John 3:22-36--John the Baptist Exalts Christ

John 3:22-36
English Standard Version

John the Baptist Exalts Christ
22 After this Jesus and his disciples went into the Judean countryside, and he remained there with them and was baptizing. 23 John also was baptizing at Aenon near Salim, because water was plentiful there, and people were coming and being baptized 24 (for John had not yet been put in prison).

25 Now a discussion arose between some of John's disciples and a Jew over purification. 26 And they came to John and said to him, “Rabbi, he who was with you across the Jordan, to whom you bore witness—look, he is baptizing, and all are going to him.” 27 John answered, “A person cannot receive even one thing unless it is given him from heaven. 28 You yourselves bear me witness, that I said, ‘I am not the Christ, but I have been sent before him.’ 29 The one who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom's voice. Therefore this joy of mine is now complete. 30 He must increase, but I must decrease.”

​31 He who comes from above is above all. He who is of the earth belongs to the earth and speaks in an earthly way. He who comes from heaven is above all. 32 He bears witness to what he has seen and heard, yet no one receives his testimony. 33 Whoever receives his testimony sets his seal to this, that God is true. 34 For he whom God has sent utters the words of God, for he gives the Spirit without measure. 35 The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hand. 36 Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.

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We see a part of Jesus' ministry here that we don't see in any of the other synoptic gospels, namely Jesus' ministry in the southern cities of Judea.  If we read the other gospels only, it would appear that Jesus rarely visited the southern kingdom except right before His crucifixion.  We also see here a detail that all the other gospels leave out, that Jesus, like John, went into the Judean countryside with His disciples and was baptizing there (it seems clear from other Bible verses that Jesus is letting His disciples do the baptizing, but it is nonetheless part of Jesus' ministry that gets overlooked).  John and his disciples were in the same area also preaching a gospel of repentance and baptizing a baptism of repentance.  Once can imagine that there might be some tension there, but we already know John would be happy if all of his followers started to follow Jesus instead, because he knew his job was to prepare the Bride for the coming of the Bridegroom and to be His attendant at the wedding.  We also get a foreshadowing here by the apostle John that John the Baptist is going to get arrested soon.

We'll see John refer to the leadership of the Jewish people (usually the Pharisees) as "a Jew" or "the Jews."  When reading the Gospel of John, do not infer this to mean an everyday, ordinary Jewish person.  It is the religious leadership of the Sanhedrin (the Pharisees and Sadducees) as well as the Roman-loving Hellenistic Jews who wanted to be "secular" in every way that were opposed to John the Baptist and Jesus.  The God-fearing regular people seemed to hear and understand and listen, for the most part.

One of these leaders comes and confronts John's disciples about purification.  This is a trick that we'll see the teachers of the Law use quite often.  They will try to approach the disciples and question them when they are separated from their Rabbi (like wolves waiting for the sheep to get separated from their shepherd).  The Jewish leaders seem to plant some doubts in the heads of John's disciples so that they come back to him and complain about Jesus being in the same area also baptizing (like modern day preachers they seemed to be concerned with decisions made and followers).  Jesus was hurting the "success" of their ministry in their eyes.

John gently rebukes and correct his disciples in saying that anything good they have received came from God and is His to give to someone else if He wishes.  They don't own anything, but are simply stewards of it for a time.  Then he reminded them of the testimony that they had referenced, but that his disciples had forgotten, that John was not the Christ, but that Jesus was.  So then John was excited for his friend that others were following Him, just as it should be and as God intended (as I said before, he probably wished everyone to go follow Jesus).  We then see the analogy of the best man that I talked about earlier.  I'll also say here that I think John the apostle put the part about John the Baptist getting arrested in here on purpose, because it's not until John gets arrested and taken out of the public eye that many of his loyal disciples start to turn to and follow Jesus.  John recognizes his place, being full of the Holy Spirit, to glorify Christ when he said, "He must increase, I must decrease."  This should be the cry of our hearts as well, and we should have no jealousy when Jesus gets all the credit and glory.

We then see more commentary from John the apostle which again draws us back to the message of the Prologue of the Gospel of John.  Jesus is God and is the Creator of all things.  He came down from heaven, so He is above all of creation (Colossians will call Him the "firstborn over all creation").  Jesus was the only one that could tell the world about God and heaven because He is God and He has lived in heaven before coming down to earth, but no one (probably better translated as "not man") would believe or receive His testimony.  But to those who did receive His testimony, such a person would be sealed by Jesus and by God (the teaching of perseverance of the saints), and such a person would show that God is true even if all other men are liars.

Jesus is the Word of God and therefore speaks the very words of God and He also is the one who gives the Holy Spirit without measure to whom He desires.  The Father loves the Son and has given all things into His hands (this probably happens at the point of the Resurrection as Jesus tells the disciples that "all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me" at the time of His ascension).

We then see John come back to his main theme and argument.  Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but then John flips the script a little bit.  He doesn't say "and he who does not believe does not have life."  That's what we'd expect him to say.  No, he says, "....whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life."  Now that's interesting!  So those who disobey are those who never believed, and the inference is that if you believer, you will also obey.  This is something we'll see stated clearly later by Jesus.  It's something people try to make out to be some fringe interpretation of the Bible that gets called "Lordship salvation," but if we read the Bible clearly we see that God's people both Old and New Testaments are always known for their obedience, and the enemies of God are known for their disobedience.  That is not to say that our works save us, but that our works are the fruit that evidences what is going on with the root.  See the Sermon on the Mount, the epistle of 1 John and the epistle of James as just a few places where this is discussed.  Those who are disobedient have the wrath of God resting upon them.