LOOK, THE LAMB OF GOD

John 1:19-34

Key Verse: 1:29

“The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, ‘Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!’”

In the first part of Chapter 1, we received the testimony of the Apostle John on who Jesus is.  Through John’s testimony we learned that Jesus is the Living God who came in the flesh.  We learned that He is the True Light of men and that His Light gives us life.

In today’s passage John the Baptist tells us why Jesus is the True Light who gives life to men.  May the Spirit of God open our hearts to accept John’s words.

First, Prepare the way for the Lord. (19-28)

Look at verse 19.  “19 Now this was John’s testimony when the Jews of Jerusalem sent priests and Levites to ask him who he was.”  John the Baptist was the son of a priest, Zechariah.  His birth was an amazing thing.  He was born to him and his wife in their old age.  His life had been about prophesied by the prophet Isaiah.   In short, he came to this world as the forerunner of the Christ.  He preached a simple message.  It was a message of repentance.  “Repent for the Kingdom of God is near!”  He preached a baptism of repentance in order to prepare the way for our Lord Jesus (Lk 3:1-14).

Amazingly, John’s message had a strange effect on people.  When John preached the message of repentance, many people came to him and repented and then they were baptized by John.  He called people to repent of their sins.  Most people hate to hear that they are a sinner; especially here in America, where they believe in personal freedom and personal choice and they are not going to listen to anyone who says otherwise. “I can do what I want and no one can tell me any differently.”    Yet strangely, when the people listened to John’s message they came to him in droves to confess their sins and repent.  What this revealed was that the people were sick and tired of their sins.  They realized that they were powerless and slaves to their sins and they eagerly desired to be set free from them.

When the people heard John’s straight and simple message and saw his holy life that backed up what he said, they were cut to the heart and hope arose within them.  So John baptized them in the Jordan River to consecrate their decision to live a new life.  He baptized them in the Jordan River because he did not have a clean and warm swimming pool like Shep. William has.  Last year we used Shep. William’s swimming pool to baptize several of our growing disciples.  But even though the people came to John and confessed their sins and repented, they really did not truly solve their sin problem and it didn’t truly change them.  But they were still so happy to come and confess and repent their sin.

Little by little John's ministry grew and grew until it shook the entire nation of Israel.  Soon everyone began talking about him.  He even caught the notice of the politicians and the religious leaders who became alarmed that he was going to start a revolution or something.  So they decided to investigate John the Baptist

So they sent out their FBI agents to get answers.  How did John answer their questions?  Look at verse 20.  “20 He did not fail to confess, but confessed freely, “I am not the Christ.”  Many who had come to John thought that John might be the Promised Messiah who would rescue man from their sins.  But John right out the gate told them straightly, “I am not the Christ.”  The religious leaders were relieved to hear this.  The idea that John was the Messiah insulted their sensibilities.  How could the Messiah be in the desert and not at the Temple?

But they were not done with their questioning.  So they asked him?  “Then who are you?  Are you Elijah?”  He said, “I am not.”  So they asked him, “Are you the Prophet?”  And he answered, “No”.  With each question John’s answer became smaller and smaller.  “I am not the Christ”, “I am not”, “No”.  When we see John’s answers we are surprised to say the least.  Today we live in the times of self-propaganda.  Today we have Facebook and Twitter and Blogs and so on; so that we can advertise and let everyone know what we’re doing, when we’re doing it and what we think about it.  These days we are bombarded with all kinds of reality shows including one called: “Jersey Shore”, where we have all been introduced to Snooki; she is one of the young women on the show.  I’ve never seen this program, but I do surf the internet and Snooki’s name occasionally pops up as news; recently she attended the MTV music awards and all the celebrity blogs talked her and talked about what she wore, and to be honest I really don’t know why.  And then there’s Kim Kardashian; can anyone tell me exactly what it she does, besides date professional athletes?

And for the high tech savvy people who have smartphones there is the phone app “Foursquare”, where by GPS you check in and let people know where you are at in real time so anyone following you can come and visit you in an instant; also, if you check into the place most often, like our Bible center than you become the Mayor of that place, I know that Shep’s. William, Jonathan and Charles are always competing for that honor.  I heard that one coworker became the mayor of a certain McDonald’s because he visited it so often.  In today’s mass media age most people try to advertise themselves to the maximum degree.  But John was different.  John diminished himself, so that he might magnify the name of Jesus and reveal Jesus to Israel.

