He Must Increase, But I Must Decrease

Today we’re finishing chapter 3 of the gospel of John, and this is also the last time John the Baptist appears in the story (though we’ll still see his name mentioned a couple more times). If you’re unfamiliar with John the Baptist, he was Jesus’ cousin, and the best way you could summarize his story is that he was a witness to Jesus.

John repeatedly pointed attention away from himself and toward the coming Messiah. He preached telling people to turn away from their sin against God, and to be baptized as a sign of commitment and preparation for the one who was still to come. His ministry started before Jesus, but it was all about Jesus, and he had the privilege of handing his ministry over to Jesus as Jesus began to do his own public work.

This is where we see John the Baptist at this point in the story at the end of John 3. He’s baptizing people in one area, and across the Jordan River Jesus is teaching and they’re baptizing even more people over there. It seems John’s ministry is starting to wind down, and his followers call him out on it.

But how does John the Baptist respond? Look with me at the end of verse 29 through the start of verse 30:

John 3:29–30 ESV

this joy of mine is now complete. ³⁰ He must increase, but I must decrease.”

How does somebody say that when things seem to be going backwards for them? On this 4th of July weekend, we can all agree that our culture values forward progress. It’s written into our DNA. And yet, John the Baptist defined the fullness of his joy alongside the emptying of his influence.

There’s a version of Christianity that’s communicated in our world as being all about you—Follow Jesus and you’ll be blessed, you’ll get the things you want and experience prosperity. There’s another version of Christianity that speaks so lowly and so exclusively of you and your sin that it seems like any relationship with God will inevitably be filled with just a bunch of guilt and shame. Neither are biblical. Neither are found here.

And that’s because God’s wisdom is different from our wisdom. We can default to thinking that our path to joy is in what we gain, but here John the Baptist tells us our deepest sense of joy finds its completion in someone else’s gain.

The Christian life isn’t first about our prosperity, and it’s not intended for our shame; it’s about God’s glory. He must increase, but I must decrease. Our greatest offer for joy in life is found in our humiliation and Christ’s exaltation.

We see shadows of this all around us: a parent who takes a backseat to her child’s interests but experiences a profound happiness when she sees her child doing what they love; a spouse that sincerely enjoys going to Pelicans games with her husband, not because she loves basketball, but because of how much she loves him (thanks babe).

If we can find joy in other people’s pursuits over our own in all kinds of little ways, how much more could we experience joy in making it our life’s mission to see the God who created us glorified in all things?

That’s the completion of our joy because God is the author of our joy. We were made for him. But, like we’ve seen over the past several weeks in the gospel of John, our sin—the ways we’ve rebelled against the rule of God in our thoughts, feelings, and actions—our sin has left us separated from God, our source of joy.

So, we look for joy in all these other things. We end up turning good things into ultimate things hoping they’ll bring us satisfaction. But we’re always left wanting more. Even the great things in our lives aren’t steady things, and the job or the partner or whatever desire it is that fills you on the days when it’s going well can utterly devastate you when it hurts you, leaves you, or fails you.

We were made for a complete joy—a steady joy. And John the Baptist tells us in our passage today that not only is Jesus able to fulfill our desire for joy—he’s able to rescue us from the weight of our sin. You see, Jesus was the ultimate example of John the Baptist’s words in verse 30: “He must increase, but I must decrease.”

In Philippians 2, the Apostle Paul points out that even though Jesus was fully God, he humbled himself when he took the form of a servant and was born as  human. He experienced the ultimate humiliation by dying on a cross—all to honor his Father. And in Philippians 2:9-11, we see the result:

Philippians 2:9–11 ESV

⁹ Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, ¹⁰ so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, ¹¹ and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Christ humbled himself to the point of death, and now he’s exalted next to the Father. The invitation of the gospel is that we get to experience the joy of Christ’s exaltation when we join him in his humiliation. When we humble ourselves to see Jesus exalted in our lives, then his joy will infuse every other joy we have in life to make our joy complete.

So, how do we do that? Here in this final story on John the Baptist, we see three truths that can can keep us humble in Christ and three truths that can help us increasingly exalt Christ with our lives. First, let’s start with our humiliation, which remember, it sounds bad, but it’s ultimately for our good.

No matter how life is going, no matter what we’re pursuing, no matter our successes or our failures, humbling ourselves in Christ will require us to remember that,

• Our work is for Jesus,

• Our lives come from Jesus, and

• Our purpose is to celebrate Jesus

Let’s start with how our work is for Jesus. Look with me at verses 22-26.

