Who Are You?
Download MP3Good morning everybody. We're gonna be in John's gospel today. So if you would go ahead and start turning there. It's also in your worship guide, if you don't have a bible with you. We'll be in John chapter 1, continuing our study.
Speaker 1:We just wrapped up the the prologue last week, and we're gonna move on into the testimony of John the Baptist today. So starting with verse 19. John chapter 1 19. It's a gospel written by a disciple of Jesus. One, that was called John the Beloved or John the Evangelist.
Speaker 1:And so we're gonna read his words here. But ultimately, we turn our attention now to God's word. And so let us listen carefully. And this is the testimony of John, when the Jewish leaders sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask, who are you? He confessed and he did not deny, but confessed, I am not the Christ.
Speaker 1:And they asked him, what then? Are are you Elijah? And he said, I am not. Are you the prophet? And he answered, no.
Speaker 1:So they said to him, who are you? We need to give an answer to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself? He said, I am the voice of 1 crying out in the wilderness. Make straight the way of the Lord, as the prophet Isaiah said.
Speaker 1:Now they had been sent from the Pharisees, and they asked him, then why are you baptizing if you are neither the Christ nor Elijah, nor the prophet? John answered them, I baptize with water, but among you stands one you do not know, even he who comes after me, the strap of whose sandal I am unworthy to untie. Untie. These things took place in Bethany, across the Jordan, where John was baptizing. The next day, he saw Jesus coming toward him, and he said, behold the lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.
Speaker 1:This is he of whom I said, after me comes a man who ranks before me because he was before me. I myself did not know him, but for this purpose I came baptizing with water, that he might be revealed to Israel. And John bore witness. I saw the spirit descend from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him. I myself did not know him, but he who sent me to baptize with water said to me, he on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain, this is he who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.
Speaker 1:And I have seen and have borne witness that this is the Son of God. The word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Let's pray. Oh Lord, you are God, and we are not.
Speaker 1:Help us to have the ears to hear your word today. Help us to understand it, and help us to respond to it. Help us to live unto you for all the days of our lives, For your name and for our deep joy, amen. So we are continuing a study in John's gospel. This is our 3rd week into it.
Speaker 1:The last two weeks have been about the prologue, the introduction that John the Evangelist I'm gonna do my best as many times as possible to distinguish John the Evangelist and John the Baptist, because the names just kind of happen a whole bunch here in in in the beginning. And, when we when we go back and actually read about the life of John the Baptist, even his the prophecy of his birth, we realize it's important to call him John. So instead of somebody like Simon, we call him Peter. Is it Levi? Is it Matthew?
Speaker 1:John? It was a big deal. His dad didn't talk for a long time because it was really important that he be named John, so I'm going to make sure I call him John, lest anything befalls me. So, John the Baptist, John the Evangelist. John the Evangelist has been writing this letter, this gospel, this good news, the story of Jesus.
Speaker 1:And on our 1st week we looked at the logos, the word. The word being made flesh and dwelling among us. And then as a church family, last week, we looked at what it means to believe in this word and to have the right to become the children of God. And how are we born to be the children of God? It is because of God.
Speaker 1:And that that wraps up this this introduction, this prologue to John's gospel. And and so it sets the stage for everything that is to follow. And really we can see the entire gospel of John, that this whole gospel letter is being written to tell us who Jesus is. Identity is a big part of John's gospel. He wants us to know who this Jesus of Nazareth is.
Speaker 1:What is his identity? And he's going to take a couple of different routes to get us there. There there are 3 that I'd like to highlight. 1, he's going to do that with signs. Throughout this gospel we will look at 7 different signs.
Speaker 1:In in chapters 1 through 12, we're going to see 7 different signs are brought up for us to consider. Signs like, the turning water into wine, curing the official sun, healing of the paralytic. We're going to see all of these different signs brought up before us, 7 different signs. There are also throughout the gospel, 7 different I am statements, which we read, corporately last week in worship. So these 7 statements come up.
Speaker 1:The third thing, the third device and method that that John the Evangelist uses in his gospel to teach us who this Jesus is is he raises up witnesses. He raises up people like Martha and Peter and Nathaniel, and they say, you are the Son of God. They they come to this place where where it has been revealed to them. Flesh and blood did not reveal this to them, but God has revealed to them who this Jesus is. John records it for us.
