Who Are They Learning to Follow?

One of my favorite Bible characters has always been John the Baptist. There's something fun about a guy who lives in the desert, eats locusts and honey, wears clothes made of camel's hair and addresses at least some of his crowd (who came all the way to hear him, by the way) as "You brood of vipers!" Come on John, tell us how you really feel!

His appearance was foretold in the Old Testament, and he himself could point to Isaiah 40:3 and say, "See there? The Voice? That's me." He was filled with the Spirit before his birth and of him Jesus said, "Among those born of women there is no one greater than John" and "He is the Elijah who was to come." More could be said, but without question John was an important figure.

Despite all of these great things about him, or perhaps because of them, what amazes me most is the humility of John. Nowhere is this better displayed than in John 3:30, "He must become greater; I must become less." I want to analyze the context of this statement and what's going on, because I think it has profound implications for those of us in ministry today.

John said this in response to some critics of Jesus. Their comment was that "he is baptizing, and everyone is going to him." This hits me as, "Hey John, Jesus is cutting in on your action! People used to come to you, now they're going to him!" But this doesn't faze John. In fact, it's already stated in John 1:29-39 that after John repeatedly told his disciples Jesus was "The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world" that they left John and began to follow Jesus. It was his goal that they become followers of Christ.

It's this mindset that is expressed in John's statement, "He must become greater; I must become less." The "must" here is very intriguing to me, because it's the same word Jesus used when He said He "must suffer... must be killed and after three days rise again." This isn't simply something that should be done - it must be done. There's no other way. And for John, it must be that anyone who follows him is ultimately learning to follow Christ.

The very simple reality is that your students will not always be your students. They'll transfer or graduate (or drop out!) and will move on in life. If their walk with God is dependent upon you then they will be in trouble. However, if by following you they've learned to follow Him, then they'll be prepared to continue following wherever He leads for the rest of their life. While you will (hopefully?) always have a special place in their heart, their allegiance must be to Jesus.

This truth has collided with my life on more than one occasion. I had a student leader who decided she needed to step down because she didn't have time to lead and also be faithful with the outreach opportunities God had given her. Another student stepped down from leadership in order to follow God's direction in being a leader somewhere else. In both cases it didn't fit in with my plans, but it was an instance of Jesus calling away one of "my followers" to pursue Him and His plan.

How about you? Are you preparing students to follow Jesus for the long haul? Are they simply relying on you, or are they diving deeper in their relationship with Him? And how will you respond when He calls one of them away from you? Will you rejoice like John, thankful that you were able to point them to the Lamb of God? After all, that's the way it must be.