John 10:41-42 - Exposition

"The posthumous fruit of John's labors" (Bengel). Many came to him, and they said, one to another, rather than to the Lord, John indeed did no sign . It was not John's function to work miracles or startle the world with visible proofs of his Divine commission. John stood on the natural sphere, found a place in contemporaneous history, and exerted all his influence by the force of his prophetic word. But as a remarkable confirmation of the whole revelation enacted by the life and deeds of Christ, we read, But all things that John spake of this Man were true. The testimonies of John were to the effect that Jesus was "mightier" than he—that he was the Son of God, the "Baptizer with the Holy Ghost and with fire," and " the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world." The absence of the miraculous nimbus from the record of John's ministry is one of the subsidiary evidences we possess of the supernatural power wielded by our Lord Jesus Christ. John was a historic contemporary of Jesus, whose following survived for some centuries, but not until comparatively recent times did credulity or the mythopceic tendency clothe him in a supernatural glory. He was believed to be the Elijah of the new covenant, but he was not supposed to have gone to heaven, like his prototype. A rumor grew up that Jesus was John raised from the dead, but nothing came of it. There was all the material for a splendid myth, but no evolution of one. The reasoning, therefore, is fair—since Jesus is reported by John ' s disciples to have wrought great signs; these reports are not to be put down to credulity or fiction. The evangelist distinctly asserts that all these testimonies which he had himself recorded in John 1:1-51 ., when followed up by the visible and wonderful presence of the Son of God himself, were held to be true. We need not wonder, then, that many believed on him there.