"A voice of one calling in the desert,There in the wilderness God had become his companion, his confidant, his teacher. In a phrase reminiscent of the calling of Old Testament prophets, "the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the desert" (3:2; Jeremiah 1:2; 2:1; Ezekiel 1:3; Hosea 1:1-2; Jonah 1:1; Micah 1:1; Zephaniah 1:1). He was the last of the Old Covenant prophets, his clothing (Matthew 3:4), spirit (Luke 1:17), and preparatory role (Malachi 4:5-6) those of Elijah. His cousin Jesus placed him among the greatest men in all history (Luke 7:28). In the desert, John came to know God better than people, and when God fully owned his heart and allegiance, John was ready.
'Prepare the way for the Lord,
make straight paths for him.
Every valley shall be filled in,
every mountain and hill made low.
The crooked roads shall become straight,
the rough ways smooth.
And all mankind will see God's salvation.' " (3:4-6)
What does this kind of desert hermit life do to a person? It produces someone who really doesn't care what "civilized" people think about him. John didn't structure his life in relation to societal norms and expectations, so when he burst upon the scene as a desert preacher, his words were unrefined, blunt, and uncompromising.
Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary
3:15-20 John the Baptist disowned being himself the Christ, but confirmed the people in their expectations of the long-promised Messiah. He could only exhort them to repent, and assure them of forgiveness upon repentance; but he could not work repentance in them, nor confer remission on them. Thus highly does it become us to speak of Christ, and thus humbly of ourselves. John can do no more than baptize with water, in token that they ought to purify and cleanse themselves; but Christ can, and will baptize with the Holy Ghost; he can give the Spirit, to cleanse and purify the heart, not only as water washes off the dirt on the outside, but as fire clears out the dross that is within, and melts down the metal, that it may be cast into a new mould. John was an affectionate preacher; he was beseeching; he pressed things home upon his hearers. He was a practical preacher; quickening them to their duty, and directing them in it. He was a popular preacher; he addressed the people, according to their capacity. He was an evangelical preacher. In all his exhortations, he directed people to Christ. When we press duty upon people, we must direct them to Christ, both for righteousness and strength. He was a copious preacher; he shunned not to declare the whole counsel of God. But a full stop was put to John's preaching when he was in the midst of his usefulness. Herod being reproved by him for many evils, shut up John in prison. Those who injure the faithful servants of God, add still greater guilt to their other sins.
Pulpit Commentary
Verse 16. - I indeed baptize you with water; but One mightier than I cometh. To refute this growing conviction that he was the Messiah, John tells the people plainly tidal Another far greater than he was coming. He, John, certainly washed (baptized) those who came to him, but his washing was merely symbolical - it could not purify them; his work had been to stir them up to repentance, to arouse them to change their lives. But the One who was coming, before whom he (John) was unworthy to stand and perform the humblest menial office, that great One should baptize too, but his baptism would be a very different thing. He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost. There was, indeed, a difference between John's baptism and the baptism of the Messiah who was to come after him. John could do no more with his words and symbol baptism than rouse the people to struggle after repentance and a change of heart and life, while Messiah would furnish to men the influence from above, that was really needed in order to purity of heart and life. He would procure and pour out the influence of the Divine Spirit (see Dr. Morrison, Mark 1:8). And with fire. Not with punitive fire, which interpretation would be quite alien from the context here. Those expositors who have adopted this meaning of the fire here have been most likely influenced by the mention of the unquenchable fire in the next sentence. The fire which was to enter into Messiah's baptism was rather the flame of purification. So we read of the coal of fire taken from off the altar and laid on the mouth of Isaiah the prophet (Isaiah 6:6, 7). "With fire," writes Bishop Wordsworth, "to purify, illumine, transform, inflame with holy fervor and zeal, and carry upward, as Elijah was carried up to heaven in a chariot of fire."
From JesusWalk:
The process of preparing grain involved (1) threshing, that is, crushing, beating or thrashing the grain heads in order to loosen the grain kernels from the surrounding stems and husks; and (2) winnowing, using a kind of wooden pitch fork (a winnowing fork) to throw the threshed grain heads into the breeze, so the lighter chaff will blow downwind, and the heavier grain kernels will fall back to the ground, separating the two. The floor would be "cleared" by threshing and then winnowing all the grain heads until the chaff and grain had been completely separated. The grain was then gathered into baskets and stored in the barn, but the remaining stems and husks piled together and set ablaze.
Look with me at a couple of interesting words. The verb translated "clear" (NIV) or "purge" (KJV) is Greek diakathairo, "clean out, cleanse thoroughly."[7] The idea of thoroughness and complete cleaning is contained in this compound verb. The second interesting word translated the "unquenchable" is Greek asbestos, a mineral supposed by the ancients to be inextinguishable when set on fire.[8] John the Baptist isn't talking about just regular fire here that would burn itself out when the chaff is consumed, but a kind of eternal, unquenchable fire.
So what is this fire baptism? There are three possibilities:
- A figure of purification of sin as the Holy Spirit does his cleansing work in us as part of the process of sanctification. Indeed, the Spirit's cleansing in us is sometimes painful, but nothing in the context suggests that this is what John had in mind.
- A symbol of the tongues of fire that appeared over the heads of the 120 disciples in the upper room on the Day of Pentecost (Acts 2:3). This, too, is a stretch for John the Baptist. In the Pentecost passage, the fire probably represents the Shekinah glory of God rather than fires of purification.
- A prophecy of the eschatological separation of the righteous from the unrighteous,
and judgment by the Messiah at the end of the age. This fits
contemporary expectations of the Messiah, as well as the words "cleanse
thoroughly" and "unquenchable fire" contained in the passage. Jesus'
parable of the Wheat and the Tares (Matthew 13:30, 41-42) includes this
kind of analogy of separation and final judgment. Remember Henry
Alford's well-known Thanksgiving Hymn, "Come Ye Thankful People, Come,"
verse 3?
"For the Lord our God shall come, And shall take His harvest home.
From His field shall in that day All offenses purge away;
Give His angels charge at last In the fire the tares to cast,
But the fruitful ears to store In His garner evermore."
(From BibleHub)
In all four Gospel passages mentioned above, Mark and John speak of the baptism of the Holy Spirit, but only Matthew and Luke mention the baptism with fire. The immediate context of Matthew and Luke is judgment (Matthew 3:7-12; Luke 3: 7-17). The context of Mark and John is not (Mark 1:1-8; John 1:29-34). We know that the Lord Jesus is coming in flaming fire to judge those who do not know God (2 Thessalonians 1:3-10; John 5:21-23; Revelation 20:11-15), but praise be to God that He will save all that will come and put their trust in Him (John 3:16)!
No comments:
Post a Comment