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In April 1993, immediately after Steve Morrow scored the winning
goal, giving the Arsenal team England's league cup soccer championship,
Morrow's teammates tossed him into the air enthusiastically beginning their
victory celebrations. However, they failed to catch him when he came down, and
Morrow was carried off the field on a stretcher with a broken arm and an oxygen
mask on his face.
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Popularity is a precarious position. A life built on popularity is on a shaky
foundation.
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In his gospel, Matthew shared with his readers the popularity of John the
Baptist.
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John appearing in the wilderness, baptizing at the Jordan River would have
created no small stir among the Jewish people.
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The minds of early first century Jews would have turned immediately to
restoration and redemption.
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Their collective memory turned back to the leadership of Joshua and God's
people entering the Promised Land.
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Their hearts waxed nostalgic over the great and mighty deeds of God among his
people in the past.
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Such thoughts of a new conquest and re-established kingdom of Israel ignited an
intensely emotional atmosphere.
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They longed deeply for God to show up and set them free from their Roman
oppressors in a mighty way.
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They heard their deliverance in John preaching repentance and kingdom, so they
flocked to John in droves to show their repentance through confession and
baptism.
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Those who went to John for baptism were confessing their sins, which is what
the prophets of old hoped for when they preached repentance.
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To repent is not merely to change one's mind as the Greeks imagined, but to
turn around and return to God.
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If one needs to repent, then that person is going in a direction that travels
further away from God.
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Repentance means a change in direction, plotting a new course in the opposite
direction, taking a U-turn on the highway of life.
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John's clothing, diet, and message are an unmistakeable suggestion that John
represents the promised return of Elijah, paving the way for the coming
Messiah.
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Earlier I said that popularity is a precarious position, a shaky foundation.
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The crowds presumed upon the meaning of John's message, i.e., they assumed his message
meant the restoration of Israel as a sovereign nation.
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John's popularity drew so much attention that Herod Antipas, the tetrarch of
Galilee, was concerned that John's message might cause a rebellion.
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John's popularity also drew the attention of both the Pharisees and Sadducees (whom
Matthew lumps together as one)and we have noted before that you could not find
two more opposite groups among the Jews of those days.
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The Pharisees were very religious and concerned with living rightly before God
which they believed came from keeping the laws of Moses.
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They were concerned with keeping the letter of the law above the spirit of the
law.
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However, the Pharisees so concerned themselves with keeping the Mosaic law that
they forgot the greatest commands of the law, namely the law of love.
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They forgot that God prefers mercy over sacrifice.
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You may also recall that they believed in the resurrection of the dead on the
last day.
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While the Pharisees had a high appeal with the general populace, the crowds,
the Sadducees, on the other hand, appealed only to the rich.
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The ancient historian Flavius Josephus had this to say about the Sadducees:
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[They] suppose that God is not concerned in our doing or not doing what is
evil; and they say, that to act what is good, or what is evil, is at men's own
choice, and that the one or the other belongs so to every one, that they may
act as they please. They also take away the belief of the immortal duration of
the soul, and the punishments and rewards in Hades.
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In other words, the Sadducees, although religious, taught that right and wrong
don't matter; God does not concern himself with that. Do whatever your
conscience dictates.
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To them, after this life there is nothing, so live for today.
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Now, the members of the Sadducees were mostly the Jewish priests, and these
self interested aristocrats who were supposed to care for God's people, in fact,
cared only for themselves.
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Both of these groups believed themselves to be children of Abraham, yet in the
Pharisees and Sadducees we find both the ultra conservative legalists and the
mega liberal biblical compromisers who come together to investigate John's
popularity and hear what he had to say.
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The Greek of verse seven can be translated to ways: 1) "the Pharisees and
Sadducees coming to watch him baptize" or, 2) "the Pharisees and
Sadducees coming to be baptized."
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Whether they came to watch or came to be baptized does not matter because John
had words of doom and gloom for those who refused to repent and be baptized.
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Keep expecting the unexpected voice and humbly repent.
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7 But when he saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming to watch him
baptize, he denounced them. “You brood of snakes!” he exclaimed. “Who
warned you to flee God’s coming wrath? 8 Prove by the way you live
that you have repented of your sins and turned to God. 9 Don’t just
say to each other, ‘We’re safe, for we are descendants of Abraham.’ That means
nothing, for I tell you, God can create children of Abraham from these very
stones. 10 Even now the ax of God’s judgment is poised, ready to
sever the roots of the trees. Yes, every tree that does not produce good fruit
will be chopped down and thrown into the fire.
11 “I
baptize with water those who repent of their sins and turn to God. But
someone is coming soon who is greater than I am—so much greater that I’m not
worthy even to be his slave and carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the
Holy Spirit and with fire. 12 He is ready to separate the chaff from
the wheat with his winnowing fork. Then he will clean up the threshing area,
gathering the wheat into his barn but burning the chaff with never-ending fire.”
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The Pharisees and Sadducees did not expect to hear John's voice telling them to
stop assuming that because they are descended from Abraham they will not be
judged.
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John's warning to the Pharisees and Sadducees was harsh and stern. It was a
message of judgement.
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But to those who have ears to hear, it is also a message of hope.
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Keep listening for the unexpected voice and humbly repent.
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We heard last week that Advent anticipates the coming of Jesus into the world
as a newborn infant, but also that Advent anticipates the return of Jesus as
King and Judge.
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We learned that the world does not look expectantly for Jesus, in fact, the
world turns a blind eye and a deaf hear, to those who speak his message.
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For those who turn a blind eye and a deaf ear to the message of repentance
because the kingdom of God is near, this message becomes a message of judgment.
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But for those who see and hear this message is a message of hope.
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Keep listening for the unexpected voice and humbly repent.
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Do we presume upon our salvation,
assuming that we are saved, while remaining unrepentant?
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Are we prepared for the coming of the
King of Kings who will judge the whole world?
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Don't go the way of the Pharisees by becoming an ultraconservative biblical
legalist measuring everybody by standards that they can't even live up to.
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And don't go the way of the Sadducees by becoming a mega liberal biblical
compromiser doing whatever you please because you think that God is not going
to judge you.
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Instead, humbly accept your salvation without presuming upon it because you are
saved by grace.
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Never stop turning away from your sins and turning toward God by faith,
confessing your sins to him and receiving the forgiveness offered to you in
Jesus Christ.
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Keep listening for the unexpected voice and humbly repent.
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