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Sermon for the Second Sunday of Epiphany – January 18, 2026
John 1:29-43
Dear friends, grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ.
“What are you looking for?”
These are the first words we hear Jesus speak in the gospel of John. It is a deep, probing question, posed to two of John’s disciples. “What are you looking for?”
The same question could be posed to us. What are we looking for in life? What are we looking for from God? What are we looking for when we come to church?
Perhaps these disciples of John were looking for a Messiah who would come and clobber their enemies, someone who would lead them in a political revolution against Rome. Perhaps they were looking for someone who would take away all of their suffering, a wonder worker who would give them miracles on demand. Perhaps they were looking for someone who would provide them with material blessings. Perhaps they were looking for a teacher who would explain to them exactly what they had to do to get right with God. After all, they did call Jesus “Rabbi,” which means “teacher.”
If these were the things they were looking for, they were going to be disappointed. They were going to be disappointed because Jesus’ primary mission was something else. Their own teacher, John the Baptist, got it right. John knew why Jesus had come. John knew what he had come to do. John knew what kind of Messiah Jesus would be. When John saw Jesus coming towards him, John declared, “Here is the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.” And John didn’t just say this once! The next day, as he was with these two disciples, when Jesus walked by John again exclaimed, “Look, here is the Lamb of God.”
Perhaps it isn’t so obvious to us what it means for John to call Jesus the Lamb of God. We might think of a lamb as one of those cute fuzzy creatures from nursery rhymes. Mary had a little one, right? But to a first century Jew, there was a lot more to it. For these disciples of John there was a whole set of Biblical references and ritual practices they were familiar with which had a lamb at the center.
First, there is the story of Abraham and Isaac. God tested Abraham’s faith by commanding that he sacrifice his son, Isaac. Abraham took his son up to the top of a hill. A blissfully ignorant Isaac asked: “Father, here is the fire and the wood, but where is the burnt offering?” And then came Abraham’s wonderfully faithful reply: “God will provide for himself a lamb for a burnt offering.” And sure enough, before Abraham had to do the horrible deed, an angel intervened. Abraham saw a ram caught in a thicket, and sacrificed the ram instead.
Then there is the Passover, a story and eventually a ritual meal which was and is at the center of Jewish life. As part of God’s rescue plan for the Israelites enduring slavery in Egypt, God told them to sacrifice a lamb and to sprinkle its blood on the door frames of their homes. When the angel of the Lord came down that night to deliver God’s wrath on the evil Egyptians, he would “pass over” the homes that had been marked by the blood of the lamb, saving them from death and delivering them into freedom and new life.
There was also the whole sacrificial system, first in the Tabernacle and then in the Temple, where God gave his chosen people a way to make atonement for their sins. They could sacrifice a lamb as an offering to God. This sacrificial offering brought them back into right relationship with God. Not only that, but the flesh of the lamb was then roasted on the altar and then shared between the priests and the people as a holy barbecue, where a forgiven and holy people ate and were nourished together in God’s presence. In so doing, they were renewed and restored and strengthened.
Then there is Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. On this holy day the priests of Israel would confess all the sins of the people over a goat and then send that goat out into the wilderness. This scapegoat took on the people’s sins and then carried them away, symbolizing forgiveness and new life.
When John the Baptist pointed to Jesus and called him the Lamb of God, he was conjuring up all of these Biblical stories and all of these sacred rituals with lambs at the center. John was saying that Jesus is that Lamb, and that he has come to take away the sin of the whole world.
Jesus is the one whom God has provided as a final sacrifice. Abraham didn’t need to sacrifice his son because God’s son was going to sacrifice himself. Just as that ram was caught in a thicket, Jesus would soon be wearing a crown of thorns. Jesus is the one whose blood causes God’s judgement to pass over us, saving us from death. Jesus came to offer himself to make atonement for us once and for all and invites us to be nourished and strengthened by his body and blood. Jesus is the one who came to be the last scapegoat, taking the sins of the whole world upon himself in order to carry them away. John summarizes all this simply by pointing to Jesus and saying, “This is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”
“What are you looking for?” Jesus asked these disciples. Their biggest problem wasn’t their political enemies. Their biggest problem wasn’t their failing bodies or their grocery bills. Jesus cares about those things. We see his great compassion in dealing with the sick and the poor. But Jesus had come to address a bigger problem. The biggest problem they faced was the sin that separated them from God. Jesus had come to take that sin away. And so John called him the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.
What are you looking for? What are you looking for in life? What are you looking for from God? What are you looking for when you come here to church?
Recently I’ve been following the work of religious sociologist Ryan Burge, who just published a new book this past week called “The Vanishing Church.” Burge warns that churches are becoming increasingly polarized. We not only have red and blue states, he argues, but we are increasingly having red and blue denominations, and red and blue congregations. This is happening because people are looking for a Jesus who will clobber their political opponents. This is wrong.
In other corners of Christianity, Jesus is sought after as a means of bringing health and wealth. This is called the prosperity gospel, and the idea is that if you have faith in Jesus, he will give you all the earthly blessings you are looking for. This is wrong.
Still others look to Jesus primarily as a teacher of good behavior, as an example to follow, as a pillar of morality for us and for all of society to aspire to. I won’t say this is wrong exactly. There is a kernel of truth to it. But it is woefully inadequate. When this is what you’re looking for in Jesus you don’t get Christians, you get Pharisees.
When we come to Jesus looking for these things we are setting ourselves up for disappointment, because none of that is his primary mission. It is not why he came.
We have all kinds of problems, to be sure. Politics these days is a hot mess. Health problems can bring us to our knees, and money problems can keep us up at night. Right living is a worthy pursuit, and something we always struggle with and need to pay attention to.
But Jesus knows what our biggest problem is. Our biggest problem is sin – our rebellion against God, our lack of trust in God, the turned-in-on-self thoughts and actions that separate us from God. All our other problems are downstream from the problem of sin.
Whatever you might have come here looking for today, what you get is what you need the most. You get a Messiah who has come to clobber your real enemy, which is the devil. You get a savior who gives you more than temporary healing, he saves you from death itself. You get a redeemer who loves you so much that he was willing to sacrifice himself for you, in order to give you his blessings of forgiveness and peace and hope.
I don’t know what you were looking for when you came here today, but here is the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world, including all of yours, so that you might live a new life with God, today and forever.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
Rev. Jeffrey R. Spencer
Oak Harbor Lutheran Church