At this point we need to spend some time to be brought into the New Testament ministry so that we may see this ministry from the beginning to the end of the New Testament. It is crucial for us to see what the New Testament ministry is. We have already pointed out that the New Testament ministry began with John the Baptist. However, we should not consider his ministry a separate, individualistic ministry. The ministry of John the Baptist was a part of the New Testament ministry. It was a service of the New Testament ministry, even the first service of that ministry. We need to look into this ministry in a particular way to pick up a crucial point.
When we come to the Lord’s appraisal of His forerunner’s ministry in Matthew 11, we can see that even that first service, that first part of the New Testament ministry, was a unique ministry. John’s ministry of repentance, the way of repentance, was a very striking ministry that drew the line between the Old Testament and the New Testament. That ministry was a landmark in God’s economy. Nevertheless, John’s ministry should not be considered as a separate, independent, individualistic ministry. If you had such a consideration, you would become what the Gospels call the disciples of John.
In Matthew 9 the disciples of John came to question the Lord Jesus, and they included the Pharisees along with themselves in their question (v. 14). According to Luke 5, it was the Pharisees who did the questioning (v. 33), and according to Mark 2, it seems that the disciples of John and the Pharisees questioned the Lord together (v. 18). Before that time, the Pharisees were one sect, and there was another sect, a heretical sect, called the Sadducees. However, at the time of Matthew 9 the disciples of John became yet another sect. From this we can see that probably not more than two or three years after John began to preach, his service caused trouble and became a rivalry to the Lord’s ministry.
God did not intend that John’s service would become a separate ministry. In God’s intention, John’s service was simply the beginning of the New Testament ministry, a recommending service that initiated the Lord’s ministry. John told us clearly what his ministry was (John 1:23; 3:28-30), but his disciples understood in a wrong way. They thought that their teacher, John the Baptist, was great and that his teaching was unique. They followed him, and they followed his teaching. Perhaps unconsciously and unintentionally, they became a rivalry to the Lord’s ministry. Eventually that preaching became something replacing the Lord’s ministry.
Quite often we fail to recognize the Lord’s sovereignty in the things that happened to John the Baptist. First Herod put John into prison, and then, due to Herod’s indulgence in lust, he had John beheaded. However, we need to realize that for John to be put into prison was sovereign of the Lord, and even for John to be beheaded was sovereign of the Lord. I certainly do not mean to say that God was happy to see John imprisoned, much less to see him beheaded. Nevertheless, we must believe that God is sovereign, and we need to consider soberly why God allowed John to be imprisoned and later beheaded.
The imprisonment and execution of John came about because there was a care for another ministry. John’s ministry and his disciples caused some trouble. First, God stopped John’s preaching through Herod. Then even from the prison John sent his disciples to the Lord Jesus with certain questions. Right after that, John suffered martyrdom. God was sovereign to terminate what was there with John at that time. Of course, that termination was not a good or positive termination.
The case of John the Baptist shows us that there is a peril that we may receive a genuine ministry, a genuine service from God, and yet we would not be willing to see that service terminated. This is a crucial point. God may use you, and He may use me. He may use us for a certain service with a view to His purpose, but after we have been used by Him, probably none of us would be willing to see the termination of that service.
The same principle can be applied in the case of Moses. The account of the shining of Moses’ face in Exodus 34 does not tell us why Moses covered his face with a veil (vv. 30-35). However, according to Paul’s interpretation in 2 Corinthians 3:13, Moses was afraid that the people would see the termination of his ministry. Moses did not want the people to see the shining of his ministry come to an end. Even in his case there was a consideration about the termination of his ministry. We all are happy to be used by the Lord in a certain service, but none of us would be willing to see that service come to an end.
It was this kind of trouble that forced God, the sovereign One, to allow John to be imprisoned and even to have his life terminated. We need to consider this whole matter carefully. Without God’s sovereignty to allow things to be carried out in this way, surely the teaching of John would have been taken over by his disciples and would have created a big problem. Here we need to learn the lesson. God would not allow any ministry, any service, to remain in a rivalry with His New Testament ministry. What happened in the case of John the Baptist sovereignly cleared up the whole situation. For the rest of the time of the Lord’s ministry, there was no rivalry, but there was opposition. Opposition is comparatively easy to deal with, but it is very hard to deal with rivalry.
God tolerated the opposition from the Pharisees for a longer time, at least up until A.D. 70, when Jerusalem was destroyed. The Lord even prophesied that not one stone of the temple in Jerusalem would be left upon another because of their opposition, their rejection of Him, and He indicated that the temple of God had become their house because they had made it a den of robbers (Matt. 24:1-2; 23:38). The Lord tolerated the opposition for a number of years, but He did not tolerate the rivalry. Immediately John was put into prison, and his life was terminated. We need to learn the lesson from this case. This matter is something of the Lord’s sovereignty.