23 Jan

12/09/18    MATTHEW 3:1-12       “JESUS ALWAYS HAS TIME FOR YOU!”

Many of you don’t know much of my history so I’m going to fill in a couple of blanks today.  I was born and raised in the very northwestern corner of Minnesota.  I grew up on a farm and I learned to work early in life.  I never spent much time in church when I was young.  As a matter of fact from high school until about the age of 40, the only time I would be in church was for a wedding or a funeral.  Around age 40, I found Jesus Christ.  He had always been knocking on my door but I finally woke up and answered.  Before this I had tried many things and I was always a failure.  Jesus changed all of that even though I still fail and I praise the Lord that He is so patient and kind.  Anyway, the point of this is that statistically, I should have never found the Lord.  The percentage of people coming to the Lord at that age is very small.  I was an anomaly.  God had a plan for me that included my coming out of the wilderness after 40 years.  I am not unlike John the Baptist in that respect and that is who we are going to talk about today.  John the Baptist was God’s chosen person to clear the way for Jesus.  He got the people thinking about the Messiah and then Jesus shows up at just the right time.  Let’s see what we can learn from this reading.

Jimmy Haile tells the story of a king.  One day, the king died. His servants spread the unbelievable news all over the palace. He had died in his bed of natural causes.

“Where has he gone?” asked one of the king’s wisest counselors

“Why, to Heaven of course!” answered all the others.

“No”, said the other gravely, “I served this king for many years and traveled with him to many places. He loved to travel and would go over the details of each journey. Every element was planned and anticipated. But I have never heard him say a word about traveling to Heaven. It is a journey for which I saw him make no preparation. I am quite sure he did not go to Heaven.”  I hope and pray that we don’t have people like this listening today.

Anyway we will get back to this but first I would like to tell about what has been happening before John the Baptist.  At the birth of Jesus, Herod the Great was still ruling and he was a few steps beyond being a tyrant as were the Herod’s after him.  If people disagreed with Him, they would be put to death.  He basically had no time for the Jews.  This, of course, was reciprocated by the Jews hating Rome even more.  They were also being taxed out of existence.  So these were very trying and hard times in Israel.

We know from 2000 years of experience that Christianity really flourishes in hard times like this but wait.  We don’t have Christianity yet.  But we have the people of Israel looking for the Messiah who would save them from all of this.  These are still people of faith and they are looking for the promises of God.  Surely, He will keep them from perishing at the hands of these evil Romans.  He will send someone who will lead their armies and their society to the freedom that is promised.  Little did they know that they had it all wrong!

So along comes John the Baptist.  If you remember John was a cousin or relative of Jesus.  He would have been slightly older.  We don’t know much about his early life.  We don’t know if their families visited other than when Mary went to see Elizabeth when she was pregnant.  We do know that he was a wild looking fellow even by the standards of these early Israelites.  He wore clothes made of camel hair.  Now I don’t know this for certain but I think that I have read where this hair was very coarse so this would have been quite uncomfortable.  He wore this with a leather belt so I would guess that he was a fairly tough man.  Plus he lived in the desert wilderness.  If you have ever seen pictures of this area you would know that it is pretty rough country.  His diet consisted of wild honey and locusts.  John was far from being one the regulars from Jerusalem.

But this didn’t stop him.  He came from the wilderness to the Jordan River preaching repentance.  He knew that all of Jerusalem had it wrong.  The Pharisees, the Sadducees, chief priests, the scribes and all others had the message wrong.  John came to prepare the way for the coming Lord.  This was a radical message.  This type of message was unheard of at this time.  It was revolutionary!

And what happens?  The people flock to the Jordan to listen to him!  They want to be baptized by John!  This is really something extraordinary because being baptized was not a common practice for the common people.  As a matter of fact it wasn’t common for anyone.  The term baptism is never used in the Old Testament.  They had similar rituals but not baptism, for the forgiveness of sins.  This is something new.  I don’t know what we could liken this to today.  This is another of those God orchestrated miracles that we don’t even bother to look at.  God did this and people flocked to the river.  It’s just amazing how God attracts people in all different kinds of circumstances.

Let’s look at what is so revolutionary about this message.  It really isn’t any different from what the Jews were supposed to be doing for centuries.  After all, when Jesus came to live in this world He was just fulfilling the ancient Jewish prophecies.  The message has always been the same throughout the ages.

First of all, we are sinners.  I don’t care who you are or what you do, you are a sinner!  One of the hardest things you have to do in this immoral society you live in is to really admit that you are a sinner.  So many just give this a little lip service and move on but this is wrong.  This is wrong because God hates sin.  It’s that simple.  You are sinning against the most powerful being that there was or is or ever will be!  We keep acting like it’s not a big deal but it is.  Jesus tells us many times that there will be many who think they are going to join Him but they won’t.  And the reason is that we are sinners who don’t really acknowledge that we are sinners.  When you are done confessing your sins, you should feel like you have done something very good because you have and Jesus will let you know.  We should be praising the Lord because He is not only the most powerful being we will ever meet but He is also the most loving.

