Gospel of Matthew Chapter 3 -- John Karmelich

 

 

 

1.                  There is an old Christian joke that goes as follows:

a)                  A pastor travels out of town to go to a pastor’s conference.  He is running late.

b)                  He finally gets there, and the place is crowded.

c)                  He scans the rows and spots an empty seat near an isle.

d)                 He looks at the person next to the empty seat and says, “Is this seat saved?”

e)                  The person next to the seat, looks at the seat, then looks at the pastor and replies,
”I don’t think it’s even under conviction”.

f)                   Now if you don’t get that joke, don’t worry, you will if you read on.  J

2.                  There is a Christian concept of “conviction”, which means that one has realize they are a “sinner” before they understand they need someone to deal with that sin problem.

a)                  You can’t accept Jesus crucifixion as payment for your sins if you don’t believe you have a sin problem.

b)                  If I had to state Satan’s greatest lie, it would be that “God will accept you just as you are.”

i)                    It is the false idea that one can get into heaven just because your good deeds outweigh your bad deeds.

ii)                  If you did a survey of most Americans and asked them if they believe in God and heaven, they will say yes.  If you then ask them are you going to heaven, they will say yes “because they are a good person”.

iii)                That is not the Christian message.

3.                  This ties in very well to Chapter 3 of the Gospel of Matthew.

a)                  The central character of Chapter 3 is John the Baptist.

b)                  The application to you and me is not to learn history and learn about the historical facts about John the Baptist.

i)                    It is about understanding the purpose of John the Baptist’s ministry and how it applies to our lives.

ii)                  John the Baptist is mentioned in all four gospels.

iii)                You can find outside historical references to John the Baptist that he really existed.

c)                  Matthew emphasizes John the Baptist came as fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy.

i)                    That is all well and good, and we’ll discuss that today.

ii)                  What I want you to see today is the necessity of John the Baptist’s ministry.

iii)                Like the joke about the “saved” chair requiring conviction, so do all people.

iv)                The purpose of John the Baptist ministry was to prepare the way for Jesus.

v)                  That is not a whole lot different from what Jesus calls us to do.

a)                  That is to “go and make disciples of all nations” (Matthew 28:19).  That means to tell people about Jesus and live our lives as witnesses for Jesus.

b)                  In order for people to accept Jesus as their Savior, first they have to realize their need for a Savior.

c)                  Too often, when giving people the gospel message, we focus directly on telling them about Jesus without people understanding the need for Jesus in the first place.

vi)                There is a street evangelist in Southern California named Ray Comfort.

a)                  Ray loves to show people copies of the 10 commandments.

b)                  He asks, “Have you ever broken one these, ever, even once?

c)                  If you have, what does that make you?  (Answer, a sinner)

d)                 He then goes into the “remedy” for sin, which is Jesus.

e)                  Ray understands, like John the Baptist understood, that there must be a sense of personal conviction, before one can accept Jesus as the remedy.

4.                  Let’s get back to Chapter 3.  Chapter 3 is mostly about John the Baptist.

a)                  It is a brief description of his life and purpose.

b)                  You have to read Luke’s gospel to get more information about his background.

c)                  First of all, let’s clear up who is not John the Baptist.  John the Baptist did not write any of the books of the bible.  There was a different “John” who was one of the 12 apostles. 
That John wrote the Gospel of John, 1st, 2nd, 3rd John, and Revelation.

d)                 John the Baptist was a relative of Jesus through Mary, probably a cousin (Luke 1:36).

i)                    Luke records several miracles around the birth of John the Baptist.

ii)                  These include the fact that John the Baptist’s mother was barren until John and his birth was a miracle itself.  An angel made his father mute until after he was born.  That angel told his parents to name him “John” even though there was no one born with that name in his family.  (Source:  Luke Chapter 1)

e)                  All of this information about John’s background is all fine and well.

f)                   What I want you to think about is how to apply John the Baptist’s work to our lives.

i)                    John the Baptist’s purpose in life was to point people to Jesus.

ii)                  He was born for this purpose: “And he (John) will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God.”  (Luke 1:16, NKJV)

a)                  John’s purpose in life was to point people to Jesus.

iii)                For this service, John’s “earthly reward” was to be beheaded by King Herod
(see Luke 9:9, et.al.)

iv)                Yet here is what Jesus said about John the Baptist before his death:

a)                  “I tell you, among those born of women there is no one greater than John; yet the one who is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he.
(Luke 7:28, NIV)

b)                  This is a strange statement.  Jesus said John the Baptist is greater than Moses, Abraham, King David, Daniel, etc., but whoever is “least” in the “kingdom of God” (i.e., Christians) is greater than John!

