Sunday December 5, 2010 Matthew 3:1-12

Greetings, I hope all of you had a nice Thanksgiving. It was fun to gather with friends and family on Thursday at my sisters. Of course we had to do a little shopping on Friday but didn’t do the early black Friday shopping. Our text for Sunday is in the third chapter of Matthew. We will discover John the Baptist’s message for the people of that time.

V1 John appears in the wilderness of Judah. The wilderness was a place of expectation and contemplation. John has been in the wilderness listening to God. He is living like a prophet from the Old Testament who would live outside of the boundaries of society due to the nation’s apostasy. The interesting thing is that John has descended from a line of Levitical priests. His father Zechariah was a priest in the Temple and his mother had descended from Aaron the first priest. Why was this priestly figure out in the wilderness and not in the Temple?

V2 John is proclaiming the people need to repent for the kingdom of God has come. Repent means to turn and go the opposite direction. It is not always invested with emotion but can be. John is telling the people that God is bringing in His Kingdom and in order to enter it they need to change direction from where they are headed.

V3 This verse uses a quote from Isaiah 40:3. In Isaiah the prophet is telling the Israelites who have been in Exile in Babylon that God is now rescuing them. God will lead them home on straight smooth roads. (But this didn’t happen when they left Babylon, the journey was rough). John is functioning in this same manner for his people. He is a herald. A herald would travel before the coming king to the villages to announce that the king was in route. This would give the villagers time to fix up the town and repair the road that the king would travel on. John is announcing (heralding) the coming king whom the people would have understood to be God. God was finally coming to rescue them from the oppression they had suffered under the Romans (pagans). Their King is visiting them and bringing His Kingdom so be prepared. A new exodus (rescue) is about to begin. John is reenacting the Exodus. The people of that day would have recognized and understood all of this imagery right away.

V4 John is dressed, not like a temple priest, but in a similar manner to an Old Testament prophet named Elijah. The prophet Malachi had spoken of Elijah returning to announce the coming new Messiah (King) who would throw off their pagan oppressors and rule with the world with them from Jerusalem. The people were waiting for the actual Elijah to return. John is acting in the image of Elijah.

V5 The people of Jerusalem and all Judah were going out to John at the river Jordan. This is amazing that the people were leaving Jerusalem where the Temple was and going out to a prophet by a river to listen to him. After all God dwelt in the Temple in Jerusalem and all of the learned people, the Pharisees and Sadducees, were in Jerusalem.

V6 Not only are the people going out to listen to John but they are being baptized by him in the river. This is shocking because Jewish people weren’t baptized; only Gentiles were when converting to Judaism. This baptism is also exodus themed. When the people had entered the land the first time after being rescued (first exodus from Egypt) they had to cross the Jordan River. Now they are “crossing” again by submitting to baptism and this is occurring in approximately the same location as the first water crossing. The sins they are confessing probably aren’t personal sins as we would think of them. The sins are more than likely national sins, the breaking of the Sinai covenant. Now they had paid the penalty for that broken covenant in God’s eyes and he was returning the rule of their land back to them. The people were taught that they weren’t fallen (sinful) but flawed and could reestablish a right relationship with God by following the Torah.

V7 John noticed the religious leaders coming to the river too. They were probably coming to investigate John and his teaching. A priestly man was bypassing the Temple system, that they supported, and offering a way for forgiveness of sins without sacrifice in the Temple. This wasn’t to be! One always had to sacrifice in the Temple for forgiveness of sins. John questions them harshly and asked why they had come. Were they trying to get out of the judgment to come when God would bring in his Kingdom? They were the same leaders who had taught that when God came he would bring judgment.

V8 John tells them to live lives (bear fruit) worthy of this turn of direction (repentance). He actually really condemned them by calling them a brood of vipers. That would literally be the offspring of snakes.

V9 John again spoke to the leaders and told them not to rely on the fact that they were descendants of Abraham. Their genetic link wasn’t going to save them from Gods judgment. The religious leaders had taught that because of their link to Abraham the Jewish people would be saved from judgment while the pagans (gentiles) would be judged harshly. John is telling them that they too will be under judgment for the way they have lived. Even their faith alone wasn’t good enough it was their actions that God noticed. God can make stones be relatives of Abraham.

V10 God’s ax is at the root of the tree waiting to chop it down if it doesn’t produce fruit. A fruit tree that doesn’t produce fruit isn’t good for anything and may as well be used for firewood. Another tree will be planted in its place that will bear fruit. In the Old Testament trees sometimes symbolized the nation of Israel. If Israel doesn’t produce God will chop it down.

V11 John used water to symbolize this repentance and change of life for the people. Now he speaks of another one coming that will go beyond him and baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire. This person is so much greater than John that John isn’t even worthy to carry his sandals. Carrying sandals was the job of a gentile slave. It was one of the lowest jobs known. John is claiming to have the status of a gentile slave to this coming one.

V12 This coming one will separate the good fruit from the chaff (waste, nonproducing). The producers of fruit will be stored in the granary but the useless chaff will be burned.

John is announcing, or heralding, the coming of the new Messiah; Jesus. When Jesus comes there will be a judgment of who bears fruit for his Kingdom and who doesn’t. Although we don’t see Jesus judging the people harshly we do see him making judgments about the people he encounters. Since he is interacting with the Jewish people at that time they are being judged by their reaction to him. Do they believe in what he says and who he is? We too are under judgment. Do we believe who Jesus tells us he is? Do we act on that belief or just sit waiting for him to reappear? I like to think of faith as an action verb. To have faith or belief in Jesus calls us to action in this world. It isn’t about waiting patiently for Jesus to reappear while just believing but it is the actions we are doing in his name now. What fruit do you bear?