Cousin John

A message from Luke 7:17-35 by Phil Rogers 2/09/07

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Raising the Dead
This was the first time Jesus had brought a dead person back to life. In the OT Elijah and Elisha both saw a dead child brought back to life. ‘Double portion’ Elisha saw 13 miracles to Elijah’s seven, but when he was dead, buried in a tomb “some Israelites were burying a man, suddenly they saw a band of raiders; so they threw the man’s body into Elisha’s tomb. When the body touched Elisha’s bones, the man came to life and stood up on his feet.” 2 Ki 13:21 Elisha’s fourteenth miracle, two resurrections to Elijah’s one. Nothing like this had happened in 750 years. Now Jesus raises not one, not two but three people: this young man, the little daughter of Jairus and Lazarus. None of these compare to his own resurrection. Elisha’s dead bones brought a dead man back to life but in his death Jesus has brought billions of people to new life, to rise again with him on the last day and be with him forever!

The crowds filled with awe, hailed Jesus as a great prophet. The news even reached John the Baptist as he languished in Herod’s jail. He sent two of his disciples to ask Jesus “Are you the one who was to come, or should we expect someone else?” The Coming One, the Expected One was another way of referring to the Messiah (the Anointed One). Certainly Jesus was a mighty miracle working prophet but was he the promised Messiah who would set people free? He showed no signs of being any more than a religious teacher and healer. Was John, stuck in prison for months on end, having doubts wondering why God had let him end up there after having had such a powerful call on his life and such a successful ministry? Was he getting disillusioned? I don’t think so.

Is Jesus the Messiah?
John saw heaven opened and the Spirit come upon Jesus at his baptism. He knew Jesus was the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world and the One who baptises with the Holy Spirit and with fire. As their mothers were cousins he knew the kind of person Jesus was. John knew that he was not even worthy to untie his sandals let alone baptise him. He knew he was ‘God’s beloved son in whom he was well pleased’. He’d heard God’s voice say so! John was the one Isaiah predicted who would ‘prepare the way of the Lord’ the pre-launch publicist for God’s Messiah. In Judah Jesus had even pinched some of his disciples. But John didn’t mind. ‘He must increase and I must decrease’ he said. For a year and a half now, Jesus had been teaching, healing and making disciples but had not publicly declared himself to be the Messiah, although many were wondering if he was. Public opinion was sharply divided. John may well have asked for confirmation because he thought it was time that Jesus ‘came clean’. “If you are the Messiah, get on with it! But even though John had declared Jesus as the Lamb of God he didn’t have a clue what Jesus had to face or what being Messiah truly entailed. John had no idea what is would cost Jesus to take away the sins of the world.

Expectations
Jesus refers to his manifesto “Go back and report to John what you have seen and heard: The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is preached to the poor.” He was saying, “I am the Anointed One, The Spirit is upon me and I am doing what I have been sent to do. So let me get on with what my Father sent me to do and don’t lay your expectations on me” Which is why he said “Blessed is the man who does not fall away on account of me.” ‘Fall away’ (NIV) or ‘take offense’ (NASB) is the Gk word ‘scandalise’ We can all have expectations of what we think God should do, and when he doesn’t do what we think, we are scandalised! Some people have fallen away, and stopped following Jesus, because God didn’t answer their prayers the way they expected. But who is in charge around here? God or us? Does God do what he wants or what we want? We prayed for comparatively young men and women dying of cancer and God chose to take them to be with him rather than heal them and let them live longer on this earth. Are we ‘scandalised’ by such things? Do we let doubts and negative thoughts turn us away from God? Jesus says “Blessed are those who accept me as I am, who accept whatever I choose to do as good, and are not scandalised by me.”

An Important Point of Theology.
Traditional theology has attributed Jesus' miracles to the fact that he was the Son of God. But since Edward Irving (1798-1834) this assumption has been questioned and it is much more widely accepted today that Jesus miracles, healings and driving demons out of people were not signs that he was God, but that he was Messiah. Jesus is God, but he did not do his miracles because he was God but as a man anointed with the Holy Spirit and with power. If he did miracles as God the Son, then he is in a totally different league to us. But since he was a man anointed with the Holy Spirit, and as we are anointed by the same Holy Spirit, we too can do the works that he did and even greater works, just as he promised!

Jesus Commends John
When John’s messengers left, Jesus commended his cousin.
1. His stability, security and fearlessness. John did not bow to the winds of opinion. He told it as it is, calling people to repentance, even King Herod, and so ended up in prison.
2. His simply John did not conform. God speaks through those who care more about what God thinks of them that what people think of them. Well dressed self-indulgent people are less likely to hear from God than those who spend hours up on mountain sides or in deserts with God, hearing from God and speaking his word.
3. He was more than a prophet, because his role was to prepare the way for Jesus himself, the Messiah, to come.
4. Amongst those born of woman no-one is greater than John. No one achieves true greatness by his own wisdom and ability. A great person is one that God chooses to speak to and entrusts with his word. John was the last Old Covenant prophets to hear from God in his generation, filled with the Spirit even in his mother’s womb. But Jesus was bringing a whole new realm into being, prophesied by Jeremiah “They will not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they will all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them,” declares the LORD, “for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.” Jer 31:34 Everyone in this Kingdom even the very lowliest person is greater than John, because, in the Kingdom of God, we are not just servants, but we are sons, we are all prophetic and priestly members of the Royal Family. John pointed the way to Christ, but did not follow him. Those who follow Christ are part of the greatest people on planet earth, his Church, a member of God’s family. Even the least person in the Kingdom of God is greater than John, who was the greatest prophet of his day.

Many had been baptised by John, because they recognised their need for repentance and cleansing. These responded to Jesus teaching and many followed him, but many Jewish religious leaders wanted to keep their dignity and status and, refusing to be baptised, they criticised John, and rejected God’s purposes for their lives, but Jesus looks at their petty squabbles and criticism and see them like a lot of squabbling children. "Ner ner ner ner ner ner! I played the pipe but you wouldn't dance!". Even today people criticise and won’t face up to the demands of the Lord. They refuse to be baptised because of pride. But baptism is the way into the Kingdom, the only way to be great is to respond to God’s call to follow Jesus and humble yourself by getting dunked in water!