The Next Day

John 1:29 says, “The next day, John seeth Jesus coming unto him…”  The previous day, John the Baptist was contending with the Pharisees answering questions about who he was.  John the Baptist was out in the wilderness crying out to the people of Israel that they needed to repent and get ready for the coming Messiah.  He was doing what he was sent to do, but he was no doubt starting to wonder when his cousin Messiah would finally make his appearance.  He had been preaching for quite a long time and living on an interesting nomadic diet of locusts and honey.  Every night, he had probably went to sleep wondering if tomorrow was the day.

That day, John had preached yet again and was baptizing people.  He had to explain WHY he was preaching to a group of religious people that he figured hated God and were a “generation of vipers” (Matthew 3:7).  The next morning, John woke up and there had to be a fire burning within him that perhaps this could be the day.  As he saw the crowds gathering to him, he donned his camels hair clothes and ventured out into the Jordan River, and as his feet hit the water and it rose up to his knee, he looked out on the crowd and saw something different.  It stopped him dead in his tracks.  A man approached the water making his way through the crowd, and in his spirit there arose a still, small voice saying, “He’s the one!”

John’s heart must have jumped up into his throat as the words leaped out of his mouth, “Behold, the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.”  Thus, his introduction to the world, and the subject?  Sin being taken away from the entire world.  What a beautiful concept.  This happened on “the next day.”  What is in your “next day?”  Could the events of tomorrow be worth holding on for today, and enduring what you are going through with a smile?

Preachers have been preaching for over a hundred years now that Jesus Christ is coming soon.  Noah had to preach for 120 years that a flood was coming before it started to rain.  Could he come today?  If not, oh, just think! Perhaps, it might be “the next day.”  He could come the next day after you have lost a loved one, or been rejected by friends because of your testimony.  It might be the day AFTER you have won someone to Christ, or had a tough conversation with a friend or enemy about the truth of God’s word.

“It may be at morn, when the day is awaking, when sunlight through shadows and darkness is breaking, that Jesus will come in the fullness of glory to receive from the world his own.  OH!  Lord Jesus!  HOW LONG?  How long?  Ere we shout the glad song, CHRIST RETURNETH!  Hallelujah, hallelujah, AMEN!  Hallelujah, AMEN.” I agree with that hymn writer.  Even so, come Lord Jesus!