You see, if you and I are going to be effective witnesses, we have to spend time with the Lord Jesus Christ. Because if we spend time with him, then we will be so in love with Jesus Christ that we will instinctively want to direct men and women to him.
Yesterday we looked at the first point concerning John the Baptist’s witness to Jesus. Let's now look at the second point, which is positive. In the second section of this first chapter, verses 29 through 34, John gives his positive witness, and it's amazing how comprehensive it is when it was given in only a few verses. John was a preacher and so he undoubtedly elaborated upon this teaching at length, but when he elaborated upon it, it had two main focal points, and they're here in these verses.
Now you have three points that concern John's witness in verses 6-9 of chapter 1, and if you look at it carefully, I'm sure you can see what they are. The first is that John was aware that he himself was not the light. Second, John pointed to Jesus Christ who was the light. And the third point is the goal for which the witness was given, and that is that all men through him might believe. This is exactly the outline that you find in verses 6-9, which is then illustrated in the latter portion of the first chapter.
Indeed, in one way, you can look at the Gospel of John as a series of witnesses to who Jesus Christ was, always by people who, like John, had received a revelation in advance. Sometimes they discovered who he was as they interacted with him, but in the end, they always give a testimony. Apart from the testimony of John the Baptist pointing to Jesus Christ and saying that he is the light who was to come into the world, nobody would have paid any attention.
In this series we are going to be studying the characters of John's Gospel who had encounters with the Lord Jesus Christ. Some of the best-known characters in the biblical story are found in this Gospel, and others that are found in the other Gospels as well receive fuller treatment in John. We begin with John the Baptist and what strikes us immediately as we turn to his story at the very beginning of this Gospel is how extensive it is.
