John 1:11

‘He came to his own, and those who were his own did not receive him.'

He came to His own ‘home' (ta idia - translated ‘home' correctly in Acts 21:6), and His own people received Him not. Here now it is made clear that Jesus is being spoken of. This was not just some abstract philosophical idea, but a human being who came as God's Word, not only to the world, but to ‘His own people', and was rejected by both them, and the world at large. The remainder of the Gospel will expand on this rejection.

It was ever a wonder to John that the very people who had looked for His coming, and whose fathers had waited longingly and yearningly through the centuries for that time, were not willing to receive Him when He came. But of course what they had yearned after was not what Jesus had come to be. What they had yearned for was superiority and plenty, and for abundance of good things and complete security. They yearned to rule the nations. But He had come to reach the hearts of men, not to pander to their desires. He wanted them to yearn for truth. He wanted them to rule themselves under the Kingly Rule of God.

The verses are full of irony. He made the world, but it did not know Him. He had a chosen people whom He had prepared to act as a home for Him, but they too failed to respond and receive God's Word. None would make the response He was seeking. When Christians who are fully committed to Christ sometimes feel strangers in their own surroundings they can comfort themselves with the thought that they follow in His steps. Yet there were those who did respond, and we now learn that to them was given the great privilege of becoming ‘children of God'.