Ep. 02
Chris Simpson continues the John series in John 1:19-28, where a delegation of priests and temple assistants is sent from Jerusalem to interrogate John the Baptist. John has been preaching up and down the Jordan, calling people to make major changes in their lives, to be baptised and to receive forgiveness. He has become the celebrity preacher of the moment, and the religious establishment has noticed. The delegation is not friendly — it is almost like a trial, with John questioned like a witness by the barrister for the other side.
The question they put to him is “who are you?” — and Chris notes the irony that the passage is not directly about Jesus at all, yet John’s answers help us answer the same question for ourselves. John knows who he is partly by knowing who he is not: not the Messiah, not Elijah, not the Prophet. Chris observes how hard they are trying to pin a label on him, and how firmly he refuses it — an identity handed to us by other people either leaves us with imposter syndrome or grinds us down. John has accepted instead the label God gave him.
Chris works through the three things John does say about himself. He is a voice shouting in the wilderness, “clear the way for the Lord’s coming” — belonging to something far bigger than himself, and pointing at Jesus rather than at himself. In a celebrity culture that says “look at me”, John emphatically says “look at him”. He is a baptiser in water: pressed on his credentials, he answers that he simply does human things by human means, and if anything important happens through them it is down to God, not to him. And he is unworthy even to untie the strap of Jesus’s sandal — but unworthy compared to him, not unworthy in a vacuum. Chris uses that to separate healthy humility from self-pity, quoting C.S. Lewis that humility is self-forgetfulness: not thinking less of yourself, but thinking about yourself less.
Two threads tie it together. First, the delegation knew the Scriptures inside out and still missed the one standing in front of them — being a believer is not about knowing the answers but about being surprised by the God who is there. Second, the big deal is not about us. Chris illustrates with graves decorated as shrines to a football club: whatever ends up in first place becomes what defines you, and the dominant godless materialism of the West gives deeply inadequate answers to the question of identity. His point is not that football or family are wrong, but that they do not belong in first place — put first things first and second things get healthier.
Bible passages
Key points
Calls to action
Watch the video: https://youtu.be/qBkUZqOsx64
