(After singing “None of Self and All of Thee“) Where do you fit in that song?
How much do you love Jesus? In which category do you fit?
You’re probably not at verse 1, where you proudly say to Jesus, “All of self, and none of Thee,” or you wouldn’t be here this morning. Though I guess it’s possible one could fit in that category, but be drug in here by a concerned friend or family member.
Maybe there should be another verse in between verse 1 and 2 about “Most of self and little of Thee,” for those who still ignore commands of Jesus that are not to their liking, but would check Christian when asked about their religious affiliation and may attend a church when they have nothing else going on.
Some of us probably are at “Some of self and some of Thee”. Where in deciding what to do in our daily lives we think a lot about the teachings and example of Jesus; that’s a big factor in how we make our decisions. But we also think a lot about “what’s in it for me,” what about my enjoyment and comfort and pleasure and status. And that still has quite a bit of influence in how we go about life.
I’m trying to get further into the next category, “Less of self and more of Thee.”
But I’m not sure any of us are fully absolutely in that final category, “None of self and all of Thee.” Where every thought and decision, all my time, money and energy, goes to please Him and exalt Him in the world.
I can think of…
Some in Scripture who appear to have been very close to that last category.
I think of Mary, the sister of Lazarus and Martha. She loved to sit as His feet and hear His teaching. And I don’t know if she saved her money for years and years to buy it or if she had just inherited it, I don’t know how she acquired it, but she had an alabaster flask of ointment made from pure nard worth about an entire year’s worth of wages, 300 denarii. It was perhaps her retirement. She could have made a huge down payment on a house with it, I imagine. It was probably the most valuable thing she owned. But Jesus was in her town of Bethany. A dinner was being held for Him at one of her neighbor’s to which she was invited. She brought over the flask of ointment, broke it and poured it on His head!
One of my old mentors told me a story about a preacher who was kind of like Mary, a true story I’m pretty sure. The preacher was paying off some big expenditure, some toy he had bought, a camper or boat or something like that, and suddenly it occurred to him, “You know, I’ve never thought about doing that kind of thing for the Lord.” So he got up and went down to the bank. He knew the banker. He said, “How much would you loan me just on my name?” The banker said, “Well, I know you pretty well. I know that you would pay it back. I’d loan you up to $10,000.” He said, “Write me out a check.” On Sunday the preacher put that check into the collection plate, knowing that he would have to make payments on it for 4 or 5 years. But he dropped 10,000 in the plate. The men who counted the money that day called an elder. “We have 10,000 from the preacher here.” The elder called an elders’ meeting. (There was a paramedic standing by.) They said, “What’s up with this? We’re not raising money. We’re not building a new building. What’s he thinking?” So they called the preacher in. “What are you doing? You can’t afford this.” They tried to give the money back to the preacher. He said, “It isn’t your money. I gave it to the Lord. I want you to use it for the kingdom.” Now, we might question if that was the wisest way to give 10,000 to the Lord. But that kind of extraordinary extravagant sacrifice for Jesus I think is moving closer to none of self and all of thee.
I think of Barnabas who sold his field and brought the money and laid it at the apostles’ feet to be distributed to whoever had need in the church.
I think of Paul who rejoiced in the Philippian letter about being in prison for the last couple years because it had actually resulted in the greater progress of the gospel, and who asked for prayers in some of the letters he wrote from prison, not that he might be released from prison, but just that doors of opportunity would be opened for him to share the news of Christ and that he would make the message clear when he spoke.
Another very close, if not there, to “none of self and all of thee,” was John the Baptist, content with one camel hair garment, and for food the locust and wild honey available in the wilderness, who was overwhelmed with gratitude for the honor of being able to serve the Lord as His forerunner, and totally given to the exaltation of the coming Lord before Israel and preparing their hearts for Him.
What makes a person so love Jesus? What makes a “none of self and all of thee” kind of person?
We’re going to look at the testimony of John the Baptist in John 1. We can see here John’s passion for the Lord and why. It has much to say about why Jesus is worthy of all we have to give.
Remember the background we talked about last Sunday.
