Game Of Thrones 3: A Study In The Book of Matthew
Matthew 3:1-17
September 21, 2014
Many of us in this room are familiar with a few constitutional amendments, different ones
may be more important to us than others. For most of us, the First Amendment is prized
and well known. For many, the second amendment is also well known and loved. There are
others of extreme importance that many people know about, the Fourth Amendment which
protects you from unlawful search and seizure, the Thirteenth Amendment that abolished
slavery and the Nineteenth Amendment that prohibits the denial of the right to vote based
on gender.
These are all amendments that speak to human rights as we see them in the United States.
There are some amendments that are far less gripping and emotional. One is the Twentieth
Amendment that changed the Presidential Inauguration day from March 4th to January 20th.
This amendment passed in 1933. This sounds like a boring and routine bit of legislation.
Prior to this legislation, elections were still held in November, and gave four months until
the transition of power happened. This amendment shortened that timeline by almost six
weeks.
Sounds like standard boilerplate political logistics. Not that interesting. Until you recognize
why it is really important. In the 18th century, it made sense that president-elects needed
four months to get their affairs in order so they could take office. By the 20th century
logistics moved much quicker and people began to recognize that four months was a long
time for a sitting president to remain in office, especially if they had been voted out by the
incumbent.
At the heart of the Twentieth Amendment is a concern for a timely and healthy transition of
power. This is something the United States does quite well. Despite all of the modern
political vitriol, the United States has orderly transitions of power every four years on
January 20th or 21st. One President moves out, the other one moves in on the same day. This
is a stark contrast to some of the violence and coups we have seen in recent years with
events around the Arab Spring in which presidents and kings only have a transition of
power if they leave in a body bag or handcuffs, but not so in the United States. We have a
Presidential Inauguration where the outgoing President stands with the Chief Justice and
welcomes in the President-elect and the new administration. Despite their political
differences, there is something so poignant about seeing the old leader welcoming in the
new one. Even if you didn’t vote for him, the fact that his predecessor is standing there
swearing him in, allows you to see the continuity and transition of power.
The transition from one administration to the next can be difficult. I want to show you a
transition of power unlike any before it or since. It is the most important transition of
power in human history, and it went completely against expectations.
Matthew 3: 1-6
This is a monumental moment for the people of God. There has been no word from the
Lord nor any prophet or prophecy in over 400 years. Four hundred years of radio silence
from God. In fact, the last prophet, Malachi, in his final words said a prophet would come in
the likeness of Elijah.
Malachi 4:5-6
In years past, prophets would follow one another closely. There wasn’t a Twentieth
Amendment, and there were often gaps in between prophets. You didn’t need a Twentieth
Amendment because when a new prophet showed up, you knew them if you saw them.
They looked, sounded and felt a lot like John the Baptist. In this passage, John rejected the
normal pattern for life and the normal pattern for religion. This made him stick out. He had
retreated to the wilderness, refusing to get locked in to the pursuit of a career. He looked a
bit wild and his clothes of camel hair and a leather waist belt are not merely affordable bits
of durable clothes. They were a rejection of the flowing robes and beautiful soft garments
of his counterparts in the city. In addition to his clothes, John lives off of the land eating
locust and honey. He looks the part and sounds the part. He is preaching with vigor against
disbelief and lack of action.
Matthew 3:7-12
John is not messing around. He is bringing some old fashioned, Old Testament fire and
brimstone. He is staring down the Pharisees who look the part but miss the point. He tells
them their faith is misplaced and their actions are hopelessly short of measuring up. He
calls them vipers. He tells them to beware that the axe is at the root and ready to cut them
down and cast them into the fire. He looks like a prophet, and he sounds like one. He is
standing up to authority and using strong language to encourage repentance and change.
He is also baptizing people. Anyone who came to grips with their sinfulness and extreme
disobedience could come to him and be baptized with an immersion baptism in the Jordan
River. We have a pretty good frame of reference for baptism in the Christian world but
what did it mean here? The baptism wasn’t mystical or magical. For John it was a spiritual
washing, a symbol of man being cleansed from the filth of sin. It was ceremonial and
symbolic but it is certain that if you were dipped into those waters you were affirming that
you were sullied and in need of God’s cleansing.
