He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire

 But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, "Brood of vipers!  Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?  Therefore bear fruits worthy of repentance, and do not think to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our father.'  For I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones.  And even now the ax is laid to the root of the trees.  Therefore every tree which does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.

"I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, but He who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry.  He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.  His winnowing fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clean out His threshing floor, and gather his wheat into the barn; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire."

- Matthew 3:7-12

 The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the Son of David, the Son of Abraham:  Abraham begot Isaac, Isaac begot Jacob, and Jacob begot Judah and his brothers.  Judah begot Perez and Zerah by Tamar, Perez begot Hezron, and Hezron begot Ram.  Ram begot Amminadab, Amminadab begot Nahshon, and Nahshon begot Salmon.  Salmon begot Boaz by Rahab, Boaz begot Obed by Ruth, Obed begot Jesse, and Jesse begot David the king.  David the king begot Solomon by her who had been the wife of Uriah.  Solomon begot Rehoboam, Rehoboam begot Abijah, and Abijah begot Asa.  Asa begot Jehoshaphat, Jehoshaphat begot Joram, and Joram begot Uzziah.  Uzziah begot Jotham, Jotham begot Ahaz, and Ahaz begot Hezekiah.  Hezekiah begot Manasseh, Manasseh begot Amon, and Amon begot Josiah.  Josiah begot Jeconiah and all his brothers about the time they were carried away to Babylon.  And after they were brought to Babylon, Jeconiah begot Shaltiel, and Shealtiel begot Zerubbabel.  Zerubbabel begot Abiud, Abiud begot Eliakim, and Eliakim begot Azor.  Azor begot Zadok, Zadok begot Achim, and Achim begot Eliud.  Eliud begot Eleazar, Eleazar begot Matthan, and Matthan begot Jacob.  And Jacob begot Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus who is called Christ.  So all the generations from Abraham to David are fourteen generations, from David until the captivity in Babylon are fourteen generations, and from the captivity in Babylon until the Christ are fourteen generations. * * * In those days John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea, and saying, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand!"  For this is he who was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah, saying: "The voice of one crying in the wilderness: 'Prepare the way of the LORD; Make His paths straight.'" Now John himself was clothed in camel's hair, with a leather belt around his waist; and his food was locusts and wild honey.  Then Jerusalem, all Judea, and all the region around the Jordan went out to him and were baptized by him in the Jordan, confessing their sins.

 But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, "Brood of vipers!  Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?"  The Sadducees, my study bible explains, were members of the high-priestly and landowning class who controlled the temple and the internal political affairs of the Jews.  They denied the resurrection of the dead and had no messianic hope beyond this life.  The Pharisees were a lay religious movement, which centered upon the study of the Law, and on the strict observance of its regulations.  They did believe in the resurrection of the dead, in contrast to the Sadducees, and they also looked to the coming of the Messiah.  But they taught that righteousness is won on the strength of one's works according to the Law, and also that the Messiah would not be divine, but rather a glorious man.  The title that the Baptist uses for them, brood of vipers, will later be used by Jesus as well (12:34, 23:33).  My study bible characterizes this name for them as indicating their deception and malice, and also being under the influence of Satan.

"Therefore bear fruits worthy of repentance . . . "  My study bible comments that repentance, confession, and baptism lead to fruits worthy of repentance, which is a way of life consistent with the Kingdom of God (see Galatians 5:22-25).  If a fruitful life does not follow, it says, sacramental acts and spiritual discipline are useless.  Therefore in many icons of the Baptism of Christ, there is an ax pictured chopping a fruitless tree (see this one, for example).

" . . . and do not think to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our father.'  For I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones."   The statement that from these stones  (in Hebrew, 'ebanim) God can raise up children (Hebrew banim) is a play on words.  My study bible says that God will not admit fruitless children into God's house, but rather will adopt other children from the Gentiles.

"Therefore every tree which does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire."  Here fire refers to divine judgment (see Isaiah 33:11, 66:24; Ezekiel 38:22, 39:6; 2 Thessalonians 1:6-9).

"I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, but He who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry.  He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire."  My study bible comments that Christ baptizes in the fire of the Holy Spirit, the power and grace of God divinely poured out on believers at baptism.  In the culture of the Baptist, a slave would carry the sandals of the king.  Therefore what John is declaring is that he is lower than even a slave of Jesus.  There is also a second meaning to this statement, my study bible says, as carrying the sandal of another once meant taking on that person's responsibility (Ruth 4:7).    Here, understood as such, it would indicate that John could not possibly have carried the responsibility that Christ does, and that the Law could not redeem the world as Christ has come to do.