Speaker 1:He raises up these witnesses. They say, you are the divine son of God. Thomas will say, my Lord and my God to Jesus. So from these signs and these sayings and then from these witnesses, John is presenting to us this case for who this Jesus is. He answers it and he wants to answer it in a really substantive and satisfying way.
Speaker 1:What is this identity? Who are you, Jesus? The first witness that comes up is John the Baptist. And really, in the prologue is where we first hear about him, 20% of the prologue is actually talking about John the Baptist and not Jesus. Because it is very important for us to understand who John the Baptist is.
Speaker 1:In fact, we have a biography of John the Baptist, one of the best biographies of any individual in the scriptures. We have starting with, Luke, we have the prophecy of his birth. We also have a description of his birth. We have when when his mother Elizabeth, John the Baptist's mother Elizabeth, a relative of Mary. Mary has been told that she, that the Holy Spirit will overshadow her, that she will conceive Jesus the Messiah.
Speaker 1:And when they come into close contact, when when Mary with child, unborn Jesus, comes in contact with Elizabeth with child with unborn John the Baptist, when they come into contact together, John the Baptist leaps with joy at the presence of the Messiah. He worships him in this way. And so we have we have the birth, the dedication of John the Baptist, the the prophecy of his father. And then in Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, in all four gospels, we have a description of John's They all go back to this prophecy from Isaiah. Isaiah chapter 40, which we read corporately this morning.
Speaker 1:That comfort would come to the people and that a voice would cry out, make way for our king. Make way for the kingdom of God. And so this is this is very important for us to understand who is this John the Baptist because we have we have his the prophecy of his birth, the birth, his ministry as baptizing, as calling people to repentance, and then we have his death. We have his death as recorded in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. See, John was calling people to repentance, and not just within, the Jewish Israel.
Speaker 1:He was calling everybody out to repentance. In fact, he called King Herod out to repentance. King Herod had married his his brother's wife, and John the Baptist says, you can't do that, and you need to repent. Now he's calling him to God's law, God's Mosaic moral law. And even though he's not a Jew, he's saying, You have offended God and you need to repent.
Speaker 1:And that really made King Herod's wife angry, and so it's a result of that that John the Baptist is arrested and beheaded. And so that's his the prophecy of his birth and to his death. And and all of the evangelists, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, they all want us to know this story. And John, the evangelist, is putting this right at the front of his gospel because something some groundwork is being laid here. Something is happening that we need to know as we move forward.
Speaker 1:So we see this scene today where these Jewish leaders have sent, the corporate office has come to figure out what's going on in the wilderness. So the suits come in. And they've heard that there's this guy. He he's doing some crazy things. He kind of reminds them of a prophet that lived a long time ago, and they're worried about who he might be, and they need to get a read on this.
Speaker 1:And so they're sent to find out who is this man, John the Baptist. He's covered in this coarse fur. He's eating locusts and honey. Some of you might know that by the the apologist DC talk. But he's doing all of this, he's doing all of this out there in the wilderness and, and he's gathering a crowd.
Speaker 1:There are people that are coming. They're listening to this. They're listening to what he's saying. They hear these words, a call to repentance, and they trust it, and they're being baptized, and they're walking in this newness, this this new call of and this new life unto God. And so these these men, they arrive, and they want to know, who are you?
Speaker 1:And his response, which is what we're gonna dig into today, his response kinda comes in 3 movements. The first movement is he responds to them in saying, I am not. And then he says statements of who he is, and then he says who Jesus is. So who he's not, who he is, and who Jesus is. So they begin in verse 19, and this is the testimony, the witness of John.
Speaker 1:When the Jewish leaders sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, who are you? He confessed and did not deny. And so this is his first statement back. I am not the Christ. Then they asked him, what then?
Speaker 1:Are you Elijah? And he said, I am not. Then they asked a third question, are you the prophet? And he answered, no. So there had been a long expectation within Israel for the Messiah that that the king, the true king, the one who would really rescue them would come to the people.
Speaker 1:And so that's their first question. As as he is calling these people to repentance, he's calling them to a new life following Yahweh, they're wondering, okay, well could this be the Messiah? He doesn't look like the Messiah we expect, but but first ask if he is the Messiah. And he says, in the way that John the Evangelist puts it, he confessed, he did not deny, but confessed. This emphatic, he did not delay in saying, I am not the Messiah.
Speaker 1:So they ask him, what then? Are you Elijah? Now, in Malachi chapter 4, there had been a prophecy that Elijah, who did not die, who was taken up into heaven, that he would come back. And that's how they understood that, that Elijah would come back, and they're wondering is he this precursor to the Messiah? Now, later, and this is kind of the the a bit of a confusing way to walk around this, is that Jesus says he is Elijah.
