Luke 7:24-28 - What did you go to see?

7:24-26

Having spoken to John’s disciples, Jesus now turns to the crowd. They would have witnessed the interaction and wondered what was going on. Notice that Jesus gets the crowd to focus on their own reaction to Him. We like to consider whether other people are right or wrong, setting ourselves up as judges. We need to realise that we are the ones who need to be judged. We need to assess the goodness or otherwise of our own reactions before worrying about other people.

John the Baptist had lived a very austere lifestyle. Why had they gone out to see John? Because they wanted to see a prophet, they wanted to hear the word of God. Now that John was in prison they may have wondered if he was indeed a prophet, but Jesus is reminding them that prophets do not live in palaces.

7:27,28

Jesus reminds them of Malachi 3:1, John was the messenger who was to prepare the way for the Messiah. John was the greatest prophet. Why? Because he actually immediately foretold the coming of the Messiah, it wasn’t something that would happen in the distant future, but something that was imminent, and happened in his lifetime.

Why does Jesus speak of “those born of women”? This is because He is contrasting it with those born of the Spirit. It is an even greater thing to be in the kingdom of God than to be a prophet. We need to realise that when Jesus is speaking of “greater” He is not speaking about the moral worthiness of the individuals. He is not saying that John himself was necessarily a better person that Elijah or Isaiah etc. Now is He saying that we as Christians are better people than John the Baptist. What He is saying is that we have something greater, and John the Baptist had a greater message than wll who had gone before because it was about to be realised. And we who are in the kingdom are now beginning to experience the fullness of God’s plans.