In Matthew chapter 3, there's
about, I've got this in your lesson, there's about 28 years
that have passed since the end of chapter 2 and the beginning
of chapter 3. You know the Bible doesn't give
us hardly any information about our Savior in His youth. We learn
about His birth, the incarnation and His birth. And then the only
time that anything is said about his youth is from in the gospel
of Luke. And I've got it listed here,
Luke chapter two, verses 41 through 52. It gives us the record of
Joseph and Mary taking the young boy, Jesus, who was about 12
years old to the temple. And you remember when he was
there discussing things with the elders in the temple, the
priest and all of that. And that's when Joseph and Mary
were looking for him. They couldn't find him. And then
when they found him, they kind of chided him. And remember,
he said, I must be about my father's business. And I think about one
significant thing about that is, you know, a lot of people
say, well, Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, he didn't realize that he was
the son of God and the Messiah until he was like 30 years old. But that's not true. I mean,
he said, I must be about my father's business. He knew then. of who
his father was and what he was there for. We don't, like I said,
we don't have a lot of details, but we do learn in Luke 2, 52,
it says this, and I've got this listed in your lesson. Jesus
increased in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and man.
And we understand that all of that can only be attributed to
his humanity. And this is not showing that
he was less than God in his deity. And you know, I thought about
this. You know, the constitution of the person of our Savior is
astonishing. I mean, it's a mind-boggling,
astonishing fact. And yet it is so comforting because
a God manifest in the flesh is the only kind of person who could
save sinners like us. unto us a child is born, unto
us a son is given, his name shall be called Jesus, his name shall
be called Emmanuel. He's what it took to accomplish
the salvation of his people, redeeming us from our sins and
establishing righteousness on our behalf whereby God could
be just and justify. But I think that as he grew in
wisdom and stature, I put this in the image of God within him
shown outwardly brighter and brighter as he grew from a child
to a youth to an adult. And so here we come in verse
one of chapter three it says, in those days came John the Baptist
preaching in the wilderness of Judea. The significance of that
is this, John, as the forerunner of Christ,
had been clearly prophesied in the Old Testament. Malachi 3,
1, Malachi 4 and verse 5. And when he came, he avoided
the religious establishment because the religious establishment or
the religious majority were leading the people astray. The Pharisees
and the Sadducees, which we'll deal with a little bit next week,
Lord willing. But the Lord, John did not go
into Jerusalem and blend in with the religious culture of false
religion. And he went outside that, he
was in the wilderness. And that wilderness is a very,
very good picture of us by nature, isn't it? Man in a dry desert,
wilderness, dead, and that's where he preached. And when the
Lord came, you know, the Bible says that Jesus suffered without
the gate or outside the camp. He, too, didn't blend in with
religion. And we're not to blend in with
the religious culture of our day. And he commands us not to
do so with what we call the status quo of false religion. We're
to be separate. That's what the Bible means when
it says be separate. It doesn't mean that we're to
have a holier-than-thou, self-righteous attitude. But we're to be separate
because our gospel is different. Our gospel is the one way of
salvation by God's grace through the Lord Jesus Christ. The Pharisees
and the Sadducees, they taught salvation by the works and the
wills of men. Salvation conditioned on sinners.
And so we preach the true gospel and that separates us from the
religious majority who come in for the things of man
by nature, what we know by nature. There is a way that seemeth right
unto man, it's the way of death. So now, when all of this comes
together, see John's out here baptizing and it says, here's
John's message, verse two, and he said, repent ye for the kingdom
of heaven is at hand. Now, This repentance, I'm gonna
deal with this in next week's message, Lord willing. But repentance,
faith and repentance come together. You can't have one without the
other. Faith is a God-given gift that turns us to Christ. Repentance
is a God-given gift that turns us away from self and self-righteousness. This repentance is not just an
outward reformation. Now, there may be outward reformations
that are needed and that come with it, but repentance is a
change of mind and heart. It's a complete turnaround from
the way that we naturally go concerning God, concerning ourselves,
concerning sin and salvation, and to the right way as related
and revealed in the gospel. It's where a sinner comes to
see that everything that he thought at one time recommended him unto
God didn't recommend him at all. As Paul wrote in Philippians
chapter three, it's all dumb that I may win Christ. It turns
the sinner to Christ and his righteousness alone for all salvation. And so when John the Baptist,
he said, repent ye, he's talking about turning away from the lies
and the false gospels that their religious leaders were teaching
them of salvation by the works and the wills of man, and turn
to the Messiah who's to come, turn to Christ. So it's a complete
reversal that way. And we'll deal with this again
next week, but I think one of the best descriptions of God-given
faith and God-given repentance is what you see in Philippians
chapter three, where Paul says that, and we'll just read a little
bit of it here, and we'll read it again because we read it a
lot. But he says, verse seven, but what things were gained to
me The things that I thought that God smiled upon me, accepted
of me, the things that I thought contributed to my salvation,
made me acceptable with God, the things that I thought were
gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ. That's faith in Christ
and repentance, and he says, yea, doubtless I count all things
but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus
my Lord, for whom I've suffered the loss of all things, and do
count them but done that I may win Christ. Be found in him,
not having mine own righteousness which is of the law. Well, repent,
John says, repent ye for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
Now the kingdom of heaven being at hand is the Messiah has come.
The kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of God, they're the same thing.
Some theologians make them separate, but they're the same thing, the
kingdom of God. Christ said you must be born again or you cannot
see the kingdom of God. You cannot enter it. It's the
kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of God. It's the spiritual eternal
kingdom that's established upon Christ and his substitutionary
death to redeem his people from their sins. That's what this
kingdom is. And it's at hand, John says.
It's going to be ushered in and established by the one who is
coming. And of course, John is getting
ready to point him out. Behold the Lamb of God, which
beareth away the sin of the world. It's the appearance of the Messiah
here on earth, Christ coming as the surety, as the substitute,
as the redeemer of God's elect, both Jew and Gentile. offering
himself as a sacrifice to the justice of God for our sins imputed
to him and Upon his death his resurrection his ascension the
Holy Spirit would be sent and the kingdom of God would be in
full force God bringing his people into the kingdom bringing his
sheep in now. He'd been doing that in the Old
Testament Bringing his elect to a saving knowledge of Christ,
but this is the time There's a particular time. You know,
I've been thinking about this because so many people have been
arguing and debating over this issue of eternity and time, and
we really shouldn't be arguing and debating over that. Here's
what we should think. Salvation is not a one-dimensional
matter. It's multi-dimensional. I think
it was Brother Tim James who said it's like a multi-faceted
diamond. You look at it from various different
points of view. But in salvation, there are eternal
matters in the mind and purpose and the will of God. And then
there are matters of time that God works in time. God created
this world in a moment of time. I don't know how old the world
is. I figured if you go by the Bible, literally it's probably
around six, almost 7,000 years old. Scientists say millions
and billions. They don't know. But I know God
created it. And it was a moment of time that
he said, let there be light. And in that time there was light.
But that was God's eternal purpose from eternity past. And then
time began to go and Adam fell, we fell in Adam, into sin and
death and depravity. But there was a time that God
appointed, whereby he sent forth his son. Galatians 4.4 says that,
in the fullness of the time, God sent forth his son, made
of a woman, made under the law to redeem them that were under
the law. And I've always looked at it this way. What God has
eternally purposed before time had to have its accomplishment
in time. And that's what this is talking
about. The kingdom of heaven is at hand. It's time now for
this to be established. What God had purposed in eternity
past is being fulfilled in time by the coming of the Messiah.
and by what he accomplished on Calvary to put away our sins
and establish the only righteousness by which God could be just and
justify of the ungodly. And there's no doubt in my mind
that even before Christ actually came and accomplished this in
time, God already had accepted his people in the beloved. The
Old Testament saints, They were accepted of God. They were justified
in God's sight. Their sins were forgiven and
they were righteous in God's sight based upon what this person,
the Messiah, would come in time on this given day and accomplish. But it's in God's eternal mind.
God's, listen, God's mind doesn't change. God never changes his
mind. He doesn't have to change his
mind. The only one who changes their minds is an imperfect person. He's not imperfect. So it's called
the kingdom of heaven here. And it's called the kingdom of
heaven because it originated with God in heaven. And it was
established by him who came from heaven, the son of God. And it
is entered by sinners who are born from above. And it's a spiritual,
it's an eternal kingdom. It's not of this world. It'll
never end. Think about that. We're part
of a kingdom that cannot be shaken, Hebrews chapter 12 says. It's
a kingdom of righteousness. The king who rules over it has
a scepter of righteousness because it's established upon the righteousness
of God, and that's the merit of the obedience unto death of
Christ as the sovereign redeemer of all his people. Seek ye first
the kingdom of God, the kingdom of heaven, and his righteousness,
and all these things will be added to you. Remember that?
And the goal of salvation is to make us righteous through
the imputed merits, the imputed righteousness of our king. So he says, repent ye for the
kingdom of heaven. Don't look for a kingdom here
on earth. And you know, that's what they were looking for. You
know, that's what some people are looking for today. They're looking for
the establishment of a future kingdom in Jerusalem, geographically,
and that Christ will rule from that kingdom. Don't look for
an earthly kingdom. This is a heavenly kingdom. This is a spiritual
kingdom. You could say this kingdom is
seen on earth in his church, the true church of the living
God, because the true church is made up of the subjects of
the king. And that's what we are. And whenever,
when Christ comes back again, he's gonna gather us together
and he will make his kingdom known throughout the universe
because every knee's gonna bow and every tongue's gonna confess
that Jesus is Lord. We'll look at verse three. He
says, for this is he that was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah,
saying, the voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare ye
the way of the Lord, make his path straight. Turn over to Isaiah
chapter 40. This is a prophecy from this
passage and what you have here in Isaiah chapter 40, you have
a prophecy of John the Baptist himself and you also have a prophecy
of Christ whom John was sent to prepare the way by preaching
the gospel. by preaching the coming of the
Messiah, by preaching the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And in
verse three of Isaiah chapter 40, listen to it. It says, the
voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, prepare ye the way
of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our
God. Open the way. Announce that he's
come and he's here. You don't have to look for his
coming as the Jews do today. He's already come. And then if
you look down at verse nine, listen to this of Isaiah 40.
