The next day, he saw Jesus coming to him, and said, "Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!
Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world ...  Thus John the Baptist hailed Jesus of Nazareth as the long expected Messiah of Israel and the Saviour of all mankind.  From the gates of Paradise until that dramatic instant, the sacrificial lamb had been the paramount and dominating feature of the worship of God throughout both the patriarchal and Mosaic dispensations; and John's thundering announcement which identified Jesus Christ as the antitype of the passover lamb, and even of the lambs slain previously from the foundation of the world, was as crucial and important as any utterance ever made on earth.  The author of this Gospel, at that moment one of John's disciples, heard that epic announcement in all of its dimensions and overtones.  It was a truth that thundered and reverberated in his mind throughout a lifetime; and this narrative of the exact circumstances of its revelation is one of the richest heritages of our holy faith.