Law & Grace - Matthew 3:1-17 John the Baptizer
Matthew 3 · Vern Peterman · May 1, 2011
Law & Grace, No. 20
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/4926233422801

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

Good morning. I would appreciate your prayers as my change of plans not to go to Uganda has put Hassan and Juliet in a bit of a spot, a quandary. I don't think that that changes the fact that, you know, I made the right decision not to go. If you've been tracking things at all, you know, between the news and YouTube and things like that, you can get pictures of the riots and stacks of bodies and things like that. So I don't think that's something I want to go into. But nonetheless, continue prayer for them, and I'd be greatly appreciated.

Now, entering into this passage here this morning, We have a question. Who is this John the Baptist? And we have another question quite associated with it. Is it John the Baptist or is it John the Bay-aptist? You get my drift here. John the Baptist was actually a relative of Jesus, some months older. through his mother. Luke chapter 1 gives that account and describes, at least in some detail, the relationship there.

John the Baptist ministered along the Jordan River in a section just north of the Dead Sea. Taking a look at the big picture here, here's the Dead Sea. and Sea of Galilee. Both of those are actually below sea level, and so is the Jordan River that flows between them. It was this section of the Jordan River here just north of the Dead Sea is where John the Baptist ministered.

And he lived out in the wilderness in rough and wild clothing and diet, a remarkable character by a number of different counts. What was interesting, August of 2004 was an announcement that they had discovered the cave where he lived. And what's interesting is with subsequent excavation, it's not absolute proof, but the evidence actually continues to point to that actually having been the cave where John the Baptist lived. His diet was of locusts and honey. That was allowed by the law of Moses.

Now, Leviticus 11.22.

Interestingly enough, all sorts of prohibitions. Don't eat this and don't eat that. Even some of the stuff you find at Red Lobster was not allowed. But oddly enough, these you may eat. The locusts and its kinds and the devastating locusts and its kinds. I suppose part of the mindset there is, well, they ate your food, so eat them. So at any rate, they were allowed to eat the locusts. I don't want to gross anybody out, but I've actually eaten some myself and they are edible.

I can't say much more. But anyway, they are edible. I'd recommend parching them and maybe a few other things. But if you want any recommendations beyond that, well, see me. Some have said that these are carob pods. That's a possibility. It's actually not quite the, the language is a little bit confused. So that is certainly what the prodigal son ate with the swine as recorded in Luke 15, but it doesn't appear actually to be a good connection with John the Baptist.

Now, this word repent is tended to bring up a variety of fairly curious images in the minds of people. One thing is that repenting is frequently thought to be really emotional, a flow of tears, crying, and such, right? So that's repenting in many people's minds. If you're not getting really emotional, then it must not be repenting, right?

Now, there are some other ideas. The feeling that is characterized by the musical style we call the blues, you know, blues for the Jews, you know, nah, nah, nah, nah, and all that, right? So the idea is if you're not singing the blues, you're not repenting. But that's actually not the case either.

Coming forward to the altar at the pastor's invitation. Well, let me tell you, this isn't really an altar. And please don't bring bulls in here. I have no way to handle them or take care of them or anything. We, unlike the Jews, don't have one of these, one of these places where we keep the fire going and all the accommodations. And by the way, the altar in the temple was open air. We haven't got that, in case you haven't figured that out. So don't look for us to have an altar and bulls and things like that.

Repent does mean, this is the last thing on your handout and on the slide, a change of mind. It's a change of mind. If there are emotions associated with it, and there very well could be, that's a consequence, but that's not the substance of repenting. Repenting is a change of mind. And it's a change of mind in the biblical context of coming from a place of, I didn't believe, but I changed my mind in order that I now do believe. See the distinction there? Repenting is going from unbelief to belief. That's the distinction. If emotions come out of it, that's a consequence, but that's not the substance of repenting. And I don't think it has anything to do with sacrificing animals.

So, now we have another term that shows up in verse 2, the Kingdom of Heaven. And we're going to see this term show up as we continue our study in the weeks and months ahead through the Gospel of Matthew. The terms Kingdom of God and Kingdom of Heaven, and even just Kingdom, or The Kingdom, have come to mean to a lot of Christians, to mean the church, or the group of people God has saved over time, or the spiritual domain of all those saved. That's what it has come to mean. That is not what is intended. People have justified all sorts of things in order to get them into the kingdom, right? But that's not really the use of the term here in the Gospel of Matthew.