But the investigators weren’t satisfied with his answer.  Look at verse 22. “22 Finally they said, ‘Who are you? Give us an answer to take back to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?’”  Finally, these men revealed their true motive in asking John these questions.  These men did not come to really find out what John actually had to say; otherwise they may have repented and received eternal life.  No they came only because their superiors had sent them out to find out who he was, not what he had to say.  Their reason to come to John was completely wrong, but John did not drive them away; instead he tried to help them.

Look at verse 23.  “23 John replied in the words of Isaiah the prophet, ‘I am the voice of one calling in the desert, ‘Make straight the way for the Lord.’’”  John told them that he was nothing but a voice; who John was, was not nearly as important as what he had to say.  He was giving them the Words of God and they should listen to them.  Here we can see that we need to listen to God’s servants who give us God’s Words.  We often dismiss God’s servants because we look at who they are instead of paying attention to what they are saying.  This is a common mistake that many make.  May God help us stop looking at the messenger and help us to instead start listening to His Word.

What John really wanted was to help them to know who Jesus Christ is.  So John gave them a real short Bible study.  It’s kind of funny, but Msn. Isaac these days often asks, “Would you like me to give you a five minute Bible study?”  I always laugh when he asks this question.  Every time he says this, I think to myself, “What good is a five minute Bible study?  The Bible is God’s Word, you can’t possibly learn the deep truths of God’s Word in only five minutes!”  But John the Baptist gave even a shorter Bible study, about five seconds!  And yet, John’s short Bible study was so deep and so powerful.  So I personally learn that I need to take Msn. Isaac up on his five minute Bible studies, so that I can learn the deep truths of God’s Word!

You know many of us are very, very busy with many things: school, work, children, etc.  We don’t always have a lot of extra time.  I’m the same.  But I found out an interesting thing: that even when I am really busy, if I take a few moments in the morning to read God’s Word and try to think about it and meditate on it and try to put one thing I learned from it into practice in my daily life, I found out that I am blessed by God.  I started to do this with my five sons.  Every morning Mari and I struggle hard to wake them up early in the morning and get them to take their showers and eat their breakfast; and while they are eating I have a daily devotion time with my sons.  It’s honestly not that long a time, but strangely I find that since I started doing this my sons are being blessed by God as well; and they don’t seem to fight nearly as much with one another as they used to and my relationship with them is becoming sweeter and sweeter.  I really pray and encourage everyone to spend even a short moment in God’s Word each and every day, to listen to God and see what He has to say to us and put it into practice in our daily lives.

When John the Baptist said, “I am the voice of one calling in the desert, ‘Make straight the way for the Lord,’” they knew that these words were from the book of Isaiah.  Isaiah 40:1-5 reads, “1 Comfort, comfort my people, says your God.  2 Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her that her hard service has been completed, that her sin has been paid for, that she has received from the LORD’s hand double for all her sins.  3 A voice of one calling: “In the desert prepare the way for the LORD; make straight in the wilderness a highway for our God.  4 Every valley shall be raised up, every mountain and hill made low; the rough ground shall become level, the rugged places a plain.  5 And the glory of the LORD will be revealed, and all mankind together will see it.  For the mouth of the LORD has spoken.” 

These were the Words of God spoken to comfort God’s people who lived during the time of the great Assyrian invasions of Israel.  Already at this time, the nation of Israel had been split into two kingdoms: the northern kingdom called Israel and the southern kingdom called Judah.  These words of Isaiah were given after the Super Power nation of Assyria had already utterly defeated the northern kingdom of Israel and had set its eyes upon the southern kingdom of Judah.  

The Assyrian invasions of Israel were the most traumatic political events in the entire history of nation.  The ruthless Assyrian style of warfare relied on massive armies, equipped with the world’s first siege engines to tear down the great fortified walled cities of Israel.  But even worse than this was their use of psychological warfare or what would be better described as terror tactics; they would impale the corpses of their victims on stakes and raise them high in the sky for everyone to see; they would stack the severed heads of their enemies in massive mounds; and they even skinned alive those they took captive.  All this was done to plant fear in the people’s hearts not to resist them.

