His Winnowing Fork
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Introduction
Introduction
Over the last couple of years, I’ve gotten into photography. I’m no Matt Robertson; I don’t have the really nice mirrorless dslr cameras. All I have is my iPhone. But I have this attachment that gives me three four different lenses. One of them is telescopic so I can zoom in from far away. The problem that I have though, is that the closer I zoom in, the more shaky the phone seems. It’s kind of like driving and looking out a window. Perspective makes things close up seem to be zooming by, all the while that electric pole way out in the distance is taking its sweet old time going by. So long as my phone has no telescopic lens attached, I can keep that far away object in view and focused, but the moment I attach it, that object is hard to keep in the shot. The slightest move and the object is gone or blurry. But if everything goes right, I can focus on a shot, and capture something I could never get from the phone alone.
As we look at the text this morning, zeroes in on three people and gives us three snapshots to help us see Jesus better. The first snapshot is an unfocused snapshot. The second is a focused snapshot. The third is a misfocused snapshot.
An Unfocused Snapshot
A Focused Snapshot
A Misfocused Snapshot
As the people were in expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Christ,
John answered them all, saying, “I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.
His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”
So with many other exhortations he preached good news to the people.
But Herod the tetrarch, who had been reproved by him for Herodias, his brother’s wife, and for all the evil things that Herod had done,
added this to them all, that he locked up John in prison.
An Unfocused Snapshot
An Unfocused Snapshot
The first snapshot that Luke presents us with in this passage is unfocused. The people are a bit fuzzy as to who John is.
As the people were in expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Christ,
There was this sense of excitement and expectation. Things were happening. A prophet was on the scene again after 400 years of silence. People were coming out to the wilderness to hear him preach. They were getting baptized. Lives were changing. The hearts of children were to their fathers and the fathers to their children just like it was said in Malachi. This was unlike any other time that these people had ever known. They were in suspense but they were also in state of confusion; they were fuzzy, unsure, unfocused.
They didn’t really know who this John guy was. Was he some prophet or was he the Christ that they had been waiting for? Luke states that they were questioning in their hearts. In other words, they weren’t saying a word; they weren’t voicing their thoughts. They weren’t asking John himself. They were keeping their questions to themselves.
Perhaps some were concerned that he might not be the Christ. What then? What would that mean for them? Would that mean that their hope was in vain? Would it mean that life wasn’t going to change? That this was just another bump in the road of life that would soon be forgotten?
Perhaps some were concerned that he might be the Christ. What then? Wouldn’t that mean that things were going to change? Didn’t that mean that this wasn’t just some fervor, some exciting few weeks, but a lasting difference that everyone is going to have to work through? Wouldn’t that mean that life was never going to be the same again?
Whatever the reason, in this season of suspense, no one was brave enough to ask.
You know what I do when I take a fuzzy picture? I delete it or at least keep it to myself. When I printed out Kassandra’s senior pictures, I only printed the good ones. I had dozens of fuzzy ones that didn’t make the cut. No one wanted to hold up their picture and admit that it was a bit hazy, a little unfocused. No one wants to admit they don’t understand.
We can probably relate can’t we? Most of us have had moments of expectations, haven’t we? Something unexpected happened. Someone unexpected showed up. What are we to think about these happenings? How are we to interpret such a such a person coming into our lives so unexpectedly? What is God up to? Is he about to turn my world upside down or is this just another moment in time that will pass by? We’re a bit fuzzy and unfocused.
We were expecting “x” to happen, but all we’re getting is “y”. It’s confusing. It’s frustrating. We want focus. We want clarity. While there are many times we won’t receive the clarity that we’d like, plenty of other times it will be if we are willing to listen.
A Focused Snapshot
A Focused Snapshot
While the people were a bit fuzzy as to who John was and what he was all about, John was perfectly focused about who he was and what he was doing. So we come to the second snapshot. The first being the unfocused snapshot of the people and the second being the focused snapshot of John.
John answered them all, saying, “I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.
John focuses the people on his ministry as he compares it to the ministry of the Christ. And he makes clear his might as compared to the might of the Christ. His ministry is about water baptism. It is certainly a baptism that is to represent repentance and forgiveness of sins as we saw in Luke 3:3, but it is only a representation of something greater. He is unable to do the greater; he can only focus in on the greater reality. And he was content with that.