Background for John 1:19-34
Jews by the hundreds and thousands were coming out of Jerusalem and the towns and villages of Palestine, and walking miles to come see and hear this young long haired rough looking preacher at the Jordan River. They came, for one, because he had every appearance of being a true prophet of God, just shy of performing miracles. He dressed like the prophet Elijah they’d read about in their Bibles. He clearly was not interested in money or pleasure or status, but only in bringing people into line with the will of God. And they came because He looked like He might be one of the ones they’d been waiting and hoping for. Their Bible had all these promises that God would restore Israel to how they were in the days of David and Solomon, when they were as numerous as the sand on the seashore and ruling over the nations around them, enjoying peace and prosperity and walking in the ways of God. God even promised to bless them exceedingly more than how it was in the days of David and Solomon. He promised to circumcise their hearts, to make it where they all love Him with all their heart and obey His voice and never again turn from Him, and totally deliver them from all their enemies and make them more numerous and more prosperous than they had ever been, and it wouldn’t be temporarily. It would be forever.
And they read in their Bible that God would send great men who would usher in this kingdom. They read in Deuteronomy that God would send them a prophet like Moses who spoke with God face to face and performed so many signs and wonders. They read at the end of the book of Malachi that God would send them Elijah. And they read that God would send them a new David, who would deliver them from their enemies and rule over them in righteousness and justice. And because the ones God chose to rule over His people in history were anointed with oil to symbolize that they were also anointed with God’s Spirit to empower and guide them, they called this new David they were anticipating, “The Anointed One,” which is mashiyach in Hebrew, or we say Messiah, and it’s christos in Greek, we say Christ. The masses came out to John the Baptist wondering, could he be the Prophet like Moses? Or could he be the Elijah God said He would send us? Or could he even be the Christ, the new David we’ve been waiting for?
We read in Mark 1:5 that “all the country of Judea and all Jerusalem were going out to him and were being baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.” However, we also read in Luke 7 and elsewhere that the Pharisees, chief priests and scribes, the Jewish leaders, generally speaking did not respond to John as the common people did. They weren’t about to admit they were dirty in sin and needed to be washed. They’d been convincing people they were the righteous ideal of human beings. They weren’t about to say otherwise by being baptized in the Jordan. Many of them wouldn’t even go out to listen to John, as if they needed any preaching.
But at their synagogues on the Sabbath, perhaps they noticed less people in the pews. And they said, “Where’s sister so and so?” And they heard, “Oh, she went to hear that new young preacher at the Jordan River.” “Where’s brother so and so?” “That’s where he’s at too.” This bothered the Jewish leaders. So they decided to send a group of priests and Levites to investigate this new preacher.
So let’s look at the text beginning at John 1:19
What John had to say about himself (John 1:19-28)
19 And this is the testimony of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, “Who are you?” 20 He confessed, and did not deny, but confessed, “I am not the Christ.” [I’m not the king we’ve been waiting for.] 21 And they asked him, “What then? Are you Elijah?” He said, “I am not.” [Now the other gospel accounts tell us that John was the fulfillment of the Elijah promise (Matt 11:14; 17:11-12; Luke 1:16-17). But either John doesn’t see himself as such or perhaps he means “I am not literally Elijah reincarnated.” So then they asked,] “Are you the Prophet?” [They mean the Prophet like Moses.] And he answered, “No.” Do you notice how his answers got shorter and shorter as if he didn’t want to talk about himself? As if to say, “Let’s not talk about me, I want to tell you about someone else.”
“So they said to him, “Who are you? We need to give an answer to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?” And he references Isaiah 40:3, which spoke of an anonymous voice in the latter days in the wilderness crying out, prepare the way of the Lord.” John says “That’s who I am. When a king or a VIP is coming to visit a town, and a herald runs ahead and tells the townsfolk, ‘Hurry, quick! Let’s smooth the road! Fill the pot holes! Get rid of these bumps! The King is coming!’ I’m that guy. I’m just the voice saying, “Get ready.” I’m not the one you need to be thinking about.”
24 (Now they had been sent from the Pharisees.) [Their tone quickly changed from open inquiring to accusing.] 25 They asked him, “Then why are you baptizing, if you are neither the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?” 26 John answered them [but he didn’t actually answer their question. The answer to why he baptizes is down in verse 33. God sent him to baptize. But it’s like he knows it wouldn’t matter if he told them that, and doesn’t want to miss the opportunity to tell them about the one coming after him.], “I baptize with water, but among you stands one you do not know, 27 even he who comes after me, the strap of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie.” The Jewish Rabbis had a saying that, “Everything a servant does for his master a pupil should do for his teacher except untie his sandal.” Untying another’s sandals was the most undignified humiliating task there was. It was the task for the lowest of the slaves. And John says, “I would be honored if I could do just that for this One coming after me.” 28 These things took place in Bethany across the Jordan, where John was baptizing.
