John 1: 29-36
29 The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! 30 This is he of whom I said, ‘After me comes a man who ranks before me, because he was before me.’ 31 I myself did not know him, but for this purpose I came baptizing with water, that he might be revealed to Israel.” 32 And John bore witness: “I saw the Spirit descend from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him. 33 I myself did not know him, but he who sent me to baptize with water said to me, ‘He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain, this is he who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’ 34 And I have seen and have borne witness that this is the Son of God.”
35 The next day again John was standing with two of his disciples, 36 and he looked at Jesus as he walked by and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God!”
Luke 7:18-23
18 The disciples of John reported all these things to him. And John, 19 calling two of his disciples to him, sent them to the Lord, saying, “Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?” 20 And when the men had come to him, they said, “John the Baptist has sent us to you, saying, ‘Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?’” 21 In that hour he healed many people of diseases and plagues and evil spirits, and on many who were blind he bestowed sight. 22 And he answered them, “Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, the poor have good news preached to them. 23 And blessed is the one who is not offended by me.”
John 1:29-36 is John the Baptist's summary of Jesus and how he knows he is the Son of God. If you read the beginning of John Chapter 1 you read that the Word was God and the Word was with God in the beginning. It is proving the point when John says "After me comes a man who ranks before me, because he was before me." Jesus was way before John was even a thought to his parents. John the Baptist says he didn't know it would be Jesus. Here is something that blows my mind. They were cousins, they probably hung out at the same spots and maybe had an Algebra class together. John didn't know he was going to be the Chosen One. Jesus is our Neo from the Matrix. Nobody knew it was gonna be Jesus.
John goes on to say "Look I have seen this with my own eyes, it's him, he is really the Messiah you guys are looking for." In verse 35 John calls Jesus the Lamb of God. The Jewish people know what a lamb is: it's a sacrificial animal before it is anything else. It is like me saying Vans. You think skate shoes, not a soccer mom's vehicle of choice. For the Jews it was like that. Sure a lamb would be great as a veal cutlet, but their first thought was a perfect animal given to a priest for the redemption from sin. Shortly after this time John would be imprisoned by Herod Antipas.
Read the verse from Luke again really quick. Okay, this is where we find out that John was a good guy and stuck to his guns about bringing Jesus onto the scene as the Lamb of God, the Savior, the Messiah, but he is still a questioning lowlife who isn't sure if Jesus is the real deal. John looks like those who thought the Messiah was going to be a political force and bring about the Kingdom of Heaven by wondering the same about Jesus. John wondered if Jesus was going to destroy those who opposed God and bring heaven on Earth. John sends some of his disciples to Jesus to question him. "Are you the dude we need to be following or is there another guy we should look for?" Jesus replies "Tell him this, yeah it's me. I'm the right guy. Look at all the stuff I'm doing for those who need it, for those who believe, for those are not offended by what I am doing." John doubted if what he had done was the right thing. He sat in a prison not knowing of his fate. Was Jesus going to help him out, what would happen to him sitting there in the dank prison cell he was in?
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