Matthew 3:1-12
One thousand years before John stepped into Jordan river to call Israel to repentance, the children of God crossed that same river into a promised land that they would have to conquer. John brings them back to the river again to prepare them for a new conquest, an even greater conquest. This great conquest is one of God’s defeating evil and the establishment of his Kingdom here on earth as it is in heaven.
John embodied the person of Elijah calling the people to repentance. One of the most remarkable things about John, for me, is that he had a message of repentance to make way for the coming messiah and the ushering in of God’s kingdom, but he didn’t fully know what that that would look like. Well into Jesus’s ministry, John was even puzzled at the outcome of how things were playing out. In Matthew 11:2-6, John asks Jesus if he is the Messiah or should we be looking for someone else. Sometimes the kingdom of God displays itself in ways that we would not expect, includes people we wouldn’t include, and takes forms we don’t fully understand. If John the Baptizer can proclaim the good news of the coming kingdom and still struggle to understand it, so can we.
John’s message, in its symbolic location, would make everyone sit up and take notice. They would have stopped what they were doing to get ready. The call to repentance is both personal and corporate. Those who went to receive John’s baptism of repentance would have done so on their own behalf as well as for the people in which they were connected. This is largely why Jesus felt the need to undergo this baptism of repentance. His baptism does not negate his perfection but fulfills all righteousness through his alignment with repentance of the people of God.
Repentance is a concept we might take for granted a bit. Who needs to repent? What does a person need to repent of? Is this a simple, “Forgive me of my sins” prayer offered at the end of the day to cover yourself? We tend to think of repentance as something that needs to be done for “big sins.”
What were the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to John to repent of? They prided themselves on their purity and were unlikely guilty of any gross or obvious sins. Pride itself was getting in the way of God’s homecoming. Their arrogance toward other Israelites, and even more so toward the rest of the world, was not in line with the humility needed before the coming of the king. John rejects them and calls for visible change in how they present themselves to the world. Is there ever a time when we as Christians take an arrogant stance on our own morality in a way that might get in the way of the coming of God’s Kingdom?
As we celebrate the coming of Christ, this is a time for us to remember that we are called to repentance. Repentance is a change of mind, heart, and action. We often think of “big sins” as the things we need to repent of, but a regular practice of repentance helps us get back to the heart of Jesus’s teachings in his sermon on the mount where he calls his followers to address the heart issues that lead to those big sins.
What does a regular practice of repentance look like? Once or twice a day for the next few weeks, ask yourself this question: Where did I withhold the love of Christ for others? Confess that to God in prayer. Ask if there needs to be reconciliation and resolve it if needed. This kind of regular repentance helps curb pride in our lives and prepares the way for the coming of Christ.