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John's Attack on Fakes & Frauds
- Wesley Arning
- 5 minutes ago
- 8 min read
Sermon 411 St. Martin’s 165 (Riverway) 12/7/25
In those days John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea, proclaiming, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.” This is the one of whom the prophet Isaiah spoke when he said,
“The voice of one crying out in the wilderness:‘Prepare the way of the Lord,make his paths straight.’”
Now John wore clothing of camel’s hair with a leather belt around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey. Then the people of Jerusalem and all Judea were going out to him, and all the region along the Jordan, and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.
But when he saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit worthy of repentance. Do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our ancestor’; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.
“I baptize you with water for repentance, but one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and will gather his wheat into the granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.” Matthew 3:1-12
Churchill’s War Room My family and I went to England two months ago for a friend’s wedding. While we were in London, we decided to visit Churchill’s War Room.
Fearing aerial bombardment from the Nazi’s, much of the British government went underground. They converted the basement of a government building into the headquarters of the War Cabinet. Hundreds of people called these underground rooms their home and office from 1940-1945, including the prime minister.
It was a cramp, windowless, and frenetic place to call home. News of the war was coming in at all times of the day and night. Walking down a hallway, you may have seen in one room generals crowding over a map, in the next one a secretary working on an important cable to the frontline, and in the next one, Clementine Churchill might have been sipping on a cup of tea before bed.
It was all happening in this makeshift bunker.
The war was not some distant event, though; bombs were crashing all around them as they worked, watched, and waited for the tide of the war to turn. Deep underground, they would have to read on a board what the weather was like outside for days and weeks at a time. It took a toll on everyone, but so is the nature of war.
What has made Churchill’s War Room a tourist destination is its preservation. It has largely gone untouched since the war ended. Apparently, the moment the war was over, everyone burst from their underground hiding spot and joined the crowds in celebration.
Everyone in that bunker had longed for the day of victory; they had worked tirelessly to end the war, even though they were far from the battlefield. They waited for news, and once they got it, they left and never went back.
The War Room has been frozen in time. A modern Pompeii for anyone who wants to see how it looked the day the war was won.
That is very much what Advent is like. It is about people who have longed to hear the news of God’s light and life breaking through the darkness; it is about the invasion of this world and the rescue operation undertaken by God himself.
Advent directs our attention to the battle between good and evil, and reminds us that God’s righteousness and justice have decisively won, even if its consummation is at the end of the age. As Jesus says, the strong man has been bound, and the king has taken back what is rightfully his.
Advent is so much more than preparation for Christmas. Advent is the time between; it is the protracted season in human history between the Enemy’s defeat on Calvary and his final demise at the end of the age.
This season reminds us that we are a people actively waiting and watching for our Lord’s return. The world may seem dark and hopeless at times, but we wait, knowing the victory has been won and that he will come again to establish his reign fully and without end.
We are living deep in the War Room, but we know the outcome.
John the Physician The herald of this new age is the voice crying out from the wilderness: John the Baptizer. You simply cannot have Advent without John. He is the preeminent End Time figure.
He is the last voice of the Old Covenant who also sounds the opening note of the New. To get to Jesus, the four gospels are clear: you must first encounter John. There is no way around him and his message.
He fulfills the role of Elijah, a prophet whose presence marks the beginning of the end. Like the prophet Elijah, John is prickly and off-putting. He is the absolute last person you would invite to a dinner party, and yet the person you most need in your life, because John is honest and real.
This world is filled with people who are fake. Whether online or in-person, they can put on a mask and deceive whoever they meet to gain favor. They want to seem more likable, more intelligent, or successful than they really are. We all know fake people, and if we’re honest, that person is us.
John the Baptist is the antithesis of fake. There is not an ounce of pretentiousness in him. John has no time for niceties; he only has time for the truth. He is gruff and impatient because he is a God-ordained wrecking ball.
He can hear the clock ticking upon the world, but he is the only one who can hear it. Everyone else is content to go about their lives, but John stands at the edge of a new age and cries out, “The time has come, wake up and arise, the Lord is on his way!”
John is a prophet and a trailblazer, but he also fulfills the role of a physician in our lives. I sat down with my doctor this week for my yearly check-up. I feel like I was trying to pass the test and impress her as she went through her questionnaire.
