Study inJohn’s Gospel

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Rejecting RivalryChap 3v22-36

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IntroductionWhat are your views on performance charts? They are often used to help us measure one school against another, one hospital against another, one company against another and so on. Many have questioned the value of such charts. In some cases so much time is spent measuring performance that there is less and less time available for the worker to do his/her work. One commentator of contemporary society writes;

“One of the major causes of stress is combative competition - more accurately, envy. Rooted in a lack of self-esteem, it grows in the soil of comparisons and blossoms in noxious thorns of desire for what others have or achieve”.

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IntroductionWhen we are encouraged to ask how are we performing compared with so and so… stress levels rise and envy begins to blossom. This seems to have been true of John the Baptist’s disciples. Picture the scene at the River Jordan. On one side Jesus, the new preacher has a handful of listeners around him. On the other, John, the long established preacher, has gathered crowds of thousands around him.

But each day sees more and more people drift over to hear the newcomer. Resentment and envy gnaws away in the hearts of John’s supporters, their congregation is disappearing. Their teacher was having to take second place and they didn’t like it!

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IntroductionThe world in which we live wants, the biggest, the best, the tallest etc. In Christian work it is easy to get squeezed into a mind-set that is driven by ‘empire building’ rather than by ‘kingdom building’ and to begin to measure ourselves by the performance of others. So that one church member says to a member of another fellowship,“We managed to get ten new members this month, how many did your church get?”

There is no place for ‘competition’ in Christian service or, for the envy and rivalry that fuels it. It is therefore important to ask, how did John deal with it?

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Responding to RivalryJohn’s response reveals his grasp of the sovereignty of God, ‘a man can receive nothing except it be given him from heaven’ v27. If, the ‘newcomer’ was attracting more followers then, it wasn’t because he was stealing them away from John but because God was giving them to the ‘newcomer’.

This belief in the sovereignty of God does not mean that we are free to be lazy in our Christian lives and then blame our lack of achievement upon God.

However, it does mean that whatever the result of our efforts that we see God as the source of all our fruitfulness and so will not be jealous of others through whom God is apparently achieving more.

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Responding to RivalryI was recently asked by a member of another church how many children came to our children’s summer holiday club. They pointed out that ‘only twelve children had come along to theirs’. Now the answer to give to that kind of question should be that we each get the numbers that God wants to give us. Do we see God having that level of control? We should! And when we do, then the whole invidious question of comparisons can be laid aside.

Imagine someone asking Gideon how many men were in the army he was leading against a vast army of Midianites? He replies 300! But that was fine for that was all that God wanted in that situation! We often allow ourselves to be panicked by a value system that does not recognise God’s sovereign control.

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Responding to RivalrySecondly, John was aware of the fact that his was always going to be a supporting role. He describes himself as a ‘friend of the bridegroom’. Now the function of such an individual in the lead up to a marriage is to support and serve the groom. This John saw as his priority and the focus of his service.

When we lose sight of the fact that we are engaged in Christ’s work, and come to think of it as our own then we begin to evaluate and compare our performance with that of others. Pride is then cultivated and we are filled with intense rivalry. The problem is we are attempting to be stars who yearn for the spotlight rather than thesupporting performers God has called us to be.

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Responding to RivalryAn actor commenting on a play in which he had a part said, ‘we rehearsed the most moving love scenes on stage but the jealous rivalry off stage produced real bitterness’. Why? Everyone wanted to be a star, no one wanted to have a supporting role. A successful career was more important than being part of a successful production. The on-stage kiss deteriorated into a bout of hair pulling as soon as the footlights dimmed.

The world's competitive spirit can creep into the church. And we need to ask constantly, are we more concerned with the performance of fellow Christians and how we compare with neighbouring congregations than with the success of Christ’s church?

