Smoodock's Blog

Whenever the work of God begins to show success and becomes a threat to the status quo, danger of corruption and seizure of authority over that work, becomes real and imminent. Such a thing occurred in the early Church, when Ananias and Sapphira infiltrated the nascent Church in order to bring it under the authority of the high priest (Acts 5:1:11; cp. Romans 6:18; 1Thessalonians 2:5; 2Corinthians 2:17; 12:17).[1]

Moreover, Paul mentions how the arrival of certain men from James had caused great havoc within the church at Antioch (Galatians 2:11-14), Not only so, but their arrival there seemed to be only part of a planned event that affected Paul’s entire ministry. Men with similar intentions were sent elsewhere, whereby it became important that he revisit all the churches that he and Barnabas had raised up through the Gospel (cp. Acts 15:36).

Herein we see uncovered the context in which the Church Council at Jerusalem was formally conducted (Acts 15:1-2, 22-32).[2] It wasn’t merely to resolve theological issues. It was that, but the issue was brought into the foreground, because men with evil intentions entered the Church and gained authoritative positions, and that problem had to be faced head-on, publicly.

Similarly, John wasn’t deceived by the approach of increasing numbers of Jewish authorities, who came to his baptism. He understood that the Pharisees and Sadducees were men of corrupt hearts, and they didn’t have any good will toward the work of God. John understood that they had come to his baptism, not to repent of their evil deeds, but to corrupt God’s work and bring it under the authority of the high priest at Jerusalem. An insignificant few among the authorities might appear to be sincere in their repentance, vis-à-vis Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea, but when great numbers came to him, John challenged them, publicly denouncing them as a generation of vipers, asking **who** had warned them to flee from the coming wrath/judgment of God (Matthew 3:7).

To flee from “the wrath of God” involves agreeing with God that their deeds were evil! If they truly believed their deeds were evil, how was it they hadn’t changed what they did daily among the people? If they had truly repented, why would they continue in the same corruption of the scriptures, by teaching the people doctrines of men in contradiction to the word of God, making it of no effect (cp. Matthew 15:9), as far as affecting or changing the hearts and ways of the people was concerned? If so many men of authority had changed their hearts and repented of their wickedness, that itself would have created a movement among the people, which John would have been able to observe. Hence, the absence of such a movement revealed the insincerity of great number of authorities coming to John’s baptism.

Therefore, John demanded that the Jewish authorities first repent of their wickedness and show evidence of their repentance, before coming to him. Their very presence without John’s rebuke would have been enough to corrupt the hearts of the truly repentant in John’s ministry to believe that he and the Jewish authorities were in agreement (Matthew 3:8). They were not, and the people needed John’s public rebuke of the Pharisees and Sadducees to help them understand the truth of what was occurring. The intention of these Jewish authorities was to corrupt the work of God.

Stones or rocks are often used metaphorically for people in the Bible (Isaiah 51:1; cf. Genesis 17:15-17). By saying that God could raise stones up to be Abraham’s children (Matthew 3:9), John seems to be pointing to observable stones in the vicinity, vis-à-vis gentiles or folks who are not physically descended from Abraham. Later, Jesus claimed that the children of Abraham would do the works of Abraham, meaning they would believe God and change their behavior (John 8:39). Therefore, anyone who does the works of Abraham, who believed God and left everything to serve him, anyone, even gentiles, would be considered spiritual children of Abraham, if they believed God (Matthew 3:9). In other words, John claimed God couldn’t be forced into a box— a relationship in the flesh which would unconditionally bless Israel (Jeremiah 18:10). When it comes to righteous judgment, God is completely impartial.

John warned his listeners, the Jewish authorities and all the people present with them, including John’s own disciples, that the end was near. What end? The last days which Jacob mentioned (Genesis 49:1), and the latter days mentioned by Moses (Deuteronomy 31:29). The Hebrew word is the same in both citations (achariyth; H319) and, therefore, both scriptures point to the same time. The last/latter days concern the days of the Messiah (Genesis 49:10; cp. Matthew 3:11-12) and a time, when the ways of the Jewish people would mimic the deeds of Sodom and Gomorrah (Deuteronomy 32:29; 32:5, 32). John identified his days as the days of the coming harvest, when the Lord would sit in judgment and reward everyone according to their deeds (Matthew 3:10, 12; cp. 16:27-28).

______________________________________________________________________________

[1] See my earlier study in Acts: The Enemy Retaliates.

[2] See my studies: The Jerusalem Council and The ‘Men from James’.