Please turn to the Gospel according to Luke, chapter 3. Luke, the third chapter, from verse 1.
Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judaea, and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene,
in the high-priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came unto John the son of Zacharias in the wilderness.
And he came into all the region about the Jordan, preaching the baptism of repentance unto remission of sins;
as it is written in the book of the words of Isaiah the prophet,
The voice of one crying in the wilderness,
Make ye ready the way of the Lord,
Make His paths straight.
Every valley shall be filled,
And every mountain and hill shall be brought low;
And the crooked shall become straight,
And the rough ways smooth;
And all flesh shall see the salvation of God.
He said therefore to the multitudes that went out to be baptized of him, Ye offspring of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?
Bring forth therefore fruits worthy of repentance, and begin not to say within yourselves, We have Abraham to our father: for I say unto you, that God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham.
And even now the axe also lieth at the root of the trees: every tree therefore that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.
And the multitudes asked him, saying, What then must we do?
And he answered and said unto them, He that hath two coats, let him impart to him that hath none; and he that hath food, let him do likewise.
And there came also publicans to be baptized, and they said unto him, Teacher, what must we do?
And he said unto them, Extort no more than that which is appointed you.
And soldiers also asked him, saying, And we, what must we do? And he said unto them, Extort from no man by violence, neither accuse any one wrongfully; and be content with your wages.
The last voice of God in the Old Testament is the voice of the prophet Malachi. After God spoke to the remnant who returned from Babylonian captivity, God was completely silent for four hundred years.
You know, in the days of Eli, we are told that the word of God was rare, and vision was not widespread. In other words, in the days of Eli, the spiritual condition of God’s people was such that God spoke very seldom and rarely appeared Himself to His own people.
It must have been a terrible situation at that time. But in comparison with the days of Eli, we find that for four hundred years God did not speak even a word to His own people. Heaven was completely silent.
What spiritual condition there must have been among His people. Just imagine if God should not speak to us for a year. What would happen to us? For God not to speak for four hundred years—what a terrible situation the people must have been in.
Any idea, brothers and sisters? When you look into the condition of the nation of Israel by outward appearance, you find that everything seemed to go on as usual, even without God’s speaking.
The children of Israel had come back from Babylonian captivity. They rebuilt the temple, and this temple was enlarged by King Herod until it became a beautiful edifice, adorned with beautiful stones and offerings. It was a pride to the Jewish people.
In the temple, the priesthood was restored, even though it was not perfect. The priests who came back from Babylonian captivity did not belong to all the twenty-four courses, but they managed to stretch out those who came back into twenty-four courses. So, in the temple, the priests served day and night, year in and year out, in the twenty-four courses as arranged by King David.
Not only was the priesthood restored, but even the sacrifices were restored. Every morning, on the brazen altar, a burnt offering was put on the fire. Then the other offerings were offered upon that burnt offering. When the morning burnt offering was completely consumed, another lamb was put there in the evening. The fire on the altar burned day and night.
Many sacrifices were offered on the altar over those four hundred years. But where was the word of God among them? Where were the miracles of God that redeemed His people?
More than that, when they came back from Babylon, they developed that wonderful human invention: the system of synagogues. During the captivity there was no temple, and yet they wanted to worship God; so the synagogue system was invented.
When they returned from captivity and the temple was rebuilt, we might think the synagogue system would completely disappear. But not so. It was even increased. All kinds of synagogues mushroomed all over the land.
In the synagogues there were prayers offered, the five books of Moses and the prophets were read, and there were exhortations. People could exhort one another. They were a very godly people.
Added to that, there was strict asceticism. The Pharisees made a special study of the law and tried to keep the law to its very letter. They were the teachers of the people.
There was also another class of people called the scribes. They devoted their whole lives to copying the word of God. How pious they were: when they came to the name of God, they had to bathe themselves before they wrote the name.
They were so familiar with the Scriptures that they did not need a concordance at all. So here you find the Jews: they were back in the Promised Land; they had a temple, the priesthood, sacrifices, the word of God, synagogues, scribes, and Pharisees. What more did they want?
