He Must Increase
John 3:22-36
INTRODUCTION: Good morning church! As we study the Gospel of John we should always keep in mind the main theme of John’s writing; So “that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name.”
There are many threads or themes in this gospel that are woven together to present the picture of the greatness of Jesus. A reminder of all that Christ has done for us, this immense sacrifice, which reaches back to chapter 1 about how light had come into the world, the darkness did not comprehend it or overcome it. In chapter 3 that thought has been retraced, describing the greatness of the light coming, but the people did not receive Him, even though He came to heal the people of their sins.
Another strand we saw in chapter 2, the miracle of turning the water to wine. We noted in that symbolism what Jesus brings is greater than what the nation had before. They had wine, but it ran out. The Old Testament prophets described wine as the blessings that are poured out from God. Christ comes and He pours out this wine abundantly, overflowing, better than what the nation had ever received before.
Then we have Jesus describing the tearing down of the temple, but He's describing Himself. A greater temple is now among you, a superior temple. The place of contact with God, the place to worship God, and the place to find atonement is no longer in a physical structure, but in the body of Christ.
In this section we're going to talk about John the Baptist again, and we will see almost the same thing that we saw in the first chapter. I wondered why John would do that. We already talked about John the baptizer saying he is not worthy to untie the sandal strap of the one who is to come, and how the one to come must increase, and he must decrease.
What are we seeing? I think we're seeing this grand strand, this great theme, that Jesus is superior, and the reasoning why is going to be laid out here in this section.
I. Glory Belongs to Jesus — Our text will be John 3:22-36 and this has a convergence of all of the themes that we've been studying. We'll break this scene into two separate parts. The first part is in verses 22-30 with an emphasis on glory that belongs to Jesus. Let's read John 3:22-30. “22 After this Jesus and his disciples went into the Judean countryside, and he remained there with them and was baptizing. 23 John also was baptizing at Aenon (EE-known) near Salim (suh-lime), because water was plentiful there, and people were coming and being baptized 24 (for John had not yet been put in prison).
25 Now a discussion arose between some of John's disciples and a Jew over purification. 26 And they came to John and said to him, “Rabbi, he who was with you across the Jordan, to whom you bore witness—look, he is baptizing, and all are going to him.”
27John answered, “A person cannot receive even one thing unless it is given him from heaven. 28 You yourselves bear me witness, that I said, ‘I am not the Christ, but I have been sent before him.’ 29 The one who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom's voice. Therefore this joy of mine is now complete. 30 He must increase, but I must decrease.”” [ESV]
A. The first thing we notice is that John does something curious, but very important. What do verses 22, 23 and 24, have to do with anything that we're talking about here? Jesus and His disciples are in Judea and they're baptizing. Then we are told that John is baptizing too, because there's some water and because John hasn’t been thrown in prison yet. Next there is a jump to a dispute between John's disciples and the Jew. What was that about? What are you telling us?
1. I suggest that what we observe is a connection being made between baptism and purification that can easily, I think, be missed. Yet it's very strongly being tied together because of what is being shown to us in verses 22, 23 and 24, the rise of what might seem to be a competition.
2. John the Baptist has been baptizing, and now Jesus is in the Judean area with His disciples and they're baptizing. Okay, Jesus is baptizing and John the baptizer is baptizing. What is going on around here?
3. John does not put things together at random. Verses 22,23, and 24 set the stage with verse 25 as the result of this scene. In verse 25 a discussion now occurs with some person or persons and the disciples of John.
B. We notice it is not an argument over baptism. It says it's purification, but the context is that John is baptizing and Jesus is baptizing. We don't get any description about the details of this discussion. Then in the next verse, 26, we find that John’s disciples express concern that Jesus is baptizing as well as John. This verse also starts with a connecting word and refers to John’s disciples who were in the previous verse in the discussion with someone.
1. John's disciples now come to John and say, do you know the fellow you said we were supposed to pay attention to? Everybody's going after him now. They seem to think that's a problem.
2. What John says as a response to this is this, “A person cannot receive even one thing unless it is given him from heaven.” This is an amazing statement that John makes, and it is important to see, just like we saw in the first chapter, John is not caught up in a rivalry. John is not caught up in a competition. He's not trying to compare himself to Jesus.
3. He doesn't get involved in any of that. He just simply states, God gave me a particular task, a particular mission. My job was to point to Jesus. That's what my job was all about. I cannot assume for myself anything more or anything greater than what God has given me to do. That was my purpose. That's why I'm here. That's why I was sent.
