Matthew 3

Matthew 3:1-2 "In those days John the Baptist came preaching in the Desert of Judea and saying, 'Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near'."

These versus are sweet. Two parts I find sweet in this passage.

1) John the Baptist (henceforth known as J the B) is "...preaching...". Yup, that's it. He's preaching. From what I know of J the B he was not very timid. A few versus down he calls the Sadducees and the Pharisees a "brood of vipers"! Talk about boldness! Today at the library some lady was talking to one of the librarian ladies about different things and she mentioned God and about how we sometimes have to create our own miracles. WHA?! But I listened. I coulda said something...but I chose not to because I didn't want to barge into their conversation (which the patron lady was dominating).

2) In the second part of the verse J the B says, "REPENT, for the kingdom of heaven is near". REPENT! Not as in, take your time...when you feel up to it or when you have time ask for forgivness. NO! As in, RIGHT NOW! Can you gaurantee me what will happen in an hour from now? How do you know that Christ won't be back? Or that you won't be killed some how? We don't need to be fretting and worrying all our lives about making sure we're 'clean'; repenting every second. But we need to make sure we repent before God and not hold sins in, just taking for granted that as a Christian we'll be ok. We owe it to God to humble ourselves before Him and ask for forgiveness.

Matthew 3:10 "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".

J the B says something here that should catch our attention (and I assume it caught everyone around's attention). The ax, our judgement, is right here beside us. It's not something that might or might not come. It is plain that we will most definitely be judged for what fruit we bear. Is what we produce in our lives glorifying to God? If not we best be worried and get to workin on a way to fix this problem.

If you know Christ as your savior - keep pressing on and work on growing closer to Him.
If you do now have a personal relationship with Christ (which IS possible!) please look into the facts and realize that Christ loves you; enough that He died for you!!

Ryan ><>