Voice in the Wilderness
Published by Stanley Pouw in 2020 · 28 June 2020
Now we come to the historical section of John 1. Verses 1 to 18 is theological, it presents the nature of Christ predominantly as God with God. Jesus is God and yet He is distinct from God the Father. Christ is the Creator; He is the Word, He is the expression of God; He is the Life; He is the source of all that lives; He is the Light, He is the shining nature of God in the darkness of this world.
John has introduced us to the nature of Christ theologically. That is a portion of Holy Scripture not found anywhere else. But John has a singular purpose in His gospel and it’s clearer than the purpose of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. His purpose is specific, giving you evidence so that you might believe, and it is evangelistic so that believing you might be saved and receive eternal life.
So everything John says is to prove that Jesus is the promised Christ, the Anointed One, the promised King, and the Son of God. His deity and His humanity and His being the Lord and Savior are John’s focus. So John doesn’t spend a lot of time on the historical background. He is not like Matthew, Mark, and Luke. They are called the Synoptic Gospels because they together tell the same story.
So why three? Because, Deuteronomy says that the truth must be confirmed by the mouth of two or three witnesses, and so we have these three inspired witnesses to tell us the full story of our Lord Jesus. And there’s much theology in the Synoptics; but John here tells us only what is important to his proof that Jesus is the Christ and that believing in His name will lead us to eternal life.
John’s first line of testimony is from John the Baptist. Verse 19 begins, “This is the testimony of John when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, “Who are you? 20 He confessed, and did not deny, but confessed, “I am not the Christ.” 21 And they asked him, “Are you Elijah?” He said, “I am not. Are you the Prophet? And he answered, “No.”
22 Then they said to him, “Who are you, that we may give an answer to those who sent us? What do you say about yourself?” 23 He said: “I am ‘the voice of one crying in the wilderness: “Make straight the way of the Lord, ‘as the prophet Isaiah said. 24 Now those who were sent were from the Pharisees. 25 And they asked him, saying, “Why then do you baptize if you are not the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?”
“26 John answered them, saying, “I baptize with water, but there stands One among you whom you do not know. 27 It is He who, coming after me, is preferred before me, whose sandal strap I am not worthy to lose. 28 These things were done in Bethabara beyond the Jordan, where John was baptizing.” Jesus said in Matthew 11:11 that John the Baptist was the greatest man who ever lived up until His time.
John the Baptist’ history is told in Luke 1:1 all the way to verse 80. He is a miracle child promised by God through an angel that came to his father, and how it was declared to his father that he would come in the spirit and power of Elijah, and he would turn the hearts of the people toward God and prepare them for the Messiah. That history is very important and very rich.
Now John the Baptist was a cousin to Jesus since the mothers, Mary and Elizabeth, were related. And John the Baptist was born six months before Jesus. And so in the same thirty years that John was waiting to begin his ministry, Jesus was waiting to begin His. Jesus waited in Nazareth, in the home of Joseph and Mary. Joseph probably died somewhere in that period of time.
John the Baptist was a desert nomad. However, after those years had passed, Luke 3:1 gives us, “the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar,” that puts it around 27 A.D. Pontius Pilate is now governor. Herod is tetrarch. His brother Philip is a tetrarch. Annas and Caiaphas are the two high priests and they were related by marriage. And they planned the execution of Jesus eventually.
So when John was 30 years and Jesus was 30 years, we read in Luke 3:2, “The word of God came to John, the son of Zacharias, in the wilderness. 3 And he came into all the district around the Jordan, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins; 4 as it is written in the book of the words of Isaiah the prophet, ‘The voice of one crying in the wilderness, “Make ready the way of the Lord, make His paths straight.”
“5 Every ravine will be filled. Every mountain, hill will be brought low; every crooked place becomes straight, the rough roads smooth; 6 and all flesh will see the salvation of God.’” John the Baptist was called into ministry by a word from God. John knew his history. He knew of the angelic visit to his father, although his father couldn’t say anything because he was doubtful.
In Matthew 3:5, many people from Jerusalem and Judea came to hear John. He was so remarkable, so powerful, so unique, and so effective as a preacher. In the Synoptic Gospels accounts of John, he is described as courageous, bold and powerful. He says to the leaders of Israel when they show up, “You snakes, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?”
So, in John 5:35 we read that of the people it was said, “You were willing for a while, to rejoice in His light.” He was a popular preacher. Not only because of the power of his preaching, but because he was saying the Messiah’s coming and that’s the message that people wanted to hear. They were weary of the centuries of biblical prophecies about the Messiah that never came to pass.
John preached about repentance that was connected to the coming of the Messiah. And so people were coming and saying, “Okay, we repent.” And John said, “If you want to repent and be cleansed by God on the inside, then demonstrate that by a public act of baptism,” which the external symbol for an internal cleansing. So he is the first formidable testifier to the deity of Christ.
So what is the character of this faithful preacher? Humility; he sought no honors. He sought no money, no accolades, no titles; no flattering words. He didn’t seek disciples because in verse 35 it says, “He was standing with two of his disciples,” and he looked at Jesus as he walked and he said, “Behold the Lamb of God!’” And what he was saying to them was, “Follow Him.”
Secondly you see the character of a faithless people. In verse 19, it says, “The Jews sent to Him priests and Levites from Jerusalem.” The term “the Jews,” is a term you will see seventy times in the gospel of John. It is never used ethnically or racially. It is always used to identify the enemies of Jesus. It’s John’s choice term. You don’t find it in the other gospels, only in the gospel of John.
