Evidence of Repentance

Is John's role here to clear the roadway of spiritual debris, to address what were essentially moral roadblocks and lead the people into genuine repentance as they prepared their lives for the Messiah? So here's the prophetic imagery. Build a roadway.

He's going to build a roadway. He's going to clear the roadway so that the King, the Messiah, can ride directly into the hearts of repentant people. There's a fascinating character in the New Testament named John the Baptist. He was a prophet and a forerunner of Jesus.

He began a preaching ministry prior to Jesus' public ministry. When John the Baptist began to share his message with the world, he taught the way of salvation to many different groups of people. And as he did that, he also gave us the keys to demonstrating a life of genuine repentance. John helps us see what living a life to glorify God looks like. Does your life line up?

We'll explore this today. This is Wisdom for the Heart, and Stephen Davey has a message for you called Evidence of Repentance. I couldn't help but think, without any doubt, that the greatest obstacle to genuine repentance is self-confident, self-enamored, self-defending, self-justifying hearts like yours and mine. We can justify anything.

We can defend anything, can't we? That happens to be the perfect description for a world in need of a Savior, a world in need of dropping the defenses and coming clean with God. This is the audience to whom a prophet by the name of John is going to preach. He shows up like a whirlwind. He's wearing his camel-haired cloak and leather belt. I can see locusts and honey matted in his beard.

He would be quite the sight. We find his ministry prophesied by Isaiah, but let's go to where that's repeated in Luke's Gospel. We're now in chapter 3, where we left off with verse 4. This is where his job description is laid out for us as the advance man, the forerunner of the Messiah.

Notice what Luke writes. He's simply quoting Isaiah. Verse 4, As it is written in the book of the words of Isaiah the prophet, the voice of one crying in the wilderness. This is John's voice fulfilling Isaiah's prophecy.

What's he saying? Prepare the way of the Lord. Make his paths straight. Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall become straight, and the rough places shall become level ways, and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.

John is this messenger. He's this herald which would have been understood in this generation, that herald which would go ahead of a royal procession to make sure the roads were clear. There were no obstacles in the way of the king who would be soon arriving. Spiritually speaking and applied in this manner, Israel was living in a wilderness of religion and rules. They frankly had their notebooks all filled out.

They were living unrepentant, hypocritical lives, and they were never missing a service in the synagogue. It's John's role here to clear the roadway of spiritual debris, to address what were essentially moral roadblocks and lead the people into genuine repentance as they prepared their lives for the Messiah. So here's the prophetic imagery. Build a roadway. He's going to build a roadway. He's going to clear the roadway so that the king, the Messiah, can ride directly into the hearts of repentant people.

And that's going to involve a lot of work to get that road ready. Repentance and this message is, as you can imagine, creating a sensation, a stir among the people. It's been 400 years without a prophet. That one shows up, you know, looking like this, preaching this kind of message. And so they all, you know, come out to see in verse 7 and you notice great crowds come out to show their interest. In John, to sort of look at him, he's a spectacle.

This is better than the State Fair. Can you imagine, though, any preacher, any evangelist today following John's method, here comes this massive crowd and John begins his sermon here in verse 7. You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? How's that for a sermon opener?

You bunch of snakes, what are you doing slithering out here to hear me? Now in Matthew's Gospel, which is the parallel account to this passage here, we're told that John specifically looked at the religious leaders when he said this, the Pharisees, the Sadducees. What John does here is call them vipers.

Now it's actually more offensive than you might think. It's not a pejorative statement, you bunch of snakes, which I teased. He's actually using a phrase in the Old Testament that refers to those who are the enemies of God. Philistines are called vipers, same phrase.

The Egyptians that enslaved the Israelites were called vipers, Jeremiah 46 and Isaiah 14. So what he's doing is instead of calling them what they thought they were, sons of Abraham and safe, he's not saying that. He's saying, actually you weren't the people of God. You are actually at war with God. You are the enemy of God.

You're no better than the Philistines and the Egyptians. And like snakes then, the imagery comes out of the fact that if there's a brush fire, they come up out of the holes, their little dens, and they slither away from the fires that are coming. So in other words, you're coming out of your den, you hear something about fire, you want to play with matches, but you don't want to get burned, so now you're going to come out to me. You just want to cover your bases. So he just cuts right to it. Like one author who wrote this, when I served in the military, I had an army buddy who wore around his neck three different medals.

A Catholic Saint's medal, a Protestant cross, and a Jewish Star of David. When I asked him about it, he said, I'm not taking any chances. He said, I've got my bases covered. Beloved, repentance doesn't try to cover all the bases. Repentance admits that before God, there is nothing hidden.

In fact, Jesus is going to preach a little later on in Luke chapter 12 of the final judgment of all of the unbelieving world. He's going to say this, there is nothing covered up that will not be revealed. There is nothing hidden that will not be made known. Repentance then takes the cover off your sin, instead of trying to pull a wool over God's eyes.

Luke, I've got 13 virtues. Maybe you won't notice this. Maybe you won't see that. Repentance says it's all open before the eyes of God. Now go back to what John says in verse 7 again.

