Grace Bible Church
Pastor-Teacher
Robert R. McLaughlin
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
John continued to fulfill his ministry as a man sent from God by proclaiming Christ and continuing to baptize with water to teach retroactive and current positional truth.
John was revealing something about God through water baptism, which was retroactive and current positional truth, but baptism was never itself to be worshipped as some still do today.
In the plan of God there is no place for human good; there is only place for divine good. God provides divine assets to the believer whereby divine good can be produced.
The Gospel of John is the Gospel of the Son of God; it emphasises the deity of the Lord Jesus Christ.
The water represents the will of the Father; His entry into the water was to signify that He was willing to go to the cross and die for the sins of the world.
His coming out of the water testified to His imminent victory. Jesus Christ would be successful at the cross and He would show this victory through His resurrection.
When you come to the Gospel of John there is an emphasis on Jesus Christ as a prophet, and as a prophet He is the first person to declare the dispensation of the Church, Joh 14-17.
There is a gap in John’s Gospel where the Lord Jesus was actually baptised, and after He came out of the water,
MAT 3:17 the Spirit descended upon Him like a dove and a voice from heaven said, “This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.”
Genitive of source =
“the Lamb from God.”
The Lamb of God ties the cross into the Levitical sacrifices and indicates that Jesus Christ is the one who would spiritually die for our sins.
“Take away” – pres-act-part – airo = to lift up, to bear, to carry. It does not mean to take away our sins; it means to lift up our sins and bear them.
John the Baptist, as the herald of the First Advent, has focused attention on the one who is the only Saviour.
Verse 30 – “This is he” = “This keeps on being the one of whom I have communicated.”
“After me cometh a man” – this is what he has been telling the people. It is a reference to the Lord Jesus Christ. “… who is preferred before me.”
“Preferred” – ginomai = has to do with the humanity of Christ.
Eimi = has to do with the deity of Christ.
“He came to pass [ginomai] before me” = this is precedent.
The humanity of Christ has precedence over any person who has ever lived and in His deity He has always existed.
The herald of the King was to keep on baptising believers until one came to him for baptism who did not need baptism, and whose baptism would be unique.
John’s baptism is a ritual baptism which involves water. This water was used to identify the Christ, the Messiah; but the Christ is going to have a real baptism.
This real baptism, the baptism of the HS, is an actual identification.