They considered themselves the most religious people in the world. They were proud of themselves as the teachers of the nations. They had the purest religion.
Through the years, traditions had accumulated. Great teachers arose to interpret the Bible, and then other great teachers arose to interpret the interpretations of those great teachers. By the time we are considering, the traditions of the fathers had become so immense that the word of God was literally buried.
By all outward appearances, they were the most religious and godly people in the whole world, and they themselves thought that was the case.
Can you put these two things together? On the one hand, you find the most religious people in the world. Surely God would be pleased with them. Surely He would like to be friends with them, to speak to them, and to reveal Himself to them. Certainly they deserved all these things.
And yet, the Bible says that for four hundred years there was no vision and not a word. God was completely silent.
It was not because God did not want to speak to His people. Certainly God wanted to speak to His people. It was not because God did not want to reveal Himself to His people. He certainly would like to, because these were the only people to whom He could reveal Himself.
But they drove Him to silence. They drove Him into hiding. God was not happy with that situation.
Four hundred years passed. What spiritual death this must have been! Yet the people could go on as usual, as if God were with them and they were God-fearing people. What hypocrisy!
After four hundred years of silence, God could not keep His silence any longer. He broke His silence, and suddenly there was a voice in the wilderness.
This man was John. We mentioned yesterday that he was an epoch-making vessel of God. God was going to change the times. He was going to conclude the age of the law and the prophets and introduce the dispensation of grace. He was going to bring in the King, His Christ.
So God found this man, John, an epoch-making vessel. He was born of grace. He was a Nazarite for life. He was filled with the Spirit and power of Elijah, and he was sent by God to prepare the way of the Lord.
As he grew in stature and in spirit, he grew up in a very different way from the people of his time. He lived in the desert, not at home. He clothed himself with camel’s hair and a leather girdle, not with the fashionable Roman dress of his day.
He did not even eat corn and wheat. He ate locusts and wild honey found in the wilderness. He was a very different person, not because he wanted to be different, but because God had a very different message for him to bring to His own people. So God reared him up in a very special way.
When he was thirty years old—remember, he came from a priestly family. When a man born into a priestly family came to thirty years of age, that was the time when he would enter the temple and serve as a full-fledged priest.
But instead of that, the word of God came to John. The word there is not logos; it is rhema. In other words, it was the current word of the Lord, the immediate and present word of the Lord, coming to John.
God did not even allow him to be a priest. He was born to be a priest, but before he was able to serve as a priest in the temple according to custom and tradition, God called him to be a prophet—a spokesman of God.
So he came out from the wilderness, and there he brought a message to God’s people in his time.
Dear brothers and sisters, as we mentioned yesterday, we are on the verge of another great change in time. We believe that God is going to conclude even this dispensation of grace. The door of grace will close very soon.
God is going to introduce into the world the age to come, which is the millennium, the kingdom. God is going to bring back His King, the King of kings and Lord of lords. We are on the verge of another great change.
What is our condition before man and before God? Probably before man you will find a group of very godly, very religious people.
You know, brothers and sisters, I was told that this country has the largest number of Bible schools and seminaries in the whole world. The air is literally filled with the gospel.
It is a Christian country, a religious people. In a small corner of the square, there are at least three church buildings; the fourth one is a courthouse. By all outward appearances, it seems as if we are a religious people. We worship God.
But, dear brothers and sisters, the question is this: Is God speaking to us? Do we hear the voice of God?
Yes, we have Bible studies three times a week. It may be expounded in many places and in many ways. But do we hear the voice of God? Is there a vision? Does God reveal Himself to His people?
Look at the hunger and thirst among God’s people. Why? Why is there not living water?
You find a situation here very similar to the days of John the Baptist. Outwardly religious, full of tradition—yet there is no reality and there is no power.
God is going to make a tremendous change: changing from the letter to the Spirit, changing religiosity into spirituality, changing formality into reality.
