He Must Increase, but I Must Decrease

And this is the testimony of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, “Who are you?” He confessed, and did not deny, but confessed, “I am not the Christ.” And they asked him, “What then? Are you Elijah?” He said, “I am not.” “Are you the Prophet?” And he answered, “No.” So they said to him, “Who are you? We need to give an answer to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?” He said, “I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way of the Lord,’ as the prophet Isaiah said.”

John 1:19-23

John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness to point the way to Jesus, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins (Mark 1:4, Matthew 3:2, Luke 3:4). When Jerusalem and all Judea and all the region about the Jordan were going out to him, they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins (Matthew 3:5-6). When the Pharisees and Sadducees came, he called them a brood of vipers, and said, “Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?” (Matthew 3:7, Luke 3:7). The Pharisees then asked him, as we read in this week’s passage, “Who are you?” John answered that he was not the Christ, nor Elijah, nor “the prophet,” but rather the voice of one preparing the way of the Lord.

One thing in particular stands out: John’s humility of identity. John the Baptist said that in relation to Jesus, he himself was so lowly that he considered himself unworthy of performing the lowest service of the low for him, that of untying a sandal strap on a dirty, dusty foot. The Pharisees, asking him, “Who do you think you are, telling everyone to repent?” had from him the response, “I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness.” John does not consider himself someone important, just a voice to prepare the way of the Lord. Later in the Gospel of John (3:30), John the Baptist says about Jesus and himself, “He must increase, but I must decrease.”

John conceives of himself as a non-entity. Jesus’s statements about John, though, are the opposite! “Truly, I say to you, among those born of women there has arisen no one greater than John the Baptist. Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he…For all the Prophets and the Law prophesied until John, and if you are willing to accept it, he is Elijah who is to come” (Matthew 11:11, 13-14). As Jesus says to his disciples later in Gospel of Matthew, “The greatest among you shall be your servant. Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted” (Matthew 23:11). Jesus’s words about John, though, seem to pose a problem for us – John says clearly, “I am not Elijah” and Jesus says, “John is Elijah.” What does this mean? Besides the question, “Actually how could John the Baptist be Elijah?” did Jesus and John the Baptist contradict each other?

To answer this, we have to understand what the Pharisees’ delegation meant when they asked John if he was Elijah, or “the prophet.” They had in mind two Old Testament passages. The first is Malachi 4:5-6:

“Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes. And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction” (Malachi 4:5-6).  

This passage from Malachi was actually referenced even earlier regarding John the Baptist: when the angel of the Lord visited Zechariah, he said, “And he will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God, and he will go before Him in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to make ready for the Lord a people prepared” (Luke 1:16-17). Clearly, then, John the Baptist was the Elijah of Malachi’s prophecy. Why, then, does John say that he is not? It seems that the Jews of the time expected a literal return of Elijah in the flesh (check your commentary of choice – I referred to J. C. Ryle’s Expository Thoughts on John). Elijah did not die but was taken up into heaven by chariots of fire, and the literal interpretation of this passage is that Elijah himself will come back before the final judgment. John therefore simply denies that he is Elijah returning literally and bodily.

When the Jews asked John if he was “the prophet,” they referred to a promise that God gave the people of Israel through Moses: “I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers. And I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him” (Deuteronomy 18:18). Like the return Elijah, the Jews also expected the coming of this foretold “prophet like Moses.” Christians now see this as a reference to Christ. Stephen quotes this passage in his speech to the Jews before his martyrdom, and John the Gospel writer refers to “the Prophet” again in John 6:14 and 7:40 in connection with Jesus. John the Baptist again told the Jews that he was not that person – the prophet like Moses.

John the Baptist’s mission was not to claim self-importance. About himself, he said, “I am a voice.” He could have told the Pharisees, “Well, I’m not literally Elijah, but I’ve come in the spirit and power of Elijah!” But he does not. John simply says, “There’s another coming. Wait for Him. Repent of your sins, and be ready.” John had a mind and heart only for Christ. If we heed the Baptist’s call, if we confess our sins, if we humble ourselves in the sight of the Lord and “know nothing but Jesus Christ and Him crucified,” then He will lift us up.