To the Jews of the New Testament times, the ones that John the Baptist was talking to, and as we'll see very shortly, the ones that Jesus was talking to, it meant the coming kingdom of the Messiah, the king of the Jews, reigning from Jerusalem over the people and land of Israel.

One of the reasons why the Jews were very hopeful of the coming kingdom is because that would get rid of the Romans. The Romans would be driven out and so many of the Jews at this time and for decades to follow wanted this kingdom to come and for the Messiah to come so that the Romans would be out of there. Those filthy pig-eating Romans, right? They wanted to get rid of them and they wanted them out of there. So the kingdom of heaven meant that the Messiah would come and they would be rid of these Romans and they would have one of their own, the Messiah. of the line of David, a Jew, a true Jew ruling over them. This coming king, Israel's Messiah, would be a descendant of David. David was promised by the prophet Nathan, you will have a descendant reign over you. They were looking for that one to reign over them. He would reign over the people of Israel and the land of Israel and actually over the entire planet in a golden age.

When we hear about Jesus as the King of Israel, that would be over this nation. When we hear about Jesus as King of Kings and Lord of Lords, that would be his rule over the other Gentile nations. So those are actually two different titles. The King of Israel reigning over the land of Israel and the people of Israel. King of Kings and Lord of Lords reigning over the Gentile nations over the entire earth.

And until the book of Revelation came along, the Jews actually would look forward to the Messiah's coming and they would just say it would rain for a long, long time. With Revelation, the figure was given of a thousand years. The Jews use the terms Kingdom of God and Kingdom of Heaven and Kingdom, sometimes just that, all as synonyms. And John the Baptist and Christ both use all these terms in the same way as the Jews did. The Jews would understand that these are synonymous terms.

You don't have this in your handout, but it is from a slide from a few weeks ago. Heaven was and still is a euphemism for God. Matthew alone used this euphemism. You won't find it in Mark and Luke and John, only in Matthew. Why? It was a book written to the Jews. It was a point of habit and concern among the Jews. They didn't want to mistakenly use the name of God in vain. So it didn't mean that they absolutely didn't use it, but they were reluctant to use it, and they felt more comfortable replacing it with the term heaven.

We actually have carried that over in our own language. What do I mean by that? We still carry on this euphemism. In our own language and culture, we say, heaven knows. We say, oh heavens, or my heavens, or oh my heavens. And what's interesting, oh yes, also for heaven's sake, we also use the term goodness in all the same way. Goodness knows. Oh goodness. My goodness, or oh my goodness, for goodness sake, we will use the word goodness in the same way as a euphemism for God in our own language.

We've carried over the same habit even after 2,000 years. I'm not sure I got this carried out here, but I will have it up on the website, and that is a supplement that talks for about five pages covering some of these questions in more detail, talking about the meaning of the word Kingdom, and whose King Christ is.

Okay, so in Matthew 3.3 There's all of a sudden this message, make ready the way. The long-standing tradition in all of the Middle East for centuries here was to make a clear, smooth level and straighten roads in preparation for a coming dignitary, typically a king or other royal person. So you go in and fix the roads. Now, let me tell you how this battle goes.

Let's imagine you're a farmer there in Israel. You're out there, you're trying to till the field. Do you want big rocks in your field? No, you don't want big rocks in your field. Where do you put them? In the road, right? Okay, so now after all this time, and the roads just full of rocks, then a dignitary is going to come through. And guess where they're going to take the rocks that they find in the road? They're going to put them back in the field, right?

All right, so this game goes on every time the dignitary comes through. And the same kind of thing having to do with whether there are level roads or roads that have rough spots or lots of sharp curves or any of that. All these things would be made as nice as possible for the coming king or dignitary.

So that's what John the Baptist does, not physically, he's not moving any rocks or straightening any curves, but he's doing so morally and spiritually. Make ready the way for the King, not in straightening out the roads or pitching the rocks back into the farmer's field, but in preparing the way morally and spiritually for the coming of Christ, the King of the Jews. He clears and levels and makes straight the way, the path morally and spiritually for the coming of Jesus Christ, the Son of David. That's what John the Baptist is doing.