Back in the 18th century, there was a man by the name of William Carey. Today, he is known as the Father of Modern Missions. He wanted to go and send others to India as missionaries, but the English Baptists were unconcerned for the lost in that nation. Carey delivered a message to pastors at a conference in which he stated his most famous words, which have been whittled down to, “Expect great things from God; attempt great things for God.” I understand where Carey is coming from, but I believe that we have been given fuzzy snapshots as to what it means to do “great things for God.” It’s not enough to be a banker. It’s not enough to drive a taxi. It’s not enough to be a homemaker. It’s not enough to be a baggage handler. But beloved, if we are fulfilling the ministry that God has given to us in those places, it is enough.
Certainly God will call some of us into the mission field. Certainly he will call some to the pastorate. But if we concern ourselves with a ministry that we aren’t called to, we end up with an unfocused, fuzzy ministry with which we become frustrated. Like those blurry pictures, we just want to delete them, rather than share them so all can see what God is doing.
We become so concerned with the size of our ministry, but God isn’t. God is concerned about the size of our faithfulness. Will we take the task we’ve been given and be faithful to it—whether we’ve been given 1 talent, 5 talents, or 10 talents; will we be faithful with what we’ve been given? John was, even though he knew that in very short order, his ministry would be eclipsed by the Messiah’s.
His was a ministry of water baptism. Jesus’s ministry was one of Spirit baptism and fire baptism. We’ve seen what we mean by water baptism. It’s a sign of something greater. It’s a sign of repentance and forgiveness. But what does it mean to be baptize with the Spirit and fire?
Baptism of the Spirit is in part a cleansing of the soul. As water cleanses the body, so the Spirit cleanses the soul. But, and this is partly why we immerse, when we are baptized we are covered from head to foot with water. The same would go for the Spirit and the soul. The entire soul is immersed in the Holy Spirit. We are told that the Spirit lives within us. We are like vessels—cups or bowls—immersed in the Holy Spirit. What happens when you plunge a cup into a sink filled with water? Not only is it rinsed clean, but the cup itself is filled up with the water. So to be baptized is not only a cleansing of the soul, but a filling of it with the Spirit as well. Hence, we see Jesus telling the disciples to wait in Jerusalem to be baptized by the Spirit, and the Luke telling us that they were filled with the Spirit. And as we saw last week, that filling means that they were given strength to do the task that they have been given. So we are baptized with the Spirit, cleansing us and filling us, making us acceptable for God’s kingdom.
But what about the fire? Jesus baptizes with fire. And it’s tempting to think that the fire and the Spirit are the same—especially in light of the tongues of fire in Acts 2 that accompanied the Holy Spirit. But, that doesn’t fit with the image John gave.
John the Baptist was a good communicator. He would say something provocative and then explain what he meant. So, he said that we are to bear fruit in evidence of repentance, but then gives examples of giving one of our two tunics or food, or being compassionate or content. He tells us that one coming is mightier than he and explains that he is not worthy to untie his sandal (the lowest form of servitude) and that he only baptizes with water, but the one coming baptizes with the Spirit and fire. John is good at explaining. So then what does it mean to be baptized with fire? It means that Jesus will put all who are not baptized with the Spirit and are therefore fit for the kingdom, and baptize them into judgment.
His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”
A winnowing fork, or a winnowing shovel was used to take wheat having been beaten and broken so as to separate the true kernel from the chaff, the husk. The fork would pick up a mixed pile of kernels and husks and the worker would throw it into the air on a breezy day. The kernels were heavy and would fall back to the ground, but the chaff was light and would float away. Only the kernels would be put in the barn. The chaff would be burned up. But the same worker is doing both jobs. He makes the kernels ready for the barn, while also burns the chaff with unquenchable fire.
