Today we are in Matthew 3: 1 - 12. John the Baptist splashes onto the scene in Judea. These verses that tell of his work.
Have you seen the commercials utilizing "the most interesting man in the world"? I actually would nominate John the Baptist for that title! I am so intrigued by him. We read of his birth circumstances in Luke 1. When did he go into the wilderness to live? Were his parents still living? What did they think about his life choices?
People were flocking out of the cities and towns to hear him preach, to be baptized by him. And I wonder, would I have gone? It would not have been easy traveling. The landscape in that southern region of Palestine is brutal. Sometimes we allow ease and comfort to stop us from experiencing remarkable things.
Clothes obviously did not matter to him. They were necessity ... not statement of value and success. He did not have to spend any time deciding what to put on for the day! Sometimes we place way too much importance on the trappings of clothing and style.
Food obviously was for living ... not the other way around. Sometimes we spend far too much time thinking about food and fixing food and where to eat and what to eat.
John's message was repentance for the kingdom of heaven was near. Repentance was an important teaching in Judaism so this is not a new idea for his hearers. William Barclay says: "To Jews, repentance was central to all religious faith and to all relationship with God." The Jewish scholar G. F. Moore writes: "Repentance is the sole, but inexorable, condition of God's forgiveness and the restoration of his favour, and the divine forgiveness and favour are never refused to genuine repentance. That God fully and freely remits the sins of the penitent is a cardinal doctrine of Judaism."
The word means "to turn". It is turning away from evil and from wrong and turning to God. Repentance was at the center of the Jewish faith as it is in the Christian faith. Sometimes we are flippant about the wrongs we do and the sins in our lives. We justify and rationalize them when what we need is repentance.
Finally today, I hear again the warning against relying on spiritual pedigrees. John confronts the Pharisees and Sadducees as they come out to see him. Did they come for baptism? Did they come out of curiosity? Were they sent by those in power in Jerusalem to check things out? We don't know their motivations ... but John lays into them with passion. What he said to them strikes a cord in me ... "And do not think you can say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our father.'"
It's easy to think that parents or family or church affiliation can take the place of my own relationship with God. It's easy ... but it's foolish. It is a privilege to grow up in a Christian home ... but there must be the realization that my own relationship with God does not rest there. It is a privilege to be involved with a church, a family of faith, that is vibrant and active in the service of God ... but there must be the realization that my affiliation with a church group does not take the place of my own relationship with God.
Michael J. Wilkins writes:
I shudder when I recognize the possibility of becoming like those Pharisees and
Sadducees who hardened their heart to God through empty religious activities.
I must open my own heart to God to live in sincerity before him and experience
the ministry of God in my own life, leading me to experience the fruit of a life
lived in humble dependence on the Spirit of God.
As we read these verses in Matthew, we, figuratively, have gone out to hear John preaching. Can you hear him? He preached repentance to those men and women centuries ago ... and he preaches repentance to you and I today. Listen ...
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