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Responding to RivalryJohn was not a personal empire builder but a kingdom builder. It was not his success but that of Christ that mattered to him. Without that focus we will constantly fail. There in an amusement park in Monterey, California that has a large barrel 8’0 in diameter and over 30’0 long. It lies on its side and revolves. Visitors are challenged to walk through without falling down. Most people manage 2 or 3 yards before their feet get higher than their centre of gravity. And that happens because their eyes are fixed on how well the people in front of them are performing.

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Responding to RivalryNow, the secret of walking through that barrel is to fix your eyes on the man operating the mechanism at the far end. This gives a true sense of the vertical so that you can adjust the speed of your steps to keep you from falling. “Keep your eyes on the one who runs it!” is the advice that is given.

The same is true in Christian life. We will lose our spiritual balance, if we are concerned about the performance of others, and fail to fix our eyes on the One who runs the show.

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Responding to RivalryThis truth is further emphasised in v30 ‘he must become greater I must become less’. The way to glorify Jesus is to be content with serving in the background. Don’t push yourself forward but instead give the limelight to Jesus; acknowledge that without him you can do nothing cf. Jn. 15v5.

We need to recognise that anything of any value that we appear to have achieved has been done only through his power and his enabling.

If the grape is sweet it is because the vine has nourished it!

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Responding to RivalryWilliam Carey, the father of the modern missionary movement, when he lay in his bed dying turned to a friend and said, ‘When I am gone, don’t talk about William Carey and his accomplishments; talk about William Carey’s Saviour and what he has done.’ Neither Carey nor John the Baptist had any appetite for public recognition! Now it is impossible to resent a fellow Christian and their accomplishments if you’re not competing with them for the limelight.

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The Superiority of JesusNow it is not possible to put Jesus first if you are not absolutely convinced of his complete superiority - and this is made clear in v31ff.

Who is in the best qualified to describe what God is like? Someone who has lived all their life on earth or someone who has come from heaven? If I want to know what Texas is like, I won’t ask someone who has only seen cowboy western films, I will ask a Texan.Similarly, who better to talk about God the Father than the Son, who has spent all eternity with him. Jesus’ superiority is related to his origin. Incidentally, this sets Jesus apart from all other leaders of world religions for only he claimed to be God and to have existed with him before taking upon himself our humanity.

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The Superiority of JesusThe superiority of Jesus is also identified as one who ‘received the Spirit without limit’ v34. In the O.T. we are told of the Spirit of God coming upon certain individuals like judges and prophets, for a brief period of time, and for a particular piece of service, or to deliver a particular communication from God.

However, when talking about Jesus, John’s language is quite different, he received, ‘the Spirit without limit’. Jesus fully understood and could communicate, what was the mind of the Father. And clearly, the Father could guarantee the truth and total reliability of all of Christ’s words.

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The Superiority of JesusOther religious teachers pointed beyond themselves to something higher - Jesus never did! Others pointed down the road to a far off destination. Jesus claimed to be the destination. Others taught that they had some aspects of truth. Jesus claimed to be the truth. Others offered to show the way to God. Jesus insisted he was the way, not least because he was God.

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The Superiority of JesusOne final thing marks out the superiority of Jesus and it is this. Our response to him shapes our destiny! You see whether people are drawn to this preacher or that one, at the end of the day, is inconsequential. Some liked John the Baptist’s plain speaking, frugal lifestyle and bizarre dress sense, others didn’t. The issue was irrelevant.

What mattered was how they responded to Christ, the unique Son, the superior Saviour. Although Jesus was unique, although he was superior that did not guarantee that people would automatically accept him.

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The Superiority of JesusIndeed John has already put down markers for the rejection of Jesus, cf v32 ‘He testifies to what he has seen and heard but no one accepts his testimony’

and earlier in v19 ‘This is the verdict, light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, but will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed.’

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ConclusionIn John the Baptist’s mind, Jesus had no rivals. He was clearly superior because he could do for men what no mere human prophet could do for them.

As Saviour, Jesus remains in a league of his own but the response of many people to him still hangs on the balance.

Have we, like John, put Jesus first in our lives? Do we want to push him and his wishes to the fore and choose to follow him?

Our answer will shape our destiny.