What would John The Baptist say to Nelson Mandela?

A few years back it was very fashionable for churches to run a series of sermons based on what Jesus would say to a variety of world figures like Madonna, Bill Clinton and even Lady Diana.

I’m not sure Nelson Mandela ever got a guernsey back then but I am certainly sure he would get one today.

President Mandela turns 95 tomorrow (July 18). Much has been said about him in life. Much more will be said about him in death; the legacy of his leadership, the stature of his statesmanship and the uncommonness of his common touch.

Ever since my first visit to South Africa in 1995, only a year into his presidency as the first elected leader of the fledgling democracy I have, like many other Australians, been a distant admirer of Mandela’s life and leadership.

I devoured his autobiography The Long Walk To Freedom, followed with a keen interest his five years in office and admired his willingness to relinquish power as gracefully as he assumed it.

Now he hovers, but a breath away, from this side of eternity. This man, like every man, will soon stand before his Maker.

I have prayed for Nelson Mandela (on and off to my shame) for the last twenty years; for his success as a leader, for his security amidst political enemies and for his salvation as a man.

Will he be judged on those successes? Does he have eternal security? Does his reputation in this life make him immune from judgement in the next?

What is God’s judgement on this man’s life? How would the Lord Jesus define this servant-leader’s life? What would John The Baptist say to Nelson Mandela?

How would John, who wasn’t backward in coming forward about the lives of high profile people (Matthew 14:1-12) prepare Mandela to meet this pending moment?

John’s message was a simple one.

Behold, The Lamb of God who takes away the  sin of the world (John 1:29).

Mandela was no stranger to this message. He heard it as a boy. He taught it as a teenager. Even to break the monotony of the rock-breaking boredom on Robben Island, he was always at church, learning lessons of style and delivery and rhetoric from the visiting preachers who represented every colour on the theological spectrum.

Much will be said in the coming months about Mandela’s achievements, his victories and his virtues. He will be likened again, as he has in the past, to Jesus, in his capacity to forgive his enemies, champion reconciliation and pursue peace.

Many will think that his virtues outweigh his vices and so he is one of a few exceptions to the rest of the world who needs the forgiveness of the Lamb of God – exceptions like Mother Theresa, Hazel Hawke and your favourite grandmother.

This thinking raises the following question:

Are we basically good people with a few blind spots  or bad people with a few good shots?

Most people who thought they knew my parents concluded that they were good people with a few blind spots. I was even tempted to think this of my father, but never of my mother, after whose more overtly roguish qualities I mostly followed.

But God knows us better than we know ourselves:

No one is good except God alone (Mark 10:18).

All have sinned and fallen short of God’s glory  (Romans 3:23).

And God both pinpoints the problem and provides the solution:

Behold, The Lamb of God who takes away the  sin of the world (John 1:29).

How could we stop praying for Nelson Mandela? I have admired him as much, if not more, than I esteemed Martin Luther King when I was a teenager.

Join with me in praying that the Lord Jesus will bring to his mind the Gospel he learned as a boy, that he heard as a prisoner and that he has been no stranger to in his years as a free man and world icon. Pray even now that ‘good’ friends will whisper truth into his pillowed ear.

Pray that his allegiance is surrendered to the Son of God and the King of Israel (John 1:49), The Lamb who takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29). The Lamb in the midst of the throne (Revelation7:17).

Pray that his trust is in that sin-bearing death, that he knows the peace, reconciliation and forgiveness of the One he has been so often likened to, but couldn’t be more different from, in this dying stage of his life.

If you have loved him from afar, as so many of us have, is not prayer for his salvation the best way to show that love?

Feature photo: Alex Drennan