The northern kingdom had been defeated because they had prostrated themselves before foreign gods and worshipped other gods.  It was God’s punishment to the northern kingdom.  God said of Israel’s destruction in II Kings 19:25-26, “25 “‘Have you not heard?  Long ago I ordained it.  In days of old I planned it; now I have brought it to pass, that you have turned fortified cities into piles of stone.  26 Their people, drained of power, are dismayed and put to shame.  They are like plants in the field, like tender green shoots, like grass sprouting on the roof , scorched before it grows up.”  God planned and executed that the northern kingdom of Israel would be utterly defeated by the Assyrians; God did this so that His chosen people would not rely on foreign gods or worship them, but repent and turn back to the One True Living God.

Now the southern kingdom, the kingdom of Judah, whose king was Hezekiah, looked like they were next on the dinner plate for the Assyrians.  So God gave Isaiah these words to comfort the people that even though the Assyrian’s looked unstoppable and ready to devour them, just as they had the northern kingdom, yet it would not happen if they repented their sins and prepared the way for the Lord to come and rescue them.

So when John the Baptist repeated these words of Isaiah, he was saying, that the Lord, their Messiah, the one whom the Israelites had been waiting for to come, had finally arrived and they needed to prepare the way for Him!  John’s point was crystal clear: The Christ was coming and people must prepare their hearts to accept Him with genuine repentance.  “Repent, for the Kingdom of God is near!”

But some Pharisees who were sent along were not ready to listen to what John said, because they were not ready to repent.  Instead they wanted John to repent of his presumptuous attitude.  Look at verse 25. “Why then do you baptize if you are not the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet.”  These Pharisees wanted to know who said that John could baptize.  That was not his job, it was their job and they had not given him permission to do such a thing.

How did John deal with their stubborn and unrepentant attitude?   Look at verses 26-27. “‘I baptize with water,’ John replied, ‘but among you stands one you do not know.  He is the one who comes after me, the thongs of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie.’”  What John was basically saying was, “Hello…  Wake up guys!  ‘Why are you so concerned over such a trivial matter as to whether I have a license to baptize or not?  I’m not even worthy to untie the Messiah’s sandals and for that matter, neither are you!  You should be concerning yourselves with the One who stands before you, the Christ; who you don’t even know; and preparing for that.  That’s what you should be concerned about!”  John made every effort to reveal Christ, especially to proud and unrepentant people.  John turned every conversation to Christ, in order to help people to prepare themselves to receive and welcome Him.

Second, Look, the Lamb of God (29).

So far John the Baptist had been trying to help people to repent their sins and prepare for the coming Messiah.  John the Baptist’s voice was a light to help people.  In the Bible there are many who were small lights, including Jonah who called the people of Nineveh to repent before God’s judgment overturned their whole city.  The prophet Isaiah was another small light sent to call God’s people to turn back to God and be healed.  The Bible is filled with many small lights of God’s servants who help people to repent.  But none of these lights that God sent can give life.  But two weeks ago we learned that Jesus is the True Light that gives life to every man.  And in today’s passage we learn how it is that Jesus the True Light gives life to men.

Look at verse 29.  “The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, ‘Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!’”  Here, John calls Jesus “the Lamb of God.”  The name, “the Lamb of God,” tells us much about Jesus.

The word “lamb” appears 99 times in the NIV Bible.  The first 49 times it appears is in the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible–Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy.  In these books “lamb” usually refers to a sacrificial lamb that makes atonement for sins.  This practice began with the Passover lamb as explained in Exodus chapter 12.  At that time, the Israelites were slaves in Egypt. They worked hard every day with no pay. They were poorly fed and ill clothed. They were whipped and beaten mercilessly.  What they really needed was not improved working conditions, but freedom from their bondage.  Yet there was nothing they could do.  Their strength was too puny.  It seemed that Pharaoh and the power of Egypt would rule them forever.

