3. Preparation

See "Appendix: Repentance".

Local Context:

Matthew 3:8

Bear fruit in keeping with repentance.

References:

Acts 19:4

Paul said, "John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in the one who was to come after him, that is, Jesus."

Acts 26:20

"[I] declared first to those in Damascus, then in Jerusalem and throughout all the region of Judea, and also to the Gentiles, that they should repent and turn to God, performing deeds in keeping with their repentance."

In addition to this reference in Isaiah, John is later said to fulfill Malachi 3:1, as well.

Matthew 11:10

This is he of whom it is written, "'Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way before you.'"

References:

Isaiah 40:1-5

Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that her warfare is ended, that her iniquity is pardoned, that she has received from the LORD's hand double for all her sins. A voice cries: "In the wilderness prepare the way of the LORD; make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain. And the glory of the LORD shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.

Isaiah 40:9-11

Go on up to a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good news; lift up your voice with strength, O Jerusalem, herald of good news; lift it up, fear not; say to the cities of Judah, "Behold your God!" Behold, the Lord GOD comes with might, and his arm rules for him; behold, his reward is with him, and his recompense before him. He will tend his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arms; he will carry them in his bosom, and gently lead those that are with young.

2 Kings 1:6-8

"There came a man to meet us, and said to us, 'Go back to the king who sent you, and say to him, Thus says the LORD, Is it because there is no God in Israel that you are sending to inquire of Baal-zebub, the god of Ekron? Therefore you shall not come down from the bed to which you have gone up, but you shall surely die.'" [The king] said to them, "What kind of man was he who came to meet you and told you these things?" They answered him, "He wore a garment of hair, with a belt of leather about his waist." And he said, "It is Elijah the Tishbite."

Matthew 11:13-14

For all the Prophets and the Law prophesied until John, and if you are willing to accept it, he is Elijah who is to come.

Luke 1:17

and he will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to make ready for the Lord a people prepared.

Malachi 4:5-6

Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and awesome day of the LORD comes. And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction.

Leviticus 11:20-23

All winged insects that go on all fours are detestable to you. Yet among the winged insects that go on all fours you may eat those that have jointed legs above their feet, with which to hop on the ground. Of them you may eat: the locust of any kind, the bald locust of any kind, the cricket of any kind, and the grasshopper of any kind. But all other winged insects that have four feet are detestable to you.

External sources:

Encyclopedia Britannica

Honey was almost the only source of sugar available to the ancients and was valued for its medicinal benefits.
Somewhat acid, [honey] has mild antiseptic properties and has been used in the treatment of burns and lacerations.

"How Can I Extract Honey From a Wild Beehive?"

How to Identify a Wild Comb

Wild honey bee nests are often found in hidden places that offer the bees protection. Ground bees can make hives in between rock crevices and even in holes in the ground. Tree bees commonly make their hives at the end of branches and inside hollow trees.

Some Words of Caution

The first thing is that bees are capable of stinging you. And if you threaten their hive, many bees may rush at you and sting you. Depending on the bees you're dealing with, this could result in a serious medical emergency, especially if you're allergic or sensitive to bee stings.

Another thing to keep in mind is that not all hives have honey in it. You need to make sure you've found a honey bee hive before you attempt to get it and extract honey. Wasps and Yellowjackets make hives as well, but there's no honey to be found within their hives.

Extracting Bee Hive Wild Honey:

1. First you need to drive the bees out of the hive. You can do this by creating a small smoky fire and holding or making it near the entrance holes of the hive. This will both calm the bees and drive many of them away from the hive.
2. Next, you'll need to break the hive open. Depending on the size of the hive, you can use a knife or a saw. Be sure to make the opening large enough so that you can fit your hand inside to create an opening big enough to put your hand in the hive.
3. Once you can reach into the hive, remove the honeycomb itself by simply breaking it off of the hive. If you find that breaking it with your hand is tough, you can reach in with the knife you used to create the opening and cut the comb instead.
4. Now that you have the honeycomb, you can begin to separate the brood cells from the cells that actually contain honey. You can identify the brood cells by looking at the coloration. Brood cells are much darker than the honey cells and they're often found at the bottom of the honeycomb. Use your knife to cut away the darker brood cells and discard.

Baptism in the Bible requires enough water to dunk a person under it.

John 3:23

John also was baptizing at Aenon near Salim, because water was plentiful there, and people were coming and being baptized.

There is no way a traveling group with a many-days journey ahead of them had no water anywhere in the party. If baptism were a matter of merely pouring water over the head, the Ethiopian would not have needed to wait until they came to a body of water to be baptized.

Acts 8:27-28, 36

And there was an Ethiopian, a eunuch, a court official of Candace, queen of the Ethiopians, who was in charge of all her treasure. He had come to Jerusalem to worship and was returning, seated in his chariot, and he was reading the prophet Isaiah....
And as they were going along the road they came to some water, and the eunuch said, "See, here is water! What [now] prevents me from being baptized?"

See Matthew 3:2.

Acts 2:38

And Peter said to them, "Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit."

The river Jordan symbolizes a crossing over into something new. Moses could get them as far as the Jordan, but Joshua led the conquest of the promised land.

Genesis 32:9-10

And Jacob said, "O God of my father Abraham and God of my father Isaac..., I am not worthy of the least of all the deeds of steadfast love and all the faithfulness that you have shown to your servant, for with only my staff I crossed this Jordan, and now I have become two camps."

Deuteronomy 31:1-3

So Moses continued to speak these words to all Israel. And he said to them, "I am 120 years old today. I am no longer able to go out and come in. The LORD has said to me, 'You shall not go over this Jordan.' The LORD your God himself will go over before you. He will destroy these nations before you, so that you shall dispossess them, and Joshua [or, Jesus] will go over at your head, as the LORD has spoken."