C. John is not going to take glory for himself. He's not going to claim to be somebody or claim himself to be important. That's not what this is about and there's no room for that in the kingdom of God. John simply says, my job, my purpose, is to point to Him. That's what has been given to me. I'm not the anointed one. I'm not the chosen one. He is, and I can only do what God has given me to do.
1. That is such a great reminder, especially when you contrast how John later in this gospel is going to describe the reaction of the Pharisees as they see Jesus going around teaching and healing. As Jesus continues to grow with numbers and disciples and multitudes, the Pharisees are going to be outraged. They will say the world has gone after Him and they are upset.
2. John's disciples are saying the world has gone after Him, and John's response is good, excellent, that is the way it should be. Remember in chapter one, John is talking with two of his disciples, Jesus walks by and John stops and says, “Behold, the Lamb of God!” What those two disciples then did was leave John and followed Jesus.
3. To John the baptizer this is victory! His job was successful. That's what he understands. He's not in a competition. Servants of God know their roles, know their purpose. Here John reveals that for us and we can find this elsewhere in scripture.
D. A similar situation happens to Moses in Numbers 11:26f. “26 Now two men remained in the camp, one named Eldad, and the other named Medad, and the Spirit rested on them. They were among those registered, but they had not gone out to the tent, and so they prophesied in the camp. 27 And a young man ran and told Moses, “Eldad and Medad are prophesying in the camp.” 28 And Joshua the son of Nun, the assistant of Moses from his youth, said, “My lord Moses, stop them.” 29 But Moses said to him, “Are you jealous for my sake? Would that all the Lord's people were prophets, that the Lord would put his Spirit on them!””
1. Same idea isn’t it? A young man told Moses there are other people prophesying! Joshua, thinking this should be done by Moses only, tells Moses, “My lord Moses, stop them!” Moses says, I don't care, that's fine. I wish everybody could do what I was doing.
2. That's what John's does here. His disciples come to John, “John, John, everybody's following Jesus.” John goes, “That's good”. Servants of God know their role. Servants of God know their purpose. Servants of God know their job. It is so important for us to understand that. It is not about competition and we experience joy when God is glorified.
3. John's purpose was to point to Jesus, to give all the glory to Jesus and tell people, go follow him. John stayed directly on that task. We notice in verse 28, “You yourselves bear me witness, that I said, ‘I am not the Christ, but I have been sent before him.’” John has been saying this all along, I'm not the one. There is great joy in doing the task that God has given a servant to do.
E. We see a beautiful picture in John 3:29. The one who has the bride is the bridegroom… Then he says, and I’ll paraphrase, “the best man of the groom who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the groom's voice.” “Therefore, my joy is complete.” The job of the best man is not to take attention away. The best man stands back and is glad for the groom, his friend. All the glory belongs to the bride and the groom. The best man does not steal that glory, does not steal the time. He knows what his job is.
1. That's how John paints himself. I'm just the friend of the groom. My joy is complete to see this wedding occasion. My job is done.
2. Then he uses these beautiful words as a summary, He must increase, I must decrease. Isn’t that what John's disciples are saying? Jesus is out there baptizing, you're losing your followers. John goes, I know, that's exactly what's supposed to happen. People are supposed to go after Jesus and not after me.
3. This is what true success looks like. True success is not about pointing to us, bringing glory to ourselves, or drawing attention to ourselves. It is always in pointing to Jesus. That is what our task is. We have no other tasks than that. It is not about who we are, as if we're something important. It is all about deflecting the glory to Jesus. To put it another way, we don't elevate ourselves.
F. We find this an amazing statement though because of what Jesus said about John in Matthew 11:11, “Truly, I say to you, among those born of women there has arisen no one greater than John the Baptist…” Yet, here John saying, I must decrease, just the best man here, just doing my job, and my joy is complete because the glory belongs to Him. John gets it.
1. We do not elevate ourselves. We elevate Jesus and we elevate nothing else. Everything must belong to Him. He must receive our attention, our adoration. He must receive all of our efforts.
2. A great reminder here, there's no room for jealousy in the kingdom of God. There's no room for competition, no room for rivalry. Those things can happen on so many levels from the simplest task to the most complex ministry. But there should be no competition or rivalry within a local body of Christians.
3. We are all different members doing various things. I'm not more important than you. You're not more important than me. We all have important tasks and God given roles of what we can do as we work in this community. It's not about preachers competing about who is the better preacher. Not about who is the better song leader and not about who has a task this week that someone else had last week.
