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Following Jesus · Part Two · Message Eleven
The Testimony of John
A witness sent from God refuses every inflated identity and directs Israel’s attention to Jesus—the Spirit-anointed Chosen One and the Lamb who takes away sin.
Part Two · The Kingdom Draws Near
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Lesson overview
The faithful witness makes Jesus, not himself, the message.
The Evangelist begins before creation with the eternal Word. Within that vast opening, he introduces another John—a man sent from God to testify concerning the Light so that others may believe.
John the Baptist attracts crowds, unsettles Jerusalem, and awakens questions about Israel’s long-awaited deliverer. Yet his calling is not to gather the story around himself. He tells the truth about who he is not, claims the humbler role Scripture gives him, and points beyond his baptism to the one already standing among the people.
John diminishes himself and bears clear, evidence-based witness that Jesus is the Spirit-anointed Chosen One and God’s sacrificial provision for the sin of the world.
Two men named John serve very different roles in the Gospel.
The writer traditionally identified as John the apostle is the Evangelist who narrates. He opens with the Word who was with God, was God, made all things, and became flesh. John the Baptist is a person within that story. He is not the Light; he is sent to bear witness to the Light.
A witness reports truthfully what he has seen or been entrusted to say. In the New Testament, this language develops into the English word martyr because some witnesses sealed their testimony with death. But witness does not originally mean a person seeking death. Its center is truthful testimony concerning another.
That distinction governs the passage. John’s unusual clothing, wilderness preaching, priestly ancestry, and baptizing ministry make him publicly significant, but significance is not the same as supremacy. His God-given importance lies precisely in directing attention away from himself toward Christ.
Not the Messiah, but the voice preparing the Lord’s road.
Priests and Levites come from Jerusalem with a direct question: who are you? Israel’s Scriptures had nourished overlapping hopes for a prophet like Moses, a Davidic ruler, a priestly king, and an Elijah-like messenger. John belongs to a priestly family, looks like a wilderness prophet, and has called crowds to repent. The investigation is understandable.
John refuses each inflated identity. He is not the Messiah. He is not Elijah in the literal sense his questioners propose, and he is not “the Prophet” promised in Deuteronomy. His repeated denials are not false modesty. They clear the field so that he can name the role God has actually given him.
John identifies himself with Isaiah’s wilderness voice: prepare a straight way for the Lord. Isaiah first evokes a road through the desert for God’s people returning from exile, but the passage moves toward the coming of the Lord himself. John is neither the destination nor the king. He is the herald announcing that the long-awaited arrival is at hand.
The unknown one among them is the Lamb of God.
John’s water baptism prepares a repentant people, but it points beyond itself. Someone already stands among them whom they do not know, and John considers himself unworthy even to loosen his sandal. The next day, Jesus approaches, and John gives the identity toward which the entire interrogation has been moving: here is the Lamb of God who takes away the world’s sin.
The title gathers a deep sacrificial history without making every lamb image identical. Passover remembers deliverance through the blood of an unblemished lamb. Israel’s worship teaches that sin, cleansing, substitution, and atonement require God’s provision. Isaiah describes the suffering servant bearing sin like a lamb led to slaughter. Genesis 22 joins a beloved son, Moriah, a substitute, and Abraham’s trust that God will provide.
Jesus is not merely another worshiper arriving with an offering. He is God’s own provision. His mission reaches beyond one nation because the sin he bears away is the sin of the world. John’s testimony looks toward a death the Gospel will later call both sacrifice and glory.
The Spirit’s descent gives John the evidence for his testimony.
John does not base his climactic claim on intuition or public enthusiasm. The God who sent him to baptize had given him a sign: the one upon whom the Spirit descended and remained would baptize with the Holy Spirit. John saw that sign fulfilled in Jesus.
The Spirit’s remaining matters. Jesus does not merely experience a passing prophetic moment. He is the Spirit-anointed Messiah who will give the Spirit to others. John’s work in water prepares; Jesus’ work brings the life and cleansing of God’s promised new age.
I have seen and have testified that this is the Chosen One of God.
John 1:34
Important early manuscripts preserve a variation at the close of the verse: some read “the Chosen One of God,” while many read “the Son of God.” Both readings fit the passage’s witness to Jesus, but the variation should be acknowledged rather than hidden. The displayed wording follows the chosen study text.
Christian testimony tells a personal story without making the self its center.
A believer’s history matters. Grace reaches real people in particular places, wounds, failures, and acts of mercy. But Christian testimony does not end with the person telling it. Like John, the witness turns attention toward Jesus and says what is true about him.
The church’s central testimony is shared: the eternal Son became flesh, the Lamb gave himself for sin, God raised him from the dead, he grants new life through faith, and his people stand in a righteousness not their own. Personal details provide context; Christ’s identity and saving work provide the content.
John’s pattern is therefore both humble and bold. He declines titles that do not belong to him, tells what he has seen, and names Jesus clearly. Faithful witness does not make itself invisible, but it refuses to become the destination. It points to the Lamb who removes sin and the Chosen One who gives the Spirit.
Scripture guide
Follow John’s witness to the Lamb.
These passages distinguish the two Johns, gather Israel’s messianic expectations, prepare the Lord’s road, trace the Lamb through Scripture, and reveal the Spirit-anointed Chosen One.
Word, Light, and witness
John 1:1–18
Identity and preparation
John 1:19–28; Isaiah 40:1–11; Malachi 3:1; Malachi 4:5–6
Prophet, priest, and king
Deuteronomy 18:15–19; Psalm 110; Isaiah 9:1–7
The Lamb provided by God
Genesis 22:1–19; Exodus 12; Leviticus 16; Isaiah 53:4–12
Spirit and testimony
John 1:29–34; 1 Peter 1:18–21; Revelation 5