Joshua 1:1-2, 5-8

After the death of Moses the servant of the LORD, the LORD said to Joshua the son of Nun, Moses' assistant, "Moses my servant is dead. Now therefore arise, go over this Jordan, you and all this people, into the land that I am giving to them, to the people of Israel....
No man shall be able to stand before you all the days of your life. Just as I was with Moses, so I will be with you. I will not leave you or forsake you. Be strong and courageous, for you shall cause this people to inherit the land that I swore to their fathers to give them. Only be strong and very courageous, being careful to do according to all the law that Moses my servant commanded you. Do not turn from it to the right hand or to the left, that you may have good success wherever you go. This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success."

Luke 16:16

The Law and the Prophets were until John; since then the good news of the kingdom of God is preached, and everyone forces his way into it.

The attribution to Isaiah poses problems in the minds of modern readers since the first quotation is clearly from Malachi, not Isaiah. There is more than one way to resolve this apparent error.

• The Greek text does have notable variation here, with the Byzantine text form reading, "in the prophets," instead.
• The Hebrew Bible is divided into Torah, The Prophets, and The Writings. The Prophets starts with Joshua through 2 Chronicles; the first book with only prophecy within it is Isaiah. The ancients may well have referred to all the books in The Prophets from this point forward as "Isaiah." (Compare the naming of Aristotle's "Metaphysics," literally "After Physics", because it was written after the earlier work, "Physics.")
• It is thoroughly modern to consider quotation verbatim representation. The ancients, however, considered quotation to be accurate representation, without much regard to whether these literal words came out of the speaker's mouth. Where we moderns may object to attributing both to Isaiah, the ancients may well have accepted the inclusion of these words from Malachi as wholly consistent with the referenced Isaiah--almost a bonus commentary.

Malachi 3:1

Behold, I send my messenger, and he will prepare the way before me.

See comment on verse 2 above.

Isaiah 40:3

A voice cries: "In the wilderness prepare the way of the LORD; make straight in the desert a highway for our God."

Acts 2:38

Peter said to them, "Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins...."

See comments on Matthew 3:6.

See comments on Matthew 3:4.

Tiberius was the second Roman emperor from 14–37 AD. Luke, therefore, places these events around AD 30.

Pilate was the Roman prefect (governor) of Judaea from 26–36 AD.

Likely, this man was temporarily installed after the removal of the terrible Archelaus. See "Appendix: Herod".

John 18:12-14, 24

So the band of soldiers and their captain and the officers of the Jews arrested Jesus and bound him. First they led him to Annas, for he was the father-in-law of Caiaphas, who was high priest that year. It was Caiaphas who had advised the Jews that it would be expedient that one man should die for the people....
Annas then sent him bound to Caiaphas the high priest.

Acts 4:1-7

And as they were speaking to the people, the priests and the captain of the temple and the Sadducees came upon them, greatly annoyed because they were teaching the people and proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection from the dead. And they arrested them and put them in custody until the next day, for it was already evening. But many of those who had heard the word believed, and the number of the men came to about five thousand. On the next day their rulers and elders and scribes gathered together in Jerusalem, with Annas the high priest and Caiaphas and John and Alexander, and all who were of the high-priestly family. And when they had set them in the midst, they inquired, "By what power or by what name did you do this?"

See comments on Matthew 3:2, 6.

See comments on Matthew 3:3.

Luke alone includes this portion of the quotation from Isaiah 40, specifying what it means to "prepare the way."

There is a hint here of the intent to include Gentiles.

The Greek here portrays the priests and Levites as indignant. We might render their question, "Who are you?"

These are patterns in John.

These priests and Levites are not honestly seeking truth; rather, they intend to serve the Pharisees regardless of what John (the Lord's prophet) may say.

John 7:48-49

"Have any of the authorities or the Pharisees believed in him? But this crowd that does not know the law is accursed."

John 9:13

They brought to the Pharisees the man who had formerly been blind.

John 9:24

So for the second time they called the man who had been blind and said to him, "Give glory to God. We know that this man is a sinner."

John 18:29-30

So Pilate went outside to them and said, "What accusation do you bring against this man?" They answered him, "If this man were not doing evil, we would not have delivered him over to you."

Contrast how Jesus characterizes honest inquiry in John:

John 7:17-18

If anyone's will is to do God's will, he will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own authority. The one who speaks on his own authority seeks his own glory; but the one who seeks the glory of him who sent him is true, and in him there is no falsehood.

John 18:19-21

The high priest then questioned Jesus about his disciples and his teaching. Jesus answered him, "I have spoken openly to the world. I have always taught in synagogues and in the temple, where all Jews come together. I have said nothing in secret. Why do you ask me? Ask those who have heard me what I said to them; they know what I said."

As for the Pharisees, it is their modus operandi to send underlings to do their dirty work.

John 7:32

The Pharisees heard the crowd muttering these things about him, and the chief priests and Pharisees sent officers to arrest him.

John 18:3

So Judas, having procured a band of soldiers and some officers from the chief priests and the Pharisees, went there with lanterns and torches and weapons.

John 19:12, 15-16

From then on Pilate sought to release him, but the Jews cried out, "If you release this man, you are not Caesar's friend. Everyone who makes himself a king opposes Caesar."
...They cried out, "Away with him, away with him, crucify him!" Pilate said to them, "Shall I crucify your King?" The chief priests answered, "We have no king but Caesar." So he delivered him over to them to be crucified.

This carefully crafted question does not accept what John says, but only records it so they can decide whether and how to respond. They see themselves as firmly in charge here.

John 9:17

So they said again to the blind man, "What do you say about him, since he has opened your eyes?" He said, "He is a prophet."

See comments on Matthew 3:3.