Matthew Henry Commentary Matthew 3

After Malachi, there was no prophet until John the Baptist came. He appeared first in the wilderness of Judea. This was not an uninhabited desert, but a part of the country not thickly populated, nor much enclosed. No place is so remote as to shut us out from the visits of Divine grace. The doctrine he preached was repentance: Repent ye. The word used here implies a total alteration in the mind, a change in judgment, disposition, and affections—another and a better bias of the soul.

Consider your ways, change your minds: you have thought amiss; think again, and think aright. True penitents have different thoughts of God and Christ, sin and holiness, of this world and the world to come, than they had before. The change of the mind produces a change of the way. That is gospel repentance, which flows from a sight of Christ, from a sense of His love, and from hopes of pardon and forgiveness through Him.

It is a great encouragement to us to repent; repent, for your sins shall be pardoned upon your repentance. Return to God in a way of duty, and He will, through Christ, return to you in the way of mercy. It is still as necessary to repent and humble ourselves, to prepare the way of the Lord, as it then was. There is a great deal to be done to make way for Christ into a soul, and nothing is more essential than the discovery of sin and a conviction that we cannot be saved by our own righteousness.

The way of sin and Satan is a crooked way; but to prepare a way for Christ, the paths must be made straight (Hebrews 12:13). Those whose business it is to call others to mourn for sin and to mortify it, ought themselves to live a serious life—a life of self-denial and contempt of the world. By giving others this example, John made way for Christ. Many came to John's baptism, but few kept to the profession they made. There may be many eager hearers where there are few true believers.

Curiosity, and a love for novelty and variety, may bring many to attend good preaching and to be affected for a while, who are never subject to its power. Those who received John's doctrine testified their repentance by confessing their sins. Only those are ready to receive Jesus Christ as their righteousness who are brought with sorrow and shame to own their guilt. The benefits of the kingdom of heaven, now at hand, were then sealed to them by baptism.

John washed them with water, as a sign that God would cleanse them from all their iniquities, thereby intimating that by nature and practice all were polluted and could not be admitted among the people of God unless washed from their sins in the fountain Christ was to open (Zechariah 13:1).

Applying the message to the souls of the hearers is the life of preaching; and so it was with John's preaching. The Pharisees placed their main emphasis on outward observances, neglecting the weightier matters of the moral law and the spiritual meaning of their legal ceremonies. Others of them were detestable hypocrites, making their pretenses to holiness a cloak for iniquity. The Sadducees ran into the opposite extreme, denying the existence of spirits and a future state.

They were the scornful infidels of that time and country. There is a wrath to come. It is the great concern of everyone to flee from that wrath. God, who does not delight in our ruin, has warned us; He warns by the written word, by ministers, and by conscience. And those are not worthy of the name of penitents, or their privileges, who say they are sorry for their sins, yet persist in them.

It becomes penitents to be humble and low in their own eyes, to be thankful for the smallest mercy, patient under the greatest affliction, to be watchful against all appearances of sin, to abound in every duty, and to be charitable in judging others. Here is a word of caution: do not trust in outward privileges. There is a great deal that carnal hearts are apt to say within themselves to set aside the convincing, commanding power of the word of God.

Multitudes, by resting in the honors and mere advantages of their being members of an outward church, fall short of heaven. Here is a word of terror to the careless and secure. Our corrupt hearts cannot be made to produce good fruit unless the regenerating Spirit of Christ grafts the good word of God upon them. And every tree, however high in gifts and honors, however green in outward professions and performances, if it does not bring forth good fruit—fruits meet for repentance—is hewn down and cast into the fire of God's wrath, the most fitting place for barren trees. What else are they good for?

If not fit for fruit, they are fit for fuel. John shows the design and intention of Christ's appearing, which they were now to expect soon. No outward forms can make us clean. No ordinances, by whomever administered or in whatever manner, can make up for the lack of the baptism of the Holy Ghost and of fire. The purifying and cleansing power of the Holy Spirit alone can produce that purity of heart and those holy affections which accompany salvation.

It is Christ who baptizes with the Holy Ghost. This He did in the extraordinary gifts of the Spirit sent upon the apostles (Acts 2:4). This He does in the graces and comforts of the Spirit, given to those who ask Him (Luke 11:13; John 7:38–39). Observe here, the outward church is Christ's floor (Isaiah 21:10). True believers are like wheat—substantial, useful, and valuable; hypocrites are like chaff—light and empty, useless and worthless, carried about with every wind. These are mixed, good and bad, in the same outward communion. There is a day coming when the wheat and chaff will be separated.

The last judgment will be the distinguishing day, when saints and sinners will be parted forever. In heaven the saints are brought together and no longer scattered; they are safe and no longer exposed; separated from corrupt neighbors around them and corrupt affections within them, and there is no chaff among them. Hell is the unquenchable fire, which will certainly be the portion and punishment of hypocrites and unbelievers. Here life and death, good and evil, are set before us: according to how we are now in the field, so we will be then in the floor.

Christ's gracious condescensions are so surprising that even the strongest believers at first can hardly believe them; so deep and mysterious that even those who know His mind well are inclined to raise objections against the will of Christ. And those who have much of the Spirit of God while here see that they need to apply to Christ for more. Christ does not deny that John had need to be baptized by Him, yet He declares He will now be baptized by John.

Christ is now in a state of humiliation. Our Lord Jesus looked upon it as fitting for Him to fulfill all righteousness, to acknowledge every Divine institution, and to show His readiness to comply with all God's righteous precepts. In and through Christ, the heavens are opened to the children of men. This descent of the Spirit upon Christ showed that He was endowed with His sacred influences without measure.

The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance. At Christ's baptism there was a manifestation of the three Persons in the sacred Trinity: the Father confirming the Son to be Mediator; the Son solemnly entering upon the work; the Holy Spirit descending on Him, to be through His mediation communicated to His people. In Him our spiritual sacrifices are acceptable, for He is the altar that sanctifies every gift (1 Peter 2:5). Outside of Christ, God is a consuming fire, but in Christ, a reconciled Father.

This is the sum of the gospel, which we must by faith cheerfully embrace.