The Word was before. That might sound like an incomplete sentence, but it is wholly complete. One ancient Christian, named Athanasius, said "there never was when he was not." Through God's spoken WORD everything was made. Everything came into being because the WORD, which already was, spoke them into being. In the WORD of God was the power and ability and will to create all that there is.
Stop and think about that for a moment. Just saying that is mind-blowing.
The last couple of days I've mentioned that John wrote his book to communicate who Jesus is. In his book, John desired that we come to discover this vast identity of the man who changed his life. So, to introduce Jesus, John chose a "word" to help us get our heads around who Jesus is. He chose to refer to Jesus as "The Word" that is behind all of creation. "In the beginning was the Word… through him all things were made; without him, nothing that has been made was made." (John 1:1,3 NIV)
Then John says this: "And the Word was with God." Literally, καὶ ὁ λόγος ἦν πρὸς τὸν θεόν, could be translated, "And the Word was towards God." Some people have suggested this means there was a relationship between God and the Word… a closeness… that the Word was closer to God than the Word was to anything else. One scholar (A.T. Robertson) suggested a translation of "the Word was face to face with God." In other words, all that existed before everything began was God and the Word. That's why translators say "And the Word was with God."
This idea makes a startling statement… that there was with God another being or entity or force of life that was distinct and yet intimately connected in some way to God. God, and His Word, worked together to create all things. The Word was God in action, in Genesis 1. Now John is saying that the Word that created all things stands on his own as a distinct, albeit same, level along with God. The Word and God are partners, so to speak. They work together. They are of the same mind. They act in unison.
But that's not all John says about the relationship between God and the Word…
(more tomorrow!)