c)                  This implies that God decided, for whatever reason, that those who are saved in the “Christian era” get more “heavenly status” than those who are saved prior to Jesus coming.

d)                 The prophets and leaders of the Old Testament were all part of God’s plan to bring Jesus into the world.  John was given the status of the “greatest of all these men” for his role as leading the way to Jesus.

v)                  The application I want you to see, and think about is “What should we have in common with John the Baptist?

a)                  How much different is that from what John the Baptist is called to do?

b)                  John the Baptist and us are specifically called to “point people” to Jesus.

(1)               Now God does not expect us to eat locusts and wear camel hair clothing like John.  J

(2)               He expects us to be witnesses where we are, or where God calls us to be.  I like the expression, “plant where you bloom and bloom where you are planted”.

(3)               Like John, our lives should have a convicting effect upon people.

(a)               They should look at us, and realize that salvation requires accepting Jesus, a changed lifestyle based on that belief in order to have eternal life.  We are here to combat the false notion that being a “good person” cannot save you.

5.                  With all that said, let’s jump into Verse 1.

6.                  Verse 1: In those days John the Baptist came, preaching in the Desert of Judea 2 and saying, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near." 3 This is he who was spoken of through the prophet Isaiah: "A voice of one calling in the desert, `Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him.' "

a)                  Verse 1 starts with “in those days”.  It is a bridge from the last part of Chapter 2.

i)                    Chapter 2 ends with the events surrounding Jesus birth and very early years.

ii)                  There is nothing said about Jesus until this period, which is about 30 years later.

a)                  We know nothing about Jesus’ childhood, except a brief story in Luke.

b)                  We know nothing about his teenage years or his twenties.

c)                  It is as if Jesus’ life is irrelevant until he started his ministry.

d)                 There is a view that “where the bible is silent, we should be silent”.  I tend to agree with this view.  Therefore, we shouldn’t speculate as to the “silent years” of Jesus’ life.  I will focus on what is written, and the “silent years” we’ll just ask God about when we get to heaven.

e)                  If God wanted us to know about those years, he would have said so!  J

b)                  So here we have John the Baptist preaching in the desert.

i)                    Notice that nothing is said about how John got there.

ii)                  The first word that Matthew chose to quote from John is “repent”.

a)                  “Repent” means to change your ways for the better.  It means to realize some aspect of your lifestyle is wrong and you need to change for the better.

b)                  By the way, the first recorded word when Jesus began his public ministry was also “repent”.  (Matthew 4:17).

c)                  Christianity is not just about saying, “I believe in Jesus”, although, it’s a good start. J  Christianity is about reacting based on that belief.  Repenting has the idea that if you believe Jesus is God and paid the price for your sins, you will be eternally grateful for that payment and change your lifestyle based on that belief.  That is the idea behind “repenting”.

iii)                Remember the purpose of Matthew’s gospel is to show the Jewish audience that Jesus is the promised Messiah.

a)                  Matthew spends a lot of time quoting the Old Testament.

b)                  Here, he quotes Isaiah 40:3, with John the Baptist as the fulfillment of that prophecy.

c)                  This is a good model for us as witnesses for Jesus.

d)                 Sometimes when we start to tell people about our faith, we have to begin with “common ground”.

(1)               Religious Jews accept that the Old Testament as the Word of God.

(2)               Therefore, Matthew uses that as a launching point to show that the events surrounding Jesus time on earth fulfills prophecy.

(3)               When we talk about Jesus, it is often good to find common ground as a starting point. 

(a)               If you find someone who does believe there is a God, but not in Jesus, you may use that as a starting point.

(b)               With Matthew, the common ground is the Old Testament, and thus, the emphasis on fulfillment of prophecy.

c)                  Let’s talk about John the Baptist’s quote from Isaiah.  John said, “Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him.”

i)                    The idea behind this passage is often compared to a word-picture of the king coming to town.

ii)                  When a big time dignitary is coming to town, you often want to prepare the way and “straighten up the mess” around the area.

iii)                If you knew someone famous is coming over to your house for dinner, you would spend the day cleaning and cooking.

a)                  On a related note, I have often found the best motivation to clean up the house is to invite company for dinner.  J

iv)                This is the idea behind John the Baptist’s preaching.

v)                  The application is to change your life because Jesus is coming.