The shadow shall pass away; the reality shall come in.
As we are living in such a time, does God have a message for us today? We may hear many voices. We may even hear many words, the word of God expounded to us. But the question is: Does God have a special message for our days?
Yes. In the age of John the Baptist, I believe He had such a message. There was a voice in the wilderness.
Because for four hundred years God had not spoken, when that voice began to speak, the whole country was literally electrified. People flocked from cities, villages, and countryside. They flocked to the wilderness to hear what God had to say to His people.
What was the message? “Repent; for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”
What a strange message that must have been. The word repent is a very strong word. It is not a weak word.
Repentance means a change of mind, an about-face, a turning around, a change of direction, a change of lifestyle, a change of everything—a complete, radical change.
Certainly, the Jews at that time would have expected John to come with a message saying, “Reform. Improve. Increase a little more.” They would have said, “That is very logical, very reasonable. That is the message we are waiting for.”
Their attitude was represented by Nicodemus. Nicodemus was the teacher of Israel. He was not simply one of the rabbis; he was the teacher of Israel—an old man, accomplished, respected by everybody.
Yet he knew that it was not enough. So he came to the Lord at night and said, “We know that You have come from God. You are a teacher from heaven. I am a teacher on earth, the greatest; but You are a teacher from heaven. You must have something to teach me, something a little more, that I may improve a little more.”
But the Lord Jesus said:
Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except one be born anew, he cannot see the kingdom of God.
God’s message to His people is a message of repentance—a total change of mind.
No wonder the Pharisees and the scribes would not accept John the Baptist. To them it was unreasonable. “Are we not the most religious people? Why should we repent of the temple? God ordained it. Why should we repent of the priesthood? God ordained it. Why repent of the sacrifices God ordered us to offer?”
“What is wrong with the oracles, the word of God? We study it and keep the letter of the law. What is wrong with praying? What is wrong with praising? What is wrong with exhorting one another? Should we repent of these things? These things come from God.”
“God asked us to build a temple, and we did many things for God. God gave us His word, and we added the traditions of the fathers. We do more than God ever asked. Certainly repentance is not for us; it is for the heathen, those unclean people.”
Only the sinners and the publicans came to John the Baptist and received his baptism.
Dear brothers and sisters, we often think that repentance is for unbelievers. It is true: an unbeliever needs to repent, because unless he repents, he will never be able to receive the salvation of the Lord.
But in the word of God, you find that repentance is preached to God’s people too. We need to repent.
Towards the end of the first century, in Revelation 2–3, you find the seven letters of the risen Lord to the seven churches. Aside from the church in Philadelphia and the church in Smyrna, you find the Lord’s message to every one of His churches: “Repent.”
Why? Did they not have good works? Did they not have zeal, understanding, knowledge, labor, and all these things? They did, and the Lord knew it. But the word of the Lord to His people was: “Repent. Repent of these things.”
In other words, the word of the Lord said, “You are altogether wrong. Everything you do has to be repented of. Even the best has to be repented of. Even the most accurate has to be repented of. Even the most orthodox has to be repented of. Even the most zealous has to be repented of. I will have nothing to do with these things.”
Dear brothers and sisters, what is repentance? I believe I have told you this story before, but I like it so much that I do not mind saying it again, if you are not tired of it.
Once there was a convention for theologians. They came together to discuss the various doctrines of the Bible. All these doctors of divinity and theology presented dissertations on various topics, and one of the topics was repentance.
Different doctors presented their thinking and read their dissertations before the audience. The more they presented the meaning of repentance, the more confused the people became, because it was all over their heads.
Finally, a retired missionary to a foreign land, who was sitting in the back listening, could not stand it any longer. He raised his hand and said, “Mr. Chairman, will you allow me to speak for just five minutes?”
The chairman looked at him. He had white hair and had spent many years in the foreign field. Though he was not considered very learned, out of respect for his many years of service, the chairman said, “All right, I will give you five minutes.”