4. It's not about any of that. It is all about making sure we are pointing to Jesus in everything that we do, and we should be excited when other people do better than we do. That's what John's doing.
5. John is happy that Jesus has people following Him because that's where the glory belongs, and the same thing should happen for us. If other Christians are doing a great job in teaching, we should be like Moses. Great! Glad they can do it. It's not about me. It's about getting God's task done. It's about bringing glory to Him.
6. I like the way that Paul worded it. Paul wrote this in 2nd Corinthians 4:7 describing the apostles; “we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.” If the apostles could say that about themselves; “we have a treasure given to us, we have been given the revelation of God, we have been given insight into the great mystery, we have this great gospel… but we are nothing but clay jars”, – then we most certainly should have the very same attitude that we're just vessels carrying the gospel to the world. We deserve no glory, deserve no honor, it is not about us, it is about Jesus. Jesus must increase and we must decrease.
II. Jesus Is God’s Supreme Representative – Read with me John 3:31-36 “31 He who comes from above is above all. He who is of the earth belongs to the earth and speaks in an earthly way. He who comes from heaven is above all. 32 He bears witness to what he has seen and heard, yet no one receives his testimony. 33 Whoever receives his testimony sets his seal to this, that God is true. 34 For he whom God has sent utters the words of God, for he gives the Spirit without measure. 35 The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hand. 36 Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.” This is the second part of this two-part section. In this part John is showing why Jesus should increase and everybody else must decrease. Here we find descriptions about the superior nature of Jesus, so that we would see everything does point to Him. Notice what John does as he brings us each verse almost in rapid fire, describing the supreme nature of who Jesus is.
A. Verse 31. “He who comes from above is above all. He who is of the earth belongs to the earth and speaks in an earthly way. He who comes from heaven is above all.” That's straightforward, Christ is from heaven. John is of the earth and he says; “who's more important?” Jesus is. Who has more authority? He does, because He's from heaven.
1. Therefore, He has authority over all things. All that is on the earth is subjugated to Him. Therefore, it is right and proper for all glory to go to Jesus, and none of the glory belongs to us because we are of the earth and are therefore of an earthly way.
2. Look at the comparison. I mean, how can we possibly compare? Look how great He is. He came from heaven and that sets Him apart from anybody else. Who else has come from heaven to this earth and revealed to us the mind of God? None, and therefore, He's above all.
B. Look at verses 32-33. “He bears witness to what he has seen and heard, yet no one receives his testimony. Whoever receives his testimony sets his seal to this, that God is true.”
1. John is saying Jesus brings the testimony of heaven. That is very powerful. Who else has firsthand knowledge, firsthand revelation, and firsthand information about the spiritual and heavenly things of God? John's saying, He's got all that information, not me. He came from there.
2. John wants us to see that not only does Jesus have the authority, but we need to listen to Jesus because He has firsthand testimony. Jesus spoke with firsthand observation and knowledge. Since Jesus is from heaven, He can speak from knowledge, not theory.
C. Notice what else he says there in verse 32. “He bears witness to what he has seen and heard, yet no one receives his testimony.” We see this continuing thread in John's gospel, nobody's listening. In John 1:10-11 we read “He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him.” In John chapter 3 we read God loved the world in this way that he gave his only son that whoever would believe in him would not perish. But the people did not receive him.
1. Here we're given that a different way. He came from heaven. He has all authority and all knowledge. He has firsthand information about the ways of God, because He came from there… but nobody's listening.
2. John continually is pointing out nobody's obeying. Nobody's listening. People are not receiving the words of Jesus. Nobody believes Him with belief that will transform their life. Instead, they're rejecting Him.
3. John continues to build this case of what Jesus is looking for in true belief and who will receive and who will believe in Him. Yet he says in the very absolute sense of verse 32, no one receives him.
D. Verse 33, “Whoever receives his testimony sets his seal to this, that God is true.” That's a complicated statement in a very condensed way, but I think it's something to the effect of this; Jesus did and said everything that God told Him to do and say. He is giving the very witness of God. He did everything that God did because that's who He is. He is God.
1. Therefore, to believe in Jesus is to believe in God. To reject God is to reject the Son. Conversely, to not accept Jesus is to call God a liar because God said, “This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased” that's my Son.
2. To believe in Him is to say, yes, God is true. God is trustworthy. God is faithful. John is telling us, we need to receive the testimony. But unfortunately, so many are not listening. It was true then and true now, people refusing to come to the light, refusing to obey, refusing to receive His testimony.