As a typical overachiever who was not only trying to pass the exam but also wanted to absolutely crush it, I felt validated as we were wrapping up. I think we all want to feel validated at a yearly check-up, and we hope the doctor will say, “Wow, you’re in great shape. Awesome job. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with you. You’re going to live a long and happy life. Don’t change a thing. ”
As I was gathering my things, my doctor looked at me and said, “Well, it looks like you’re in pretty good shape, you’re healthy, and you don’t have any major issues.” I took a deep breath and said to myself, “I did it. I passed with flying colors.” But then she paused and said with a faint smile, “But let’s see how your test results come out.”
In other words, “Not so fast. You may look fine on the outside, but let’s see when we check the inside.”
John is the voice of the Divine Physician, and he is not deceived by our outward signs of spiritual health and piety. He has our test results in hand, and they are not good.
Each individual—and society as a whole—has not met God’s standards; we are sick, and John has found the medicine we need from on high. He is the one who prepares, the one who tells us our dire situation in order that we may be ready to receive God’s healing balm of salvation.
John does not mince words, and he was not at the bank of the Jordan to make friends. He was clear: we cannot proceed as long as we continue to deceive ourselves and others. To take what he’s offering, we have to look in the mirror honestly and repent.
For John, repentance was not a bad thing; it was the doorway into the good thing that God had in store. One scholar describes repentance as the “radical recognition of God.”[i]
Repentance, then, is the way our eyes can be opened to recognize God’s work of salvation, and it is the only way our hands can be opened to receive that mighty gift.
John had a radical recognition of God, and intuitively sensed God’s movement was afoot in the world. Hence, baptism was his way of preparing individuals (and the whole nation) to open their eyes and their hands to God.
The crowds flocked to him because he spoke to something deep in their soul. He put words to a longing each of them had. And it was as if he saw through them, all their games of pretention, but instead of people feeling cruelly judged by him, they felt, for the first time, that they were being given a medicine that they desperately needed.
John’s baptism was for the honestly insecure.[ii]
John considered the Pharisees and Sadducees “a brood of vipers” because they were coming for all the wrong reasons. They were the only ones on the riverbank still clinging to their masks of religiosity and ancestry. They were dishonestly secure.
John was a preacher’s kid who knew their games all too well, and he was having none of it. There was no more time to wait; the ax was at the root of the tree, and bearing fruit of repentance meant getting honest with themselves in front of everyone by getting in the water and submitting to the work God was doing in John’s ministry.
It was a pill too hard to swallow for most of the comfortable religious types.
If John the Baptist walked into this room, I’m not sure any of us would know what to do with him. I’m a little afraid we’d call security on him. Honestly, I wouldn’t know what to do with him. I am fascinated by him, terrified by him, and yet, deep down, I know I need him. We all need him.
John is placed in the season of Advent for a particular reason. He shatters the things the world values, and he shatters many of the things you and I strive for. We go to great lengths to ensure our safety and well-being, our financial stability, and professional development.
John will have none of it. He challenges us to see our lives on a larger scale, one in which heaven is being infused into earth, and God’s kingdom is breaking into our lives, which upends our desire for comfort and control.
There is more going on than meets the eye, and John is our necessary guide to the heart of Jesus and the kingdom he is bringing about.
As much as we’d like to avoid it, we must go toward the voice of John, and all those whose voice is like his. Their ministry is to unsettle us and convict us, but we must realize that God’s judgment is not meant for our undoing but for our redeeming, and the redemption of all things. Being honestly insecure is a good thing.
We should long for the world to be made right; for God's perfect justice to reign in us and our common life together. At the end of the age, wrongs will be made right, not by us, but by God.
And that comes as welcome news for every person who has been honest with themselves. The problem is not somewhere out there, or in everyone else; it is in us as well. God, in his mercy, has set us right and reconciled us to himself and our neighbor through his well-beloved Son.
And just maybe, even vipers can be redeemed.
The infant will play near the cobra’s den,
and the young child will put its hand into the viper’s nest.
They will neither harm nor destroy
on all my holy mountain,
for the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the Lord
as the waters cover the sea.[iii]
[i] Joachim Gnilka
[ii] Dale Bruner Matthew: A Commentary Vol. 1, pg 93.
[iii] Isaiah 11:8-10, NIV
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