The missionary stood up and began to walk toward the platform. As he walked, he raised both hands and began to shout, “I am going to hell! I am going to hell! I am going to hell!”
He shouted all the way up, and everybody was electrified. They said, “This man—something must be wrong with his head.”
He shouted louder and louder until he got to the platform. After he ascended the platform, he turned around to face the audience, lifted up both hands, and said, “I am going to heaven. This is repentance.”
I think there is nothing clearer than that. Do you know what repentance is? Repentance is not merely turning a little to the right or a little to the left.
Repentance is this: you are going in one direction, which is toward death, and now you turn around—an about-face—and go in another direction altogether, toward life. That is repentance.
In other words, it is not improvement. It is not reform. It is a complete change.
Now, after you have heard this, do you think you need to repent? Probably you are just like the Pharisees and scribes. You are heading in the right direction. Certainly there is nothing wrong with the direction. Maybe you veer a little to the right or to the left and need some adjustment, but to change the whole direction? Certainly not.
You do not need to repent, do you?
Did the Jews need to repent? They were all going to the temple. Did they need to repent of offering sacrifices? Did they need to repent because they had synagogues? Did they need to repent because they read the word of God, prayed, praised, studied the word, and kept the commandments? Did they need to repent of all these things? Yes.
Why? Because the time had come. The temple was a shadow; the reality had come.
The temple in Jerusalem was magnificent, but the presence of the Lord was not there. The presence of God was with a Man, Jesus of Nazareth. He is the temple.
There was nothing wrong with the priesthood, but the priesthood was a shadow. The reality is in Christ. He is the Priest, the High Priest after the order of Melchizedek. He has come.
There was nothing wrong with offerings, for the offerings were types. But the reality had come. The Lamb of God had come.
There was nothing wrong with the word, but the Spirit of the word had come. The Lord Jesus said:
Ye search the Scriptures, because ye think that in them ye have eternal life; and these are they which bear witness of Me;
and ye will not come to Me, that ye may have life.
Dear brothers and sisters, because a tremendous change of time had come, if they remained under the dispensation of the law and the prophets, all these things were right. But now, if they held on to those things and rejected the Christ who had come, then they were wrong.
Do they need to repent of that? Certainly. Certainly they need to repent.
Oh, dear brothers and sisters, how often we think that we are very scriptural, very orthodox, very traditional. We are doing things that are right according to the word.
But, brothers and sisters, the time is coming. God is looking for reality. If there is no reality, if there is no spirituality, if it is not Christ, then even though you may be doing all these things, the message of God to you is: “Repent.”
You cannot rely on these things. You cannot cling to and rely upon these things.
John preached repentance, and he acted out his teaching with baptism. What is baptism? Baptism is death, burial, and resurrection.
Repentance is acted out by baptism. In other words, repentance is nothing less than what baptism is.
If you need to be baptized, that means you need to die to the old—whether it is good or bad, whether it is your achievements or your failures. Anything that is of the old must die.
Not only must it die, but it must be put out of sight. You do not want to see it anymore, so that you may partake in resurrection.
Dear brothers and sisters, this is the meaning of repentance. It is not merely that you repent of something you consider sinful and evil. Certainly you need to repent of that which you consider good as well.
You look at your whole past as something completely wrong, something that must go to death and be buried. You do not want to see it anymore, that you may begin anew in Christ, in reality, in spiritual reality. This is repentance.
Why do we repent? We repent because we have sinned, because we have fallen, because we have done something wrong. That is true.
But do you know, dear brothers and sisters, if repentance is based only on negative reasons, it is superficial.
“Repent; for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” That is the reason.
It is not merely that you repent because you have done something wrong. Certainly they did not need to repent because the temple itself was wrong, or because the priesthood and sacrifices were wrong. No.
The only reason given for repentance is a positive reason: “Repent; for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”
Unless we repent because there is something positive, our repentance is always superficial.
