New Believer's Bible Sample - Flipbook - Page 44
J ohn 1
page 996
The Testimony of John the Baptist
19 This was John’s testimony when the Jewish
leaders sent priests and Temple assistants*
from Jerusalem to ask John, “Who are you?”
20 He came right out and said, “I am not the
Messiah.”
21 “Well then, who are you?” they asked.
“Are you Elijah?”
“No,” he replied.
“Are you the Prophet we are expecting?”*
“No.”
22 “Then who are you? We need an answer
for those who sent us. What do you have to
say about yourself?”
23 John replied in the words of the prophet
Isaiah:
“I am a voice shouting in the wilderness,
‘Clear the way for the Lord’s coming!’”*
24 Then
the Pharisees who had been sent
him, “If you aren’t the Messiah or Eli
jah or the Prophet, what right do you have to
baptize?”
26 John told them, “I baptize with* water,
25 asked
but right here in the crowd is someone you do
not recognize. 27 Though his ministry follows
mine, I’m not even worthy to be his slave and
untie the straps of his sandal.”
28 This encounter took place in Bethany, an
area east of the Jordan River, where John was
baptizing.
Jesus, the Lamb of God
29 The next day John saw Jesus coming toward
him and said, “Look! The Lamb of God who
takes away the sin of the world! 30 He is the
one I was talking about when I said, ‘A man
is coming after me who is far greater than I
am, for he existed long before me.’ 31 I did not
recognize him as the Messiah, but I have been
baptizing with water so that he might be revealed to Israel.”
32 Then John testified, “I saw the Holy Spirit
descending like a dove from heaven and resting upon him. 33 I didn’t know he was the one,
but when God sent me to baptize with water,
he told me, ‘The one on whom you see the
1:19 Greek and Levites.
1:21 Greek Are you the Prophet? See Deut 18:15, 18; Mal 4:5-6. 1:23 Isa 40:3. 1:26 Or in; also in 1:31, 33.
C O R N E R S T O N E S
The beginning of it all
read JOHN 1:1-5
Eventually every child gets around to asking the question, “Where did God come from?” And
there is no easy answer for that, except to say, God has always existed. He is self-existent.
He already existed in the beginning. God has no beginning, nor does he have an end.
It is worth noting that the Bible never tries to prove the existence of God. It just says,
“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” (Genesis 1:1). You can’t go back
any further than that! Now, certain people would like to eliminate the major player here.
They’d rather the verse read, “In the beginning, the heavens and the earth . . .” But if we
eliminate God, then we have a big problem. In the beginning . . . what?
Some would say, “In the beginning, a mass of gases was floating in space.” But that’s
not the beginning. Where did the mass of gases come from? Where did space come from?
The Bible simply says, “In the beginning God.”
The Bible doesn’t tell us when the beginning was; it just says God was already there.
And here, John tells us that the Word, Jesus Christ, already existed in the beginning with
God ( John 1:2). He was with God, he was God, and God created everything through him
( John 1:1, 3 ).
Sometimes we speak of God by describing his attributes: omniscience, omnipotence,
omnipresence, sovereignty, truth, righteousness, holiness, and love. While these descriptions can help, if you really want to know what God is like, then look at Jesus—God in
human form. Jesus did not represent God as a glorified man; he was God himself among
us, the Messiah in human flesh, God with skin on. God has a face. Jesus, who embodied
all of God’s attributes, walked our planet as a man and breathed our air and felt our pain.
He was so knowledgeable he could predict future events, so humble he could get on his
knees and wash a friend’s dirty feet, so powerful he could calm the wind and waves with
just a word, so approachable that children laughingly climbed into his arms. In Jesus, God
spelled himself out in language that every one of us can understand.
For the next note on “Who Is God?” turn to page 1052.
