Sermons

Matthew 3:11-12 Baptisms

Matthew 3 read as a whole, makes a clear theme stands out: Baptism. 

• The words Baptist, baptized, and baptism make up 8 references in 17 verses.

 

Verse 1 “John the Baptist” – John’s title, what he was known for.

Verse 6 “they were baptized” – Masses moving out of the religious center, repenting, being baptized.

Verse 7 “his baptism” – John’s baptism of repentance, not for Pharisees and Sadducees.

Verse 11 “I baptize” – John’s baptizing ministry, contrasting Jesus’ baptizing ministry.

Verse 11 “He will baptize” – Jesus’ baptizing ministry, contrasting Johns’ baptizing ministry.

Verse 13 “to be baptized” – Jesus coming to be baptized by John.

Verse 14 “I need to be baptized” – John’s argument for his unworthiness to baptize Jesus.

Verse 16 “Jesus was baptized” – Jesus’ obedience by being baptized. 

 

Eight references with the same word, two very dramatically different baptisms.

 

John’s baptism, external, physical, symbolic, temporal, a baptism of repentance.

 

Jesus’ baptism, internal, spiritual, transformational, eternal, a baptism of conversion.

 

Why did Jesus, being perfect, yield himself to John’s baptism of repentance? 

• Jesus did not need to repent; neither did he need a new heart.
  • The answer is to “fulfill all righteousness” (v. 15).
  • Jesus is our example.
    • Not only in what he did not do, namely sin.
    • But, by what he did do, namely obeying perfectly.

 

• Jesus’ impeccability was not a foregone conclusion while on earth.
  • Real temptations and real decisions to be holy.
  • To understand what Jesus accomplished for us, you have to understand the difference between Christ’s passive and active obedience.

 

• Believers (born in sin) have to constantly put off and put on.
• Jesus, without sin, even more so, constantly put off (by never sinning) and put on (by always obeying!).

Verses 13-17 is a Savior’s Baptism! 

Verses 11 and 12 speak to a Sinner’s Baptism! 

We’ll save the Savior’s Baptism for next week!  We need a Sinner’s Baptism first!

 

“Do you still need to be baptized?” 

• Not (first) physical baptism.
• The Spirit’s baptism.

 

“Do you still need to repent?” 

• Confess Jesus as Lord, turn from the world, surrender to Christ’s Lordship? (Rom. 10:9-10).

 

“Do you still need conversion?”  

 

Two baptisms, two outcomes

1. John’s baptism (v. 11a)

John’s baptism comes with the backdrop of the Pharisees and Sadducees. 

• Knowing hearts are unrepentant, John defines repentance by its “fruit” (v. 8).
  • Repentance is not observing a religious rite but a humbled heart.
  • Repentance is observable, namely “fruit” (v. 8).
  • Repentance is not an ethnic privilege.
    • Who cares that you trace your line to Abraham, God could make children of Abraham from stones.
  • Repentance is taking God’s warning seriously.

 

• John exposed spiritual deafness with a rhetorical question in verse 7, “…Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?” (v. 7).

 

“Even now the ax is laid to the root of trees.  Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire” (v. 10).

 

Verses 11-12, John closes this argument against the Pharisees and Sadducees and going deeper into the heart! 

 

Explaining how his baptism differs from Christ’s. 

 

“I baptize you with water for repentance” (v. 11). 

• John’s baptism was unique to itself.
  • A big movement of God, using a prophet of God (cf. v. 5 “…Jerusalem and all Judea and all the region about Jordan were going out to him.”).
  • The only comparison to this was Gentile proselytes becoming part of God’s chosen people.
  • Crowds leaving the religious center going in protest to God’s man!

 

• John is quick to divest himself of credit.
  • My baptism is “with water for repentance” (v. 11).
  • John’s baptism was symbolic of a transformed heart.
  • Water is a functional picture on the outside of what must happen on the inside.

 

• Repentance is not merit-based but God-based.
  • The word baptize immersion.
  • Being baptized is a mature, life decision.

A child or teenager can be baptized, only as a genuinely believing child or teen-ager. 

 

John’s whole point of his baptism was to contrast his with Jesus. 

But, before this disparity between baptisms, do not miss where they overlap. 

