What did John the Baptist truly understand about his cousin Jesus and his divine mission? Bob Wilkin and Ken Yates explore this question, discussing prophetic insights and understanding of major events like Jesus’ death and resurrection. They also delve into whether John the Baptist was privy to the plan of salvation and how it was to unfold, challenging common theological perspectives. Tune in for a robust dialogue filled with scriptural insights and thoughtful analysis.
00:07:51 Question about John the Baptist’s Understanding
00:12:59 Closing Remarks and Future Episode Teaser
SPEAKER 01 :
The following is a listener-supported ministry from the Grace Evangelical Society. How much did John the Baptist know about his cousin, Jesus? And what did Jesus mean when he said to his disciples in John 20, Receive the Holy Spirit? We welcome you to Grace In Focus. Thank you for joining us. This is a radio broadcast and podcast ministry of the Grace Evangelical Society. Find out more about us at faithalone.org We want you to subscribe to our blogs which include the same kind of information you hear on this program but in written form. They come to you daily. Find out more about them at our website faithalone.org We also want to let you know our registration is still open for our annual national conference coming up in just a week or so May 19th through the 22nd. Get registered today. We’d love to have you with us. Register at faithalone.org. Now with today’s question and answer discussion, here’s Bob Wilkin along with Ken Yates.
SPEAKER 02 :
Welcome to Grace in Focus. You’re here with Bob Wilkin and Ken Yates, and we are answering questions that have been sent in by our listeners, and they’re always really, really good questions. Amen. We got a question here that deals with towards the end of the Gospel of John. And Bob, why don’t you tell us who asked the question and what the question is?
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, and I think you’ve actually partially answered this question, you and Catherine, on one of the podcasts. It’s from Charlie, and Charlie’s asking about John 20, 22. Now, you discussed John 20, 23, which was the part about if you retain the sins of any, they’re retained, and if you forgive the sins of any, they’re forgiven. But the other part of the question is, what about verse 22? And verse 22, I’ve got a red-letter edition, and it says, And when he had said this… He breathed on them and said to them, receive the Holy Spirit. Now, I’m sure, Ken, as you’re aware, this has led to lots of interest among commentators and theologians, right? Because the church didn’t receive the Spirit until the day of Pentecost, right? which was 10 days after Jesus ascended into heaven. And so this is at least 10 days before they were going to receive the Spirit. So what does this mean? Well, there are different ways to explain it. You and I were talking in the break. I think we both take the view that this is actually looking to the day of Pentecost, right?
SPEAKER 02 :
Yeah, and we also talked about it that people take the view that they had some—even here, again, whether it was 10 days or 20 days or whatever it was, they had some kind of special enablement with the Holy Spirit. And I’m assuming that those who take that view would say it was something like in the Old Testament, when the Holy Spirit would come upon people to perform some kind of task or But the Holy Spirit, I’m talking about even believers, the Holy Spirit could leave. You know, the Holy Spirit would come upon a person to fulfill a task, but it wasn’t a permanent indwelling. Right. So some would say that this is what Jesus was doing. He breathed on them and said, receive the Holy Spirit. And they received the Holy Spirit in that temporary, would we say, sense here in John chapter 20.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, and the problem I have with that is we don’t see any evidence of that at all in the Gospels or in the book of Acts. We don’t find that the apostles are out there preaching Jesus in the temple. We don’t find them out there evangelizing. Right, before Pentecost.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yeah, before Acts 2. And so if the disciples here did receive some kind of special enablement of the Holy Spirit temporarily, what was it? That’s your point, Bob.
SPEAKER 03 :
Right. And here’s the other part. Notice it says he breathed on them. and said, receive the Holy Spirit? Well, the word for breath and the word for spirit are related. And you’ll remember that when Adam became a living, breathing human, God breathed on him the breath of life, right? Right. Well, here, Jesus is basically instituting a new age in which believers will be permanently indwelt By the Holy Spirit. And so it’s kind of a new creation. In fact, didn’t Paul say, if anyone is in Christ, new creation? There is a new creation, or he is part of a new creation, something like that. Sure. So it’s a new creation. And so when he breathes on them, it seems to me he’s breathing part of the new creation, which is the church age. And the church age, Paul calls a new man at various places. And he couldn’t breathe on them on the day of Pentecost because Jesus wasn’t in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost, right? Right.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yeah, so Bob and I both take this as, I think you use the word proleptic. Yeah. That’s how smart people talk. We just say this is, people from Kentucky like me, it’s looking forward to what’s going to happen in Acts chapter 2. We might say it’s a prophecy. Breathe the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit’s going to come upon you, is what Jesus is doing here. And it is talking about Acts chapter 2 in both Bob’s and my opinion. I’m kind of curious, Bob, in your experience, what do you think – the majority opinion is when you read the commentaries on the Gospel of John?
