What If?Sample

What If John Paved The Way For Jesus?

John the Baptist was the forerunner of Jesus. Luke 3:4-6 is a reference to Isaiah 40:3-5, which tells how God will comfort his people, even in the midst of their rebellion and sin, and that it is God, not us, who removes the obstacles for us to experience him, even obstacles we ourselves have created.

What Luke (through John the Baptist) shows us is that there is one from whom all people can receive salvation. But through this one person anyone can be redeemed. It doesn’t matter your ethnicity or gender or social status. John told the crowd that they should produce fruit consistent with repentance. In verse 10 they asked how to do this, and John gave them some practical examples: be generous with your possessions, be honest in your business dealings, and don’t take from others unfairly even if you have the power to do so.

John’s point was that the mark of a true believer is repentance and faith. And we demonstrate that repentance and faith by living in a way that is consistent with the one who has redeemed. We don’t do this so we will be redeemed, but as a sign that we trust in the Lord, not ourselves. Then we treat others as he first treated us.

This is what James was getting at in James 2:14-19. If we just say we have faith, but our lives don’t demonstrate that faith, then do we really have faith at all? Or are we really just believing in ourselves and what we can get from our own effort?

Put another way, how you respond to Jesus is as important as what you think about Jesus. We can intellectually think the right things about Jesus, but knowledge is not the same thing as belief. Even the demons know who Jesus is, but they shudder. Their knowledge doesn’t lead to submission and trust.

And John put his money where his mouth was. In John 3, we read a story about how he was losing followers to Jesus, and he was confronted about it. You have to imagine, even though John really did believe Jesus was the Messiah, that it was hard to see his influence dwindle. Yet his response to this development was not to get jealous or upset, but to celebrate what was happening. In the words of John the Baptist, “(Jesus) must become greater, I must become less.”

In the end, it is Jesus who brings us from darkness to light. Jesus invites us into the kingdom of God. Jesus pays the entrance fee. For all those who would follow and trust what he has done, the kingdom of God’s love, power, and grace awaits.

And so we follow Jesus. Not to prove ourselves or get something from Him, but rather in response to what he has done. It is grace, not obligation, that changes our hearts.