This is the old administration. There hasn’t been a prophet for 400 years, but this is the
same message from the Old Testament. Men like Isaiah, Joel, Amos and Elijah before him
had spoken it. Repent. Turn around and return to God. People were showing up in the
wilderness because they knew things weren’t right in Israel. The Romans had taken over;
they were financially and emotionally stretched because of it. They were spiritually dry and
had not heard a fresh word from God in 400 years. They were hungry for this moment. You
realize how hungry they were because this is a wild man in camel hair with locust
remnants in his beard yelling for repentance and baptism and they still showed up. John
isn’t soft-selling it or sugarcoating it. He is preaching fire and brimstone and they are
lapping it up. They are ready to return to God and hear from God, and they will take it any
way they can get it. And then, this happens:
Matthew 3:13-17
That was a transition of power in many meanings of the phrase. I have always been a bit
confused about the baptism of Jesus, but through the larger context, God showed me
something new. The key piece of scripture to unlock this episode comes later.
Matthew 11:7-14
Jesus affirms that John was the promised one in Malachi, the new Elijah. He affirms he was
the messenger who was to come and prepare the way. He also affirms that John is the least
in the Kingdom of Heaven. He says that, after saying, there has never been a greater man
born of a woman. This is the greatest, most faithful, most fruitful man in human history.
This is coming from the lips of Jesus…and yet, he is the least in the Kingdom of God. You
would think that would put him at the top of the list. Why would Jesus say something like
that?
Because this meeting is a change of administration, a transition of power. We have good
reason to be puzzled by the baptism of Jesus and this meeting because John the Baptist was
confused too. He didn’t know a new administration was taking over. John had been offering
baptism for repentance and the cleansing of sin. He knew Jesus was special. He had heard
the story since he was little. Don’t forget, John and Jesus were cousins and born only a few
months apart. Mary and Elizabeth were sisters. You have to imagine that the stories of
Jesus’ birth were told and retold each year. You think you’d get sick of hearing stories from
your cousin’s life? Imagine John’s dilemma. Jesus was supernaturally conceived. He was
threatened with death by the king of Israel. His parents heard from angels numerous times
about his birth. He was born in a stable and then magi from a foreign land came because
they followed a divine star to him. They gave him gold, frankincense and myrrh. Then of
course, there were stories about Jesus being left in Jerusalem for three days and saying he
had to be in his Father’s house.
John knew from an early age that this was the messiah. He knew Jesus was different. John
also knew that he had his own calling to prepare Israel for this coming king. Then the king
came to him. He had been baptizing people who forgot Yahweh and no longer worshiped
him. He was baptizing sinners and bringing a message of fire, brimstone and axes on trees,
and the king came to him.
Four times in America’s history the outgoing president has not stuck around to help
inaugurate the new president. John Adams refused to be there for Thomas Jefferson’s
inauguration because for the first time the presidency was changing parties and it had
happened on his watch. His son, John Quincy Adams, was the second to refuse to be there
for the inauguration when Andrew Jackson defeated him in an especially slimy political
race. Andrew Johnson did not show up for the inauguration of Ulysses S. Grant and
Woodrow Wilson did not show for the inauguration of Warren Harding. In each of these
instances, the outgoing leader had enough questions about the new leader that they didn’t
show up out of protest.
You have to imagine John’s mentality for a moment. He sees Jesus as his successor. The one
who will bring about the kingdom, then this moment happened. Jesus takes his role among
the sinners. He submits himself to be at this event even though he did not need to be
cleansed. He stood in the place of a sinner and took on the role of one in need of
repentance. John might have started to wonder what this new administration was going to
look like. I think John assumed Jesus would bring in more of the same. He would call the
people to even higher standards of obedience and repentance. He would preach with even
more fire and more brimstone.
Verses 7-12 illustrate John’s mentality completely. He tells them there is a coming wrath.
This is what every Old Testament prophet before John had done. They warned people of
coming judgment often called the Day of the Lord. Every time the Day of the Lord was
mentioned by the old prophets, it was about God’s wrath and destruction upon the people.
If Jesus was the Lord and his day had arrived, then the wrath and death couldn’t be far
behind.
John was right in a sense but completely wrong in another. This was not a passing of the
torch from one Old Testament prophet to another. This was not more of the same. This was
a change of administration. This is the moment of change from the administration of the
law to the administration of grace. Jesus was bringing in a new kingdom, a kingdom of
grace, and he would be its king. Jesus took his place among the sinners to set forth an
entirely new paradigm. It was no longer about what you could do for God; it was about
what God could do for you.
This baptism is a foreshadowing of the coming cross. There were three major events where
the king stooped low and took the place of a sinner, through baptism, foot washing and
finally the cross. At each event, people questioned this king and this administration of
grace. No Jew, including John, could have understood this baptism until they saw the cross.
Even then it took awhile to sink in. This was a transition of power where Jesus relinquished
his own position and power and rights for ours. He laid himself down so we could be raised
up.