• John’s baptism did represent truly saved converts.
• John’s baptism like John was the forerunner of Jesus’ baptism.
• It is outwardly proving what Jesus does on the inside.

^ESV  John 3:22-27 After this Jesus and his disciples went into the Judean countryside, and he remained there with them and was baptizing. John also was baptizing at Aenon near Salim, because water was plentiful there, and people were coming and being baptized (for John had not yet been put in prison).

Now a discussion arose between some of John’s disciples and a Jew over purification. And they came to John and said to him, “Rabbi, he who was with you across the Jordan, to whom you bore witness–look, he is baptizing, and all are going to him.” John answered, “A person cannot receive even one thing unless it is given him from heaven.”

 

What was the fruit of these dueling baptisms?

• Acts 18 and 19.

 

• First with Apollos.

^ESV  Acts 18:24-25 Now a Jew named Apollos, a native of Alexandria, came to Ephesus. He was an eloquent man, competent in the Scriptures.  He had been instructed in the way of the Lord. And being fervent in spirit, he spoke and taught accurately the things concerning Jesus, though he knew only the baptism of John. He began to speak boldly in the synagogue, but when Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him and explained to him the way of God more accurately. And when he wished to cross to Achaia, the brothers encouraged him and wrote to the disciples to welcome him. When he arrived, he greatly helped those who through grace had believed, for he powerfully refuted the Jews in public, showing by the Scriptures hat the Christ was Jesus.      

 

• Second with the disciples of John.

^ESV  Acts 19:1-5 And it happened that while Apollos was at Corinth, Paul passed through the inland country and came to Ephesus. There he found some disciples. And he said to them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” And they said, “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.” And he said, “Into what then were you baptized?” They said, “Into John’s baptism.” And Paul said, “John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in the one who was to come after him, that is, Jesus. “On hearing this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.

 

John’s message was not half-measured though Christ’s coming and preaching informed it. 

• This is progressive revelation.

 

Compared to when you were saved, your understanding of the Gospel should have grown. 

 

• The basics were the basis for conversion.
  • You may have been tempted at points to deny your faith.

 

• John at the end of his ministry was tempted to deny Jesus but did not! (cf. Matt. 11:1-11).

 

^ESV  Matthew 11:3 and said to him, “Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?”

 

^ESV  Matthew 11:11 Truly, I say to you, among those born of women there has arisen no one greater than John the Baptist. Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.

 

John’s point is not to undo his message of repentance nor his baptism but to say that his baptism looks to another. 

 

• John is the forerunner and Christ is the point.

 

• “…he who is coming after me is mightier than I…” (v. 11).

 

• You need to understand John was a distant cousin of Jesus, someone he actually did not know (cf. John 1:31 “I myself did not know him…”).

 

• According to John 1 the religious leaders assumed John might even be “the Christ” if not, “Then why are you baptizing?” (cff. Jn. 1:19-20, 25).

 

^ESV  John 1:19-20 And this is the testimony of John when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, “Who are you?”  He confessed, and did not deny, but confessed, “I am not the Christ.”

 

 

John’s point was to say, “he who is coming after me is mightier than I” (v. 11).      

 

^ESV  John 3:30-31 He must increase, but I must decrease.”  He who comes from above is above all. He who is of the earth belongs to the earth and speaks in an earthly way. He who comes from heaven is above all.

 

“How much mightier?”

 

Incomprehensibly mightier. 

 

• The example of not being worthy to carry sandals, thought by some to have been a made-up version of shame.

 

^ESV  John 1:27 even he who comes after me, the strap of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie.”

 

• There is no human role that John could take to demonstrate the difference between himself and Jesus.
  • A slave’s role was to wipe off fecal matter from the feet of another.
  • To start this process someone would unstrap the sandal.
  • We know Jesus took the posture of a slave (cf. John 13).
  • Christ came to earth adding humanity to deity to take the form of a slave.

 

John is saying, I would not wipe Jesus’ feet because of what Jesus could only do!

 

 2. Jesus’ baptism (vv. 11b)

Verse 11 “I baptize you with water…He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire” (v. 11). 

 

• Where John’s baptism symbolized heart repentance, Jesus’ baptism actually changes the heart.

 

“Were Old Testament saints converted by the Holy Spirit?” 

