Jesus: The Lamb of God [John 1:29-34]
Who is Jesus? What did He come to do?
John the Baptist, on seeing Jesus walking by pronounces these amazing words dripping with revelation and meaning;
“Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29)
To behold is to look, to see, to pause and observe someone or something that is especially of remarkable or impressive nature. John saw who Jesus really was and saw His purpose on the earth and called people to stop and to consider Jesus.
Jesus is worthy of our stopping, worthy of our consideration, worthy of us giving time to meditate on this great mystery contained in these words; “the Lamb of God”.
In calling Jesus the ‘Lamb of God’, John was declaring that Jesus is the One who by His sacrificial death on the cross, will fulfil all the symbolism of the Passover lamb and other OT sacrifices (Genesis 22, Leviticus 1:1–5:19; 1 Corinthians 5:7; Ephesians 5:2; Hebrews 10:1–14). In the OT, God’s people were delivered through the blood of a lamb that was sacrificed on their behalf.
That sacrificial lamb in the OT, prefigured the coming of Jesus as the true Lamb of God, who lived a perfect spotless life (Hebrews 4:14-15) so that He could be sacrificed on our behalf, to forgive us for all sin for all time and to obtain final salvation for God’s people through his death, which in turn redeemed them from death, sin, and Satan (Colossians 1:13–14; Hebrews 2:14–15).
And why do we need Jesus or anyone/anything to die for us?
Because we have all fallen short of the righteous requirements of God (Romans 3:23), everyone of us is in the same predicament. We have sinned before God who is Holy. But the good news John saw on that day was that Jesus came to take away the sin the world! That’s the good news of the Gospel, that although we have all sinned, fallen short of God’s glory, we have a Saviour Jesus, who died in our place for our sin as the Scriptures say;
23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, 25 whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. (Romans 3:23-25)
How incredible it is, that God in whom their was no lack, no need , loved you and I so much that He was willing to make Himself the very sacrifice that would rescue us from our sin and from His holy wrath! Behold the lamb of God. Jesus is worthy of worship and adoration and praise forevermore.
Two words that matter 