E. Look next at verse 34. “For he whom God has sent utters the words of God, for he gives the Spirit without measure.” In these verses is clearly the descent of the dove alighting and remaining on Jesus (John 1:33). A measureless gift of the Spirit is received by Jesus, and the inevitable corollary is that Jesus spoke the true words of God. Jesus is in full possession of God's Spirit, not merely in some manifestation of it, or some portion of it, but to the fullest and total extent.
1. Not only is He from heaven, not only does He bear the testimony of heaven, of all that He has seen up there, but everything He said are the very words of God. He wasn't making it up. He is superior because He says God's words.
2. Then he says in verse 34, without measure. The contrast is, yes, the prophets spoke the words of God, but that was with limitation, by the measure of the spirit given to them. They were the mouthpiece of God. Not like Jesus, because Jesus is the full receiving of all that.
3. Not even the apostles possessed the Spirit in the total sense that Jesus did. John gives us a picture of Jesus superior nature. He utters the very words of God. He possesses the spirit without limitation, without measure. He distributes it to others as well.
F. Verse 35, “The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hand.” That pretty well sums it up, doesn’t it? He has supreme authority. How powerful it is when you get to the end of Matthew's gospel where Jesus utters those very words, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.” I have all authority, do as I say, is supreme in every way.
1. We can see how this fits with what John, the apostle, is doing. Of course, John, the baptizer must decrease. Jesus is the one sent from God, speaking the very words of God, who has observed heaven itself. He can describe to us and give His testimony to spiritual things because He has been given all authority by the Father.
G. The seriousness of this is brought home to us in verse 36, “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.” This wraps up the whole chapter of what John is trying to accomplish about the work of Jesus. Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life. That goes right back to John 3:16.
1. Here is Jesus. He is the author of life. Notice that belief and disobedience are contrasts. He that believes … whoever does not obey … These are among the most decisive words in the New Testament regarding what is meant by "believing," or "faith" as frequently used by New Testament writers. In all instances, it is an OBEDIENT FAITH that is meant and never is some special quality of faith apart from obedience intended.
2. Salvation by "faith alone" is an erroneous tenet of human creeds and is not the teaching of God's word. He who does not obey the Son, in the practical sense, is an unbeliever; and all faith, of whatever degree, is dead without obedience as James says.
3. Note also that for the one who does not obey… “… the wrath of God remains on him.” Folks, that goes back to John 3:17-18 that we talked about in a prior lesson, the one who does not have obedient faith is condemned already.
CONCLUSION:
This confirms what we read in 2:23, where we saw people were coming to Jesus claiming to believe in Him, but Jesus did not believe in them because He knew their hearts.
That set the stage for Nicodemus who seemed to have belief. He says to Jesus, we know that you've come from God. Jesus tells him, no, “unless one is born again… unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.”
This shows belief is not mere acknowledgement of what we have been talking about throughout these lessons, but about a radical life transformation and service to Jesus. Belief is now contrasted with disobedience. Believing is obeying. Believing is following Christ, and transforming your life, experiencing that new birth so that you do all He says. To disobey is to not believe, to go on our own path and to do our own thing. True belief desires to do what He says and to flee from sin.
When we consider that last part of verse 36, we see it's very similar to verse 18 where he says, “… whoever does not believe is condemned already…”
If faith in the Son is the only way to inherit eternal life, and is commanded by God, then failure to trust Him is as much disobedience as unbelief. Belief and obedience are used interchangeably in verse 36. This shows our observations throughout this chapter have been correct.
Genuine belief is the new birth, life transformation, so that we will desire Jesus. We will desire to obey Him and desire to flee from sin, rebellion, and disobedience. True belief as seen in the new birth, leads to eternal life. John ends with the thought he declared in verse 18, we are the condemned. There is justice there, we are all disobedient, and we are all sinful.
Jesus did not come to condemn the world because we were already condemned by our actions. Jesus came to rescue the world, but if we do not have a new birth through Jesus, the wrath of God remains on us. We are still condemned and therefore wrath still rests upon us. The wrath of God rests upon us until we come to Jesus for salvation. Jesus came to save.
The question is; Will we believe His heavenly testimony and be transformed into His children?
The message is yours. We are about to sing our invitation song. If anyone here has the need to be baptized into Christ, or needs the prayers of faithful people, the invitation is there for you to come forward while we stand and sing.
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Reference Sermon: Brent Kercherville