Here in Isaiah 40 verses 3 and 4, which is also referenced in part there in Matthew 3, a voice is calling, clear the way for the Lord in the wilderness, make smooth in the desert a highway for our God. Let every valley be lifted up, and let every mountain and hill made low, and let the rough ground become a plain, and the rugged terrain a broad valley.

So here in Matthew 3.3 it quotes from Isaiah chapter 40. This is getting to be several years back now, but we studied Isaiah here at Holly Hills and at that point in time we pointed out the parallels between the chapters in Isaiah and the books of the Bible. There are 66 chapters in Isaiah. There are 66 books in the Bible. What's very interesting is that Matthew is the 40th book And Matthew here quotes from Isaiah chapter 40.

And so anyway, there are a number of other parallels. We won't get into that now. But simply point that out. Real interesting how that showed up. Now on page two, you've got four slides called Pharisees and Sadducees. And as I was looking through this, since there's four slides, rather than have you be confused, I numbered them. So hopefully that helps. Let's see if I got them in order, right? Okay.

The Pharisees and Sadducees were two Jewish groups, the Pharisees of course being the more prominent and dominant group, and the Sadducees being a smaller group, generally located in and around Jerusalem, but still powerful. They were not of the same viewpoint, however. But together they had a grip of control on Israel and the Romans, at least for some decades, allowed them to have control within their own domain there over the Jews. The Pharisees believed in all of the Old Testament, that is from Genesis all the way to Malachi, all 39 books.

But as Jesus, and in fact John the Baptist also points out, they added to and made rules around it. We're going to be talking about how they made rules around it, but let me give you some brief examples. Okay, so if you are a Jew, you are not supposed to work on the Sabbath, right? And one definition of work, and they had a bunch of definitions, one definition of work was not walking more than a defined Sabbath day's journey from your home. But there's a way around it. You know how you do that?

You carry small things from your home with you. And then once you get that Sabbath day's journey, you take that small thing from your home and put it beside the path. Oh, hide it if you like, but it's there. And then you can walk another Sabbath day's journey because you just left a part of your home there by the side of the road. And then you can go the next Sabbath day's journey and then put down another piece of your home And so on. And so no matter how many different things you carry, you can continue to make these Sabbath days journeys from your home because a piece of your home is there.

So that's one example that they came up with. Another one that Jesus addresses is you could say the truth or tell a lie, depending on what you swore by. So you could swear by this and swear by that and then it didn't matter because you couldn't be held to it because things sworn by certain things didn't matter, but only swearing by certain other things mattered.

Is that very clear now? Okay. So depending on what you swore by, you could tell a lie. And so now since lies are serious and you could be, you know, stoned to death for telling a lie, that was very important that you get from the right list. Right? Okay. Anyway, you get the idea. Added to and made rules around the law.

The Sadducees claim belief in the five books of Moses, but were skeptical of miracles, angels, and they didn't believe in a Messiah. They didn't believe in any of the books after Deuteronomy as being inspired books and even what was in those first five books they didn't believe all that was in them if it was about angels and miracles and things of that sort which is why when Jesus oh that's right they didn't believe in a resurrection either it is why when Jesus told them in the week before his crucifixion that The books they believe in speak of a resurrection. He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. I am, present tense, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

It shut them up completely. So here are the Pharisees and the Sadducees. These are the ones that come down. John, immediately, it openly describes these two groups in strong and very graphic negative terms. What's very interesting, and this is not the last time we're going to see it, is the scribes and Pharisees are often described by terms that they themselves would consider appalling and disgusting.

John called them a brood of vipers, creatures that are poisonous and by the law unclean. You're not allowed to eat these things. And so he goes and throws it in their face, so to speak, by saying, you guys are a brood of these unclean things. So John openly told them that they were subject to the wrath to come in this passage.

They're thinking that they're the best there is. Matter of fact, the Pharisees said when the Messiah comes, he will love us because we just love and support the law of Moses. And so here's John the Baptist and he says, you're going to be subject to God's wrath. It was exactly the opposite of what they wanted to hear.

They would not be exempt just because they were descended from Abraham. Just because you're descended from Abraham doesn't mean you're going to be exempt. You're going to be subject to the wrath too. One of the Jewish myths was that Abraham stands at the end of time, he stands at the gate of hell so that no Jew would ever go in. Right?

