John 1:17

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For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.

John 1:17 (NKJV)

For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.

John 1:17 (NIV)

For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.

John 1:17 (KJV)

For the law was given through Moses, but God's unfailing love and faithfulness came through Jesus Christ.

John 1:17 (NLT)

For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.

John 1:17 (ESV)

For the Law was given through Moses; grace and truth were realized through Jesus Christ.

John 1:17 (NASB)

Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. www.lockman.org

For the Law was given through Moses, but grace [the unmerited favor and blessing of God] and truth came through Jesus Christ.

John 1:17 (AMP)

Scripture quotations taken from the Amplified® Bible (AMP), Copyright © 2015 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. www.lockman.org

For while the Law was given through Moses, grace (unearned, undeserved favor and spiritual blessing) and truth came through Jesus Christ.

John 1:17 (AMPC)

Scripture quotations taken from the Amplified® Bible (AMPC), Copyright © 1954, 1958, 1962, 1964, 1965, 1987 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. www.lockman.org

We got the basics from Moses, and then this exuberant giving and receiving, this endless knowing and understanding — all this came through Jesus, the Messiah.

John 1:17 (MSG)

Scripture quotations from The Message. Copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. Used by permission of NavPress. All rights reserved. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers.

New Covenant Meaning

Given Versus Came: Two Different Modes of Arrival

John uses two different Greek constructions to describe the law and grace. The law was "given" (edothe), a passive verb indicating transmission through a human agent. Moses received the law and passed it on. It came from outside. Grace and truth, by contrast, "came" (egeneto, the same word used in verse 14: "the Word became flesh"). Grace and truth did not come through transmission from an outside source mediated by a human agent. They arrived in Person. Christ is not the messenger of grace and truth. He is their embodiment. Where Moses brought a written code down from a mountain, Christ became the living reality of what the law was always pointing toward.

Grace and Truth Together: Why Both Matter

John pairs grace and truth deliberately, because each without the other is incomplete. Grace without truth collapses into permissiveness that does not take sin seriously. Truth without grace collapses into condemnation that has no redemptive power. The law, given through Moses, was true but could not supply grace. It revealed the problem of sin accurately but could not resolve it. Christ brings both together in one Person. He does not lower the standard of truth to accommodate human failure. He satisfies it. And He does not withhold grace from those who have failed. He extends it freely. This is why the incarnation is necessary: only a Person can hold both fully at once.

John 1:17 is not a dismissal of Moses or the law. It is a calibration: the law was genuine and given by God, but it was preparatory. Grace and truth in the fullest sense required a different kind of arrival, one that the law itself pointed toward. John has already described Christ in verse 14 as "full of grace and truth," using the same pairing. The verse in context functions as the explanatory note after the declaration of Christ's fullness: this fullness is what the law anticipated but could not itself provide. The law was the announcement. Christ is the arrival.

Application for Your Life

You Relate to God Through Grace and Truth, Not Through Law

John 1:17 establishes the mode of the New Covenant relationship. The law defined the terms of the old covenant and left every participant under condemnation because no one could meet its terms. Grace and truth arrived in Christ to establish a new mode of relationship: one in which grace supplies what law demanded and truth is no longer threatening but liberating, because the one who embodies it also forgives those who have violated it. Living under grace does not mean living without moral clarity. It means living with the awareness that the truth about who you are is no longer defined by your violations but by your position in Christ.

Grace Came, Not Was Sent

The personal nature of grace is significant for how you receive it. Grace is not an abstract quality that God distributes from a distance. It came in a Person. You do not access grace by performing correctly or by achieving a state of spiritual readiness. You access grace by receiving a Person. This is why John's Gospel consistently speaks of believing in Him rather than believing in a set of principles. The grace that came through Jesus Christ is encountered in relationship with Jesus Christ, not in adherence to a system or achievement of a standard. He is the grace.

Prayer Based on This Verse

Father, thank You that grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. Not through a code, not through my performance, not through a system I have to master, but through a Person I receive by faith. I receive Him. I receive the grace He embodies and the truth He reveals. Where I have been relating to You through the lens of law, measuring my standing by my compliance, I turn to the grace that came in Christ and I rest in it. And where I have avoided truth because truth felt like condemnation, I receive it now, knowing that the One who is the truth also forgives, restores, and transforms. He came full of grace and truth, and that fullness is enough for me. In Jesus name. Amen.