 

• In a word yes!
• Conversion is traceable throughout Scripture.

 

^ESV  Jeremiah 31:33 But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people.

 

^ESV  Ezekiel 36:26-27 And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.  And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.

 

^ESV  John 3:5-7 Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.  That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’

 

^ESV  2 Corinthians 5:17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.

^ESV  Titus 3:5-6 he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit,  whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior

• Christ in John 14 and 16 promised the Holy Spirit and He came in a significant way at Pentecost in Acts 2.

 

• The conversion was the same but with greater revelation.

“What does it mean that Jesus baptizes with ‘fire?’” (v. 11). 

• Most assume this refers to judgment because of immediate references to wrath.
  • Unfruitful trees, “thrown into the fire” (v. 10).
  • “unquenchable fire” (v. 12).

 

• Instead of this “fire” being wrath, this “fire” is grace!

^ESV  Malachi 3:1-3 “Behold, I send my messenger, and he will prepare the way before me. And the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple; and the messenger of the covenant in whom you delight, behold, he is coming, says the LORD of hosts. But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner’s fire and like fullers’ soap. He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, and they will bring offerings in righteousness to the LORD.

 

• John the Baptist is “my [Christ’s] messenger” and the Lord “will purify the sons…like gold and silver.”

 

Why?  Purify? 

• So they “will bring offerings in righteousness to the LORD” (Mal. 3:3).

 

• Malachi 4 refers to “the day…coming, burning like an oven” (Mal. 4:1).

 

• However, John’s reference in Matthew 3:11 is to a single baptism, “in Holy Spirit and fire” [single preposition] (v. 11).

 

• This is God’s purification of the heart at salvation, the basis for glorification (cf. 1 Cor. 3:11-12; Rom. 8:29 “glorified”).

 

 3. God’s grace (v. 12)

Remember our outline: Two baptisms, two outcomes.

• As I have pointed out, this section is filled with warnings of irreversible terrifying judgment that is coming.

 

• At the same time, you need to see God’s heart of grace in warnings.

 

^ESV  Ezekiel 33:11 Say to them, As I live, declares the Lord GOD, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live; turn back, turn back from your evil ways, for why will you die, O house of Israel?

^ESV  2 Peter 3:9 The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.

John’s baptism was a call to turn to grace.  Jesus’ baptism was grace. 

• This warning is grace.

Jesus’ “winnowing fork” was another farmer’s tool for the purpose of separation. 

• The farmer would carve out a depression into a hillside that would serve as a catch.
• He would pack down dirt to create a hard surface.

 

• He would then take harvested wheat and lay it within the catch and drive his oxen to drag large pieces of lumber over it to crush it.

 

• The farmer then would wait for a windy evening and scoop the crushed wheat into the air so the wheat would fall and the chaff or lighter husks would blow outside of “his threshing floor” (v. 12).

See the Lord Jesus humbly stooping down to personally “gather his wheat into the barn” (v. 12) is grace. 

• His baptism is personal.
  • He changed your heart and gathered you to himself forever!

 

The warning is to those outside of his threshing floor. 

“…the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire” (v. 12). 

• The second portion is equally personal.
  • This is wrath.
  • Jesus also personally gather everyone who rejects this grace and “will burn with unquenchable fire” (v. 12).

 

• This is the picture of Gehenna (cf. 5:22 “the hell [geennan] of fire”).
  • This was Jerusalem’s trash dump.
  • Burned continuously.
  • A picture of unquenchable hell.

Burning flesh, underneath the flesh on a cellular level!

What the rich man was pictured begging for relief from, by Lazarus.

^ESV  Luke 16:24 And he called out, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the end of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am in anguish in this flame.’

 

You are either wheat or chaff, sheep or goat, saved or unsaved, repentant or unrepentant. 

This is the reality of the winnowing fork.   

 

“Do you need to be baptized?” 

• Not outwardly but inwardly.

 

• If you have not been baptized by Jesus in this life, then you are remaining unsafe and insecure for eternity.

 

• How do I come to have Christ baptize me? Repent and believe. 

Consider Peter’s call:   

 

^ESV  1 Peter 3:21 Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ

• Appeal to God for grace.

 

• This will clean your conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ!