Baptized Lives
Notes
Transcript
Sermon Tone Analysis
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FCF: We want to give God everything except what He wants from us.
LO: We need to understand that the best indicator of our hearts is our everyday lives.
AO: We need to commit to following God in the details of everyday life.
Christ link: Jesus
Intro: John the Baptist announced that Jesus was coming with power and fire, to judge the word. They could not trust in their genetics or the traditions of the past - they needed to bear the fruit of a changed heart.
What would you expect John to ask of them? Think about the scene. He is living alone in the desert - living on locusts and honey, dressed in rough camel garments. What do they need to do to get ready for the end of the world?
You would probably expect something dramatic. Sometimes Jesus called on people to do big things: sell everything you own and give it to the poor. Maybe John would want them to do that. Or maybe move to the Jordan River valley alongside him, giving up pillows and pies for the life of a wandering prophet.
Maybe he would want them to go through some ritual. Go to Jerusalem and make a sacrifice! Take a Nazirite vow. Show up to church every week. When Martin Luther was a Catholic monk, he would beat himself and crawl up stone steps until he was bloodied mess, trying to win God’s favor. Is that what God wants?
Let’s see how John answers when they ask.
And the people asked him, saying, What shall we do then?
He answereth and saith unto them, He that hath two coats, let him impart to him that hath none; and he that hath meat, let him do likewise.
Then came also publicans to be baptized, and said unto him, Master, what shall we do?
And he said unto them, Exact no more than that which is appointed you.
And the soldiers likewise demanded of him, saying, And what shall we do? And he said unto them, Do violence to no man, neither accuse any falsely; and be content with your wages.
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And now, Israel, what doth the Lord thy God require of thee, but to fear the Lord thy God, to walk in all his ways, and to love him, and to serve the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul,
Wherewith shall I come before the Lord, And bow myself before the high God? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, With calves of a year old?
Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, Or with ten thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, The fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?
He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; And what doth the Lord require of thee, But to do justly, and to love mercy, And to walk humbly with thy God?
Therefore turn thou to thy God: Keep mercy and judgment, And wait on thy God continually.
By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name.
But to do good and to communicate forget not: for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.
And as the people were in expectation, and all men mused in their hearts of John, whether he were the Christ, or not;
John answered, saying unto them all, I indeed baptize you with water; but one mightier than I cometh, the latchet of whose shoes I am not worthy to unloose: he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire:
Whose fan is in his hand, and he will throughly purge his floor, and will gather the wheat into his garner; but the chaff he will burn with fire unquenchable.
And many other things in his exhortation preached he unto the people.
But Herod the tetrarch, being reproved by him for Herodias his brother Philip’s wife, and for all the evils which Herod had done,
Added yet this above all, that he shut up John in prison.