John chapter 1

For some reason, the underlining shortcut stopped working, so now I have to code it by hand. Stupid new blogger.

vs 30

Obviously John TB had said something earlier about someone coming after him. And that person, it turned out, was Jesus. Again we see this theme of Jesus sharing that attribute of God of being before time.

vs 31

When John TB says he didn't know Jesus, I don't think he meant that he didn't know Jesus at all. They were related, so Luke tells us, and so surely they knew each other, even just a little bit. But John TB is probably saying that he didn't know that Jesus was this person until it was revealed to him by doing the whole baptism thing. Even then, that would mean he was someone kept in the dark by his parents, because his own mother, upon meeting Mary, knew there was something special about her baby. In any case, we can safely say that all this stuff about Jesus was confirmed by John TB's prophetic baptismal ministry, and not by him being related distantly to Jesus.

vs 32

John TB saw the Spirit of God rest on Jesus and remain, like some sort of dove. The most literal understanding of this is a literal dove, I guess, but then that would involve Jesus walking around with a dove on his shoulder like some sort of peace-pirate.

vs 33

So God had told John TB how to recognise the one he was looking for. And again, even if he knew Jesus, he didn't know that he was going to be the one to be filled with the Spirit of God. Which makes us wonder just who did know before John's baptism. Did Jesus himself know?

vs 34

Seeing that was enough for John TB to know that Jesus was the Son of God. He didn't need to see miracles, he didn't need to quiz Jesus on theology. God had told him "The one who gets my Spirit, that's the one" and that was good enough for John TB.

vs 35

Jesus wasn't the only one with disciples. Some people had seen John and heard his words, and thought "Yeah, this guy's worth following".

vs 36

John couldn't help saying to his students "Look at that, there's the Lamb of God!" Considering he felt that his whole ministry had led up to this point, this would have been something of prime importance to point out to your disciples.

vs 37

Of course, it cost John a couple of disciples, but he was probably expecting that. Elsewhere, he says that he must decrease, while Christ increases". I mean, if you're following the person who is waiting for the Messiah, surely when the Messiah comes, you'll start following the better person instead.

vs 38

Note that they didn't start following him as disciples though. They didn't even come up and talk to him, they just started following behind. Just like those people in kung fu movies who follow around a master until he accepts them as students. Jesus has to turn around and say "Are you guys stalking me?"

They want to know where he's staying, probably so they can stay there too. Notice that John the author spells out what Rabbi means, which means that his audience can't have been entirely Jewish. Those sorts of little hints are worth looking out for.

vs 39

He invites them to follow him and see where he lives. They spent the day with him, and you have to assume they talked about a bunch of stuff.

vs 40

Now we learn the names of one of those two - his name was Andrew, and he is the brother of the soon-to-be-famous Simon Peter.