I talked about this last week when I said that most pastors of this country have one or many parts of the Bible that they don’t believe.  This is part of it.  They don’t believe because they are mired too deeply in sin.  I just read a news report from a Christian university in the Midwest.  A student made a complaint against the university because a sermon there made them uncomfortable.  Heaven forbid should we be uncomfortable!  This person failed to realize that they were uncomfortable because the Holy Spirit was convicting them of their sin.  They were or are unable to realize what is happening so they complain.  People, you can complain all you want when you come before judgement and it will do you no good.  By then it is too late.

This is because we are not only to realize that we are sinners but we are also to repent.  This is Biblical!  Before we move on here we have to realize that there is a huge difference between repenting and confessing.  Confessing is actually part of realizing you are a sinner.  You confess your sins to Jesus.  He is waiting for you and you can confess to Him at any time.  As a matter of fact I confess to Jesus on a daily basis.  If you think that pastors aren’t sinners, you are wrong.  We are human and no better than anyone else.  We have struggles and trials.  We might even have more trials than the general population because Satin really wants to get rid of us.  Anyway, confess you sins.  Make this a part of you daily prayer life.  And by the way, make sure that you have a daily prayer life.

Then, we are to be repenting after we confess we are sinners.  Repentance is different from confessing in that when you repent, you actually change your ways.  Confessing is you telling God that you are a sinner, whatever those sins are and repenting is actually doing something about the bad behavior.  Genuine confessing is an instantaneous event.  You confess and you are forgiven immediately.  As a matter of fact, the Bible tells us that after you confess, Jesus actually forgets your past sins.  I want you to think about that for a minute.  Jesus doesn’t even remember your confessed sins.  It is you who remembers them.  Anyway, think about that for a moment.

Repenting is your changing your behavior.  This can be instantaneous also but it may not be.  If you decide you aren’t going to lie any more, you may quit right now.  Or if you decide not to drink or take drugs or use people of the opposite sex anymore, you may start that right now.  However, if you are addict to any of these or other things it may take a little time.  This can readily be seen in drug addicts or alcoholics where they have become Christian but they have a hard time shaking that addiction.  All I can say is to keep bringing these troubles to Jesus and listen, listen to what He tells you.

Here is a personal example.  Years ago before I was a pastor,I used to be a smoker.  Over the years I had tried to quit many times but I always failed.  This failure continued after I came to know Jesus.  But I kept praying about it and finally it dawned on me that He had told me the answer.  It seemed that every time I quit smoking for a few days, I would have a beer or a drink and I would start smoking again.  Jesus told me to quit drinking.  So I did which in turn led me to quit smoking.  It was that easy.  This happened sometime after I came to know Jesus. So I did get to repent but in this case it took some time.

John also tells us to baptize and be baptized.  Jesus too tells this in the last chapter of Matthew and elsewhere.  I’m not going to go into this too much today because it is still very controversial.  There are many ways to be baptized and each denomination is different and according to them, they are the only ones who are right.  Just as a little history, there were wars fought over baptism in the 1500’s.  This was a very touchy subject and it continues today.  We have denominations thinking that they are always right by saying that they will only accept the baptism from their churches.  I hope you can see that it gets real sticky!

My take on all these things is that they are probably all wrong.  However, I don’t know which way is right. I also know that we are commanded to do this by Jesus himself.  I don’t know what happens when I do an infant baptism but I do know one thing.  God through the Holy Spirit is working.  I can feel Him.  Also know that there is no saving grace through most baptisms but know that Jesus is still working.  Jesus will always be working for you if you just believe.  Have total faith in Him.

And this leads us to the most important part of John’s message.  He tells his audience that there will be someone coming after him whose sandals John isn’t fit to carry.  In other words as important and good John is, he isn’t one little bit worthy of anything of the one to come after him.  And of course the one to come is Jesus.

Jesus is many things and they are all good.  It is worth your time and effort to know Him.  For instance, He is infinite.  He has always been and always shall be.  Along with this is that Scripture tells us He never changes.  Therefore His Word as found in the Bible is always right and never needs changing.  He is totally reliable.  Due to all these things, Jesus has no needs.  It is we who have needs and Jesus is always there to help you if you just call on Him.  He is also all powerful, all knowing and He is everywhere at the same time.  These terms of greatness are probably too much for us to comprehend.  But just know that He is everything to all people if you just accept Him.

Jesus is all knowing and His wisdom is perfect.  When He tells you something then that something is absolutely right and you can count on this 100%.  Jesus is also absolutely faithful and good.  We are not but we should praise Him that He is the author of all good.  When the going gets tough you can count on Jesus.  Also when the going gets tough, you can count of Jesus to have an infinite amount of love and kindness.  He is merciful beyond our comprehension.  His grace is limitless.  He is glorious, beautiful and great.  As a matter of fact I can’t even begin to cover the wondrousness of this God of ours.  And I of course, above all else Jesus is God.

Put all these things and more together and you have a pretty good deal.  And the best part is that even though Jesus is the God of the universe and everything in it, He knows and loves you beyond any part of your comprehension.  He takes care of all of these things and He still has time to love you this much.  He loves little old you and He will forever.  That is what John the Baptist was talking about in this passage.  Please don’t be like most of his audience in that they didn’t believe.  Ask Jesus to live and rule in your life and you will find a tremendous change for the better.  Jesus is always for the better.  You have a God who loves you that much.  Thank you Jesus for first loving us.  Let’s pray.