Jesus is Superior

RIVERSIDE INDONESIAN FELLOWSHIP
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Jesus is Superior

Riverside Indonesian Fellowship
Published by Stanley Pouw in 2020 · 6 September 2020

This is about fading recognition of the preacher and the increasing glory of Jesus Christ. And that is exactly what John the Baptist is saying and that is the first law for all who serve in ministry. And the greatest model of this is the Lord Jesus Christ in Philippians 2 who though eternally equal with God, thought it not something to hold on to but humbled Himself, took on the form of a slave and became obedient.

People who elevate themselves in ministry are without grace. Why do I say that? Because James 4:6 records that God gives grace to the humble, but resists the proud. The path of humility, the path of exalting Christ is the only path that any faithful minister would desire to pursue. Now all of this becomes clear in this passage of Scripture that focuses on John the Baptist life.

John the Baptist was the forerunner to Jesus Christ, the last Old Testament prophet. There hadn’t been one in 400 years before Him. In Matthew 11:11 Jesus said he was the greatest man who ever lived. He had the greatest calling to not prophesy about a future Messiah, but to point to the Messiah who had arrived, the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lamb of God who came to take away the sins of the world.

He was the most privileged man with the greatest ministry of anyone who had ever lived in human history. He was empowered, he was popular, he was influential, and yet it is from this man that we learn this great lesson of humility. “He must increase and I must decrease,” which that phrase, that axiom coming out of the mouth of John the Baptist speaks of his true spiritual humility.

Now let us read John 3:31-36, “He who comes from above is above all; he who is of the earth is earthly and speaks of the earth. He who comes from heaven is above all. 32 And what He has seen and heard, that He testifies; and no one receives His testimony. 33 He who has received His testimony has certified that God is true.” 34 For He whom God has sent speaks the words of God.”

For God does not give the Spirit by measure. 35 The Father loves the Son, and has given all things into His hand. 36 He who believes in the Son has everlasting life; and he who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him.” Now this is a very important set of verses because of its focus on the preeminence of Christ. Inside verses 31 to 36 is a full, rich Christology.

The power to convince people concerning the identity of Christ comes from Scripture. The gospel of John is written that you might know and believe that Jesus is the Christ, and by believing have life in His name. Here the testimony is not from John the apostle, but it’s from John the Baptist. It’s amazing that John the Baptist had such a full understanding of who Jesus Christ is.

First, the reason for exalting Christ is that He has a heavenly origin. The New Testament establishes this at the very beginning. You start in Matthew 1:20 and you have a dream and an angel telling this, “Joseph, son of David, don’t be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child who has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. 21 She will bear a son, and you will call His name Jesus.”

“He will save His people from their sins. 22 Behold, the virgin shall be with child and shall bear a Son, they shall call His name Immanuel which translated means God with us.” In Luke 1:31 the same thing takes place, an angel appears and identifies the child. “You will conceive, Mary, in your womb, bear a son, and call His name Jesus. 32 He will be great, will be called the Son of the Most High.”

“35 The angel says to her, the Holy Spirit will come upon you, the power of the Most High will overshadow you, for that reason the holy child shall be called the Son of God.” Now look at verse 31, “He who comes from above is above all.” It doesn’t have any moral connotation. He’s saying simply, any earthly human being is of the earth, speaks of the earth, but He who comes from heaven is above all.

There’s only one person, Christ, who is from heaven. This is John the Baptist, the greatest human being who ever lived saying, we humans are all of the earth, and all of us fall into this category, speaking from a human viewpoint. And therein lies our limitation. Therein lies the purpose and reason for our need for humility.” On the other hand, he says, “Christ who comes from above is above all.”

John understands the divine origin of Jesus Christ. He is the uncreated Son of God who entered into human form in a human body in His incarnation. In John 17 Christ prays and says, “Restore to Me the glory I had with You before the world began.” In John 17:8 it says, “The words You gave Me I have given to them and they received them and truly understood that I came forth from You.”

Secondly, reasons for exalting Christ, is that Christ knows everything from first-hand divine experience. And that is found in verse 32, “And what Jesus has seen and heard, that He testifies; and no one receives His testimony.” And we know He knows everything because in John 2:23-25, God said Jesus knows everything. He even knows the thoughts of every human being.

This is omniscience. Jesus is the only man who never needed to take any information from anyone else. Yes, He grew in wisdom, stature, favor with God, favor with man and there was an awakening to His divine knowledge as He grew legitimately from being a baby. He was conformed to the development of a human being. By the time He was twelve, He already had a sense of His mission.

Did He choose to use all that knowledge? No, He restricted the independent use of His own omniscience in His humiliation. That’s why He could say things like “I don’t know the day or the hour when I return to establish the Kingdom.” But even though He could limit His omniscience, no one could add to His knowledge. He limits His development and that was in the plan of God.

Everything that we know, somebody has to teach us. We need information from heaven given to us from someone from heaven. So Jesus comes. God spoke in time past by the Holy Spirit through the prophets and then He spoke, according to Hebrews 1, by His Son. Either God speaks to us through Scripture or He speaks to us through His Son, because we have no knowledge of heavenly things.

John 3:11 says, “Most assuredly, I say to you, We speak what We know and testify what We have seen, and you do not receive Our witness.” ‘We’ here refers to the Trinity. This is firsthand knowledge. And He calls these things in verse 12 heavenly things. So in referring to Jesus Christ, everything begins with an understanding of His heavenly origin and then moves to His omniscience.