You brood of vipers who warned you to flee from the wrath to come. Bear fruits in keeping with repentance. In other words, if you really are people who want to belong to God, then you really ought to want to live as God would want you to live if you're truly repentant.

Let's show some evidences of repentance. Notice further in verse 8. Bear fruits in keeping with repentance and do not begin to say to yourselves, we have Abraham as our father. For I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham.

You think it's special you're a son of Abraham? God can take these rocks and turn them into one of the children of Abraham. Even now, the axe is laid to the root of the trees. In other words, that orchard developer already has the axe ready. This tree is dead.

Doesn't need to take any space up. Therefore, because it doesn't bear good fruit, it will be cut down and thrown into the fire. The imagery of fire is a reference to the coming judgment and eternal hell fire for those who will not repent.

Now, don't misunderstand. He's not saying you can avoid hell by doing good works. John is not saying that salvation is by faith plus good works. What he's stressing here as other passages do in the New Testament is that salvation is by faith proven by good works. Now, you need to understand the religious leaders are actually teaching the nation Israel that they don't need faith and they don't even need good works.

They don't need either one. All they need to be is related to the bloodline of Abraham. If you're related to the bloodline of Abraham, you don't need faith in God. You don't even need to obey God. Live like you want to live. You're a member of the Jewish nation.

You don't even need to keep a notebook. They were being taught that anybody who was a descendant of Abraham was safe from judgment. Notice what John says here again.

Did you notice? Do not begin to say to yourselves, I'm a son of Abraham. Literally, don't even let that thought cross your mind.

It reminded me of my mother growing up. Don't even let that thought cross your mind. Don't even think that.

That's what he's saying here. Don't even think, well, Abraham is my father. My friend, you do not get into the family of God by your bloodline. You get in by following the word of God, which is going to be revealed ultimately in the Messiah of God and his blood shed for you. You don't inherit eternal life from your parents.

That's why we've made it clear in this dedication earlier. You don't inherit it from your grandparents. I don't know how many people I've said, you know, I've got a brother who's a preacher. Well, that could actually be a bad thing.

We just don't know. Or I've got a grandfather. Or we built a church. You don't inherit eternal life from family.

You inherit it by grace through faith in Jesus. Now, no doubt, this message from John is highly offensive to the nation Israel. Just as offensive as it would be to our country today.

Any culture at any time. See, John is placing the Jewish people in particular on the same level as the Gentile people. He's essentially called them Philistines and Egyptians.

We can't imagine the explosion his words created here. People who for the most part had come out to John thinking that they were okay, but maybe we better add what John is saying to our little bag of tricks to cover our bases. Now, some of them are ready to listen after that kind of sermon opener. And Luke summarizes for us the response of three groups of people.

Notice we'll go through them very quickly. The first group is this crowd. Look at verse 10. The crowd asked him, members within this crowd, what then shall we do? And he answered them, whoever has two tunics is to share with him who has none. And whoever has food is to do likewise. Now, you might think, well, this is no big deal. Give your tunic, literally your T-shirt, the original Greek word, they would wear it underneath their garment, both men and women. Give one of your T-shirts away.

I have no problem. I got 12. They might have had just one. Not to have two, but if you had two, give one of them away. And he also adds, share your food. Now, they don't have refrigerators, so effectively what he's saying to do is bring somebody home for supper tonight. Eat the food you have and share it.

Start sharing what you have. And what we need to understand here, and what I love about John's completely surprising answer is it's entirely different than what you would expect a prophet to tell people to do to evidence repentance. You would think that they would say, well, you need to do something penitential. You know, something like do a pilgrimage.

Walk somewhere for a mile on your knees. Make it hurt. You know, suffer. Or maybe you would tell them to do something ecclesiastical. You know, like go to the synagogue, sign up, make sure you never miss another service on the Sabbath. Or maybe something devotional, like you need to start memorizing the Torah. Or start praying through the Psalms. Do that. God will be impressed. Or maybe something educational. Go join a rabbinical school and become a prophet like me.

God will really be impressed with that. None of that. It isn't penitential, ecclesiastical, devotional.

It isn't anything educational. It is entirely ethical. Change the way you're living for yourself. Start sharing your stuff with others. Now to the next group. John tells them to stop stealing. Look at verse 12. Tax collectors also came to be baptized and said to them, teacher, what shall we do? And he said to them, collect no more than you are authorized to do. Now we could spend a lot of time on the system in place here surrounding collecting taxes. We'll probably deal a little bit with it when Jesus calls Matthew, the tax collector.

But for now, let me at least say this. The Roman Empire had set up a system of taxation called tax farming. They literally farmed it out to different layers and levels in their culture. They gave the right to collect taxes to wealthy Roman families. And they were either able to pay the fees or bribe the officials for the privilege of owning a franchise.

And it was lucrative. And then what they would do is hire these tax collectors who would be out in the field, which would have been Matthew. And it was their role to collect them from the citizens. And what they would do is they would add to the tax Rome required by giving their bosses a cut. And then they would add on top of that their own cut, which they'd skim off for themselves. And they were all becoming wealthy in the process, as we'll see later in this gospel account with Zacchaeus. Now this is a legitimate occupation, but it had been thoroughly corrupted by greed. In fact, Lucian, a writer who wrote about a hundred years after Luke wrote this gospel, said that the worst of society were composed of informers, adulterers, pimps, and tax collectors.

