Are You the One?

Imagine how Jesus felt.

A short while before,

this mighty prophet John was announcing Jesus to the world,

“Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”

“I’m not worthy to even carry his sandals.”

But now this same prophet has all but given up on Jesus.

John is sitting in prison.

He’s had a lot of time to think and he can see

that Jesus is not coming up to his expectations.

What kind of Messiah is he? Where is his power?

If he really is the one who is to baptize us

with the Holy Spirit and with fire,

why isn’t he doing it?

“Oh, he may be out there preaching and healing,

but nothing seems to change.

Life goes on like it always did.

This nation is as corrupt as ever.

And I’m sitting here in prison at Herod’s mercy.

He’s going to kill me.

I know he’s going to kill me.

And what’s Jesus doing about it?”

So John sends a message to Jesus,

“Are you the one who is to come? Or do we look for another?”

Explain yourself!

Now, before we get too impatient with John,

we’d better understand that we’re in no position to judge him.

Most of us, in our hearts,

have asked that same question a thousand times.

“Are you the One who is to come or do we look for another?”

The proof that many of us are still asking that question is in our lack of commitment.

If we really believed that Jesus was the Messiah,

our Messiah,

our Lord,

it would show in the way we live,

the way we think,

the way we talk,

the way we use our money,

the way we fit in with each other.

The truth is

that most of us are at least as mixed up as John the Baptist was

when it comes to figuring out who Jesus is

and what we owe him.

“Are you the one who is to come or do we look for another?”

Jesus was disappointed with John’s question.

Disappointed not because he was looking for compliments,

but because John, this awesome prophet,

this holy man, didn’t get it!

He didn’t get it!

He was missing the whole thing.

As they went away Jesus began to speak to the crowds concerning John. “What did you go out into the wilderness to behold? A reed shaken by the wind? Why then did you go out? To see a man clothed in soft raiment? Behold, those who wear soft raiment are in kings houses. Why then did you go out? To see a prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. This is he of whom it is written,

‘Behold I send my messenger before thy face, who shall

prepare thy way before thee.’

Truly I say to you, among those born of women there has risen no one greater than John the Baptist; yet he who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.” (Matthew 11: 7-11)

Why is the least person in the kingdom of heaven greater

than this awesome prophet, John?

Because the least person in God’s kingdom knows who Jesus is

and John doesn’t.

It all comes down to whether or not we know who Jesus is.

That’s why Jesus nailed his own disciples with this question.

Some time after John was killed by Herod, Jesus asked his disciples,

“Who do people say that I am?”

“Some say you’re John the Baptist alive from the dead.

Others say you’re Elijah or Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”

“But who do you say I am?”

And I’m looking for an answer, not just from your mouth,

but from your heart,

from your life.

Peter got it right.

He got it right, not because he had the brains to figure it out.

No human brain can figure this one out.

He got it right because it was revealed to him.

“You’re the Messiah, the Son of the Living God.”

That confession by Peter was the light that guided him the rest of his days.

“You’re the Messiah, the Son of the Living God.”

Each one of us at this moment is living a life that says one of two things:

Your life - my life - either says,

“You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God.”

or it says,

“Are you the one who is to come or do we look for another?”

If it’s, “Are you the one…?” notice how Jesus handled it.

When John’s disciples came to him with that insulting question,

“Are you the one or aren’t you?”

Jesus could have sent back a stinging rebuke,

“Tell John he better watch himself.

What kind of prophet is he if he can’t even figure out who I am!”

Instead,

Jesus sends back a message which will be John’s salvation,

if he’ll only take hold of it.

“Go tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive

their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and

the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the

poor have good news preached to them. And blessed

is he who takes no offense at me.” (Matthew 11: 4b-6)

If John will only open his heart as he has called thousands to open their hearts, the Spirit of God will show him again what he once knew.

The Spirit of God will retore his vision

so that he will be able to say once more,

“Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the

sin of the world.”

“You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God.”

See, Jesus didn’t beat John over the head because of his doubts.

There’s no point in beating people over the head

for their weak commitment,

their lack of discipline,

their on again - off again connection with the Body of Christ

as long as their inmost heart is saying,

“Are you the one who is to come or should I look for another?”

There will be no real commitment.

There will be no blazing vision.

There will be no faith,

no hope,

very little charity.

First, these questions have to be answered.

Who is Jesus for me?

What does he have to do with my life?

Have I ever really received what he has to give?

Had John the Baptist ever really received what Jesus had to give?

Yet, John the Baptist, sitting in prison,

was one step ahead of most of us.

He didn’t just let that question

lie on his soul and drain away his faith.

He brought it out into the light and spoke it.

“Are you the one who is to come or is there another?”

In other words…

If Jesus is not the one to guide my life and give it meaning,

why am I wasting my time

doing the few little things I am doing in his direction?

I might as well forget the whole thing and look elsewhere.

But if he is the one,

why am I dabbling?

Why is Jesus getting the leftovers of my time,

and thought,

and strength?

For most of us

it takes a crisis of some kind to get us to deal with this issue.

We chug along doing our thing…

working,

shopping,

paying our bills,

watching t.v.,

sleeping,

without giving much thought to what it’s all about.

“Oh yeah, church, Jesus, and all that stuff.

It won’t do any harm.

Maybe it adds a little something to my life.

It’s good for the children.

I’ll be part of it as long as it doesn’t interfere with my program.”

Then one day something happens that rattles my cage.

I’m not so sure of myself anymore.

Where do I turn?

It happened to John when they locked him up in prison.

It can happen to us in a thousand different ways.

And it doesn’t have to be a big tragedy.

It can be a few words spoken by a stranger

that go off like a bomb in my head.

Suddenly, I realize that I need help.

“Where do I turn?”

“Are you the one, Lord?”

“Can I depend on you?”

“If I get serious and really start to follow you,

where will you take me?”

Notice that Jesus answered John’s messengers,

not with some vague theory,

but with what they could hear and see.

“Go tell John what you hear and see.”

You’re looking at people undergoing supernatural change!

You’re looking at the kingdom of God.

“The blind receive their sight and the lame walk. Lepers

are cleansed and the deaf hear. The dead are raised

up and the poor have the good news preached to them.

And blessed is he who takes no offence at me.”

Maybe, we haven’t seen the blind receive their sight - yet.

Maybe, we haven’t seen the dead raised up - yet.

But if we really want to know who Jesus is,

and if we approach him with a contrite heart,

we will begin to hear and see things

that will confirm to us who Jesus is.

We will see heaven opened.

We will hear the Word as we never heard it before.

We will see our own chains fall away.

And we will know first hand, by the revelation of God himself,

that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of the Living God.

And once we know that,

know it in our very bones,

our commitment to Jesus Christ will be real.

And it will show in the way we live.

“Truly I say to you, among those born of women there has risen no one

greater than John the Baptist; yet he who is least in the kingdom of God

is greater than he.”

Because he or she who is least in the kingdom

knows who I am.

Do you know who I am?