Speaker 1:Now, not in the way that these men, these Jewish leaders had come asking. They thought he would be literally the physical Elijah. And Jesus says, no. He's the one with the spirit of Elijah coming in and preparing the way. So John was honest.
Speaker 1:I'm not Elijah. Then they ask, are you the prophet? Now, we studied this back in Deuteronomy 18, where Moses tells the people that a greater prophet is coming. There there will be a great prophet coming. It's greater than me, greater than Moses.
Speaker 1:And so they're asking, is that you, John? And he says, no. That's not me. So then he moves to answering their their further question. They they're saying, we've got to give an answer when when we go back, And so just 3 no's isn't going to cut it.
Speaker 1:If you then if you're if you're not the messiah, if you are not Elijah, and you are not the prophet, then why are you doing all of this? And that's when he goes and zeroes in on saying who he is. Verse 23. He said, I am the voice of 1 crying out in the wilderness. Make straight the way of the Lord, as the prophet Isaiah said.
Speaker 1:And then he goes on. Then why are you baptizing if you are none of these things? And he says, I baptize with water, but among you stands 1 you do not know. Even he who comes after me, the strap whose sandal I am not worthy to untie. In other places where this is recorded, he says I shouldn't even carry his shoes.
Speaker 1:These things took place in Bethany across the Jordan where John was baptizing. His answer to, okay, so who are you? He says, I'm the one that's preparing the way. I'm the preparer. I'm the voice crying out.
Speaker 1:That's who I am. I I'm the messenger that in Malachi 3 is being talked about. The one who's gonna come and begin to proclaim, that's who I am. And so why am I doing this? It's part of me preparing the way.
Speaker 1:So to focus in on that where he says, I am I I I know who I'm not. I'm not the Christ. I'm not Elijah. I'm not the prophet. I also know who I am.
Speaker 1:I'm the one who prepares the way. And I'm doing that through calling people to repentance and baptism. Think about that. That's how he is preparing the way for Jesus, How he is preparing the way for the Messiah is not through just condemnation, not through behavior modification, not just trying to change what people do. He's calling them to repentance.
Speaker 1:He's calling them to turn and believe. That baptism is this outer symbol of an inner reality that they are being cleansed and walking in faith humbly with Yahweh. And that's preparing them, that's readying them to hear the good news of Jesus. And so he's preparing the way. And this is why he will lose his head, because he's calling people to repent.
Speaker 1:He's calling them to believe. Now for many reasons, this is important because this question that's being posed here by the rulers and the Pharisees is a question that actually comes to each one of us. The question of, who are you? And I would like to ask you, how do you answer that question? Maybe you have to write a bio for something.
Speaker 1:Maybe you've got a really clever bio on social media. You know, mother to 12, wife to 1, some kind of word math. Maybe you have maybe you have one of those. Maybe maybe it's a description in in in your workplace where you have to give like your curriculum vitae, you've got to give your stats. So this is who I am.
Speaker 1:This past week I was in Boston and I went to Harvard. I'm going to put that on all of my, LinkedIn and my CV now. Like I went to Harvard. I don't have to say that I did anything else there except for buy a magnet. But, but I went there.
Speaker 1:So how do you well, what do you do? How do you how do you how do you answer this? Where do you go? Family name? Job?
Speaker 1:Spouse? Kids? Your activities, your talents, your skills, the things that impress people? Where do you go? How do you answer this question?
Speaker 1:We all have to answer it. Who are you? And this is a big question for our culture too. In, a recent study by the Barna Group out in California, they they did a study of, 18 to 29 year olds, and in in that age group, people in their twenties, top five things to do before you turn 30. Number 4, find out who I really am.
Speaker 1:Now, top five regrets of people over 30. Number 5, not finding out who I really am. This is a question that comes to every one of us. Who am I really? We we kind of have this impulse, whether it's culture or or innate in us, we kind of have this drive like an archaeologist of the self that we have to dig deep and dig deep and find out who I am really, really find out.
Speaker 1:And so how do we answer this question of identity? I think John the Baptist can help us with this problem. Number 1, we need to know who we aren't. We start there. We start by knowing who we are not.