They were among the most despised people group on the planet. So here they are, they're asking, what do we do? And again, this is surprising advice to me. John doesn't tell them, quit your job and become a tax auditor.

That'll fix you. You stop collecting taxes. Or take 10% of what you're skimming off the top and give it to the charity in your region. No, he's saying keep your job, but from now on bring God to work with you.

Let your honesty and your integrity become known in the way you collect taxes. Now there's a third group. These are the soldiers. They're told to stop something and start something. First, they're told to stop abusing people with their power.

Verse 14. Soldiers also asked him, and we, what shall we do? And he said to them, do not extort money from anyone by threats or by false accusations. These are essentially military police. They work for Rome.

They're assigned to keep the Jewish people in line. And you notice he says here, do not extort money from anyone by threat. That word threat literally translated would be by shaking violently. We get our expression today of shaking somebody down.

Same idea. You want to get money from them? Well, you're going to go shake them down. You're going to threaten them. You're going to push them around. You might even beat them up unless they pay you for protection. They had essentially created a mafia in Jerusalem.

Added to that is the comment, did you notice extorting money by making false accusation? They're going to make a false arrest. They're going to come up with something. Maybe they're going to put a little drugs in the saddle bag on their donkey or in their locker or whatever. And they're going to say, well, look at here.

If you don't pay us any money, we're going to have to fill out this report and we're going to turn you in and you're going to jail. Add to this the fact that soldiers in the first century had the right to demand room and board wherever they wanted. They could knock on your front door and say, I'm moving in. Take over your master suite. You've got to feed them.

Take care of them. And if you mess with them, they're going to make your life absolutely miserable. John cuts right to the heart, right to the motive, right to the practice of these men. He doesn't even bat an eye as he looks at these rough, battle-worn, intimidating soldiers. And he points a prophetic finger in their face and he says, you stop pushing people around.

Start there. They've got to change their lives. They have to change everything. See, in these days, he's telling them to be kind to people, to be gracious. A kind soldier in these days would be as impossible to imagine as an honest tax collector. Those words never went together. Kind soldier, honest tax collector.

See, it's not going to take long before their world, their nation, their city is revolutionized by people. What happened to you? Oh, I repented of my sin. I really did believe the message of John. And is it ever going to be obvious who belongs to God?

John adds here, I want to at least briefly mention, he adds, essentially these soldiers aren't going to be able to pull this off unless they change their attitude about their paycheck. Verse 14, the latter part, be content with your wages, be satisfied with your salary. All these evidences of repentance would apply to everyone, the crowd, the tax collectors, the soldiers. Start sharing, stop stealing, stop pushing people around, start being content with what God has provided you. Repentance then becomes godliness in everyday living. Now let's bring it down to our own minds as we wrap it up.

How would John's verdict apply to us today? He told the crowd to start sharing. I wonder if somebody looked at your bank balance, your monthly expenditures, your credit card report, would they uncover any kind of priority for God, for people? Do you give anything away? Are you generous or stingy? How about the tax collectors?

Well, I'm glad I'm not one of those, you're thinking. Well, if someone secretly watched you in the workplace and listened to your personal interactions, would they walk away convinced of your honesty and integrity? What's on your tax returns? What's on your computer when no one's looking? Or your smartphone? What's that fine print in that contract you're getting, that guy decided as he signs it, you're kind of smiling?

Got him. What about the soldiers? I'm really glad I'm not one of them. Well, if somebody observed your treatment of others, would they be struck by grace, kindness? If I could summarize this paragraph with just one question, it would be this. If you were taken to court and accused of being a Christian, would there be enough evidence to convict you? How long would it take for them to dig something up that seems to indicate they live for God? They belong to God.

They care about God. If the prophet John were to preach to you today, what would your response be to his call of repentance? Where would you stand? It could be a thousand other things that I haven't even mentioned that might come to your mind and heart. If the prophet John preached to you today, what would you say? Well, let me tell you, John preached to you today because all I did was repeat him and explain the meanings and the context of his words.

So what are you going to do about it? Where do you stand with God today? As you've listened to this message, you've been confronted with this question. If the prophet John were to preach personally to you today, what would your response be to his call to repentance?

This is wisdom for the heart. Stephen Davey is passionate about helping you understand God's word and teaching you how to apply that truth to your life. I hope you'll take advantage of all the Bible-based resources we have available to help you grow closer to God and walk faithfully with him. If you visit our website, wisdomonline.org, you'll find the entire Wisdom for the Heart teaching archive. It contains the entire collection of Stephen's Bible teaching. Each message is available for you to listen on demand. In addition, each message has a manuscript that you can read if you prefer. All of that content is available free online at wisdomonline.org. In addition to equipping you with these daily Bible lessons, we also have a magazine called Heart to Heart. Heart to Heart features articles written by Stephen where he explores various topics related to the Christian life. There's also a daily devotional guide.

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