54. John the Baptist (Luke 3:1-20).

by Wesley Blackburn

We don't really talk a whole lot about him, but I feel like John the Baptist was a pretty cool guy. Excluding Jesus, he is probably the person I most admire in the stories of the Gospels. John was a guy who understood his role in God's mission, he had a humble attitude that knew his place, and he taught the people the way of God in a way that made sense to them.

Think about it after reading this narrative today: what would you have done if people came to you asking if you were the Christ? That is some pretty high praise for John's ministry, and it was almost certainly a possibility to cause some deep-seated pride in John. I can only hope that in a situation like that I would have the attitude of John, being willing to step aside and say, "No... One will come after me who is a way bigger deal than I am." That's some really Godly humility that I could definitely learn to model my life after.

But I also don't want us to miss out on John's teaching. Luke 3:3 tells us that John was preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sin. In other words, John was teaching people to turn from their wicked ways and follow the commands of God. Even 2,000 years later, I think God's message to us is much of the same. He simply wants us to see the wrong things we do in our lives and turn away. Luke 3 gives us a cool context for this; when tax collectors (who were famous for extorting tax rates so they could pocket money for themselves) came to John asking what they should do, John simply told them to do the right thing and not collect more than they needed to. A very similar concept was voiced to the Roman soldiers who came to be baptized by John.

God's message to us is quite simple, but sometimes I have this tendency to make it way harder. In the words of Micah 6:8, what has God asked of us but to be people defined by our mercy, dutiful sense of justice, and our humble walk before God and others? It's a rhetorical question; if we've done that, we are well on our way toward following the commands of God. John reminded the people of that 2,000 years ago... let's not lose sight of that today!