Jn 3:27-30, “John answered, ‘A person cannot receive even one thing unless it is given him from heaven…The one who has the Bride is the Bridegroom. The friend of the Bridegroom, who stands and hears Him, rejoices greatly at the Bridegroom’s voice…this joy of mine is now complete. He must increase, but I must decrease.’”
Nothing can be received unless it is given from heaven, i.e., by God. This is a healing and humbling vision of reality. No victory, no strength, no title, no achievement, no good, no glory can be received unless it is ordained—granted—by God. It is the joy of the human soul, then, not to reach and grasp and obtain for itself, but to humbly receive what has been granted it from above.
For John, this meant receiving the role of herald. He was a ‘burning and shining lamp’ (Jn 5:35), a lantern whose flickering flame dimly anticipated the world-kindling radiance of the True Sun (Jn.1:6-8).
This same principle holds true for Jesus—He can receive nothing unless it is given Him by God (cf.5:19; 17:7). The difference is that what God has given Jesus is *all things* (Jn 3:35).
Part of that ‘all things’ is the Bride, the Church, the People of God, Beloved and Blood-Bought from the foundations of the earth. Yes, Jesus Christ is the Divine Bridegroom anticipated throughout the OT, and His people are His Bride, washed in the purifying fountain of His own life’s blood and covered by the garment of His tabernacle-flesh as it is lifted up on the cross (cf. Rev. 7:14-17, 19:6-8).
At the lowest part of today’s image, you have those in darkness coming to the lifted lamp of the Baptist. Those who follow this light come to The Light are gathered into the Bride (here pictured as the Moon which, though still in the Night, already shines with the Light of the Day, upon whose face She continually gazes). Though she does not yet see her Groom in the light of the Day, the Bride is still in His hands; hands which hold her through the Night because they have borne every wound of the Night. Finally, at the top—illumining the whole—is the radiant Sun of the Risen Groom (Ps.19:4-5), the true Light of the World, into whose nail-pierced hands all things have been given.