You know…
As we mature in Christ we become Baptists.
Did you know that? I’m working on becoming more of a Baptist… I thought if anybody was sleeping, wording it that way would wake them up. You know I don’t mean Baptist as opposed to Church of Christ or Catholic or any other church grouping. I mean the Baptist of John 1; so in awe and admiration of the One who is coming, that we feel honored to be able to serve Him in any way, that we rejoice at every opportunity to do something for Him, so we give cheerfully and serve gladly and wish we could do more.
Around our friends and co-workers and neighbors we’ve conversed with, we want to say, “You know, friend…
We talk about your work how your boss is a jerk
We talk about your church and your head when it hurts
We talk about the troubles you’ve been having with your brother
About your daddy and your mother and your crazy ex-lover
We talk about your friends and the places that you’ve been
We talk about your skin and the dimples on your chin
The polish on your toes and the run in your hose
And God knows we’re gonna talk about your clothes
You know talking about you makes me smile
But every once in awhile
I wanna talk about Him
Wanna talk about He
Wanna talk about number one
Oh He Him He
What He thinks, what He likes, what He knows, what He wants, what He sees
I like talking about you, you, you, usually, but occasionally
I wanna talk about Him
I wanna talk about Him
That’s the Baptist we should be – unconcerned with people being impressed with us, with our stories, our accomplishments and our credentials, very concerned about them being impressed with Jesus. Who do you want to talk about?
What makes one want to talk about Him? What moves one toward “none of self and all of thee”? Certainly a big part of it is what John the Baptist knew about the one coming after him. Let’s look at…
What John had to say about Jesus (John 1:29-34)
1:29, The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold…” Stop there for just a minute.
John just told people, I’m the voice in Isaiah 40, crying in the wilderness make ready the way of the Lord. And in Isaiah 40, the voice, the herald to Jerusalem and Judea, is told to say something. Isaiah 40:9ff, “Go on up to a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good news; lift up your voice with strength, O Jerusalem, herald of good news; lift it up, fear not; say to the cities of Judah, Behold your God! Behold, the Lord God comes with might, and his arm rules for him; behold, his reward is with him, and his recompense before him. He will tend his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arms; he will carry them in his bosom, and gently lead those that are with young.” He’s supposed to say, “Behold your God! Behold the Almighty! Behold your shepherd!” “Who has measured the waters in the hallow of his hand and marked off the heavens with a span, enclosed the dust of the earth in a measure and weighed the mountains in scales and the hills in a balance?” Verse 15, “Behold, the nations are like a drop from a bucket, and are accounted as the dust on the scales; behold, he takes up the coastlands like fine dust.” Verse 26, “Lift up your eyes on high and see: who created these?…” If John is the voice in the wilderness, why didn’t he say what the voice is to say, “Behold, your God!”? Was it that he didn’t realize he was preparing the way for God in the flesh? I lean toward thinking that John did know God became flesh and He was Jesus. He makes this incredible statement here in verse 30, “This is he of whom I said, ‘After me comes a man who ranks before me, because he was before me.'” That’s an incredible statement because Jesus was John’s cousin, according to the gospel of Luke, I think he knew he was born 6 months before Jesus. But John has come to realize that his younger cousin actually existed before him. All the hints he gives makes me think John knew our God became one of us. Perhaps John could tell or God told him that people were not yet ready for that mind blowing truth to be stated plainly. They weren’t yet ready to believe it. So John just hints at it.
Then he hints very strongly at another staggering truth about Jesus, calling Him “the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” Lambs that took away sin, or obtained for the offering for forgiveness of sins with God, were very familiar to the Jews. Every day of every year, at the Temple, lambs were offered that people might obtain forgiveness. It was a practice that ingrained in their minds that the wages of sin is death, that either you die or the innocent substitute dies instead. “Behold the Lamb of God.” Maybe John had in mind the imagery of the Passover lamb. You remember on the night when the destroying angel was coming through Egypt to destroy the firstborn of every home in Egypt, Egyptian or Israelite. But those families who took heed to Moses’ word and slaughtered a lamb and smeared the blood on the doorway of their home, were passed over when the judgment came. The Passover lamb died in place of the firstborn. The judgment fell on the lamb instead of the firstborn.