John 3:22–26 ESV

²² After this Jesus and his disciples went into the Judean countryside, and he remained there with them and was baptizing. ²³ John also was baptizing at Aenon near Salim, because water was plentiful there, and people were coming and being baptized ²⁴ (for John had not yet been put in prison).

²⁵ Now a discussion arose between some of John’s disciples and a Jew over purification. ²⁶ And they came to John and said to him, “Rabbi, he who was with you across the Jordan, to whom you bore witness—look, he is baptizing, and all are going to him.”

Okay, so we’ve already setup a lot of the story. After Jesus’ conversation with Nicodemus in Jerusalem earlier in John 3, he now moves from that urban setting to a more rural setting in the surrounding countryside. It’s interesting that John, the author, gives the specific locations where everything was happening and even fits the events within the broader timeline by saying that this was before John the Baptist had been put in prison.

If I’m writing a myth for people to read 2,000 years later, specific details make it more interesting. But if I’m writing what I witnessed in order to share it with my peers, then the specific details they’d recognize help make it verifiable. When we put ourselves in the shoes of the original audience who was reading the New Testament books like the Gospel of John, it’s clear they weren’t trying to fabricate a story; they were attempting to explain what really happened.

Verses 22 and 23 say that in one place, John the Baptist was continuing to preach his message of repentance and baptizing people, and then across the Jordan River Jesus was teaching to a much larger crowd and his disciples were baptizing even more people over there. We know it was Jesus’ disciples doing the baptizing and not Jesus himself because verse 2 in the next chapter tells us Jesus didn’t personally baptize anyone.

Given how water baptism at the time was linked to the practice of commitment and cleansing, it makes sense that this particular Jewish man in verse 25 gets into a deeper discussion on the topic of purification with some of John’s disciples. However that conversation ends, it seems to motivate them to approach John the Baptist with a sharp critique: “That man who was with you across the Jordan—they don’t even say Jesus’ name—but that man is baptizing, and all are going to him.”

It sounds like people were leaving John’s ministry to go follow Jesus, and these particular disciples of John didn’t like it. You can hear the judgmental tone in their words. It’s like they’re asking John the Baptist, “What are you going to do about this?” And as we’ve already read through the rest of the passage, John’s response to the dwindling of his ministry is to celebrate. Here we see a clear distinction between how John the Baptist reacts and how his disciples react. Why the difference?

If an accountant teaches his clients how they can easily do their own taxes and get their biggest return and then all those clients start doing their own taxes and don’t give him their business anymore—for one, that was probably not a great business decision—but how the accountant is going to feel about it depends on why he taught them how to do their taxes in the first place: was it to benefit him or to benefit them?

John the Baptist and his disciples each had a different why behind their work. His disciples saw what they did as an end in itself, but John saw his work as ending with Jesus. When their ministry grew, his disciples viewed it as a success. When it shrank, they saw it as a problem. But John defined success by how well he pointed to the Messiah.

The truth is, it’s much easier for us all to be like John’s disciples when we think about our own work. We tend to define success in our careers or our projects or our aspirations not too much differently than the rest of the world defines success—is it growing, is it profitable, are you happy? But then what’s the point of being a Christian in the workplace? Is God just supposed to be like this little turbo boost that strengthens our own performance and accomplishments?

If that’s the case, then when our work isn’t going well, that kind of mindset leads us to assume that God’s not in it. Maybe he’s not happy with us, or maybe we’re not praying enough, or we don’t have enough faith, or we need to make a change. But at the center of each of those hypothetical statements is us. We might use spiritual language, but our approach to work could still be very secular.

And that results in the anxiety you see from John’s disciples here. As long as the work you do is primarily for you or even for your family, then you’ll find yourself a slave to your own performance and accomplishments. When you’re struggling, your job feels like a weight around your neck. But even when you’re doing well, the pressure’s still there to either keep it up or do even more so you can climb the ladder higher.

John the Baptist shows us that Jesus offers us a better why for our work. Our jobs don’t have to be viewed exclusively through the lens of our performance or our accomplishments. What if we viewed the success of how we worked through the ways in which we glorified our Savior?

Not just in telling people about him, but letting the work he’s done for us and in us shape the way we work in the world. It takes humility to see our jobs as being able to glorify Jesus even when they’re not going well. But when our work is for him, then our joy will be full when he’s magnified in it.

John’s disciples were concerned about the effectiveness of their ministry, but when John begins to respond, he expands the conversation beyond just their work to every part of their lives. Let’s look at verse 27.

