The People Who First Point Us to Jesus

Before you start todays devotional, ask the Lord to use it to grow you up in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

“Who are you?” That was the question the priests asked John the Baptist (1:19) who was ministering in the desert east of Jerusalem. Are you Messiah?, they hoped. But John made it clear—“I am not the Christ. You’re looking to the wrong man.”

“Who are you then? Elijah? Moses? Tell us ….”

John said, “I am ‘the voice of one crying in the wilderness: make straight the way of the LORD,’ as the prophet Isaiah said” (1:23). John the Baptist was the voice; Jesus Christ is the Word.

Read John 1:29.

John identifies Jesus as the Messiah and also as Savior of the world. When John’s disciples, Andrew and Phillip, heard this, they followed Jesus down the road to ask Him questions. Jesus invited them, “Come and see” (1:39). (That’s the same invitation He gives to us today.) So the disciples spent the day talking with Jesus.

Right away, Andrew told his brother Peter, “We have found the Messiah” (1:41). Peter then came to meet Jesus. Philip, too, found his friend Nathanael and told him, “We have found the one who Moses and prophets wrote about—it’s Jesus of Nazareth.”

When Nathanael heard that, he made a wise crack. “Nazareth? Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Philip just said, “Come and see” (1:46). And the first conversation Nathanael had with Jesus convinced him that Jesus was the Son of God.

As Jesus invited His disciples to follow Him, He showed them His glory so they would believe on Him. The first time He did this publicly, Jesus was at a wedding in Cana. Jesus’ mother had some kind of responsibility at this wedding, and she went to Jesus with an unusual problem. “They have no wine,” she told him (2:3). You have to wonder if she implied that Jesus should perform a miracle.

Mary then told the servants to do whatever Jesus asked (good advice in any situation). The Lord directed the servants to fill six stone water pots, the 30-gallon kind used in ceremonial cleansing, with water. Then, He told them to ladle some out and take it to the host. And somewhere between the filling and the ladling, the water had turned to wine.

Do you see the great spiritual lesson for us? We’re just beat up old water pots that the Lord wants to fill with water—the Word of God. Then we can ladle it out to others. Inexplicably, when that water leaves the water pot and gets to those for whom He intends, the water becomes the wine of joy. That joy is the work of the Holy Spirit.

Next, we’ll visit with an important religious leader who came to Jesus with a question.

1. Why do you think God chose to send someone like John the Baptist to prepare the way for Jesus?

2.The early disciples show us that telling people about Jesus doesn’t have to be complicated. They simply told people, “Come and see.” Is there anyone in your life you need to give this simple invitation to, and what would they see of God’s work in your life?

3. The early disciples show us that telling people about Jesus doesn’t have to be complicated. They simply told people, “Come and see.” Is there anyone in your life you need to give this simple invitation to, and what would they see of God’s work in your life?