This wasn’t John’s ministry. John’s ministry was to prepare the people to receive the ministry of Jesus. His ministry was to level the field. Mountains and valleys level. Crooked paths made straight so that everyone could see the salvation of the LORD. In this way, our ministry is much more like John’s than Jesus’s. We cannot baptize the soul with the Holy Spirit. And we are not to condemn and throw the chaff into the fire. We are call people to repentance and point to the one who is mightier than we. Our ministries are not about us—how big or small, how many or few, how influential or non-influential. Our ministry is taking away the mountains and valleys and crooked paths; in other words, to make as simple and easy as can be allowed to see Jesus’s greater ministry of salvation. Only he can save and only he can condemn.
A Misfocused Snapshot
A Misfocused Snapshot
Unfocused, focused, and now misfocused. What I mean by that, is that we’re all going out on a photo-shoot. It’s a landscape shot. We’re at a beach, the sun is setting creating all these magnificent colors. The light is reflecting off the ocean. There’s a jetty with a couple of people fishing off of it. Rolling hills in the background. Some people take an unfocused picture. Some take an amazingly crisp picture. And you turn around to see someone taking a selfie. Completely misfocused!
We get this intrusion of Herod Antipas. So far, the people are noticing that God is doing something, but are fuzzy as to what it is. They see the landscape, but can’t get a clear shot. John is focused and taking crisp, clean shots. But Herod is oblivious to anything God is doing. He was focused on himself, his own desires and pleasures.
So with many other exhortations he preached good news to the people.
But Herod the tetrarch, who had been reproved by him for Herodias, his brother’s wife, and for all the evil things that Herod had done,
added this to them all, that he locked up John in prison.
In his hunger for power, we see that Herod was corrupt. He was immoral to the core. He was incestuous, marrying his own sister-in-law who was also his niece. And while John was happy to exhort the regular common folks and tell them good news, he reproved Herod in front of everyone for his corruption and immorality.
Luke used the word reproved. He exposed his sin. He brought it to light. He held it up before him and for all to see that what he was doing was sinful and rebellious against God’s law. This was not condemnatory, but it was courageous; it would put him in the cross hairs of Herod and land him in prison. To reprove Herod was not to embarrass him, but to refocus him—to bring him to repentance; turn from self and turn to Jesus.
But he couldn’t do that by cuddling up to him and pretending he did nothing wrong. That was the job of the Herodians—those who sided with Herod because it served their cause and gave them power with Rome. He was called to level the field. Everyone, commoner and king, rich and poor, sickly and healthy, everyone was on the same plain. Everyone was called to repent.
Beloved, we are called to this ministry. As Paul would say,
Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.
It is not our job to blow smoke up the skirts of one political party over another so that our cause is served and our power is increased. It’s not our job to court presidential candidates. We are not Herodians. We are Christians. We do not gloss over sins just for expedient’s sake. And yes, that means that politicians will show their true colors on both sides of the aisle. We’ll be surrounded by enemies.
“If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you.
If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.
Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours.
Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted,
Here is John showing that there is no partiality with God. He shows that all have sinned and have fallen short of God’s glory. He is not making excuses for kings or for rich. He reproves their corruption and immorality and shows that God does not wink at anyone’s sin. And in turn, Herod adds to his evil. Acting as king and judge, he throws John into prison—no one will tell him he needs to repent. No one will tell him he’s misfocused. He does not have the final judgment. He may be able to throw someone into prison but he cannot throw them into the unquenchable fire.
Conclusion
Conclusion
As we finish with this text this morning, we’ve seen three snapshots of various people: unfocused, focused, and misfocused. But all three actually help us see Jesus better. He has a greater ministry than John did and has greater authority than Herod. But if you’re leaving here today simply thinking, “That’s neat,” then you’ve missed the point entirely. Remember why Luke was writing this account to Theophilus. He was writing him so that he would have certainty over the things he had been taught. Luke, master-historian and storyteller, is presenting an argument that Jesus is more wonderful and more powerful and more amazing than we were even aware he could be. Jesus would cleanse the threshing floor and make a people ready for his kingdom, bringing them into his barn. Jesus would remove the chaff, the unbeliever and bring him or her to a fiery judgment. Everything Theophilus heard and more was true!
It is to this Jesus we are called to focus on, to love and devote ourselves to for he loves and is devoted to us.
If you have not given yourself to him, you can do so today by turning from your rebellion and self-reliance, being forgiven of it all, and following and loving him. He who will cleanse you from the inside out.