SPEAKER 03 :
I don’t remember seeing anybody that said this was proleptic. Oh, wow! I remember them all saying this is temporary enablement. I could be wrong, but that’s my recall when I wrote on John for our Grace New Testament commentary. Let’s put it this way. That is a very prevalent view that this is temporary enablement.
SPEAKER 02 :
So I’m assuming that they would say something like you and I just said a few minutes ago. Well, we don’t see anything like that. I’m assuming the people who take that view would say it was something like. OK, I’m about to leave. It’s going to be a time of difficulty as you’re waiting. And now the spirit is going to give you strength for this coming day or something like that. You know, I don’t know. I’m just guessing how they would define that.
SPEAKER 03 :
It seems pretty vague.
SPEAKER 02 :
Right.
SPEAKER 03 :
What they’re saying. Yeah. You know, I mean, it’s kind of like jello that you nailed to the wall. It doesn’t stick. Right. I agree.
SPEAKER 02 :
So Bob and I have solved this. It’s prophetic.
SPEAKER 03 :
Once and for all. Prophetic. All right.
SPEAKER 01 :
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SPEAKER 03 :
I got another question for the—we got about five minutes left, so let’s do another question. Okay, Ken? Sure. It’s from Jacob, and it’s a super easy question. I know you’re going to love this one. He says, how much do you think John the Baptist understood about the death and burial and resurrection of Jesus when he said, behold the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world? John 129 and I think John 135. What does he mean when he says, behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world? Is he talking about Jesus? the cross of Christ? Does he know he’s going to the cross? Does he know he’s going to be buried in Joseph of Arimathea’s tomb? Does he know he’s going to rise from the dead on the third day? How much does he know?
SPEAKER 02 :
Yeah, that’s really the question here. How much did John the Baptist understand? I remember when I was in seminary, I had a professor who said, he was talking about this, who said that It was that he knew that the Messiah was going to bring in a righteous kingdom. He’s going to remove sin from the world. And so he knew that Jesus was the Christ. He knew that he would have a righteous kingdom. Right now, Israel was not righteous. John the Baptist was calling the nation to repentance. But he understood that Jesus was going to bring in righteousness based upon the Old Testament prophets about the coming kingdom.
SPEAKER 03 :
And you know what I’m going to say to that?
SPEAKER 02 :
What?
SPEAKER 03 :
I’m going to say thank you for playing our game today. We have a nice parting gift for you because that’s wrong.
SPEAKER 02 :
That’s wrong. Now, the next question, though, is we have friends at GES who think that even – you know, Bible-believing dispensationalists sell John the Baptist short. Because I think most dispensationalists would take the position that John did not understand the cross, or he certainly didn’t have a real clear picture of it. And we would say something like, John the Baptist knew that Jesus was going to take care of the sin issue, but he didn’t know all the details. How would you word that?
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, he may not have known how he was going to do it, but he knew that he was going to do it. And he knew it was more than just he’s going to bring in a righteous kingdom. He was actually going to deal with the sin problem by removing sin as a barrier so that people could be born again simply by faith. But that’s different than saying he understood that this was going to be death by the cross. He may have, we don’t know. What we do know, and by the way, Jacob mentions it in his question, in Luke 18 and Matthew 16, when Jesus said, I’m going to the cross, and I’m going to Jerusalem, and I’m going to suffer, and I’m going to be mistreated, and I’m going to be killed, and I’m going to rise on the third day, Peter takes him aside and says, God forbid it, Lord, this will never happen to you. None of the disciples believed Jesus was going to die. So if John the Baptist believes that, he’s the only one, with the possible exception of Mary, because remember Simeon had told Mary when the 40-day-old Jesus was brought into the temple that there was going to be this piercing and this pain that she was going to experience and her son was going to experience. So Mary may have gotten it, but in any case, I would say it’s unlikely— That John the Baptist knew the how? He might have. If so, he was different than the 12, because the 12 didn’t know the how.
SPEAKER 02 :
And it’s certainly possible that God revealed that to John the Baptist. And so he did know it. But one of the questions is, do you believe, Bob, that he had a crisis of faith right before he was executed when he sent his disciples to say, hey, are you the one or should we look for another?
SPEAKER 03 :
You know, I just saw an article by John Niemela, and he argued that the question was for his disciples who were having doubts.
SPEAKER 01 :
Exactly.
SPEAKER 03 :
Not for him. And I found that compelling. And by the way, I was doing some research on Logos, and I came across another commentator that took the same view. Oh, wow. So I think that’s the correct view, that John the Baptist was still certain of his eternal destiny. He still knew Jesus was the one, but he asked that for his disciples.
SPEAKER 02 :
For their benefit.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, for their benefit. But we’re out of time here, and we so appreciate each of you for tuning in, as always. And until next time, let’s keep grace in focus. Amen.
SPEAKER 01 :
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