{"id":25664,"date":"2025-12-04T10:48:00","date_gmt":"2025-12-04T09:48:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/?p=25664"},"modified":"2025-12-04T10:48:00","modified_gmt":"2025-12-04T09:48:00","slug":"matthew-31-12-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/matthew-31-12-4\/","title":{"rendered":"Matthew 3:1-12"},"content":{"rendered":"

The 2nd Sunday in Advent 7-12-25<\/strong><\/p>\n

A Sermon on Matthew 3:1-12 by The Rev. Dr. Judson F Merrell, STS<\/strong><\/p>\n

In those days John the Baptist came, preaching in the wilderness of Judea 2<\/sup> and saying, „Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.“ 3<\/sup> This is he who was spoken of through the prophet Isaiah: „A voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‚Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him.'“ 4<\/sup> John’s clothes were made of camel’s hair, and he had a leather belt around his waist. His food was locusts and wild honey. 5<\/sup> People went out to him from Jerusalem and all Judea and the whole region of the Jordan. 6<\/sup> Confessing their sins, they were baptized by him in the Jordan River. 7<\/sup> But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to where he was baptizing, he said to them: „You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? 8<\/sup> Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. 9<\/sup> And do not think you can say to yourselves, ‚We have Abraham as our father.‘ I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. 10<\/sup> The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire. 11<\/sup> „I baptize you with water for repentance. But after me comes one who is more powerful than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. 12<\/sup> His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor, gathering his wheat into the barn and burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire.“\u00a0 Matthew 3:1-12<\/strong><\/p>\n

New International Version\u00a0(NIV)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Holy Bible, New International Version\u00ae, NIV\u00ae Copyright \u00a91973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by\u00a0Biblica, Inc.\u00ae\u00a0Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Brothers and sisters in Christ, grace and peace to you from God the Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.\u00a0 Amen.<\/p>\n

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Last month we had three weeks in a row of baptisms.\u00a0 It is such a joy to see the Holy Spirit calling people to the font to be claimed by God as a child of His forever.\u00a0 Baptism is one of those moments where the work of God interacts with us in a variety of ways.\u00a0 We hear the water being poured into the font and over the head of the one being baptized.\u00a0We see God working through the parents and sponsors to bring a child to the font and through the pastor who is baptizing.\u00a0 We hear God\u2019s promises and the promises the parents make to God.\u00a0 All baptized persons can come to the font and touch the water and make the sign of the cross on their own foreheads, remembering the promises that God made in their own baptisms.<\/p>\n

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\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Baptism is the very death of the sinner inside of us.\u00a0 It drowns the old Adam and from the water springs forth a child of God who will one day join all the saints in light.\u00a0 An old tradition in the church is that the person being baptized dressed in black until they were baptized.\u00a0 Then, and only then, did they put on a garment of white.\u00a0 It was a visible change that the congregation could see.\u00a0 Out of death springs forth resurrection.<\/p>\n

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\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 In our Gospel today we are once again introduced to John the Baptist.\u00a0 He is out in the wilderness, dressed like Elijah and baptizing people for the forgiveness of sins.\u00a0 Matthew tells us that among the crowds were known Pharisees and Sadducees.\u00a0 The religious elite.\u00a0 The educated class of the temple.\u00a0 Those that enjoyed being in control.\u00a0 It is interesting to note that they also disagree with each other about a very important theological issue:\u00a0 resurrection.\u00a0 The Sadducees did not believe in a resurrection of the dead, while the pharisees did. Now if you are a Sadducee, and you don\u2019t believe in resurrection, why get baptized?\u00a0 They didn\u2019t believe that there was anything beyond this life, and that when you died, your soul died with it and there was nothing else.\u00a0 In that same vein, why even be religious?\u00a0 Just go and do whatever you want.<\/p>\n

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But perhaps this is one of those moments that like us witnessing a baptism, draws all our senses to the work of God.\u00a0 Why did they come?\u00a0 Perhaps they wanted \u201cfire insurance\u201d in case their own thoughts were wrong?\u00a0 Or perhaps deep down they knew God was at work.\u00a0 I look at this text and I see God at work showing his grace to those that don\u2019t even believe in what God is up to.\u00a0 And like baptism, it shows that sometimes things need to die so that something else can spring forth.<\/p>\n

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In our own lives, are there things that need to die so that we can see the work of God doing something new?\u00a0 What about here in the church?\u00a0 We are Lutheran.\u00a0 We like to do things the same way we always have.\u00a0 To sit in the same pews, to sing the same songs, to use LBW setting 1 until Jesus returns.\u00a0 But what if a ministry dies so a new ministry can blossom.\u00a0 Here in the season of Advent we don\u2019t normally focus on resurrection, but it seems to me that our Gospel lesson shows us that God is at work in many and various ways.\u00a0 The old Adam is dying, and springing forth from the waters of baptism is something new, something wonderful, something that is indeed the everlasting work of God.\u00a0 As baptized children of God we have had the old Adam in us drowned.\u00a0 We have smelled, touched, heard, and seen the work of God in our midst.\u00a0 How much better will it be when one day we live with God Himself, knowing that as baptized children of God we have been gathered as he gathers wheat, and we will stand before his throne of grace and behold his glory forever.\u00a0 In the name of the Father, and of the +Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.<\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

\u00a9The Rev. Dr. Judson F Merrell, STS<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 judsonmerrell@bellsouth.net<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 St. Peter\u2019s Lutheran Church<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 Lexington, SC USA<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The 2nd Sunday in Advent 7-12-25 A Sermon on Matthew 3:1-12 by The Rev. Dr. Judson F Merrell, STS In those days John the Baptist came, preaching in the wilderness of Judea 2 and saying, „Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.“ 3 This is he who was spoken of through the prophet […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25666,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36,612,157,853,108,110,235,676,349,3,109],"tags":[],"beitragende":[],"predigtform":[],"predigtreihe":[],"bibelstelle":[],"class_list":["post-25664","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-matthaeus","category-2-advent","category-beitragende","category-bibel","category-current","category-engl","category-judson-f-merrell","category-kapitel-03-chapter-03-matthaeus","category-kasus","category-nt","category-predigten"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25664","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25664"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25664\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25667,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25664\/revisions\/25667"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25666"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25664"},{"taxonomy":"beitragende","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/beitragende?post=25664"},{"taxonomy":"predigtform","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/predigtform?post=25664"},{"taxonomy":"predigtreihe","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/predigtreihe?post=25664"},{"taxonomy":"bibelstelle","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bibelstelle?post=25664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}