You read the Scriptures and find this in the life of Job. Job was a perfect man. God could even use him to challenge Satan: “Hast thou considered My servant Job, how perfect and righteous he is?”
Certainly Job thought he had nothing to repent of. When he was accused by his three friends, they said that something must be wrong with him, that there must be some secret sin hidden somewhere; otherwise, all these calamities would not have fallen upon him.
They told him to repent before the Lord and the Lord would be merciful to him. But Job said, “I searched myself. I could not find anything I needed to repent of. If I repent, I am a hypocrite. I am not true to myself.”
Oh, dear brothers and sisters, we can be self-righteous like that. “If I repent, I am a hypocrite, because I have nothing to repent of.”
But what his friends could not accomplish, an appearing of God did accomplish. God appeared to him. God challenged him. God did not even explain why such things happened to him. God simply revealed His majesty, His glory, His creative acts, and His power.
And Job said:
I had heard of Thee by the hearing of the ear;
But now mine eye seeth Thee:
Wherefore I abhor myself,
And repent in dust and ashes.
Why did Job repent? Because he had seen God.
If all you see is man, you may not think you need to repent. You may think you are better. But if God appears to you, you cannot but repent.
Look at Daniel, the beloved of God. He was beloved of God, but when God appeared to him in a vision, he fell upon his face as dead.
When the angel of the Lord touched him and raised him up, he said, “My comeliness was turned in me into corruption.”
Dear brothers and sisters, one day, if you see God, your beauty will turn into corruption. You think this is your beauty, your strength, something upon which you can depend. But if you see Him, your beauty will turn into corruption; it will become something you are ashamed of.
Isaiah was a great prophet. How he denounced the children of Israel for God! But in Isaiah 6, in the year that King Uzziah died, he entered into the temple and God gave him a vision.
Of course, he was not allowed to enter the holy place, because he was not a priest. He must have been praying in the outer court. Yet God gave him a vision of the Holiest of All. There the Lord was upon a throne, and His train filled the house. The seraphim cried, “Holy, holy, holy.”
When Isaiah saw the vision of the Lord, he cried:
Woe is me! for I am undone;
Because I am a man of unclean lips,
And I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips:
For mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts.
Thank God, a seraph flew down and touched him with a living coal from the altar. But it was a sight of the Lord.
The same thing happened to John the apostle, the one who lay on the bosom of our Lord. Yet on the island of Patmos, when the Lord appeared to him, he fell down as dead.
Dear brothers and sisters, do we need to repent? The reason why we feel we are all right is because we have not seen the Lord. If we see the Lord, we know we need to repent. There is no other place for us. Repentance is our ground.
“Repent; for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Dear brothers and sisters, this is the message that God gave to His people through John the Baptist, and this is the message that makes ready a prepared people for God.
In other words, how are we to be prepared for the coming of the Lord? How can we be a prepared people for the Lord? If the Lord were to come tonight, how would we prepare ourselves to meet Him? What is the way of preparation?
Some people say, “Oh, if the Lord returns and He finds me preaching, then I will be ready to meet Him. Or if the Lord should return and I happened to be on my knees praying, then I would be ready.”
I know friends who believed the Lord was coming soon. The husband was a well-known surgeon. Because they thought the Lord was coming soon, they left this country with a group of people and went to the northwest of Canada. They cleared the ground and built houses because they wanted to wait there for the Lord’s coming.
Is that the way to be prepared for the Lord’s return?
Maybe we think that if we want to prepare for the Lord’s return, we must do something. “Let us serve Him and do something for Him, so that when He returns, we have something to offer Him.” Or we may say, “If I grow and grow and become so spiritual, then I can meet the Lord.”
You will find many surprises.
How did John the Baptist prepare for the Lord? How did he prepare the way of the Lord? How did he make ready a prepared people for the Lord? With the message of repentance.
Dear brothers and sisters, I believe that the way to be prepared to meet the Lord is the way of repentance.
In other words, we need to be in constant repentance before God—continuous repentance. Repentance is not merely something we did once in our lifetime.
