3:1-12
All four gospels tell of John the Baptist preparing the way. Indeed in Matthew the summary of John’s message is “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near”. These words are identical to those used to summarise Jesus’ teaching (Matt 4:17). John is part of the ministry of Christ. John may well have had connections to the Essene community, and interest in him persisted for many years, see Acts 19. John saw himself as preparing the way for Jesus, and fulfilling Isaiah 40:3. Repentance prepares the way for receiving Jesus. His dress and lifestyle were somewhat like Elijah. When people repented they were baptised by John. There are two unique features here. One is that John did the baptising, rather than the person baptising themself, and the other is that Israelites, rather than proselytes, were required to be baptised, everyone needed to repent and be baptised.
John did not aim for popularity, calling the Pharisees and Sadducees a “brood of vipers”.Their refusal to recognise their own sinfulness was a perpetual problem. Ethnicity was not a guarantee of being part of God’s kingdom. A fundamental change was coming (4:10) John brought some change, repentance, Jesus would bring an even greater change , baptism with the Spirit. (4:11).
No comments:
Post a Comment