The Apostle John’s gospel account began with a picturesque view of Jesus Christ as the eternal Word of God.[1] This is who the good news is all about. Knowing him is essential to knowing God.
Now John begins drawing our attention to the
witnesses of the Word. Since we cannot go back in time to see Jesus’ life,
death, resurrection, and ascension for ourselves, we must listen to the witnesses
and consider their testimony about our Savior. It is still true of these people
what was written in God’s Book about one of the very first witnesses of walking
with God, “And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks.”[2]
This study explores the introduction of a
Witness that many people have heard of, a man who came to be known as John the
Baptist. He has a testimony for each of us today that not only speaks into our
time, but directs our attention to Jesus who came to speak into hearts forever.
If you want to load a Word document version
of this study onto your computer for prayer-journaling, you can find it here.[3] If
you want a PDF version to print out, you can find it here.[4] If
you have suggestions to improve this study, please send me an email. I would
love the help! And, if you need assistance attaching to the Savior John the
Baptist testifies about, I would love to help!
John
Bible Study ~ John 1:6-8 ~ A Man Named John
There was a man sent from God, whose name was
John. He came as a witness, to bear witness about the light, that all might
believe through him. He was not the light, but came to bear witness about the
light. (John 1:6-8 ~ ESV)
The man named John who wrote down the book we
call The Gospel of John is not the same man as is now introduced to us
in this gospel account.[5] The
Apostle John who wrote down what God gave him is introducing us to the person
we know as John the Baptist. The apostles were the foundational leaders of the
church, while John the Baptist was the “forerunner” of the Christ, the man God
would use to prepare the way for his Son to come into the world as the Light of
Life shining in our darkness.
Part 1: A Man Sent From God
6 There was a man sent from God, whose name was
John. (John 1)
1.
What are
the first three things God wants you to know about this person?
2.
Which of
these three descriptions tells you what effect God expects this man’s ministry
to have on you?
3.
What is
your initial reaction to God having an expectation that applies to you?
Part
2: A Witness With a Purpose
7 He came as a witness, to bear witness about
the light, that all might believe through him. (John 1)
1.
The
purpose of John the Baptist’s role is stated in three expressions. What does
God intend this to mean to you that he “came as a witness”?
2.
The introduction
to this Gospel account told us that “In him (Jesus) was life, and the life
was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has
not overcome it.”[6] What
does it mean to you as the recipient of this testimony that John the Baptist
was sent, “to bear witness about the light”?
3.
What
expectation does God have on your life by sending a man whose aim in ministry
was, “that all might believe through him”?
4.
How would
you describe your response to God in sending someone like this to you today
with such a clear invitation?
Part 3: A Witness About the Light
8 He was not the light, but came to bear
witness about the light. (John 1)
1. Why is this clarification so necessary to our
experience of what God is offering us in his Son?
2. What does this emphasize about the effect
John’s ministry was intended to have on us?
3. In the rest of this first chapter of John’s
gospel, we will see greater detail of how John the Baptist prepared the way for
Jesus to begin his work. What does this initial introduction to John the
Baptist do to prepare the way for you to examine the work of Jesus Christ for
yourself?
Conclusion: There are
delightful accounts of people setting out to prove the Bible could not be true,
particularly the testimony it claims about Jesus Christ, and yet the one thing
they could not get around was the list of witnesses that testified about Jesus
as the Light of Life. The more they set out to prove the testimonies false, the
more they had to admit they were true.
If you were sitting in
a court room where Jesus was on trial as an imposter (the way the world likes
to accuse him) and you were just introduced to John the Baptist as the first
witness of the defense that Jesus truly was the Word of God, how would you
describe your starting place in terms of your feeling of objectivity to know
for yourself what was true about this person we know as Jesus the Christ?
© 2021 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517, Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8
Email: in2freedom@gmail.com
Unless otherwise noted, Scriptures are from the
English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text
Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of
Good News Publishers.)
[1] John 1:1-5
[2] Hebrews 11:4 regarding Abel as introduced in Genesis 4:1-16
[3] https://www.dropbox.com/s/0alp8msg9oanpwe/0002%20-%20John%201_6-8%20-%20A%20Man%20Named%20John.docx?dl=0
[4] https://www.dropbox.com/s/alynvfp8nw594xe/0002%20-%20John%201_6-8%20-%20A%20Man%20Named%20John.pdf?dl=0
[5] We have a beautiful
introduction to this man who came to be known as John the Baptist in the gospel
of Luke (Luke 1:1-80). It gives some sense of the excitement of his arrival in
that particular time because the prophets had spoken about this person who would
one day set the stage for the coming of the Christ (Messiah) (see Malachi
4:5-6).
[6] John 1:4-5
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