Where did John get this, that Jesus, God among us, is the lamb provided by God? Did he get this as a direct revelation from God? He was a prophet; he very well might have. But John may have really known the OT Scriptures and got it from there. There’s that passage in Genesis when God told Abraham, “Take now your son, your only son, whom you love, Isaac, and go to the land of Moriah [which was the area of Jerusalem in the future], and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.” And Abraham went through with it right up until God stopped him at the last second. Then he lifted his eyes and saw, caught in the nearby thicket, a ram provided by God for him to sacrifice instead. The ram dies in Isaac’s place. Abraham named that hill in the Jerusalem area, “The Lord will provide.”… The Lord will provide.
Another text John may have got this from is Isaiah 53 about the great servant of God who would be high, lifted up, greatly exactly. And yet like a lamb led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that is silent before it’s shearers, He doesn’t open his mouth, as He is oppressed and afflicted, pierced for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities, cut off out of the land of the living for the transgression of the people to whom the stroke was due.
Are you beginning to see why John felt so honored to be able to serve Him? He realized that our God, our Maker, the Creator of heaven and earth, who owes us nothing, so loved the unworthy likes of us, that He became one of us to take our just judgement, to take our death.
But there’s also something more, I think, in John’s statement here. Notice the phrase, “who takes away the sin of the world”. He doesn’t just reduce the sin of the world, He doesn’t just provide a way for the world to be forgiven of sin. He gets rid of the sin of the world. He totally removes the pride and selfishness and greed and jealousy and hate and ungodliness that pollutes and destroys the world God has made. I think it’s still on His schedule. One day there will be a heavens and an earth in which everyone loves the Lord their God with all their heart and loves one another, and only lives righteously, and sin will be no more. His work on the cross was that you and I might live in such a world. It was to provide us with forgiveness and it was to change our hearts to love God and one another through showing us God’s amazing love for us. When Jesus comes back, He will finally totally get rid of the sin of the world, and introduce a world without sin, a world even without the effects of sin, a world without thorns or thistles, disease or disaster, suffering or death.
How did John know this is who Jesus is? And we have here a record of John’s testimony about how he knew for certain that Jesus was indeed our God and Savior and restorer of the world. Verse 32, “And John bore witness: “I saw the Spirit descend from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him. [I saw Him anointed with the Holy Spirit when I baptized him. God made it visible to me.] I myself did not know him [I don’t think he means I didn’t know anything about my cousin Jesus. I think He means I didn’t realize who all He was.], but he who sent me to baptize with water said to me, ‘He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain, this is he who baptizes [who immerses people] with the Holy Spirit.’ And I have seen and have borne witness that this is the Son of God.”
There’s depth to those words we don’t have time to explore this lesson. But I’ll just point out another part of how Jesus enables sinful people, as we have been, to live in a new creation without sin. He immerses us with the Holy Spirit. From what I see in the NT, that is something Jesus does for all who come to believe in Him, repent and are baptized in His name. Acts 2:38-39, when the crowds in Jerusalem finally realize that Jesus whom they had crucified is our Lord and Christ, and they asked Peter what do we do. He said, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself.” As the Spirit came upon Jesus after His baptism, Jesus also, who now has all authority in heaven and on earth, sends the Spirit on those who turn to follow Him and are baptized. As the gospel of John will later say, the Spirit is our helper.
We are given a helper on the path Jesus has left for us to walk.
Why did John so love Jesus? Why was he so close to “none of self and all of thee”? Because he realized from the depths of his soul that the almighty Creator of heaven and earth who we don’t deserve to even take notice of us, so thought of us and loved us that He became one of us to suffer and die in our place for our sins. And is working toward sharing with us a new perfect creation without any sin or its effects. And by His Spirit He’s helping us get there. And we deserve none of it. He made us, He sustains us, He died for us, He’s given us His Spirit to help us. Our God is awesome. We ought to be “none of self and all of thee.” And I hope I get closer to that in my life.
-James Williams