And one of the things that John the Baptist and Jesus said that was shocking news for the Jews was that they were not necessarily going in just because they were descended from Abraham. As a matter of fact, things didn't look very good for them. He says, you make them more a son of hell, which of course pleased them to no end. He said they needed to repent and to live out that repentance. Remember repentance? Changing the mind. They needed to have that.

So here's Matthew 5.20 in the beginning of what's called the Sermon on the Mount, just two chapters from where we are now.

Jesus says, For I say to you, that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and the Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven. This statement right here is shocking. First of all, if anybody is going to enter the kingdom of heaven, they thought it's going to be the Pharisees. They are the best of the best. And so what does Jesus say?

He says, you are not guaranteed by being a Jew. You are not guaranteed by being a Pharisee. As a matter of fact, you know, the Pharisee is the one that everybody says, these guys are the cream of the crop, the best of the best. He says, you have to be more righteous than that. Most people on hearing this would panic.

Ah, I've got no chance at all. John the Baptist introduces a shocking piece of news for the Jews that Jesus continues on as we'll see through the Gospel of Matthew. Entry into the coming kingdom for the Jews is not to be assumed based on their ancestry. Shocking news!

Strive to enter the narrow gate. The narrow gate, not the wide gate that all the other Jews are traveling. He's talking to Jews there, and striving to enter the narrow gate is not about whether you're going to be saved or not. It's not talking to the people here. It's talking about the Jews who will not all enter into this coming kingdom on earth.

John says what the Old Testament prophets say, and that is that there are going to be judgments coming, and the Jews will not be exempt from it. John is saying the Jews will in fact be judged and the scribes and the Pharisees and the Sadducees will be among those judged. In Zechariah 13, 8 and beginning of verse 9, it will come about and all the land declares the Lord that in two parts, that two parts will be cut off and perish but the third will be left in it. Now we'll bring the third part through the fire. Those Jews who survive this coming time of trouble in the land of Israel will be the minority.

Now, John the Baptist makes reference to trees here. Trees that are well planted and bearing fruit were pictures of godliness in all of the Old Testament. We give examples here in reference of Psalm 1, 1-3, Psalm 92, 12-14. Trees that were planted and well watered and fruitful, okay, were these pictures.

However, the law allowed that only the kinds of trees that did not bear fruit could be cut down. And therefore, what did he say of these Pharisees and Sadducees? You guys are not fruitful, therefore you're going to be cut down. And the law allows it. You think you're fruitful. You're not. You're not exempt. And that's why the axe is coming to the root to chop this tree down entirely. He says, you're not fruitful. You who think you are, the most fruitful.

Now in verses 11 and 12, John the Baptist baptized as a sign of repentance. It is as a sign of a change of one's mind. John baptized as a sign of repentance. He also pointed to the one who was coming, coming both sooner and later, and I think that's key. Sooner and later, not just under one set of conditions, But two, in his soon coming, he was the Lamb of God who lifts up our sins. 1 John 2, 29 and 36. We'll take a look at that in just a minute here. In his later second coming, he will come in judgment winnowing in order to separate the wheat to be kept, the Jews who will be entering the kingdom from the chaff to be burned up.

Winnowing was done by taking some sort of a rough fork and casting up the mixed chaff and wheat into the air. The wind would then blow away the chaff which was lighter and then the heavier grains of wheat would then fall in a pile closer. So that would separate the chaff from the wheat and you'd have a chaff pile over here and spread and scattered and then you'd have the wheat pile here. You'd keep the wheat and you would torch off the chaff that it would burn away.

And that's the distinction that he makes here, and is in fact made later on in the book of Matthew. So when Christ comes again, there will be a separating out of those who are kept and those who are not. And it's a separating out of Jews and Gentiles. It is not a judgment of the church, as we'll see.

Here's the poetic pattern here, but as for me, I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, and I am not fit to remove his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand. He will thoroughly clear his threshing floor, and he will gather his wheat into the barn, but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire. Let's take a look at that a little bit at a time.

I baptize you with water for repentance. This water doesn't do anything to you. It symbolizes that you've repented. You've identified, that's what baptism means, identification. You've identified with my message of repentance, of changing of mind. He who is coming after me, this is Christ, is mightier than I am.

