ glory. To be sure, John himself did not understand as the events unfolded and he is careful to indicate this to us at various points in his Gospel. However, he wants the reader to be primed to recognize Jesus’ glory in the narrative.

For John, of course, Jesus’ glory is most supremely revealed in his death on the cross. However, there are advance signs, which John describes, from turning water into wine to raising Lazarus from the dead, that enables the reader to also recognize that Jesus’ death on the cross in no shameful thing, but rather a glory-revealing event.

And all this because, in John’s words, ‘he pitched his tent among us’.