He must—by a Divine necessity of things (cf. John 3:7, John 3:14; John 9:4; John 10:16; John 20:9; Revelation 1:1), he must—increase; augment in power and following and great joy. He must win eventually all hearts.
His enemies must become the footstool of his feet. His is the beginning of an eternal blessedness. I must decrease; not become annihilated, though through the very completion of the purpose of my calling of God, my scope must, by the nature of the case, become narrower and smaller.
Some have felt the improbability of the great prophet, the ascetic reformer, acquiescing so patiently in the diminution of his influence or the virtual cessation of the primary importance of his career.
Yet this is in complete harmony with John's repeated and continuous recognition of the preparatory and transitory nature of his own work. He cannot lay down his commission, but he knows that, like prophetism, priesthood, Nazarite asceticism, and the like, it will be merged in the grander life of which he was the herald.
The ministers of the New Testament all take up the same note of Divine praise and of self-depletion as they prepare the way of the Lord to human hearts. They hide themselves behind the greater glory of their Lord.
However considerable their powers, they are serviceable only as they contribute to the glory, and succeed in unveiling the thee, of their Lord. There is a Johannine message still required to disturb the fleshly equanimity and to break up the narcotized sleep of the unbeliever.
The stern spirit of rebuke and warning is still indispensable; yet the voice of him that cries, "Repent!" knows that his voice may fade away into faint echoes and stillness, so soon as the promises of redemption and salvation are uttered by the Divine Lord.
When the absolution of grace gives the kiss of peace to the broken-hearted, the morning star fades into the dawning of the day.