I'm not fit to remove the sandals. The point we make there is the duty of the lowest household servant to remove the sandals of guests and other members of the household and to wash their feet. John says I'm not even that high up when it comes to him. I'm a few months older than him. He's my relative. But he says I'm not even worthy to be the lowest household servant in his household. and undo his sandal and wash his feet. I don't even have that status. Even though I'm a little bit older, even though we're blood related, I don't have that status. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. The fire is a baptism of judgment when Christ comes again. There will be a baptism of the Holy Spirit for all those Jews who believe and proceed into the coming kingdom. The kingdom of heaven.

That's why he's saying repent. His winnowing fork is in his hand. He is going to take all the wheat and chaff. He says he'll clear the threshing floor. That means he's thorough. He's going to take all the wheat and chaff, toss it up so that the wind blows the chaff away and the wheat falls in a pile. He will keep the wheat and the chaff will be gone. He's talking about great judgment here coming for the Jews.

So we have this question, if that's the case, why would Jesus be baptized? Does Jesus need to repent? No. So why would he do that? He said that he did a baptism of repentance. When people came to John, they didn't proclaim their own righteousness, but what did they do? They confessed their sins, it said. So does Jesus need to confess his sins? No, he didn't. He didn't need to repent or confess his sins.

So why is he going through with this baptism? Shouldn't he come and say to John, John, I'm exempt? Doesn't that seem to make more sense? So what's he doing here? Christ asked for John to go ahead and baptize him. In fact, John objected. He says, I shouldn't be baptizing you. I've already told them I'm not worthy to undo your sandals. Why should I be baptizing you?

It's a picture of his total agreement with and identification with John's message. John, I agree with what you're telling them. Every bit. I agree with it. So I'm going to have you do this. I want to tell them that I identify with your message. It would also picture Christ as spiritually clean. Did He need to be cleaned from a place of being dirty? No. But it would show Him as clean. And it would, as we've said, identify Him with John's message. He would agree with John's message.

That's what this baptism for Christ would represent there. After Jesus was baptized, something that is interesting, several of the Gospels record this similarly. After Jesus was baptized, we see in this one passage the presence of all three persons of what we call the Trinity.

Now, if you look up Trinity in your Bibles, you won't find it. However, it's a very clear teaching of Scripture, and the way to summarize it is three personal beings, one essence. Now we're accustomed to thinking of one personal being, one essence, right? But three personal beings, one essence. That's the Trinity.

That is God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. We also see the approval of God the Father toward the Son in this event. The Father doesn't just let this happen, but he expresses openly and audibly his approval of the Son. It would reflect what God the Father says of the Son, as we've referenced here, Psalm 47 and Isaiah 42.1. The Father's disposition towards the Son is that He is pleased with Him. It was necessary that the Father be one who is pleased with Christ in order for Christ to be the sacrifice, an acceptable one. Would it do to have somebody else go up with whom the Father is not pleased? No, it would not. Could we just say, hey, you know, let's just have Vern die for your sins. I mean, why have God the Son do this? Well, guess what? I don't cut it. I don't cut it.

I and none of us can stand in the place of everyone else, but Christ, the spotless Son of God, the one who pleases the Father, that's the one, the single one who is qualified. The one who is fully God and fully man is qualified, being like us, being the Son of Man, fully qualified to take our place.

John 1.29 says this, The next day he, that is John the Baptist, saw Jesus coming to him and said, Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Now this takes away doesn't mean that the sin just kind of goes and it's gone. It takes away means lift it up.

It's lifted off of our shoulders, and the other half of that, 1 Peter 2.24, Hebrews 9.28 also says it, He Himself bore our sins on His body on the cross. He takes away the sin of the world not to just toss it, but to take it upon Himself. The sin of the entire world was carried on Christ's shoulders. He bore it voluntarily.

Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world and places that sin on his own shoulders. Later on in that very same chapter in John 1 verses 35 and 36, again the next day John was standing with two of his disciples and he looked at Jesus as he walked and he said, Behold the Lamb of God, the Lamb that God sacrifices, the Lamb without blemish, the Lamb whose sacrifice will completely satisfy God's character, God's character of holiness, God's character of justice, God's demand for absolute justice. Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, lifting it off of our shoulders and placing it all on Him.

Let's pray. Lord, we thank you as we look at this passage. You came as the Lamb of God. You came with this forerunner, John, and you identified with his message, but you voluntarily were the Lamb. You were not a struggling victim asking to be released, demanding to be released, demanding your rights, but you voluntarily took the sins of each one of us and placed them upon your own shoulders. Thank you for that marvelous sacrifice. In Jesus' name, amen.