vi)                Here is a related set of Bible verses to make all of us nervous:  J

a)                  “It is written: “‘As surely as I live,’ says the Lord, ‘every knee will bow before me; every tongue will confess to God.’” 12So then, each of us will give an account of himself to God.  (Romans 14:11-12, NIV)

b)                  Paul, in quoting Isaiah 45:23, says we will all give an account of our actions to God the Father.

c)                  For a nonbeliever, it means explaining what information you did know about Jesus and how you reacted to that information.

d)                 For a believer, it means being accountable for the information you were given and what you did with that information.

e)                  So here is John the Baptist saying, “Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him”

(1)               Both Paul’s quote and John the Baptist quote has the same implication for us.  We are to repent, i.e., change our lifestyle based on the fact that Jesus 1) did come and 2) will come again to judge us based on our knowledge of Him.

d)                 One last thing before I move on.  John said, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near”.

i)                    A lot of commentators make a big deal about the expression “kingdom of heaven”.

ii)                  There are other places in the Gospels where Jesus uses the expression “the kingdom of God”.  Most people believe the two terms are used interchangeably. 

a)                  Scholars debate if the two expressions “kingdom of God” vs. “kingdom of heaven” each have a different meaning.

b)                  First of all, when John the Baptist says “the kingdom of heaven is near”, he simply means that eternal salvation is not hundreds or thousands of miles away, but is as close as your lips confessing Jesus.  On earth, the “saved” are mixed in with the “unsaved” until we are called away to heaven.  Therefore the “kingdom of heaven” includes all saved people currently living as those who have died.

c)                  As to the “kingdom of God” vs. “the kingdom of heaven”, I am convinced the terms are meant to be used interchangeably.  To a Jewish mind, the “kingdom of God” can mean things other than salvation, and Matthew specifically used the term “kingdom of heaven” for that reason.

d)                 It’s not a big deal, but you’ll see those two terms used, is seems, inter-changeably and I thought I’d address the issue.

7.                  Verse 4: John’s clothes were made of camel's hair, and he had a leather belt around his waist. His food was locusts and wild honey. 5 People went out to him from Jerusalem and all Judea and the whole region of the Jordan. 6 Confessing their sins, they were baptized by him in the Jordan River.

a)                  In Verse 4 we have the only physical description of John the Baptist.

i)                    The rest of the chapter focuses on his ministry and his purpose.

ii)                  We need to keep that in perspective when applying this chapter to our lives!

b)                  Personally, if I were to have a public relations representative for Jesus, I would have done it differently.  I would have someone who was a known high official, dressed well, and he would be standing on the main stairwell of the temple announcing it to the thousands of religious Jews that Jesus is coming.

i)                    Instead, we find John the Baptist out in the middle of “nowhere”, the desert area on the south end of Israel along the river.

ii)                  John’s father was a priest (See Luke 1:8).  He was part a division of priests, who regularly worked in the temple.  Yet, John choose to live an isolated lifestyle with uncomfortable clothes and an uncomfortable diet.

iii)                I’m sure John’s father (Zechariah, no relation to book of Zechariah) told John as he was growing up of the information the angel told him how John’s role was to be a messenger for the Messiah.  Zechariah also knew that Joseph and Mary, who were relatives through his wife Elizabeth, were to be parents of the Messiah.

a)                  Just when John left his parents to go live in the desert is another mystery of which we have to wait to find out.

b)                  It makes you wonder if John recognized Jesus when he first walked up to him or did God somehow prompt him to say “This is the guy” prior to Jesus’ baptism by John (coming up later in the chapter).

c)                  I should probably give a brief discussion of the comparison of Elijah and John the Baptist.

i)                    In 1st Kings, there was a prophet named Elijah.

ii)                  He did not die, but was taken up into heaven.  (See 2nd Kings 2:11)

iii)                Centuries later, the Old Testament prophet Malachi predicted that Elijah would return prior to Jesus coming:

a)                  “See, I will send you the prophet Elijah before that great and dreadful day of the LORD comes.  (Malachi 4:5)

b)                  The only description we have of Elijah is that “A man with a garment of hair and with a leather belt around his waist.” (2nd Kings 1:8b, NIV)

c)                  Therefore, to a religious Jew, a description of John the Baptist with camel’s hair and a leather belt is a direct comparison to Elijah.

d)                 Yet, in John’s Gospel, John the Baptist denied he was Elijah (John 1:20)

e)                  Here’s the key:  “”He (John) will go on before Him (Jesus) in the spirit and power of Elijah,”  (Luke 1:17a, NIV)

f)                   So John the Baptist is not Elijah, but he was given his spirit and power.

