Jesus: Lamb of God

Chuckle: Little Johnny's new baby brother was screaming up a storm. Johnny asked his mom. "Where'd we get him?" "He came from heaven, Johnny." "Wow! I see why they threw him out!"

Quote: "In taking the form of a servant, Jesus established the law of rank in the church of Christ. The higher one wishes to stand in grace, the more it must be his joy to be a servant of all." --Andrew Murray

"Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world" (John 1:29 NIV). ". . ., we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. . . But when this priest (Jesus) had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God" (Hebrews 10:10, 12 NIV).

John (the Baptist) was a strange character, but with a powerful message from God. He lived an obscure and lonely life somewhere in the Jordan River Valley. His clothing was made from coarse camel hair and he ate locusts and wild honey. He was not a very social person, but he was a man with a divine mission -- a mission to prepare the way for the coming of the long awaited Messiah. He was the herald to announce the arrival of the King -- the King that was also a sacrificial lamb.

It was John's unpopular task to shock people into awareness of their need to repent and turn from their sins. It's interesting that his was the first prophetic voice among God's people since Malachi four hundred years earlier. No one living had heard a true prophet of God, nor had they seen the fiery eyes of a person filled by the Holy Spirit and through whom God Himself spoke. John's words were spoken with God-given authority and pierced hardened hearts and resistant minds.

The religious leaders (priests and Levites) sought out John in the wilderness along the Jordan and asked who he was. They asked if he was the Messiah, or the Old Testament prophet, Elijah, or "that prophet who is to come." John answered that he was only a single voice crying in the wilderness, pleading with people everywhere to prepare the way for the King, and it was for this mission that he had been born. The voice of John echoes throughout eternity with his profound and reverberating declaration: "Look, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world."

It was Jesus, the Sacrificial Lamb, who was offered on the cross as the ultimate blood sacrifice necessary for our redemption and the forgiveness of our sins. Over the centuries, prior to the crucifixion of Christ, countless thousands of lambs had been sacrificed in the temple and elsewhere. But John's message was that only the blood of the sinless "Lamb of God" could "wash away our sins" once for all. No other sacrifice would ever be needed.

There is an awesome wonder in the name "the Lamb of God." This title for Jesus appears 29 times in the book of Revelation. As John wrote the apocalyptic vision from God, it became one of the most precious titles of Jesus and sums up his unfailing love, willing sacrifice, and total triumph over sin, death, and the grave (Revelation 5:6, 11-14). Today, we have the same mission as John, to proclaim to a lost world: "Look, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world!"

Love, Jerry & Dotse