Sermon Tone Analysis

I want to invite your attention away from ourselves today and to Jesus especially, as we look at the matter of Extinguishing Ego.

Now all of us have an ego.

Not to have an ego is to be dead.

We usually use ego in a negative sense.

It is just an awareness and appreciation of yourself.

Of course, we talk about people having lofty egos and using it in that way.

But it is an awareness of yourself.

What we want to see today through the eyes and actions of John the Baptist is how to extinguish ego and put Christ where He needs to be in every life, where He needs to be high and lifted on that throne.

We change scenes today.

We move away from the nighttime scene with Nicodemus…this Pharisee and leader of the Sanhedrin...who had come to Jesus by night, who asked about the keys to heaven.

Jesus responded by saying, "Your problem is you need to be born again."

We move now to scenes as Jesus is traveling with His new band of brothers…His disciples who are going with Him and following Him.

What we find in today's encounter, in John the Apostle including this is there are really two bands of disciples.

There are the disciples of Christ.

Then, there are also the disciples of John the Baptist.

You remember it was from the disciples of John the Baptist that the original disciples came to Jesus.

It was John the Baptist who baptized Jesus.

It was John the Baptist who said, /"Behold!

The Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world!"/

Some of the disciples of John began to follow Jesus.

We see both of these groups are in force in the region as we come to our text today.

Our focus of our text is going to be John, chapter 3, verses 29-31.

But what I want us to do is to back up to John, chapter 3, verse 22.

In order to give us the background and to bring us up to the events and what I think is the crux of the story today.

So we come to John 3:22 and we see there are these two groups.

It begins by saying, /"After these things Jesus and His disciples came into the land of Judea, and there He remained with them and baptized."/

So the group that is with Jesus…His disciples, His band of brothers if you will…are baptizing in Judea.

It says, "Jesus is with them baptizing."

Of course, John, chapter 4, verse 2, tells us that Jesus Himself did not baptize anyone, but His disciples were the ones actually in the water doing the baptizing.

So John the Apostle points that out.

That becomes necessary for the story as it unfolds.

Jesus and His disciples are now in the land of Judea, away from Jerusalem, and they are baptizing.

Verse 23, /"Now John/ [This is John the Baptist] /also was baptizing in Aenon near Salim, because there was much water there.

And they came and were baptized."/

So John and his ministry are continuing.

He is continuing to baptize those.

He is continuing, no doubt, He is continuing to preach repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

His mission, no doubt, is to point people to the Messiah.

So he is over here in Aenon near Salim.

He is also baptizing because there is a lot of water there in order to immerse the followers of John.

Verse 24 says, /"For John had not yet been thrown into prison."/

Now just a sideline for free.

John is going to see his ministry come to an abrupt end.

What we'll need to understand is that it is not that John's ministry has somehow escaped the protection of God.

It is not when John is successful and baptizing that John doesn't have to worry about anything ever happening or that the measure of John's ministry is that He is going to be, you know, successful all through is life.

That's not how God operates our ministries.

He can call us home at anytime.

We can still say our joy is complete and our ministry is full.

But at this point, John is free.

So he is out there baptizing.

Then verse 25, /"Then there arose a dispute between some of John's disciples and the Jews about purification.

And they came to John and said to him, "Rabbi, He who was with you beyond the Jordan, to whom you have testified—behold, He is baptizing, and all are coming to Him!"/

Now all of a sudden we are told a dispute arises between some of the Jews and some of those who are John's disciples about the matter of purification.

That's all we're told.

What's interesting is the term purification doesn't get brought up again.

It's strange that it's mentioned that the dispute is over purification.

Yet, John's response…he's going to give here in a few minutes…never mentions anything about purification.

At first, it seems as though the comment about purification is given to us just to lead us into the next scene.

But I think what we want to remember throughout this whole discussion this morning is that this really is about purification.

John is going to answer that question in a most marvelous and phenomenal way.

So John's disciples are challenged by some of the Jews.

You know it probably went something like this: The Jews come up to him, and they see they are baptizing.

They say, "Hey, I see you're baptizing.

That looks like one of our purification rituals we go through."

Because the Jews had a baptism that they would do for purification purposes, and the dispute arose about that.

So they bring the matter to John.

In verse 26, it says /"And they came to John and said to him, "Rabbi, He who was with you beyond the Jordan, to whom you have testified—behold, He is baptizing, and all are coming to Him!"/ In other words, we have a question here about the purification.

Is yours not very good?

Because some of your disciples have left.

They've gone over here to Jesus, and He's also baptizing.

Did yours not stick?

Is yours not as good?

Does yours not purify?

This is perhaps the discussion since the word purification is how the Jews presented it.

So they bring this argument to John, and it's as though why are they leaving you and going to Him?

Is what you're saying not true?

Is what you're saying failing?

Do they need a better purification?

Is that why they've chosen to go after this Rabbi instead of staying with you?

The disciples are scratching their heads.

They are not quite sure how to answer this.

They don't know why this one Jesus is also baptizing, and why they are not just content with the baptism of John the Baptist.

So they bring this to John.

John seems to give an answer that has nothing to do with the situation at hand.

Notice, if you will…verse 27, /"John answered and said, 'A man can receive nothing unless it has been given to him from heaven.

You yourselves bear me witness, that I said, 'I am not the Christ,' but, 'I have been sent before Him.'

So "John answered and said, 'A man can receive nothing unless it has been given to him from heaven.'"/

Well, that's a great statement.

But at first, you're wondering what does that have to do…what is he saying?

There is a concern over whether your baptism is any good.

Why are people leaving your group and joining this new group?

John answers the question if we'll just decipher it for a minute.

He says, "I know this One who was with me, who I testified about, I know people are leaving me, and they're going to Him.

But the reason they are being given to Him is they are being given to Him from heaven.

No one would go except from heaven."

Notice with me: /"A man can receive nothing unless it has been given to him from heaven."/

In other words, those who are leaving my discipleship and are joining up with Jesus' discipleship are doing so because they are led of God to do so.

They are going to Jesus because heaven is sending them to Jesus.

They are leaving me.

They are going to Christ because they are seeing Jesus for who He is.