g)                  In Matthew 17, we do have an appearance of Elijah, and we’ll discuss that when we get there.

h)                 The main point to see from this section is simply that when Matthew mentions John the Baptist camel hair and belt, it was meant to show the direct comparison of John to Elijah.  We can now move on.  J

d)                 The interesting thing about John the Baptist’s ministry is that it is not a good example (by modern standards) of how to have a successful ministry. 

i)                    There are lots of Christian books out there on how to have a big ministry.  I’ve yet to see one that says we are to go to the middle of nowhere, eat locusts, wear itchy camel clothes, yell “repent” and wait for people to show up.  J

ii)                  Yet Matthew tells us that people from all over Judea came to hear John’s message.

a)                  It makes you wonder how it spread. 

b)                  Did a handful of people spot John out there, and with “word of mouth”, people just start traveling to see this guy?

c)                  I suspect many people just went out for the curiosity factor.  Once they heard John preach, they got convicted.

(1)               That is how God expects to work with us.  It is the Holy Spirit’s job to do the convicting; our job is just to preach the message.

d)                 You also have to remember that the Jews desperately wanted the Messiah.

(1)               They were living under bondage to Rome and they were looking for someone to overthrow Rome.

(2)               Therefore, under messianic expectations, they went to go check the guy out and see if John the Baptist was the Messiah.

(3)               The application for us is that in the same way people need air, food, clothing, etc. they also need to worship something.  It is inherit.  People can suppress that need or fill it with a substitute.  Our job is to show people how to correctly fill that need.  God does the rest.

e)                  Verse 6 says that people were “confessing their sins, they were baptized by him (John) in the Jordan River”.

i)                    Baptism for a Jew, was a ritual for the conversion of non-Jews (Gentiles) Judaism. 

a)                  For a Jew to be baptized was unheard of.

b)                  Personally, I suspect most of the people who went were the “common folk”.  They understood the rituals of Judaism, but didn’t care for the moment.  They were simply convicted by John’s speeches and thought,
“If the Messiah is coming, I need to confess my sins and change”.

c)                  All my Baptist friends want me to point out that the word “baptism” means emersion in water, and not just sprinkling.  I don’t believe you are not baptized if you are sprinkled, I just believe the proper method is emersion.  I’ll get off my soapbox now on that point. J

ii)                  I should also discuss a group of religious Jews during that time called the Essenes.

a)                  When you read of the religious leaders in the Gospels, you often read of the Pharisee’s and the Sadducee’s.  There was also a third prominent group called the Essenes.  The 1st century historian Josephus talks about all three.

b)                  Many people think John the Baptist was part of the Essenes.

(1)               The Essenes were separatists.  They were roughly the Jewish equivalent of “monks”, who separated themselves from society.

(2)               The Dead Sea Scrolls, discovered in the 1940’s were the collections of writings by the Essenes of that day.  The Dead Sea Scrolls included copies of Old Testament books and personal writings.

(3)               With all that said, I don’t believe John the Baptist was an Essene.

(a)               Essenes believed in continual baptism on a regular basis.

(b)               John was a once-and-for-all baptism kind of guy.  J

8.                  Verse 7: But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to where he was baptizing, he said to them: "You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? 8 Produce fruit in keeping with repentance.

a)                  Personally, I find this kind of comical.

i)                    You can picture people going back and forth, sometimes over a 10-20 mile journey to go check out John the Baptist out in the desert.

a)                  Let’s say one of them says to a Pharisee friend, “Hey, you have to come see this guy”.  He says the Messiah is coming soon.  People are confessing their sins to him and he’s baptizing them.”  So off they go.  The religious leader, thinking, “ok, here’s another kook.  People are following him.  Let’s go check him out”. 

(1)               The first thing out of John’s mouth to these guys is “brood of vipers”.  You can almost hear the voice of the guys who brought them to the river say, “Hey John, keep it down, this is one of the religious leaders.  Do you have to be so rough on him?”  J

ii)                  You have to understand that “brood of vipers” was a terrible insult.

a)                  A viper is a type of snake.  It looks a dead branch lying on the desert floor.  You examine it and it bites you.  This is type of snake that bit Paul in the book of Acts (28:4)

b)                  To compare Pharisees and Sadducees with a low-life desert snake waiting to put their venom in someone is a terrible insult.

b)                  Let’s talk a little about Pharisees and Sadducees and then give modern-examples.

i)