"After Malachi there was no prophet until John the Baptist came. He appeared first in the wilderness of Judea. This was not an uninhabited desert, but a part of the country not thickly peopled, nor much enclosed. No place is so remote as to shut us out from the visits of Divine grace. The doctrine he preached was repentance; Repent ye. The word here used, implies a total alteration in the mind, a change in the judgment, disposition, and affections, another and a better bias of the soul. Consider your ways, change your minds: you have thought amiss; think again, and think aright. True penitents have other thoughts of God and Christ, sin and holiness, of this world and the other, than they had. The change of the mind produces a change of the way. That is gospel repentance, which flows from a sight of Christ, from a sense of his love, and from hopes of pardon and forgiveness through him. It is a great encouragement to us to repent; repent, for your sins shall be pardoned upon your repentance. Return to God in a way of duty, and he will, through Christ, return unto you in the way of mercy. It is still as necessary to repent and humble ourselves, to prepare the way of the Lord, as it then was. There is a great deal to be done, to make way for Christ into a soul, and nothing is more needful than the discovery of sin, and a conviction that we cannot be saved by our own righteousness. The way of sin and Satan is a crooked way; but to prepare a way for Christ, the paths must be made straight-- - Matthew Henry's Commentary
There is so much truth and beauty in these words. No place is so remote as to be shut out from the visits of divine grace. Yet in the run up to the election that just passed you had false teachers like Jack Hibbs saying if people chose not to vote they would literally be consigned to hell. Lunatics like Mario Murillo and Greg Locke said anyone who voted Democratic was likewise, going to hell, and were beyond the redemptive powers of Christ. Think about that for a second. Salvation was no longer contingent upon saving faith in Christ but instead upon our carnal voting record. How absurd and blasphemous. As John the Baptist was making the way straight for the literal Christ, the gospel makes the way to our souls straight but only if we preach it. The way of sin and Satan are a crooked way that must be made straight in order to prepare the way for Christ. That is never accomplished through preaching politics, hate, division, money, greed, fame, or any of the other topical distortions that pollute the pulpits today. Let us continue in the scriptures:
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!" 37 The two disciples heard him say this, and they followed Jesus. 38 Jesus turned and saw them following and said to them, "What are you seeking?" And they said to him, "Rabbi" (which means Teacher), "where are you staying?" 39 He said to them, "Come and you will see." So they came and saw where he was staying, and they stayed with him that day, for it was about the tenth hour. 40 One of the two who heard John speak and followed Jesus was Andrew, Simon Peter's brother. 41 He first found his own brother Simon and said to him, "We have found the Messiah" (which means Christ). 42 He brought him to Jesus. Jesus looked at him and said, "You are Simon the son of John. You shall be called Cephas" (which means Peter).
A moment here about verse 41 and the glorious words to Simon, who would become Peter - we have found the messiah! This is the entirety of the gospel. We have found the messiah. We have found our Deliverer. We have found our King. The world may never admit it but they too are seeking their messiah. They are seeking the peace can only find in Jesus. The peace that surpasses all understanding. They are seeking deliverance from the miseries of this life. From the hatred that is all around us. From the sin we are so easily ensnared by. We are all seeking joy. We are all seeking love. Not love as the world delivers it, full of conditions but the agape love of a God who refused to leave us where we were. We have found the Messiah. Who is that messiah for those in the world? Who are the idols they turn to instead of God? They turn to the idols of money, power, greed, fame, lust, pride or any number of idolatrous pursuits. We should always remember that is where God found us. The more frightening proposition is what messiah those in the church have chosen. Sure, they pay lip service to Jesus but they pursue the politics of this world. They pursue prosperity. They pursue false signs and lying wonders. They pursue carnal idols and political messiahs. Jesus once taught that when we have convinced ourselves that our darkness is light, how deep is that darkness. The number one mission field today is in the church in America and that is because while they have found A messiah, they have not found THE Messiah. They have what the bible refers to as a form of godliness while denying its power. The modern worship music is largely unbiblical, self-centered, and leads people away from Christ. That is followed by a 20-minute sermonette that is always topical, relevant, but neither gospel-centric or accurate. They are largely designed to make us feel better about ourselves instead of feeling better about our Messiah. After that we hand over ten percent of our money in exchange for being promised heaven while never changing anything about ourselves. Saving us cost God everything, yet we think our salvation shouldn't cost us a thing. Yet here we see in the first chapter of John's gospel account the story of John the Baptist declaring behold the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world! We see here the calling of the first disciples with the glorious declaration that we so desperately want every to say - we have found the Messiah! Now, the chapter ends.
43 The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, "Follow me." 44 Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter. 45 Philip found Nathanael and said to him, "We have found him of whom Moses in the Law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph." 46 Nathanael said to him, "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?" Philip said to him, "Come and see." 47 Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him and said of him, "Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no deceit!" 48 Nathanael said to him, "How do you know me?" Jesus answered him, "Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you." 49 Nathanael answered him, "Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!" 50 Jesus answered him, "Because I said to you, 'I saw you under the fig tree,' do you believe? You will see greater things than these." 51 And he said to him, "Truly, truly, I say to you, you will see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man."
There is so much here. Let's start with how cheaply we can treat things like prophecy or biblical insight. Jesus essentially gives Nathaniel a word of knowledge, a prophetic word to break through the unbelief and automatically he declares that Jesus is Son of God and the King of Israel. Jesus tells Nathaniel, just you wait. You will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man! Just realize now how easily we are amazed and how quickly we ascribe what we see or hear to a sovereign move of God. We can be so easily duped in the church today because we want to believe. I remember the televangelists from the 80's would have ear pieces in and someone would be relaying personal information to them about people in attendance so they could pretend they were receiving words of knowledge. More recently, we had Shawn Bolz from Bethel use a smart phone openly to pretend to prophesy and give fake words of knowledge. In this day of social media, all it would take is an email address on an event registration form to be able to discover all sorts of information. Now Jesus was obviously telling Nathaniel the truth but his reaction reveals how easily we can be deceived if we are not careful. Do not be taken in by false signs and lying wonders. Gem stones, gold dust, angel feathers and glory clouds are fake and man-made. Can God do it? Sure, He is God - but why would He! Jesus has so much more to show us just like He explained to Nathaniel here.
Secondly here we see how we should handle unbelief. Nathaniel's initial reaction is a mockery - can anything good come out of Nazareth? Is Phillip offended? Does he bark back at Nathaniel? Does he criticize him? Nope. He just says - come and see. That is what we need to say to those we are witnessing to. Come and see. Come and see the peace I have. Come and see the joy I have. What is the church showing the world instead. Disdain, hatred, and blame. We hide behind verse fragments taken out of context and given to us by NAR leaders who have purely carnal agendas. There is a great portion of scriptures in Acts 19, when Paul is preaching the gospel in Ephesus:
Paul entered the synagogue and spoke boldly there for three months, arguing persuasively about the kingdom of God. 9 But some of them became obstinate; they refused to believe and publicly maligned the Way. So Paul left them. He took the disciples with him and had discussions daily in the lecture hall of Tyrannus. 10 This went on for two years, so that all the Jews and Greeks who lived in the province of Asia heard the word of the Lord. - Acts 19:8-10 (ESV)
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