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John 1:29-42
A Sermon for the Second Sunday of Epiphany
Have you heard of “The Nutshell Library”? It’s a collection of four miniature books, published in 1962, by Maurice Sendak. They are tiny pocket-sized books, perfect for small hands.
I was once given a pocket-sized New Testament, but the print was so small it was difficult to read, and I missed the Old Testament.
In the Bible there are, however, certain verses that are like the whole Bible in a nutshell. Our gospel text today has one such sentence, John 1:29: “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”
If you hold this verse in your head and your heart, it’s as if you can carry the whole Bible with you wherever you go. I’ll show you what I mean.
That first word, “Behold,” is key. It tells us that the action is outside of us, in spite of us. Behold, look, see what the Lord is doing. The Lord saw the problem of sin and death, he solved it by himself, and “it is finished” (John 19:30). Nobody else does this. Not Allah, not Buddha. Only God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Second, “Behold, the lamb of God.” That takes us back to Genesis, to Abraham and Issac. The Lord said to Abraham: “Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah and offer him there as a burnt offering upon one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.” And when they got there and made a pile of wood for the fire, Isaac turned to his father and asked: “Father, where is the lamb for the burnt offering?”
And Abraham says: “God himself will provide the lamb.” This account finds an echo in the New Testament in John 19:17: “And so they took Jesus, and he went out, to the place of a skull.” The Lord will provide the lamb.
From the lamb provided to Abraham and Isaac, we move to the main event in the Old Testament: the Exodus. There the Lord said to Moses: “Tell the people that they are to sacrifice a lamb and put the blood on the door posts and lintel.” The blood of the lamb would protect them against the wrath and destruction to come. And so, they did, and they were spared. The blood of the lamb protected them.
And then in Isaiah 53, there is he who is “like a lamb that is led to the slaughter” (Isaiah 53:7). And the famous preceding lines:
“He had no form or comeliness that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief . . . he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely, he has borne our griefs, carried our sorrows; he was wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities and with his stripes we are healed.”
When John the Baptist says: “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” – he is harkening back to how the Lord provided a lamb for Abraham and Isaac, how the Lord protected the ancient Hebrews with the blood of the lamb on their doorposts. He is saying Jesus is like those, only different. Only in Christ, never before and not elsewhere, has God himself has come to solve the problem of sin and death. Moreover, he solved it by himself, without our help, and it is finished (John 19:30).
Jesus’ crucifixion is “the” decisive battle of all history, certified by the resurrection.
As it says in Revelation 17:14: “They [the powers of evil] will make war on the Lamb, and the Lamb will conquer them, for he is Lord of Lords and King of Kings.”
Which brings us to today and to you and me. What about us?
Consider the plight of Scott Adams, the cartoonist, creator of the Dilbert cartoons. Adams has been in the news because he has terminal cancer and is close to death.
He has not been a Christian, but he has friends who are Christians. They are urging him “to convert.”
In a recent interview he said he considers converting to Christianity a risk-reward situation because he agrees with what he calls “the dominant Christian theory that he would wake up in Heaven if he had [lived] a good life.”
He adds: “I don’t necessarily have to, you know, just state something in advance.” In other words, he’s not sure his friends are right that he must make a decision for Christ. Nevertheless, he concludes: “I’m convinced that the risk-reward is completely smart.”
Scott Adams presumes that what matters is being a virtuous person and living a good life. As he says: “You wake up in Heaven if you’ve lived a good life.”
Moreover, he presumes he’s good enough. After all, he hasn’t been in big league sins like murder or extortion. Rather, he judges himself as good as the next regular person. In short, good enough. He’s earned it. God is more or less obligated to take him.
“Are you listening Lord? Here’s how you need to handle this.”
If “the general Christian theory” that heaven is a risk-reward wager based on good works, why not convert?
The problem is, of course, that that’s a misdiagnosis, and in ultimate matters, as in health and sickness, a misdiagnosis can be deadly.
The Bible says that death is a big problem, but it is also light the warning light signaling an even bigger problem. As Paul writes: “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). And: “No one is righteous, no not one” (Romans 3:10). Jeremiah 17:9 says: “The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately corrupt.”
The Bible warns us that there is judgment ahead and the real problem is holiness and sin. It is hard to talk about holiness and sin because holiness is beyond us and sin is a far deeper corruption than we can imagine.
For this reason, Christ came. As 1 John 3:5 states: “You know that he appeared to take away sins,” and: “The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil” (1 John 3:8).
Scott Adams needs better Christian friends. The ones he has have told him he needs to convert, to make a decision for Christ, as one might say, to seal the deal.
That’s cringeworthy because any decision for Christ is just another “good work.” Did I do that right? Was I earnest enough? Say the right words? But that doesn’t work because as Isaiah 64:6 says: “All our righteous deeds are filthy rags.” All our decisions for Christ are riddled with sin.
It’s too bad that Scott Adams doesn’t have Christian friends who say: “Scott, you don’t have to make a decision for Christ, and any decision you make and think you’ve done it is just another way you are trusting in yourself and in works.”
A Christian friend could also offer to baptize him or encourage him to be baptized, because whether we arrive at the baptismal fount as adults or infants, our situation is the same. We are as helpless as a tiny babe. We need the Lord to rescue us.
Baptism does that. As it says in 1 Peter: “You know that you were ransomed from the futile ways . . . not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot” (1 Peter 1:18-19).
“By his wounds, you have been healed” (I Peter 2:24, echoing Isaiah 53:4-5).
It’s like the famous painting by the Lutheran artist, Matthias Grünewald, back in Luther’s day. You can see it today on display in Colmar, France.
The painting is massive in size — three huge panels, which portray the crucifixion. Off to the far side is John the Baptist, who with his knobby finger forever points to Christ on the cross: “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”
That’s the gospel. Our comfort and our calling. We point to him.
That’s the gospel in a nutshell and the Christian life in a nutshell: “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”
Amen