Pattern of Increase and Decrease

UV 2833/10000 Pattern of Proportionate Increase and Decrease
He must increase, but I must decrease.
John 3 v 30

At the start of Jesus’s ministry on earth, His cousin and forerunner who came just before him had a much larger following and was more well known. John, the Baptist recognized that he was just the servant, the herald, the precursor of the promised Messiah- Jesus. He therefore, humbled himself to say that even as he decreased, Jesus must increase. It was not just a mark of the humility of John but the will of God. We too as believers and followers of Jesus, should have this attitude that Jesus should increase in our lives even as we decrease. It implies that we obey the will of the Lord implicitly and explicitly, that we give all praise, honour and glory to the Lord for every good thing that happens in our lives, that we give primacy to the Word over our own desires and whims.

Each of us is a John, the Baptist in the making as we are anointed to be forerunners of the second coming of the Lord Jesus. John was only a cousin of Jesus while we are brothers by faith with Jesus. We are called to do greater things than John in the name of Jesus. John did no miracles and he confined himself to the task given to him to prepare the way of the Lord, to call people of Israel to repentance. Every miracle and every answer to prayer we receive should be attributed to the grace of Jesus. Our own agenda, our egos, our pride and our desire to satisfy our own ambitions should decline over time and the rule and reign of Jesus in our lives should keep increasing. The character and attitudes of Jesus should increase in us even as our own character and attitudes decline from day to day. People around us including our own near and dear as well as others should see more of Jesus in us and less and less of our old selves.

An implication of this uni-verse is that we never become set in our ways but keep changing to reflect the grace and glory of the Lord. The government, the grace and the glory of Jesus should keep increasing in our hearts and lives and proportionately, our own wills, lusts, pride should keep declining. Spiritual growth and maturity is about living for, to and in Christ and dying to our selves, the world and its approval or disapproval of us. As our own strength declines, the joy of doing the Lord’s will keeps increasing in us. We should not resist the spirit but yield increasingly to the Holy Spirit in all that we think, speak and do. Like John, once we have done the will of the Lord, we should be willing to disappear from this world to appear again with the Lord.

Prateep V Philip