Why Did John the Baptist Have to Decrease?

T. A. McMahon:

If you have been following our program you know in this segment we have been going through the gospel of John and our heart here is to amplify, to discuss the gospel and salvation all that we have in Christ and we believe this is tremendous, all the books of the Bible are terrific, but this one, as I have mentioned in past programs, if you are going to start somewhere, some place in reading God’s Word the gospel of John is the place.  Now Dave, we are in John 3 and we are going to pick up with 29.  I read it at the end of the program last week, but I want to go over it again.

Dave Hunt:

Well Tom, we didn’t really cover 27 and 28.  Can I take a minute for that?

T. A. McMahon:

As long as you don’t get on me for moving so slow.  I remember one time you said, we were talking about John 8 and you said we will never get there.

Dave Hunt:

I didn’t say we would never, I said if we ever.

T. A. McMahon:

All right.  I like to keep going over this—this is great, go ahead.

Dave Hunt:

We didn’t really say anything, I don’t think, about verses 27 and 28.  “John answered and said, a man can receive nothing, except it be given him from heaven.”  That’s something that we need to be reminded of.  And they are comparing Jesus with John now, they are saying, look he’s got more disciples than you have and John is saying well I am perfectly content with whatever God wants to give me.  There was no jealousy on his part.  Jealousy is a problem in the church, it’s a problem among Christians, it’s a problem among brothers and sisters and even husbands and wives and so forth.  So, a man can receive nothing except it be given him from heaven.  Do I want what God wants to give me, or am I out to get what I want.  An atheist could say hey, that’s not true because I went out there and I earned, you know, and I made my millions and so forth.  Well, God allowed you to have it but you don’t really have it because what will it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his soul.  So, you have it for a few moments but you have lost your soul eternally.  Then, he says, “Ye yourselves bear me witness, that I said, I am not the Christ, but that I am sent before him.”  So, John is not trying to take to himself some importance, some position that he does not have.  

T. A. McMahon:

Yes, chiding his disciples for looking to him.

Dave Hunt:

Right.  In that way he is certainly an example to us.  Now, that brings you to verse 29.  Go ahead.

T. A. McMahon:

“He that hath the bride is the bridegroom:  but the friend of the bridegroom, which standeth and heareth him, rejoiceth greatly because of the bridegroom’s voice:  this my joy therefore is fulfilled.”  Verse 30, “He must increase, but I must decrease.”  Boy, if we had that in our hearts, Dave, this jealousy business, this getting in our own way, being an offense to brother and sister in Christ that would just go by the boards wouldn’t it?

Dave Hunt:

Christ in you, the hope of glory, Paul writes, Christ must increase.  I hope that I could become more and more like Christ.  That Christ in me would outweigh and outshine and push out of the way that little Dave Hunt.  If I could shrink and Christ could increase and I would decrease exactly as John says, that would be wonderful.

T. A. McMahon:

What a witness!  I’m not just talking in your case, Dave, but in all those who claim Christ because we know Him, what a witness that would be.

Dave Hunt:

You know Tom, the Bible is so fantastic.  We go back to Genesis, sin entered into the world, man was made in the image of God and the Bible defines sin as coming short of the glory of God.  So, that image was marred.  Man was not made in the physical image, God is not a man, God is a Spirit.  We were made in the moral and spiritual image of God.  It must have been wonderful in that paradise to begin with until sin entered.  The relationship between Adam and Eve, the purity, the selflessness, the genuine love and concern.

T. A. McMahon:

And He became a man for our sake, right?

Dave Hunt:

Right.  But through sin that image was marred, then the perfect man is brought into this world, God himself becomes a man.  And, it says that he will bring many sons into glory in his image.  In 2 Corinthians 3 it says, “We all with unveiled face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord are changed into the same image from glory to glory.”  We are beholding Christ.  We should be looking upon Him by faith in our hearts through His Word.  Well, in chapter 4 it says that the God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness has shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.  I’m launching a little sermon here, Tom, but bear with me.

T. A. McMahon:

No, it’s good stuff.

Dave Hunt:

Paul writes to the Ephesians, Ephesians 1, he says he is praying for them that God would give them the spirit of wisdom and understanding, that they would know what is the hope of His calling and what the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints and exceeding greatness of his power to us-ward who  believe according to the working of his mighty power which he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead and so forth.  So, Paul wants us as believers, he’s writing to us today as well as to them, to know the hope.  What is the hope of his calling?  That we will one day retire and live in a nice home?  What is our hope?  That we will be in heaven?  That’s not even good enough.  Peter, 1 Peter 5, tells us the hope the God of all grace who has called us unto his eternal glory.  Paul says the hope of His calling and Peter says the God of all grace has called us unto His eternal glory.  And John in 1 John 3 says, “When we see Him we shall be like Him for we shall see Him as He is.”  What is my hope, my desire? That one day that I will be like Christ.  Paul says, Christ in you, the hope of glory.  Now, just maybe relating to what we’ve been talking about with regard to salvation, it’s not of works and so forth, but that doesn’t mean that I just sit back and do nothing.  Paul goes on in Colossians 1. He says, “Christ in you, the hope of glory whereunto we labor.”  We want to present every man perfect in Christ. And then he says, “Whereunto I labor, striving according to his working, that worketh in me mightily.”  So, on the one hand, it’s all of Christ, it’s all of God, man can receive nothing except it is given Him from above, He must do it all.  On the other hand, I must give it all I’ve got.  Paul in Philippians 3 says, I don’t count myself to have apprehended:  one thing I do, forgetting those things behind, I am pressing on to that which is before to the prize of a high calling of God in Christ Jesus.  And, He has laid His hand upon me but I am giving it everything that I’ve got.  I don’t know whether I have expressed it very well, Tom.

T. A. McMahon:

Dave, this has been past programs.  We have talked about the crucified life.  I mean, I am crucified with Christ nevertheless I live, yet not I.  There’s always going to be that tension, but it’s got to be a tension that moves forward and is fruitful and productive because we are leaning upon Him, looking to Him for everything that we have everything that we are to do and certainly we want to do these things to please Him.  That’s our goal.

Dave Hunt:

Again, in Philippians 2 it says work out your own salvation.  It doesn’t say work for your salvation; work out your own salvation.  We’re working out in our lives the salvation that he has given us.  “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling for it is God that worketh in you.”  Now, I suppose we could speak of this as having some balance in our lives.  On the one hand, there are those who are striving to do it all in their own strength.  On the other hand, there are those who say well, I’m just going to let God do it, let go and let God.  No, Paul says God is the one who is working in you to will and to do His good pleasure.  But you have a responsibility to work out your own salvation.  In other words, I take—well, go back to Colossians:1:29Whereunto I also labour, striving according to his working, which worketh in me mightily.
See All..., I think it is, “Whereunto I also labor, striving according to his working, which worketh in me mightily.”  This is a partnership, He hasn’t turned me into a robot, I don’t just float on a pink miracle cloud singing glory on the way to heaven.  But there are good works.  I have been created in Christ Jesus unto good works.  So, getting back—how do we go so far afield from John?

T. A. McMahon:

I think we are right there.  He must increase, I must decrease.

Dave Hunt:

Exactly.

T. A. McMahon:

Get me out of the way and let Christ live His life through me.

Dave Hunt:

I must still be doing it.

T. A. McMahon:

Absolutely.  I like the term, wait.  There are two ways to think about it.  We wait and trust in the Lord, but we wait as though we wait upon tables, there is plenty to do.

Dave Hunt:

Right.  Tom, it is just so fantastic, the Bible is the Word of God, and it’s thrilling.