Yet, God looked down on the Israelites, because they were His people and He was concerned about them.  So God raised up one man Moses to deliver them.  Through Moses, God sent plagues against the Egyptians. God revealed His power and wisdom, and revealed His intention to set Israel free.  Pharaoh resisted God for a while.  But finally, God announced He was going to send a plague of death against all the firstborn sons who lived in Egypt, from the firstborn son of Pharaoh all the way down to the firstborn son of the lowest slave.  This was going to be the decisive event that would set Israel free.  Now God did not execute this plague based on race or nationality; any who lived in the land of Egypt was subject to it.  Yet, through His word, God gave instructions about how to escape this plague for any who did live in this land.  God’s word of instruction was the way of salvation.  This salvation was available to anyone who obeyed God’s instructions.  He told the Israelites to slay a defectless, year-old lamb.  They were to eat its meat and to spread the blood of the lamb on the doorframes of their houses.  When the angel of death visited Egypt, he would pass over the houses wherever the blood of the innocent lamb was found over the doorframe.  In Exodus 12:13, God said, “The blood will be a sign for you on the houses where you are; and when I see the blood, I will pass over you.  No destructive plague will touch you when I strike Egypt.”  God did exactly as He had said.  Those who had blood on the doorframes of their houses were spared.  Those who did not lost their firstborn sons; there were no exceptions.

This was a terrible judgment against those who lived in the land, especially to the Egyptians, who did not place the blood on their doorframes, but we must remember that God is just.  Sin must be paid for, it cannot be pardoned away and it must be paid in full.  But the wages of sin is too great for any of us to pay on our own.  So when John the Baptist said, ““Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!”; He was telling the people that Jesus was the sacrifice, the Lamb of God, that God Himself had prepared; and whose blood He spread over the doorframes of our lives, to rescue His people from the hand of the angel of death.  The real reason Jesus is the True Light who gives life to men, is because He is first and foremost the Lamb of God; who takes away our sins by placing them upon Himself in our place.

When we look at the book of Romans, one thing it teaches us is that the wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men.  In America godless people provoke God to anger every day; Lady Gaga promotes the homosexual lifestyle; Katy Perry, and others promote sexual immorality; Bill Gates and others enslave our young people to video games and make them useless; Rob Walton, the son of the founder of Wal-Mart and others promote greed and no compassion on others; Lebron James, Eminem and others promote arrogance; Lindsey Lohan promotes lack of respect for the law; Stephen Hawkins promotes that there is no God; etc., etc.  Sometimes we tremble at the realization that God is bringing justice to our nation and the world; terror from war and Islamic fundamentalists; severe storms and natural disasters; economic uncertainty, etc.  But Jesus, the Lamb of God, saves us from God’s wrath.  When we accept Jesus in our hearts, God recognizes us as His children.  He passes over us in the time of wrath and enables us to live a blessed life even when the whole world is like a war zone spiritually.

But Jesus does more than save us from God’s wrath.  Jesus saves us from the bondage of sin.  As Pharaoh and the Egyptian Empire held the Israelites captive, satan and the power of sin hold human beings in bondage.  No one can break free from this bondage by their own strength.  However, Jesus takes away the sin of the world.  Jesus took upon His own body the sins for which we should be punished.  Jesus bore them on the cross.  Jesus shed His blood and died on the cross for our sins.  I Peter 2:24 says, “He Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by His wounds you have been healed.”  Thus, Jesus not only takes away the sin of the world; but also, those who have faith in Jesus are set free from the power of sin and become holy children of God.  I Corinthians 5:7 says, “Get rid of the old yeast that you may be a new batch without yeast–as you really are.  For Christ our Passover Lamb, has been sacrificed.”  This means that we are no longer bound by the power of sin.  We are a new creation in Christ Jesus.  Our relationship with God is restored.  Hebrews 9:14 says, “How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God.”  Now we can stand before God with a clean conscience.  We can enjoy God and receive His love and power and joy in our souls.  We can serve God in holiness and righteousness, as we really want to do.  To do so, we must look at Jesus, the Lamb of God.  We must not look at ourselves.  We must not look at other people.  We must not look at the present situation.  We must not look at the troubled world.  We must look at Jesus, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world. 

The phrase, “the Lamb of God” also shows us the character of Jesus.  Jesus has many names or titles in the Bible.  This is because Jesus is God.  Through His title “the Lamb of God” we learn that Jesus is gentle like a lamb and humble in His obedience to God.  Isaiah 53:7 says, “He was oppressed and afflicted, yet He did not open His mouth; He was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is silent, so He did not open his mouth.”  The mission God gave Jesus was a hard one.  It was to suffer like a criminal and die on the cross for the sin of the world.  Jesus took this punishment and death even though He was innocent. Jesus carried it out silently, so silently, with no word of complaint.  Jesus carried it out willingly.  We who are called to live as a kingdom of priests and a holy nation are obliged to learn to follow Jesus’ good example of gentleness and humbleness in His obedience to God. 