Oh, Zion, that bring us good tidings, get thee up into the
high mountain. Oh, Jerusalem, that bring us
good tidings, lift up thy voice with strength, lift it up, be
not afraid. Say unto the cities of Judah,
behold your God. And I think about John the Baptist,
behold the Lamb of God. He says in verse 10, behold,
the Lord God will come with strong hand and his arm shall rule for
him, that's Christ. Behold, his reward is with him
and his work before him. He shall feed his flock like
a shepherd. He shall gather the lambs with
his arm, that's his power, and carry them in his bosom and shall
gently lead those that are with young. What a great picture and
prophecy of Christ, who is our shepherd king. He's gonna rule,
but not like an iron-fisted despot. He's gonna rule like a shepherd,
leading his people who are with young. Prepare ye the way, make
his path straight. Now, we can relate that to the
preaching of the gospel. Why do we preach the gospel?
Well, because number one, God commanded us to do it. And number
two, we're seeking his sheep. And number three, we're comforting
his people. And so we prepare the way in
essence when we preach the gospel, because the only way that God's
people can be prepared to receive the king is through the preaching
of the gospel. And we know that it's not our preaching that does
it, it's the power of the Holy Spirit. giving us a new heart
to receive the Word of God. You must be born again. That's
the Spirit's work. So the Spirit is the sovereign
agent in bringing the subjects of the King into the kingdom. So look at verse four now, back
in Matthew chapter three. He says, and the same John had
his raiment of camel's hair and a leathern girdle about his loins
and his meat where his meal was locust and wild honey. Why is
that important? John, he didn't care for the
niceties of this world, obviously. His pulpit was out there in the
wilderness. He wore animal skins. He ate locust and wild. What
that is doing, it's connecting him graphically with the school
of the prophets because this is the way Elijah was. I've got
it in your lesson. Like Elijah before him, John's
dress and his diet were unusual. You can read that back in 2 Kings. And see, John represents the
whole school, the whole line of the prophetic message that
Christ, the king, is coming and he will do his work. And so this
kind of identifies him with them. And he was led, he was empowered
by the Spirit of God, the same Spirit that empowered Elijah.
That's why in some of these prophecies of John it says Elijah is coming.
It's not talking about Elijah personally, it's talking about
John the Baptist who's in the school, the line, the message
of Elijah as were all the prophets. And so John represents that conclusion
of the prophets right before Messiah comes into the world.
And then he says in verse five, then went out to him Jerusalem
and all Judea and all the region round about Jordan and were baptized
of him in Jordan confessing their sins. There's been a lot of debate about John's baptism. Was John's baptism the same as
our baptism, the ordinance of baptism? And of course you know,
John's baptism and our baptism was not for salvation. Baptism
in water, literal water, does not wash away our sins. And it
does not even apply the blood of Christ. Some denominations
say, well, the water actually doesn't wash away our sins, but
that's where the blood of Christ is applied to us. That's not
so. There's nothing in the word of
God that states that. The blood of Christ is applied
to us by the spirit when he brings us in conviction to believe in
Christ, to worship him and to rest in him. That's what the
Bible means when it talks about the blood of sprinkling, sprinkling
the conscience. That means that our conscience
is cleared of the guilt and the defilement of sin as we look
to Christ and rest in him and plead his blood and righteousness.
That's what that means. And that takes place or ought
to take place before you're baptized in water. Well, here the baptism
of John is called the baptism of repentance, confessing their
sins. Well, that's what we did when we were baptized. We were
confessing that we have nothing to recommend us unto God but
the blood and righteousness of Christ. That's what we confessed.
We confessed that we were represented by the surety. who when he died,
we died. When he was buried, we were buried.
When he arose again, we arose again. So baptism was an outward
confession of something that had already taken place inwardly.
And so, you know, in the years that I've studied this, I really
don't see the difference between John's baptism and our baptism
that Christ instituted because I think it was a way of preparation
It was preparing them, but there's no verses of scripture that we
can go to that explains that there's a difference. So I just
say they're virtually the same. It was a confession of our identification
and our public confession of Christ. Just like, and that's
what John was talking about. Matthew doesn't, John, the book
of John gives us a little more information, and then when we
talk about Christ's baptism down here in the next few weeks, we'll
have a little more information. But what was John's message?
Behold the Lamb of God. Look to Christ. You remember
he told me, he said, I'm not the Christ. Don't look to me. Later on here in Matthew, he's
gonna say, I indeed baptize with water. But there's one coming
after me who can baptize with fire. That's the baptism of the
Holy Spirit. And what is the baptism of the
Holy Spirit? It's the new birth. It's the Holy Spirit convicting
us of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment, and bringing
us to believe in Christ and to repent of dead works and idolatry. All right. That's it.