NTEB SUNDAY SERVICE: He Must Increase, But I Must Decrease

There are things in our Christian life that are not optional, things that we must go through in order to be brought closer to Jesus. Jesus Himself had a path to follow, and your King James Bible takes careful note of the many things that "He must" accomplish. That word "must" is a funny word, it's not found in the Greek or the Hebrew. The word translated as "must" is G1163 in your Strong's concordance, and it is the word "dei". In the Hebrew the word is "Asah", Strong's H6213. So where does the King James word "must" come from? It's "advanced revelation" to be sure.  It's the Latin word "mustum", and according to Webster's 1828, it means "New wine; wine pressed from the grape but not fermented." Where is the first place that the phrase "he must" appears? In Numbers 6:21 talking about what "he must do" who takes the vow of the Nazarite. Jesus had the vow of Nazarite, how's that for a coincidence? John the Baptist tells us that Jesus must increase, while he, the biblical forerunner of the Messiah, must decrease. My message today centers around the confidence that we have in Christ as the Bible tells us of all the things that "he must" do.