When Jesus is speaking of what He has seen and heard, that means that He was with God in eternity past, as the Trinity, where they shared a common understanding of truth. John 5:30-35, “I can do nothing on my own initiative, as I hear I judge, My judgment is just. I don’t seek My own will but the will of Him who sent Me. 31 If I were to testify on my own behalf, my testimony would not be valid.”

Verses 32-35, “But someone else is also testifying about me, and I assure you that everything he says about me is true. 33 In fact, you sent investigators to listen to John the Baptist, and his testimony about me was true. 34 Of course, I have no need of human witnesses, but I say these things so you might be saved. 35 John was like a burning and shining lamp, and you were excited for a while about his message.”

Jesus says John gave you a testimony that he had received from God. I give you a testimony that comes from heaven itself. The difference is John had to be taught this, Jesus knew it eternally. He is the omniscient one. In John 8:26, “I have many things to speak and judge concerning you, but He who sent Me is true and the things which I heard from Him, these I speak to the world.”

Jesus says My knowledge is the knowledge that belongs to God, it is knowledge which we share. Verse 38, “I speak the things which I’ve seen with My Father.” Because He is of heavenly origin then, He has all heavenly knowledge. We struggle at best to grasp the heavenly things, to understand the heavenly things, to articulate the heavenly things, and we’re only scratching the surface.

Thirdly, anyone who affirms Christ, affirms that God is true. Look at verse 33, “He who has received His testimony has certified that God is true.” That is such a short statement to say something so profound. Does God speak truth? He is truth personified. So, then you must believe in Christ. Why? Because God sent an angel and said this child is Immanuel, meaning ‘God with us’.

This is Jesus who will save His people from their sins. Because God sent an angel, this is the Son of God, because God spoke at His baptism, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well-pleased.” Because God spoke at the Transfiguration, “This is My beloved Son, listen to Him.” If you don’t believe that Jesus is the Son of God, then God must have lied. You cannot say, “I believe in God, but I reject Christ.”

You can’t say God is true and reject Christ. The Jewish people think they affirm the God of the Old Testament. They talk about the God of Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, the God of the Old Testament Scripture, they affirm that that’s their true God. But their God is a liar because it is the God of the Old Testament who revealed every prophecy directed and fulfilled in Jesus Christ’s first coming.

It is God who prophesied about the seed of a woman in Genesis 3, it’s the God of Isaiah 53 who talked about one who would be crucified, pierced, wounded for the transgressions of His people. Every prophecy in the Old Testament fulfilled in Jesus Christ is a point at which you either validate God as speaking the truth, or lying. You cannot reject Christ and say God speaks the truth.

In 1 John 5:10, “The one who believes in the Son of God has the testimony in Himself. The one who does not believe God has made Him a liar.” You don’t have the right to say I believe in God and that I believe God is true, and then reject Christ. John 7:16, “So Jesus answered them and said, “My teaching is not Mine, but His who sent Me.” If you reject Me, you’re rejecting God.

Fourthly, the Christology of John the Baptist speaks to His Trinitarian relationships. Verse 34, “For He whom God has sent speaks the words of God, for God does not give the Spirit by measure.” Jesus possessed the full Holy Spirit presence. One of the ministries of the Spirit, of course, was to bring the words of the Father through His Son. Everything Jesus did was the work of the Holy Spirit.

Why? Because part of His incarnation was to become human, part of His incarnation was to restrict the independent use of His attributes. Part of His incarnation was to yield over His will to the operation of the Holy Spirit in His humiliation. John the Baptist was filled with the Holy Spirit from the very time that He was conceived, so the Holy Spirit took special care in the life of John.

But not to this degree that Christ had, because Christ was given the Spirit without measure. What does that mean? Infinitely to the level of His infinite deity. So what you have in Jesus Christ is God the Son who is equal to God the Father in His fullness and equal to God the Holy Spirit in His fullness. That is what the term ‘without measure’ means. Without limit and without boundary.

Finally John the Baptist shows the superiority of Christ in that He has received all authority from the Father. Verse 35, “The Father loves the Son and has given all things into His hand.” The whole of redemption and the whole of creation, all of it is about the Father loving the Son and creating a universe in which He can redeem humanity and give a bride to His Son, a love gift to His Son.

Ephesians 1:21-23 says, “Christ is far above all principality and power and might and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come. 22 And He put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be head over all things to the church, 23 which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all.” God’s love relationship with His Son results in God giving His Son all of His creation.

John the Baptist closes with an invitation in verse 36, “He who believes in the Son has eternal life. He who doesn’t obey the Son will not see life.” Why does it go from believing to obeying? Because to believe the Son is a command. He who believes in the Son has obeyed the command. He who does not believe in the Son has disobeyed the command and shall experience the wrath of God.

Those are the last words from the lips of John the Baptist recorded in Scripture and he’s a gospel preacher. Not long after this John’s ending came in Matthew 14. Herod arrested him because John publicly preached against Herod’s immorality and illicit marriage to Herodias, the wife of his brother Philip. He had seduced his brother’s wife and married her. Only John dared to speak up.

On Herod’s birthday, the daughter of Herodias danced before them and pleased Herod so much so that he promised with an oath to give her whatever she asked. Prompted by her mother, she said, “Give me the head of John the Baptist.” So Herod had John beheaded in prison. His disciples came and buried him. He lived a short life on earth, but this humble servant will live forever in heaven. Let us pray.



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