Finding faith in Jesus Christ: John the Baptist

      For my religion class I chose to study about John the Baptist. I don't know a whole lot about him so that is why I did this assignment. I learned so much about him. He truly was a great man like Christ said. 

      In Matthew 11: 1-19 the two disciples of John asked Christ, “Art thou he that should come, or do we look for another?” Christ then told them to report back to John all that they saw him do. If I were in place of these two men I would report back how he heals the blind, cleanses the leprosy, and raises the dead. To me those are the miracles that I would love to see because they are the hardest to do.

In the Institute manual commentary it says that John did not doubt Christ. I think John knew what was going to happen to him. Also his disciples need to gain a  testimony of Christ because it was Christ’s church and not John’s. So he sent them to ask a question for him really posing the question for his disciples. That was smart thinking on John’s part.

Christ said about John the Baptist, “…among them that are born of women there hath not risen a greater than John the Baptist…” But there were prophets before John and there were prophets after John. What makes him so special? Again in the Institute manual commentary we are given three reasons why he was so great. 1. He prepared the way for Jesus Christ. 2. His second mission was to baptize Christ. 3. Hold the keys of power to do the things that he did. No other prophet had the opportunity to do any of those things. What makes him so special was because he was in Christ’s time. What an honor that would be.

In John 3:30 we see John’s attitude about Christ. He says, “He must increase, but I must decrease.” What I understand from this is he did not want to be under the same light as Christ. John did nothing near what Christ did. Christ rose above everything and overcame all. We must see Christ as the savior. I think also if John was decreasing while Christ was increasing like variations of light, it is implied that we need to look to Him. John was humble and not wanting anything more than what was given. How can we adopt his attitude in our life? I think humility is what it is all about. John didn’t want the lime light for himself. He knew that isn’t what needed to be done.