Anchor My Faith

John did not Personally know Jesus

Scripture: John 1:30-31

When John saw Jesus coming toward him he proclaimed, “Behold the Lamb of God!” and then he said: “This is he of whom I said, ‘After me comes a man who ranks before me, because he was before me.’” (John 1:30 ESV). Two things come to mind as I look at this verse. First, John began his ministry before Jesus, being his forerunner. When Jesus comes on the scene it will become clear very quickly that he is much greater than John and does rank before him. Second, John said that Jesus comes after him because he was before him. Jesus was born after John and began his ministry after John did, so how can he be before John. Back in lesson H003 and H004, we looked at Jesus being the Word. In this sense Jesus has existed from eternity past and thus he was before John and being the Son of God is of greater rank than John.

John continues to talk about Jesus and says: “I myself did not know him, but for this purpose I came baptizing with water, that he might be revealed to Israel” (John 1:31 ESV). Even though Jesus and John were distant relatives, they did not spend time together during the years before their public ministry and thus were not personally acquainted. During their early adult life, Jesus spent time employed with Joseph and John spent his time living in the wilderness in the hill country of Judea. Then at a time determined by the sovereignty of God, Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan, where John was baptizing, to be baptized. About that same time, God allowed John to understand that Jesus was to become the Messiah. Since John did not personally know Jesus, or that he was the Messiah, there was no opportunity for agreement or conspiracy between them to impose a false story on the people about who Jesus was.

As God prepared John for his work as forerunner, he knew what his ministry, his mission in life was to be and at just the right time God brought him to the publics attention by delivering the message of repentance and baptizing those who were convicted of their sin and in need of repentance and a change of lifestyle. The purpose of John as a forerunner was to reveal Jesus to Israel, to raise the public awareness of him.

There are three summary verses left in this section, but too much to include here so we will save them for a short lesson next time.

Prayer

Father, I find it easy to understand that Jesus and John were not personally acquainted. They may have seen each other a few times when very young, but it seems you kept them apart to keep the message John delivered about Jesus authentic. Growing up apart from each other prevented any agreement or conspiracy between them to mislead the people. It is exciting to see little details like this as they create additional credibility to what the Bible has to say; a book of Basic Instruction Before Leaving Earth.