GOSPELS 1 THE BAPTISM OF REPENTANCE

GOSPELS 1 BAPTISM OF REPENTANCE 

The combined accounts of the four Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, give us a comprehensive narrative of the life of Jesus from his birth through to his resurrection and ascension into Heaven. The four Gospels are written by four different men of different temperaments and backgrounds who also write from different perspectives, so there are variations in details and emphases and there are certain gaps in some Gospels that end up being filled by other Gospels. For example, only Matthew and Luke write in their early chapters about the birth of Jesus and give genealogies of his ancestry. 
The Christmas stories in the books of Matthew and Luke reveal the fact that Jesus and John the Baptist were cousins because of their mothers, Mary and Elizabeth, and would have met one another as families in their younger years when everyone visited the Temple in Jerusalem for the three major Jewish feasts of Passover, Pentecost and Tabernacles. And they may also have enjoyed other family gatherings together before John went off to live in the wilderness.

John the Baptist had for many years lived a monastic life in the wilderness amongst a group of male Jewish disciples called the Essenes (which are not mentioned as such in the Bible but are referred to generally as Zealots), and they lived in the lowest geographical place in the earth close to the Dead Sea near Jericho. Simon the Zealot is named in the Gospels as a disciple of Jesus, and Judas Iscariot is also believed to have been a Zealot. Iscariot means to be a member of the Sicarii, the Zealots who committed assassinations against Romans and their allies and were waiting for a Messianic leader to lead them into war against the Roman oppressors. This could partly explain the disappointment of Judas and his bitter betrayal of Jesus. 

All the Gospel writers begin talking about the ministry of Jesus by introducing the ministry of John the Baptist and his message of repentance.  Matthew dramatically describes the entrance of John the Baptist into the religious and political scene in Judea. He was wearing a camel’s skin and eating locusts and wild honey and he despised the opulent and corrupt lifestyle of the rich and powerful people like Herod Antipas who cruelly lorded over the people on behalf of the Roman Empire. John saw that the integrity of Israel’s religion was under threat and decaying from within and he berated the religious teachers of the Jewish Law as well as the corrupt Jewish tax collectors who acted for the Roman government. The simple God-fearing hearts of the Galileans were becoming more and more burdened by the ungodly influences around them which offended their consciences and distressed their souls, and the same oppression was felt by the needy and the poor in spirit in Judea and Jerusalem. So the warning issued by John the Baptist began to draw many hearts back to godliness like a magnet. 
Matthew 3:1 In those days John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” For this is he who was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah when he said, “The voice of one crying in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord; make his paths straight.’” Now John wore a garment of camel's hair and a leather belt around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey. Then Jerusalem and all Judea and all the region about the Jordan were going out to him, and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.  But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, “You offspring of snakes! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bring forth the fruit of repentance. And do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.

He spoke fervently to all the different types of people who came to hear his message of repentance and the warnings of judgement - and among these were certain fishermen from the Lake of Galilee who had heard how John had been baptising people in the Jordan River.
He told them that if the tree that bore the fruit of their lives was useless then an axe would have to be laid to the root of that tree. He told different ones about how their actions and attitudes had to change, saying to the plentiful who had ample food and clothing that if they had two coats then they should give one away (Luke 3). 
‘Then tax collectors also came to be baptized, and said to him, "Teacher, what shall we do? And he said to them, "Collect no more than what is appointed for you." 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." (Luke 3:12:15).