Brothers and sisters, we need to be continually repentant before the Lord. Why? Because if we continually see the Lord, we have to be repenting continually.
It is when we do not see the Lord that we begin to put our confidence in this thing or that thing.
Do we put our confidence in our knowledge? Do we put our confidence even in our obedience? Do we have confidence in our achievements? Do we put our confidence in our spirituality? Do we put our confidence in all these things, brothers and sisters?
If we think we are ready to meet Him, we are not ready.
Oh, that He may give us an increasing vision of Himself, that we may stand on the ground of repentance.
That will create within us a right spirit—the spirit of humility. That is the spirit of the Lamb, and that is the only spirit that can meet the Lord.
God resists the proud and gives grace to the humble. Dear brothers and sisters, how can we be humble?
We may think we have achieved a lot. Certainly we have obeyed the Lord. Certainly we have found the right way. Certainly we know much more. Brothers and sisters, if that is your attitude, you are not prepared.
There must be an increasing vision of the Lord to bring us lower and lower and lower at His feet.
Someone said that even the tears of repentance need to be repented of. It is true, very true.
“Repent; for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” In the days of John the Baptist, the King had arrived, but He was despised. Those who were not prepared could not recognize Him.
Only those who repented and received Him entered the kingdom of heaven. Over them, the King ruled.
Dear brothers and sisters, the day is drawing nearer and nearer for the kingdom of heaven to be manifested publicly upon this earth. But who will be those who rule and reign with Him for a thousand years? Those who are prepared.
How do we prepare ourselves? The only way to be prepared is repentance.
Brothers and sisters, I know that in the days of John the Baptist it was a surprise to the people. They could not believe it. I believe it will be a surprise to us today. We cannot believe it. We think that being prepared for the way of the Lord must mean something different.
But it is the same message: “Repent; for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”
When the scribes and Pharisees came to John the Baptist to be baptized, they thought it was merely a ceremonial washing. John made them know that it was real.
Unless you bear fruit worthy of repentance, there is no use in being baptized. Do not think in your heart that you are children of Abraham. God can raise out of these stones children unto Abraham.
In other words, all that is natural cannot help anymore. It is a spiritual relationship with the Lord that alone will count.
To the Jews at that time, the fruits worthy of repentance were found in Micah 6:8:
He hath showed thee, O man, what is good;
And what doth the Lord require of thee,
But to do justly, and to love kindness,
And to walk humbly with thy God?
For us today, dear brothers and sisters, what is the fruit of our repentance? The fruit of our repentance is the fruit of the Spirit.
In other words, we know that there is nothing good in us. We know that we cannot rely on anything, even our achievements. We know that we need constantly to humble ourselves before Him.
Out of that will come the fruit of the Spirit. That is worthy of repentance.
So may the Lord help us as we are approaching nearer and nearer to the day of the return of the King. Brothers and sisters, may the Holy Spirit keep us in the spirit of humility, in constant repentance, that He may truly be all to us. Then the kingdom of heaven shall come.
Oh, heavenly Father, how we do praise and thank Thee that we are living in a most wonderful time—difficult, but wonderful.
We praise Thee that there is a hope that we may see Thee without going through death, because Thou art coming. But, Lord, are we a prepared people for Thee, that Thou shouldst come and really dwell with us?
Build a kingdom spirit in us, a spirit of humility. Lord, find among Thy people a people who repent for themselves and cast themselves completely upon Thy mercy and Thy grace.
Find a people who will not put confidence in anything or anybody, but in Thee alone. Oh Lord, deal with us, and Thou truly reign in our lives. May Thou have absolute rule over our lives in every area.
Oh Lord, do not allow us to be self-righteous or self-conceited. Lord, bring us to dust and ashes, because this is our hope.
Oh Lord, we do open ourselves to Thee. Lord, Thou art our only salvation. Thou art our only help. How we trust Thee.
Just keep us, Lord, in this way until we meet Thee face to face. We ask in the name that is above every name, the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.