John 3:27 ESV

²⁷ John answered, “A person cannot receive even one thing unless it is given him from heaven.

That’s a big statement. In the immediate context, John’s pointing directly at his ministry. Yes, he might have put in the work. Yes, he might have been faithful. But his ministry was not his own. It belonged to God. It was for God, and it was given to him by God. So if God wanted to take away what was always his in the first place, praise be to God.

That’s easy for us to see that when it relates to John’s ministry that was preparing people for the Messiah. It’s easy for us to see Jesus come on the scene and think, “Yeah, John, God gave you that ministry, and so if it’s reached it’s end now as Jesus’ ministry begins, then that’s a good thing. But John the Baptist doesn’t limit verse 27 to just his ministry. He’s much more all inclusive: “A person cannot receive even one thing unless it is given him from heaven.”

My kids can’t earn much on their own at this stage in their lives. Oliver’s 3 and Nora’s 1. They eat the food that we make, they wear the clothes that we buy, they sleep in the house we’ve provided. Oliver might even get some candy after doing a small chore around the house, but both the candy and the responsibility were gifts from his parents. The things they have they have because they were given to them.

There’s a reason the Bible continually depicts God as our Father and his people as his children. We are dependent on him, and everything we receive comes from him. I can give Ollie TV time, and I can take it away. It’s my TV. But when he focuses too much on the things he has or the things he doesn’t, then he tends to see me as either helping him or getting in his way.

And I think we can treat God the same way. If we’re not humbly acknowledging that everything we have belongs to God, then when we get more of what we want we might thank him, but when we lose the things we want we might critique him. If it all depends on us, then we bear the burden of maintaining it. But if it all comes from the Lord, then we can rest in his sovereign grace as we faithfully work within it. I don’t ask Ollie to provide for himself. I ask him to trust me and enjoy life with me.

That invitation to humbly rest in the sovereignty of God is part of what makes the gospel so sweet. When we see ourselves through the lens of what we’ve accomplished, then we’ll either be puffed up or defeated—prideful for how we’ve performed better than others or ashamed at how we fall short of others.

But when we see ourselves through the lens of what Christ has accomplished for us, then we can view everything we have—whether that feels like a lot or a little—we can view everything we have as grace from him and use everything we have to bring glory to him.

But bringing him glory is only good news if you think Jesus is worth it. And that’s the last truth John the Baptist draws out as he continues to describe a life that’s humble in Christ: it’s enjoying the fact that our purpose is to celebrate Jesus. Let’s continue now in verses 28 and 29.

John 3:28–29 ESV

²⁸ You yourselves bear me witness, that I said, ‘I am not the Christ, but I have been sent before him.’ ²⁹ The one who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom’s voice. Therefore this joy of mine is now complete.

John is as clear as he can be with his disciples. He is not the Christ. He cannot pay for anyone’s sin; he cannot bring anyone from spiritual death to life like Jesus was talking with Nicodemus about earlier in John 3. But John does know his role. He knows his purpose, and he describes it like the ancient equivalent of a best man attending a wedding.

Does the best man get the bride? Maybe in some rom-coms but no, he wouldn’t be doing his job very well as a friend of the groom if he tried to take the bride for himself. John’s telling his disciples that the people he’s been ministering to aren’t his. He’s not preparing them for himself. He’s preparing the bride for the groom.

And just like a good best man, his greatest joy isn’t in the preparation, it’s in seeing the fulfillment. Like the middle of verse 29 says, it’s when he hears the grooms voice and knows the day is finally here. It’s in witnessing the wedding of the people he loves and being thankful for the small part he got to play in it.

How much different would your life look if you saw yourself less as the groom and more as the best man? Less in how people were helping accomplish your purposes and more in how you could be used in accomplishing Christ’s purposes? Less in trying to be the center of attention and more in trying to point to Christ as the center of attention?

Lots of people experience some pressure when they’re getting married. It’s a big deal. When you’re officiating a wedding, it feels like a different kind of pressure. You don’t want to skip a part of the ceremony or say something stupid. Everybody’s kinda following your lead.

But do you know who tends to look like the most relaxed people at a wedding? The people who have some of the most fun? It’s the groomsmen. Because they don’t have to stress out about much. Maybe the best man is in charge of the rings, but they’re mainly there just to celebrate their friend getting married. The focus is on him, and so they’re freed up to enjoy the process.