Later on in the ministry of Jesus, John still didn’t fully get this. In the passage in chapter 11
that we read earlier, John was in prison and asking Jesus whether he was the long awaited
messiah or not. He saw Jesus healing, teaching and loving people. He didn’t see fire and
brimstone, he didn’t see the Romans being kicked out and he didn’t see the Pharisees being
kicked out of the temple. All John saw was a carpenter talking about the Kingdom of God
and stooping low among sinners and pariahs.
This is our first real introduction to the Kingdom of God. John the Baptist tells people to
repent for the Kingdom of God is near. He just isn’t quite sure what that means. He doesn’t
understand it is a king who stands among us. One who would be laid in the water and be
laid in a tomb on our behalf. The answer wasn’t more of the same, bigger and better
application of the law. Jesus fulfilled the law through a perfect life and still took the penalty
of death.
That is the new kingdom. That is the transition of power. That is what we want to proclaim
as a part of our new ministry vision at SFC. Two weeks ago, I gave you a preview of this
vision: to equip and release a loving community of Kingdom Entrepreneurs. Over the
course of this series, I hope to explain different pieces of this statement. As a reminder, the
vision for our church is about what we produce here at SFC. It is a given that we are seeking
to produce disciples, but what is our specific flavor and niche at SFC? We want Kingdom
Entrepreneurs. People who see something broken in the world around them and fix it in
the name of Jesus. People who are passionate about using their gifts and skills for the
bigger picture of what God is doing here and around the world.
To understand this statement, you have to understand the kingdom, and to understand the
kingdom you must appreciate the king’s inauguration, which was his baptism. After Jesus
emerges from the baptismal waters, God sends a message that this is his son with whom he
is well pleased. You see the twist here is that it wasn’t John who was affirming Jesus in this
inauguration. It was God the Father. John prepared the way, but this baptism and
everything it represented occurred so people could know this wasn’t more of the same.
This wasn’t a prophet preaching fire and brimstone and the coming of the Day of the Lord.
This was the Lord and it was his day, and he was ushering in a new kingdom, a kingdom of
grace. The law was no longer the standard. What we could achieve was no longer the
standard. The king came to do for us what we could not do for ourselves.
When we talk about being Kingdom Entrepreneurs, this is the kingdom we are working for.
When you go out to serve and speak in his name as a Kingdom Entrepreneur, you aren’t
telling people to earn their way back to God. You aren’t doing something for them so
hopefully one day they might be able to do for themselves. You are lavishing grace. You are
giving freely. You are stooping among the lost and the broken because that is what your
king did for you. You aren’t offering judgment and brimstone but wild grace that will lead
people to repentance.
Lynn’s Story
I told you two weeks ago that the kingdom is essentially a collection of people living like
Jesus is king. It is people following the lead of a king who stoops, a king who offers what has
not been earned and a king who humbles himself for those around him. It is about a
transition of power; where we let go of our power and our rights so others may be restored
into God’s presence. It is about a change of administration. We live in a place that is all
about earning your way to the top. It is the ultimate Kingdom of Man. A meritocracy, where
you get what you deserve and you earn based on your talents.
John the Baptist missed this early on when he preached that mankind needed to produce
fruit. We needed to act our way into God’s presence. That is why Jesus said John was the
least in the kingdom because he did not yet see that it was not going to be about what we
can do for God but what God can do for us. That is the philosophy of the Kingdom of God,
the administration of grace. That is the kingdom we are called to share with others.
In addition to the swearing in ceremonies every January 20th, something amazing happens
behind the scenes. In five short hours, about 100 people move out all of the outgoing
President’s stuff and move in all of the incoming President’s stuff. And I mean everything,
furniture, clothes, books, food in the pantry, everything. I read an article that called this a
well-choreographed ballet. In five short hours, the old stuff is gone and the new stuff is in
its place. This is what a move should look like. I am sure if some of you have moved in
recent years, you know you are moved in but not unpacked for a year or more sometimes.
You keep finding knickknacks from the previous residents and you have two, three or four
boxes that just take forever to unpack and find a home. Can you imagine, such a huge and
thorough move done completely in five short hours? No reminders of the last residents.
Fully moved in as new residents.
All too often we can become aware of the kingdom of grace, but still find artifacts of the
kingdom of the law in our lives. Or maybe we haven’t fully moved in to the kingdom of
grace. Sometimes we believe that the law is about what we can do for God and not what
God did for us. Sometimes we mistakenly think that God’s love for us is conditional and
fleeting and not based on underserved grace. Your king stooped for you and for me. He
stood among us and died in our place. For your friends and family who see God as a distant
dictator who demands perfection. For your loved ones who are enslaved to performance
and earning their way through this valley. We want them to know our king. We want them
to know the good news of his kingdom, the Kingdom of Grace.