But the third group was the faithful people. And you get a glimpse of them in verse 37 when those two disciples heard what John said about the Lamb of God and they followed Jesus. That’s how this gospel breaks down. Through this gospel you’re going to see the faithless people associated with the leaders of Israel, and the few faithful who followed Christ. That’s going to be the story.
John the Baptist had told people that after he had baptized Christ, that Christ was the Messiah, because the Father had said, “This is My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.” Which was the same Father who had commissioned Him to ministry. The Holy Spirit had come down like a dove; and Jesus had just come triumphantly from this temptation over Satan. John was giving all this testimony.
We’re going to join him on ‘Day one’ because John has given us this record of three specific days, giving us the sequential testimony of John the Baptist toward the Lord Jesus Christ. John receives a word from the Lord out in the wilderness to begin to preach in Matthew 3. And about the same time, the Lord Jesus leaves Nazareth after 30 years working as a carpenter.
Jesus now goes down the Jordan Valley to where John is because He’s going to be baptized by John, because that’s part of Him fulfilling all righteousness. In other words, doing everything that God required. So He is going to a place that’s identified for us in verse 28, “These things took place in Bethany beyond the Jordan, where John was baptizing.” This is a different Bethany than what we know.
So Jesus leaves, goes about twenty six miles south and east from Nazareth, and He comes down to where John is baptizing. This all happened before this account, because in this account John is remembering at the baptism of Jesus. He remembers the baptism, verses 32 and 33, so it’s already happened. And this is where Jesus is baptized and launched into His earthly ministry.
Now John is preaching repentance. Get ready for Messiah. Jesus comes. John doesn’t really know who He is. Verse 31, “I didn’t recognize Him,” he says. That tells you there were thousands of people coming, and here comes just another Jewish man dressed like everybody else, walking forty two km from His home. And He shows up and introduces Himself, but John doesn’t want to baptize Him.
Jesus says in Matthew 3:15, “No, you have to baptize Me, for thus it is fitting so all righteousness can be fulfilled.” So He says, “Everything that God requires of His people, I’m going to do to show them the path of obedience.” So John baptizes Him, and the Holy Spirit comes down like a dove, and rested on Him. Actually He might have been manifested in light or in fire.
And then the Father speaks out of heaven, “This is My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased,” and John baptizes Him. And then Jesus disappeared. Where did He go? He was led by the Holy Spirit, according to Luke 4 and Matthew 4 into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. For forty days He’s tempted in the wilderness. Meanwhile, John keeps preaching; people going through a proselyte baptism.
So here comes the representatives of the Jews who are the enemies of the truth and righteousness, and John and repentance and Jesus, and they are a delegation; verse 24, notice that, had come “from the Pharisees.” So they say in verse 19, “Who are you?” It’s a respectful way to ask the question. In verse 20, “he confessed and didn’t deny, but confessed, ‘I am not the Christ.’”
And in verse 21, they asked him, “What then? Are you Elijah?” They ask that because the Malachi 4:5-6 said this of the coming of Messiah: “I’m going to send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the Lord. 6 He will restore the hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of the children to their fathers, so that I will not come and smite the land with a curse.”
Why wouldn’t he say “I’m not?” Because he was not a recycled Elijah. However, the angel said he will come “in the spirit and power of Elijah”; with that kind of prophetic power and effect, turning people’s hearts back to God. So they said, “Are you the Prophet?” They were talking about a specific prophecy in Deuteronomy 18:15, “The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me, you shall listen to him.”
Verse 22-23, “Then they said to him, “Who are you, that we may give an answer to those who sent us? What do you say about yourself?” 23 He said: “I am ‘The voice of one crying in the wilderness “Make straight the way of the Lord,” ’as the prophet Isaiah said.” John is just a voice. This is the essence of real greatness, humility. But I am a voice fulfilling an Old Testament prophecy in Isaiah 40:3-5.
Isaiah said that before the Messiah would come He would be preceded by a voice crying in the wilderness: “Make the way of the Lord clear; make smooth in the desert a highway for our God. Let every valley be lifted up, every mountain and hill be made low; let the rough ground become a plain, and the rugged terrain a broad valley; then the glory of the Lord will be revealed, and all flesh will see it together.”
Now listen, he was in a physical and a geographical wilderness. But that’s not the point of the word “wilderness” in the prophecy of Isaiah. He was talking about a spiritual wilderness that was in the hearts of the leaders and the people of Israel. He says in verse 23, “Make straight the way of the Lord.” Create a highway in your heart that is open to the Lord, is what John is after.
The high things are the elevated self-righteous, prideful, hypocritical things that need to be brought low. The crooked things, the deviant things need to be straightened out. The clutter of life needs to be cleared off so that the road is clean. This is all a part of the message of repentance. Deal with the issues of the heart, which is both wretched in its self-elevation and it’s self-debasing.
“So they said to him in verse 25, ‘Why are you baptizing if you’re not the Christ, and you’re not Elijah, and you’re not the Prophet? What are you doing? Who are you?’” Verse 26-27, “I baptize with water, but there stands One among you whom you do not know. 27 It is He who, coming after me, is preferred before me, whose sandal strap I am not worthy to lose.”
Again John knows his place, he realizes that Jesus is God Almighty and he is just a messenger to tell others that Jesus is the Messiah, who not only baptizes with water but with His Spirit. Let us study next week what John the Baptist did and how he wanted his followers to become disciples of Jesus. Let us see the Lamb of God next Sunday. Let us pray.