That’s the life of the Christian. The weight of our salvation is on Jesus, so we get to celebrate him as he takes his bride. That’s a blessing we get to humbly participate in, not a burden we have to continuously earn, and it’s why John the Baptist can look at the ministry of Jesus across the river and say, “this joy of mine is now complete. He must increase, but I must decrease.”

And that’s exactly what John does next as he pivots from his humiliation to Christ’s exaltation. He says that,

• Jesus is above all things,

• He tells us all about God, and

• He is the source of eternal life.

In verse 31, he starts with the superiority of Jesus. Look with me at the verse. He says,

John 3:31 ESV

³¹ He who comes from above is above all. He who is of the earth belongs to the earth and speaks in an earthly way. He who comes from heaven is above all.

Twice he describes Jesus as “above all”, and the logic is pretty simple: Jesus comes from heaven, so he’s greater than everything under heaven. John’s ministry might speak helpfully in an earthly way, but his words will always need to bow to the Word, which is what Jesus is called way back in the beginning of the gospel of John.

Central to John the Baptist’s point here is that he can be joyful about Jesus increasing and himself decreasing because there’s nothing greater than Jesus. Which means that you will struggle to magnify Jesus in your life if deep down you value something as greater than him.

I love being healthy. I love the energy from eating right and not feeling bloated… but I love ice cream more. And so I’m cool with trying to limit my dinner portions, and the night can go really well… until I remember there’s some Tillamook Campfire Peanut Butter in our freezer. That battle’s lost before it even started.

We all have things like that in our lives. Things that can subtly (or not so subtly) compete with our affections for our Savior. “Jesus, I want to honor you with my life… as long as you don’t ask me to give you this… as long as you don’t ask me to change that.”

But the gospel isn’t about making you surrender your favorite things; it’s about savoring Jesus as the greatest thing. He’s above all. That’s what makes him worthy of our worship, and it’s why our worship is a key part of us becoming more like him. If you’re wanting to put to death a certain kind of sin in your life or you’re wanting to grow in a particular area of your character—the path to changing isn’t just by trying to do bad things less; it’s by seeing Jesus as greater and desiring him even more.

Because when we see Jesus, we behold God. He tells us all about God because he is fully God. Let’s keep reading, starting in verse 32.

John 3:32–35 ESV

³² He bears witness to what he has seen and heard, yet no one receives his testimony. ³³ Whoever receives his testimony sets his seal to this, that God is true. ³⁴ For he whom God has sent utters the words of God, for he gives the Spirit without measure. ³⁵ The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hand.

Because Jesus comes from heaven, because he’s above all, his testimony about God is fully true. He is the Word of God, sent by the love of God, to restore us in relationship with God. That means that believing what he says about God is the same as believing God and not believing Jesus is the same as rejecting God.

According to verse 34, the words of Jesus are the very words of God. So, I want to be clear here: there is no better word; there is no other word about God that comes from anywhere else than beholding Jesus. In the opening verses of the book of Hebrews, the author makes this incredibly clear:

Hebrews 1:1–4 ESV

¹ Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, ² but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. ³ He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, ⁴ having become as much superior to angels as the name he has inherited is more excellent than theirs.

Jesus is the pinnacle of prophecy, and he’s the radiance of God’s glory. So, no feeling, no spiritual experience, no new method of ministry will reveal more of God to you than what has already been revealed in the person and work of Jesus. It’s really easy in our community here on the Northshore to desire—even sincerely—but to desire a fresh “word” from God.

But if that’s you here this morning, I want to encourage you: Jesus is enough. He hasn’t become stale. You don’t need to experience God in a new way for you to keep growing. The strength for the Christian’s life is the same as the start of our Christian faith, and it’s the final truth here in our passage that can help us increasingly exalt Christ as we continue to revisit it: Jesus is the source of eternal life. Whether you’re a Christian here this morning or not, what we all need is the gospel of Jesus. Look with me one more time at verse 36.

John 3:36 ESV

³⁶ Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.

Scripture consistently describes us as spiritually needy and Jesus as the source of God’s provision. We don’t have to look to our performance or our effort or our intentions for being made right with God or growing to better reflect the character of God. Our only hope for eternal life after rebelling from the God who created us is who Jesus is and what he’s done on our behalf and in our place.

He’s lived the sinless life we couldn’t. On the cross, he took on the justice that was owed to us. In his resurrection, he defeated death, so we could experience his life. And in his ascension back to heaven, he became the ruler that lovingly leads us in all things.

Just like John the Baptist’s reply to his disciples: humbling ourselves and exalting Jesus is all we need to find our joy completed in life. He must increase, but I must decrease. Let’s pray.