Prepare the Way!

Luke 3:1-20

John the Baptist Prepares the Way

1 Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea, Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, his brother Philip tetrarch of Iturea and the region of Trachonitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene, 2 while Annas and Caiaphas were high priests, the word of God came to John the son of Zacharias in the wilderness. 3 And he went into all the region around the Jordan, preaching a baptism of repentance for the remission of sins, 4 as it is written in the book of the words of Isaiah the prophet, saying:

"The voice of one crying in the wilderness:
'Prepare the way of the LORD;
Make His paths straight.

5 Every valley shall be filled
And every mountain and hill brought low;
The crooked places shall be made straight
And the rough ways smooth;
6 And all flesh shall see the salvation of God.'"

John Preaches to the People

7 Then he said to the multitudes that came out to be baptized by him, "Brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? 8 Therefore bear fruits worthy of repentance, and do not begin to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our father.' For I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones. 9 And even now the ax is laid to the root of the trees. Therefore every tree which does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire."

10 So the people asked him, saying, "What shall we do then?"  11 He answered and said to them, "He who has two tunics, let him give to him who has none; and he who has food, let him do likewise."

12 Then tax collectors also came to be baptized, and said to him, "Teacher, what shall we do?"  13 And he said to them, "Collect no more than what is appointed for you."

14 Likewise the soldiers asked him, saying, "And what shall we do?"  So he said to them, "Do not intimidate anyone or accuse falsely, and be content with your wages."

15 Now as the people were in expectation, and all reasoned in their hearts about John, whether he was the Christ or not, 16 John answered, saying to all, "I indeed baptize you with water; but One mightier than I is coming, whose sandal strap I am not worthy to loose. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. 17 His winnowing fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clean out His threshing floor, and gather the wheat into His barn; but the chaff He will burn with unquenchable fire."

18 And with many other exhortations he preached to the people. 19 But Herod the tetrarch, being rebuked by him concerning Herodias, his brother Philip's wife, and for all the evils which Herod had done, 20 also added this, above all, that he shut John up in prison.

John heard the word of God in the wilderness and went into all the region around the Jordan to begin preaching a baptism of repentance for the remission of sins in preparation for Jesus Christ starting His ministry.  The way way being laid through repentance to clear the land of the hearts of sin to listen and hear Him to follow.  John was the herald promised in Isaiah 40:3-5 who would call out in the wilderness to forge this path for Him.  As Isaiah 52:10 is also quoted here by Luke, this path was the way to salvation, the deliverance from sin’s penalty and fleeing from sin to turn to Him.  All who listened and heard would see the salvation of God in Jesus the Christ who would soon come after John broke the hardened dry ground of the wayward hearts of God’s people with this call to repentance sealed by a baptism of cleansing which represented the eternal baptism of the Holy Spirit of God in Christ to come after His death and resurrection.  This forerunner John preached a repentance of true turning from sin as evidenced by a changed life with good fruit as a proof of their commitment to turn away from sin to the Lord in willing obedience.  Though such lasting fruit would not be completely possible until Christ’s work, it moved the people in that direction to build on by getting them in the good habits of avoiding evil and doing good even if those good works could not save them.  Their hearts were being prepared for Christ by John’s message of repentance and baptism of commitment to straighten out their ways to be ready.  When asked what they should do to demonstrate this change of their life direction, John told them to share food and clothing with those in need and be honest in matters of money.  For the soldiers, he told them to be content with their pay instead of complaining and not to misuse their authority to treat others badly through intimidation or slander to falsely accuse and probably even imprison them.  These wise words of godly advice followed scripture and led the people to question if John was himself the long-awaited Messiah.  He told them clearly that he was not.  That one would not baptize with mere water, but with the divine water of God’s own Spirit of true holiness that would be as fire to consume their sins or themselves if they were found to be chaff separated from the good seed of threshed wheat in the end (Micah 4:12).  The Lord would and will fan away the useless chaff from the good grain of the righteous according to them grace of salvation in Jesus Christ to be revealed.  Because John was faithful to proclaim such inconvenient and uncomfortable truth, the tetrarch Herod locked him up in prison to stop the convicting words that exposed his own sins.  Even now then the full gospel of repentance and faith in Jesus Christ is preached many will react harshly to stop the message from exposing their sin.  We cannot expect the world to welcome this good news of grace which exposes the bad news of their sinful hopeless condition apart from the salvation from God’s wrath (Romans 3:20-23, 6:23).  Many have since prepared the way for Christ with the message of the gospel that calls for Him to enter their hearts and immerse them in His Spirit in such a baptism (Acts 2:38, 18:25, 28, 19:4, Romans 6:3-4, Galatians 3:26-27, 1 Peter 3:21) into Christ.  May we be faithful to hold the course as John the Baptist gave us the example to tell this truth in love with perseverance.