Speaker 1:And just like that first question came to him, to John the Baptist, are you the Messiah? We say, no. I'm not the Messiah. And in that, we can give up on on our own trying to save the world and fix everyone in it. Because at that point, when we give up on trying to save the world on our own and fix everyone around us, we might start to see how much fixing we need.
Speaker 1:And we might see that we don't have a theoretical savior, but a real savior. Because when we live like we are the savior, we start to believe it. No one else is going to believe it, but we believe it. We start to believe that we can save ourselves. The prophet Jeremiah tells us that the heart is deceitful above all things, and the most ferocious lie that our hearts tell us is that we don't need saving, and our culture cosigns.
Speaker 1:I don't need a savior. I might I might need to fix a few things. I might need to make some better choices. Maybe I need a better environment, and then I can make some better choices. But I think that the environment of the garden has taught us that that doesn't really help.
Speaker 1:If I just had everything perfect around me, perfect family, perfect job, if my spouse got a few more things together, if my kids would just listen, if I got all these things neatly placed around me, if I could make my own Eden, then I would make such great decisions. It didn't work in the Garden of Eden. It's not gonna work in our own lives. So we have to come to grips with this. You see, we try to keep Jesus at this acceptable moralistic distance and keep that savior talk away.
Speaker 1:And so often, we work really hard not to need Jesus, to not need a savior, but we do. We always do. Zach Eswine, who wrote a book, kind of an autobiography, a memoir of his pastoral ministry, and really he would say his pastoral failures, he said this, trying to be an exception to the human race encourages arrogance among most of us and burnout among many of us. The 2 invasive fruits of having to prove that we are not flawed, that we do not need rescue from Jesus the way our neighbors do. When we don't answer as John the Baptist has answered, I am not the Christ, arrogance and burnout grow.
Speaker 1:That's the fruit that we start to bear. See, my perfectionism, even the appearance of it, is a declaration that I don't need Jesus like you do. And s 1 is saying that this pretend perfect, it it bears this fruit of arrogance and burnout. And I know that many of you have experienced 1, and some of you both, just like I do. I know that I often fall into a way of living that pretends to not require a savior.
Speaker 1:I can have role model Jesus, but not Messiah. John the Evangelist and John the Baptist will have none of this. That's what we've seen so far in chapter 1. John the Baptist knows. He confesses.
Speaker 1:He does not deny. He confesses, I am not the Christ. And we need to know that we aren't either. We We need to know who we aren't. The other thing is we need to know who we are.
Speaker 1:John the Baptist knew what his role was. He knew his responsibilities. He was called by God to prepare the way for Jesus. He was the messenger that Malachi prophesied about. He was the voice that Isaiah prophesied about.
Speaker 1:He was commissioned by God to preach repentance and to baptize. And notice that he answers the questions of his identity in ways that are connected to the identity of Jesus. Baptizer, preparer, making the way, 6 times in chapter 1 it's talked John the Baptist is referenced as the one who bears witness to the light, the son of God, that he's bearing witness to Jesus. That's where he's beginning to receive his identity. You see, we are gifted and wired, we are equipped and we are called.
Speaker 1:And yes, we are limited, and we need to know who we aren't, but we need to understand how we do find identity, who we are in Jesus. And John does that. His answers are connected to who Jesus is. I would call this a derivative existence, a derivative identity. Paul finds his identity as a slave to Christ.
Speaker 1:That's how he introduces himself. Like that's on his business card, slave to Christ. That's who I want to be. That's how I want to be known. This is how he describes it in 2nd Corinthians chapter 5.
Speaker 1:He writes this to the Corinthian church. We have concluded this, that one has died for all, and therefore all have died. And he died for all that those who live might no longer live for themselves, but for him who for their sake died and was raised. To the Galatians, he wrote this, I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.
Speaker 1:This derivative existence, this derivative identity means, this this is the phrase, this is how I would define derivative identity. I become the person I'm meant to be when I find my identity in another. Let me say that again. I become who I'm meant to be when I find my identity in another. Now culture is gonna tell you the same thing.
Speaker 1:It's poisonous when we apply this to other people and things. I become who I am meant to be when I find my identity in another. When placed on people, and things and jobs and possessions and reputations, it's poisonous. But when that is applied to Jesus, it is life. And that is what John knows.
Speaker 1:He knows that he receives his identity from this Messiah, And that leads us to this 3rd movement. So first, it's who I who I am not and who I am, and then he moves to who he is. And this is what everything has been leading up to. This is why John the Baptist matters as a witness. This is what makes John's story matter because he is a part of a bigger story.
