Matt 3:17 And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”
I have been reading about John the Baptist lately. He wasn’t Baptist he just baptized people in the river and therefore got the name. He was the cousin of Jesus and was filled with the Holy Spirit from the womb. This was not a natural occurrence then only prophets had the Spirit in them or on them prior to this. He was a prophet and was a very outspoken man of God.
John knew he had a mission which was to prepare the way for the Messiah. He knew that the Messiah was Jesus. When John baptized Jesus in the Jordan River the sky opened up and God spoke and said “this is My Son whom I love and in Him am well pleased.” John heard this and knew for sure Jesus was the Messiah.
Then when John was being his passionate outspoken self, he winds up speaking about the king and his sin in front of everyone and landed in prison. I am sure this is not what he thought his life should be like because after all he had a mission from God. While John was in prison he began to doubt.
He sent his disciples to ask Jesus, “hey, are you really the one we have been looking for or shall we look for another?” Luke 7:19 paraphrased. Basically I think that he may have felt like he should not be in prison since he still had work to do for God and if Jesus really was who he knew that he was then why would He not come and rescue him?
Have you ever felt like John? God, this is so not how I pictured my life. What on earth is going on and why aren’t You rescuing me so I can continue to work for You?
Jesus told John’s disciples that the blind see, the lame walk and the dead are raised… blessed are the ones who do not fall away because of Me. Then He went on to say there is no one on the face of the earth greater than John. But the very least one in the kingdom of Heaven is greater than John. This means that John was an amazing prophet who did prepare the way for Jesus Christ to come. John was absolutely sold out in his mission and ministry. But everyone who accepts Jesus as their Lord is just as important to Him as John.
It also showed me that if John who was filled with the Holy Spirit and heard the very voice of God and grew up with Jesus could doubt I could too. Anytime our focus gets on our circumstances we end up doing just that; doubting God’s plan, that He has our best interest in mind, doubting His absolute goodness in every situation which goes back to Genesis 3 and that darn snake!!
I just want to let you know that all people go through stuff. We have to make a daily if not momentarily choice to focus on the good and not on our circumstances. It is our nature. But when we choose to focus on Him our feelings will eventually follow suit. We also have to remember if we choose to stay in our fickle feelings we can always make a change and choose to focus on Jesus who is infinitely bigger than all of our life’s problems!