READ: John 1:29-34: … The Lamb of God who takes away the sin …
A day after the confrontation with the Pharisees, John sees Jesus coming toward him. This is some time after he baptized Him (see v. 33). Jesus wants to be pointed out by John once again. The herald must not only preach and testify about Jesus but also point Him out.
As soon as John sees Him, he says: “Look,” pay close attention, this is “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” A very deep description, referring especially to the Passover lamb, which had to be sacrificed as a substitute so the angel of death would pass over the Israelites in Egypt (Ex. 12:3,23).
Each year, that Passover lamb had to be slain in remembrance (Ex. 12:17), foreshadowing the substitutionary suffering of Jesus Christ on the cross (1 Cor. 5:7). We also hear an allusion to Isaiah 53:7 (see also Acts 8:32).
The “taking away of the sin of the world” does not apply to all people, just as Christ’s coming was not meant to bring peace to all people (see Luke 2:14). Faith is necessary—see John 3:16: “so that whoever believes in Him shall not perish.”
John the Baptist speaks as a prophet with divine inspiration and therefore with absolute authority. He had not seen Jesus before baptizing Him (v. 31), but during that baptism, he received a revelation from God Himself to watch for the dove that would descend upon Jesus. That was the proof that He is the Son of God, who exists from eternity (vv. 30–34).
The dove is the Holy Spirit, who anoints Jesus as the Christ (the Anointed One) and remains upon Him to enable His mediating work. He will also give the Spirit to the believers (v. 33).
So John points Him out with full certainty. Yet accepting Him still requires faith—from John, from the bystanders, and from us. Now that John indicates that the true Lamb has come, it also means the end of all sacrificial services, which find their fulfillment in that Lamb.
So even now we already hear of Good Friday, Easter, and Pentecost!
Explain the last sentence of this devotional
Sing: Hymn 22 (1984) / 26 (2014)