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January 15, 2017 Text: John 1:29-42
Dear Friends in Christ,
What are you looking at? If one asks that question emphasizing the you, it is a challenge to the other person. But ask the question this way: “What are you looking at?’ Now the emphasis is different. Now you are challenged, but not to a fight. Someone wants to know what has captured your attention. It might be a teacher or a parent or a child. It might be the Lord. Oh, yes. Was it really so different a question when he asked the disciples, “But who do you say that I am?”
“What are you looking at?” Someone who is searching might ask that question. It might not be put exactly in those words, but that is the question they are asking. “What are you looking at?” Who, me? Oh, I . . . .
“LOOK TO THE LAMB!”
Last week we saw John baptizing Jesus. Today he continues the shift away from himself. “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (v. 29) Don’t look to John, look to Jesus.
Our world is filled with all kinds of things to look at. Magazine covers and newspapers, you tube videos and snap chats, commercials and infomercials promising life, and wealth, and happiness. In the end, these are all shallow and help us pass the time. They do not lead to eternity. The voice of John cried to us today, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.”
Come back today, people of God. Come back from wherever your eyes have wandered. Look to Jesus. “I have seen and I have borne witness that this is the Son of God.” (v. 34) Look to the Christ of the cross and the empty tomb. Look to Jesus, who forgives and gives you real life. Gaze on him. People are watching. Like John, our lives can say, “Look to the Lamb.”
Advertising executives will tell us we need to encounter information six or seven times before we begin to pay attention. Think of “K-A-R-S, Car for Kids” or “The Most Interesting Man in the World.” You know because you have seen it over and over again. John brings the same message to the disciples, “Behold, the Lamb of God!” John points them to the one he wants them to know about – Jesus.
Two of the disciples start to follow Jesus. Jesus then poses a question, “What are you seeking?” They were seekers. It is not just some 21st century concept. These men were seeking spiritual meaning. The world is hungering for the same thing, except they look in the wrong places. They may look to themselves, they make look to life coaches, they may look to nature or politicians or religious charlatans. We seek that which we know and have learned through the Holy Spirit. We look to the Lamb.
The disciples have what we would call a timid response. “Where are you staying?” ((v. 38) Was this the real burning question that John’s twice-insistent “Behold” had created in them? Aren’t we the same? Are we always clear about what it is we are looking for? Even in Christ?
Jesus likes to ask questions. He likes to challenge us. He likes to breathe faith into us, then draw it out of us. We know the grace of our faith again and again but sometimes we say silly things like, “Where are you staying?” What spiritual seekers are these!
As with us, Jesus does not reprimand these first disciples. His grace thunders in their ears with, “Come and you will see.” (v. 39) Christ draws them to himself with these simple words. He did not say, “You dolts! Couldn’t you seek something more substantial than that?” What Jesus said then, he says again today in our hearing, “Come and you will see.” Look to the Lamb!
Immediately the disciples’ lives took on the nature of proclamation. Andrew did not wait for someone to say, “What are you looking at?” He found his brother and proclaimed, “We have found the Messiah.”
The Lord brings this change about. Jesus had really found them. This is what happens to you and me through faith in Christ Jesus. Look no farther. Look to the Lamb. God has marked you in Baptism with the indelible mark of one who is his child. Believe it when He says He loves you. Trust Him when He says He is with you always, to the end of the age. Look to the Lamb today and tomorrow and every day.
This is what our world needs – the people of God living by looking to the Lamb. This trusting gaze will show in our lives this week. People will notice. How many lives will be touched by those of us here today? How many eyes will see evidence of something in us that causes them to wonder? How many opportunities will we have in these next seven days to say, “Look to the Lamb! Come, and you will see”? God will use our heart’s gaze, our soul’s fixation on Jesus, to proclaim to the people in our lives, “Look to the Lamb!”
Amen.