"His winnowing fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clean out His threshing floor, and gather his wheat into the barn; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire."  A winnowing fan is one that separates threshed grain from the chaff.   This is a metaphor for divine judgment, which will separate good from evil.

One thing worthy of note in today's reading is the similar use of "fire" both as representative of the energies of God the Holy Spirit and also as that which burns the chaff -- that which is not fit for consumption and not good for human beings.  In this sense, we can read a spiritual metaphor as that fire being one and the same:  the energies of God are those with which we either become compatible -- producing fruits of worthy of repentance, as John puts it -- or for which we are incompatible and cannot stand in that fire.  Either way, fire is a purifying image, burning away that which is not good, not healthful.  If we consider Christ's mission into the world (and John's) as a healing ministry, then perhaps we also get another sense of this meaning of winnowing the wheat from the chaff.  Christ will come into the world in order to heal and to restore, to bring good health on all levels:  to spirit and soul and body.  That is, to seek what is good and restorative not just for human beings but for all of the creation.  This is one meaning of "to save."  It is not simply to keep from perishing, but rather to give life and fullness of life, abundance of life, as Christ will put it (John 10:10).  "Wheat" will also become an understood metaphor for the good and healthful "food" of the Eucharist.  John also speaks of bearing fruits worthy of repentance, and we must consider what that means, as fruits of faith.  John addresses the religious leadership in the harshest terms, describing them as a "brood of vipers," indicating, as my study bible says, malice and deceptiveness, as well as being under the influence of Satan.  His statement, "Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?" strikes me as scathingly sarcastic, indicating that they hold no true idea of the God of Israel in their hearts, nor the warnings of the prophets of the Old Testament as applying to themselves.  From these statements we can deduce that a lack of awareness of any judgment at all, and the practices of malice and deception, are those things that are needful of repentance, of a turning toward God and the things of God.  It is these religious leaders of whom one would expect a greater knowledge and understanding than others, yet it is they whose practices John condemns.  It indicates to us a responsibility unfulfilled, in response to which even what they have will be taken away and given to others -- so John warns, as Jesus will after him (Mark 12:9).  John's words suggest a condemnation of practices well-known and understood by the common people, who flock to him for baptism in preparation for the Lord.  They suggest a corruption known and understood by the people, a form of oppression upon which Christ will also comment ("For they bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on men’s shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers" - 23:4; "For you pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone" - 23:23).  None of these things are said in private, but in the hearing of the people, both when John the Baptist states them here in today's reading, and also when Christ speaks in the temple during what we know as Holy Week.  They are all warnings, said in the context of prophetic speech, about the need for repentance before the work of God's holy fire, the proving out of the work of the Spirit in the world.  They speak to us of the destructiveness of sin and selfishness, that both are not simply bad for us as human beings, but rather something to mourn, that which harms the creation and works against true healing.  Thereby do the saints mourn not only their own sins, but the sins of the world which harm all of the creation.  What we understand from today's reading is not just that each of us must consider repentance and turning toward the Lord, but that we must also think about this fire of the Holy Spirit, an image of energy at work among us.  How is this fire of love one and the same as that which burns away sin -- or even that which has become wholly self-identified with sin?  How does that fire work on one who considers no need for repentance or reconsideration of personal orientation and understanding?  These are mysteries beyond the possible valuation of each one of us, a judgment which belongs only to the One who will Judge.  Nevertheless, we can heed these words and awake to the work that needs to be done.  This is a call to spiritual awareness, and to the deep healing needs of the soul.  John's words speak to us not only of our own lack of perception of the place to which Creator calls us for healing, but also to an understanding that none of us is exempt from this work.  Even so, thereby, our prayers can be understood as that which heals -- our turning to God in dialogue (the very goal of repentance) as that which helps restore not only ourselves and our fellow human beings, but the whole of the creation as well.  This echoes in the prayers of the Church at each liturgy, in which we pray not simply for ourselves but for the whole of the nation and of the world.  In the fullness of all of these understandings, John's words give us a sense in which the fire of the Holy Spirit is ultimately healing in both its purifying and energetic senses -- both giving us what we need and taking away that which is unhealthful.  Let us join with our prayers to this work on behalf of "all of the creation."