The word “lamb” appears frequently in one more book of the Bible.  It is the book of Revelation, which was also written by the Apostle John.  There are some who want to study the book of Revelation and I believe that Msn. Isaac is interested in teaching it to anyone who has desire.  Well in the book of Revelation the word “lamb” appears 29 times.  In 28 of those instances it is capitalized and refers to Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God.  Throughout the book of Revelation, the Lamb is pictured in Heaven.  At first, He looks as if He had been slain.  Yet the Lamb appears in the center of God’s throne.  The Lamb is the object of worship of the holy beings in heaven.  The Lamb alone is found worthy to open the seals and release the judgment of God against the unbelieving world.  The Lamb is finally revealed as the King of kings, and the Lord of lords.  The Lamb destroys the devil and his agents and puts them into the fiery lake of burning sulfur.  The Lamb brings the saints who have been cleansed by His blood into a heavenly wedding banquet for eternal life with Him. Interestingly, the Lamb of God, who was slain for our sins, reigns alive forever and ever in the new heaven and the new earth.  And all who worship the Lamb will also have eternal life and reign forever with Him as well.

Third, Jesus is the Son of God (30-34). 

Look at verse 30. “This is the One I meant when I said, ‘A Man who comes after me has surpassed me because He was before me.’”  John testifies that Jesus is the eternal God.  Look at verse 31. “I myself did not know Him, but the reason I came baptizing with water was that He might be revealed to Israel.”  It is interesting to know that John did not know who the Christ was when he began his mission as the forerunner.  John simply began preaching and baptizing by faith.  But one day, as he was baptizing, Jesus came to him.  Unlike others, who looked shameful and guilty as they came and confessed their sins, Jesus was holy and pure.  Jesus had no sins to confess.  Recognizing this, John hesitated to baptize Jesus.  But Jesus insisted that it be done.  As Jesus was coming up out of the water, something amazing happened. 

Look at verses 32-34. “Then John gave this testimony: ‘I saw the Spirit come down from heaven as a dove and remain on Him.  I would not have known Him, except that the one who sent me to baptize with water told me, “The Man on whom you see the Spirit come down and remain is He who will baptize with the Holy Spirit.’”  Here we learn two things. First, we can come to know Christ personally when we accept the word of God by faith and experience the work of the Holy Spirit.  When God sent John to prepare the way for the Lord, he did not tell him who the Lord was.  But he told him that the Spirit would come down from heaven and remain on him.  John held this word from God in his heart and watched for the Christ day by day.  At last the Holy Spirit fulfilled the word and John recognized Jesus.  John testified, “...this is the Son of God” (34). We must accept the word of God by faith. Then the Holy Spirit will open our eyes to see Jesus, the Son of God.  Jesus wont just be words on paper, but we will truly know Him; we will have a true relationship with Him.  Second, we learn that Jesus baptizes with the Holy Spirit.  When the Holy Spirit comes into our hearts, He burns away our sins and purifies our souls.  The Holy Spirit enables us to live a powerful and dynamic life for the glory of God.

Personally, I testify to this truth.  When I heard the Words of God in the past and did not accept them truly by faith, I did not know Jesus personally and I remained powerless in my life, even though I said many big words.  But when I finally repented my own thinking and accepted God’s Words as they are; a strange thing took place in my life.  I now have a personal relationship with my Savior and I pray to Him every day and He hears my prayers and answers them.  And not only that, but He baptized me with the Holy Spirit and my sins are being burned away in my everyday life and what amazes me the most is that I am being empowered to serve Him.  In the past I always talked about pioneering UCLA, but I really wasn’t doing anything.  But these days, God has strengthened me to go to campus and invite many students to study the Bible and they are responding and not only that but they are even coming to church with Mari and I to worship God together with us.

Today we learn why Jesus is the True Light who gives life to men; it is because Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, including our sins.  May God help us to Look to the Lamb of God that we may have our sins forgiven and have true life.

One Word: Look, the Lamb of God!

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