John’s Message
Excerpt
John warned the Jews against trusting merely in their religious ancestry to secure a good relationship with God (3:8). John called the people to repentance. Repentance reveals itself by producing fruit—deeds for God. Note the thrice-repeated question asked by the hearers of John the Baptist’s message concerning what they should do to show repentance (3:10–14; cf. Acts2:37).
John the Baptist used the imagery of harvest to describe events of the Second Coming—deliverance of the righteous into God’s kingdom and punishment of the wicked in the fires of hell (Luke 3:17; cf. Matt. 25:46; Isa. 30:24). John had been preaching the gospel of the coming kingdom (3:18) and called the people to repent of all sin. More
Hughes, Robert B., and J. Carl Laney. Tyndale Concise Bible Commentary. Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 2001. Print. The Tyndale Reference Library.
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