Speaker 1:Now I have to confess, I've grown pretty weary of the celebrity status that story has gotten in our culture. Maybe you have to. It feeds on a lot of our narcissistic tendencies, a lot of our self absorption in really troubling ways. And John the Baptist gives a clear depiction of someone who has found life and freedom in losing his story for the greater story of Jesus. I mean, this is the guy who's going to say, he must increase, I must decrease.
Speaker 1:Zach Eswein, again, in his book Sensing Jesus says, God is the remembered one. This doesn't mean that we are forgotten, not by him, not by a long shot. In fact, being remembered by Him means we no longer fear being forgotten by the world. Living humanly within His remembrance is enough. Being remembered by him is enough.
Speaker 1:So as John the Baptist did, we need to recognize and declare who who Jesus is. And he does this the next day. Look with me in verse 29. The next day, he saw Jesus coming toward him, and he said, behold the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. This is he of whom I said, after me comes a man who ranks before me because he was before me.
Speaker 1:Now we know that, in the chronology, John was born before Jesus, older. But what does he mean by before me? He's talking about the preeminence of Christ. He is before me. He is above me, and what I'm doing is preparing a way for him.
Speaker 1:And so he testifies to that. Then he says in verse 31, I myself did not know him, but for this purpose I came baptizing with water that he might be revealed. That's that's the revelation that we talked about and and read together in Isaiah 40 this morning. That he would be revealed, that he would be seen by Israel. And John bore witness.
Speaker 1:I saw the spirit descend from heaven like a dove. He's recalling the baptism of Jesus and and the spirit resting on him, remaining on him. And John knowing that that was the sign of the Messiah, that is the Son of God, and so he bears witness to that. Verse 34, and I have seen and borne witness that this is the Son of God. The first witness, the first testimony bearing witness to who this Jesus is, answering the question of identity.
Speaker 1:Who is this Jesus? And he holds up the lamb of God and the son of God. He's the lamb of God. Now this this image of the lamb was as accessible to their culture at that time as it seems to be inaccessible to us. They they would have seen lambs regularly sacrificed.
Speaker 1:First, it's it's a part of that, Passover meal, that the the blood of the lamb would be put on the doorpost as the destroyer would pass over as we studied in Exodus. There's that image of the lamb. There's the image of the lamb of the daily sacrifice. A lamb was offered every day. It was offered by men coming to the priest.
Speaker 1:And, lest you think that it was just the priest that was doing all of this butchering, no, the one who brought it would bleed out the animal. And they would have blood on their hands, and they would know the sacrifice of the lamb. But this lamb is a lamb brought by God. It's the divine sacrifice. Not only is this lamb God, but it's a lamb brought by God.
Speaker 1:And that's why this sacrifice is the final and perfect sacrifice because this lamb is brought to the slaughter by God and offered for the sins of the world. So the sacrifice. And then he says he's the son of God. He bears witness to the divinity of Jesus, and he calls us out for everyone to hear as Jesus is walking up. He witnesses to who this man is, and he says, I have seen, I've born witness.
Speaker 1:This is the Son of God. This is the savior, the messiah, the one who rescues. It's this man. He is the divine son of God. He is the sacrifice, and he is the savior, and he has come to his people.
Speaker 1:You see, we too must know rightly who we are in light of who Christ is. John bears witness to this. He says Jesus is the savior and the sacrifice. And how did he prepare the way? He declared these things, that he, Jesus, is the lamb of God, the sacrifice, and that he is the son of God.
Speaker 1:He is the messiah, and he called people to repent. He called people to believe. And it is that faith, it is that belief, it is that confession, it is that witness that made him lose his head. Unless we think that that's a long ago truth, there were Christians a year ago that did not think that they would lose their heads, who now have, in our modern time. And they bear witness.
Speaker 1:They bear witness to who this Jesus is. I'm not sure if you saw back in one of the videos that that ISIS had put out, where where men were being beheaded for confessing Christ, and they kept referring to them almost as as a derogatory term as the people of the cross. And these men said, yes. That is my derivative identity. That is who I am.
Speaker 1:I am I am a person of the cross. And on that identity, I'm willing to be forgotten by the world because I am remembered by my father. We are faced with these questions. Maybe it's not with a sword next to us, but we are faced with these questions. Who are you?
Speaker 1:And will that be an identity that you get from Jesus, or one that you cobble together with arrogance and burnout. We will be turning our attention now to the table, which is an opportunity to remember.