The fervent call of John the prophet to repentance pierced the consciences of many people, drawing their hearts to desire a return to the ways of God just like the prophets of God’s people in the days of old such as Jeremiah; Turn me, O Lord and I will be turned. And after my turning, I was surely sorry. (Jeremiah 31:18) 
The word for turning in the Old Testament is ‘sub’ which means turning from and turning to  - from the bad that you had been drawn to and being drawn back to the good that God wants for you. But the turning is only the beginning and then there is the sorrow and the need for forgiveness.
God’s word, the Torah guided Israel and highlighted their disobedience of what they had to turn from. There were the weighty commandments not to steal or to kill or to lie and there were the countless precise rules or regulations like the multitude of unclean food laws or the touching of dead things like reptiles - lizards, and the hundreds of other ordinances in the book of Leviticus. They would have to go to the priest who would offer specific sacrifices of atonement on their behalf such as goats, bulls, doves and pigeons, for all of these transgressions and in this way a person received forgiveness. Then once a year on the Feast of yom kippur, the Day of Atonement, all Israel were cleansed and forgiven. But as that sense of being right with God soon wore off they their minds and hearts continued day after day to bear the guilt and shame for all of these sins and indiscretions. 

The word in the New Testament for this kind of repentant turning towards God and away from self is stronger than sub in the Old Testament. The Greek word is epistreph?? which is found in this transformational Scripture from 2Corinthians.’ even to this day, when Moses is read, a veil lies on their heart. Nevertheless when one turns to the Lord (epistrepho), the veil is taken away. Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom and liberty. But we, all of us, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, by the Spirit of the Lord (2Corinthians 3:15)

This word epistrepho comes from the word trope which means being drawn in a certain direction because of an attracting influence. The movement of a plant shoot being drawn towards the sun is phototropic, which means being drawn to the light (photos) because of a growth substance called auxin which is part of its design of creation. A plant shoot will not reach up and grow toward the light if it is corrupted at the roots or deprived from its auxin. 

Part of the creative design of every human heart is that it is spiritually coded to be drawn toward the light of God’s love and truth. But there is a part in every human mind and heart that can be drawn away from the light by being damaged at the roots by the destructive power of darkness and become blinded from God’s light and truth. This struggle goes on in every human heart since the time of Adam when darkness first invaded the human soul. 

The fervent words of John the Baptist were able to draw the poor in Spirit away from darkness and toward the light, but John the Baptist could only point toward the light that only Jesus could shine into their hearts. John pointed to Jesus and said to the people ‘I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance (a change of mindset, turning from and turning to), but He who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.

And this is where John’s Gospel fills in a gap in the other Gospels about who the true light is.
‘God sent John as a witness to the fact that Jesus Christ is the true Light. John himself was not the Light; he was only a witness to identify it, but then the one would come who is the true Light and to bring light to everyone who comes into the world. But even though Jesus the true light made the world, the world didn’t recognize him when he came. And even in his own land and among his own people, the Jews, he was not accepted. Only a few would welcome and receive him. But to all who received him, he gave the power (exousia – authority, liberty, freedom and sovereignty) to become children of God. All they needed to do was to trust him to save them. (John 1:6)
Welcoming and receiving Jesus in any and every circumstance in our lives is the sovereign authority and freedom that wins against the struggle of the power of darkness to damage our souls. 
David in the Psalms described this internal destructive drawing power of darkness. He asked God to search his heart and know him and to show him any wicked way that was in him and he asked God to lead him in the way everlasting. The word for wicked here is ‘ôs?e?; an idol (as in fashioning an idol); also pain (bodily or mental): or sorrow, wickedness. (the destructive baggage in our souls – confused mind and crippled heart)

We can have the same honest prayer as David had to search our heart and show us any wicked way in us and to draw us into the way everlasting. That wicked way, the ‘oseb’ of inner pain along with all the other crooked ways that cripple our souls draws us like a magnet back into ourselves where we resist the drawing power of God’s love and truth to us. It is grievous to see so many people in these days being drawn inwards by the pain and sadness in their lives rather than being drawn upwards into the light of God’s hope and purpose for their lives.
Many people sadly spend most of their thinking lives in the inner pain of their souls, trying to find a way to fix things and feel better about themselves instead of finding the freedom of faith in God . It’s one thing to be made aware of the oseb of our inner pain and waywardness but we do not have to go and get a priest like in the Old Testament to make a sacrifice of atonement, because we have what Jesus has done for us and the fervent drawing of the Holy Spirit turning us towards him, to his love and truth about who we are in our togetherness with him.