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challenges them and makes it clear that if their repentance is worth anything, it will be
manifested by appropriate conduct.
Nor must they take refuge behind the idea that because they were the physical
descendants of Abraham their future in the coming kingdom was assured. God was able
to change the shingle on the banks of the Jordan if He so wished, and raise up children to
Abraham (3: 9). The Baptist continued:
"The axe 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" (3: 10, N.I.V.).
Or like chaff--it will be burned up. In other words there will be a tremendous sorting
out by God of those who desire to enter His kingdom. Not one will have a portion there
who does not come up to the Divine standard. The Lord Jesus proclaimed the same truth
when He said:
"Every plant that My heavenly Father has not planted will be pulled up by the roots"
(Matt. 15: 13, N.I.V.).
And who will do the uprooting? No human being, but God Himself! Before the
establishment of the earthly kingdom there would inevitably be judgment and a Divine
sorting out. The axe to cut out the false branches already is lying at the root of the tree,
declared the Baptist (3: 10). The present tenses are startling. This is not something that
inevitably pertains to the distant future--it was a present reality. Here is no evolution of
ages, a gradual development of the new order of things, taking centuries of improvement
to work out. Rather the whole series is condensed into a single scene where God is the
sole actor.
This is the testimony of many other Scriptures and it makes one wonder how the idea
originated that this kingdom would be brought in slowly by the church preaching the
gospel--it is so unscriptural. All is bound up with the Lord's doings, either at His first
Coming or His second Coming back to this earth.
The prophet goes on to elaborate this refining work of God:
"I baptize you with water for repentance. But after me will come One Who is more
powerful than I, Whose sandals I am not fit to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy
Spirit and with fire" (3: 11, N.I.V.),
the object of which is to purge and refine by the fire of His holiness which is
unquenchable (3: 12).
We must take care with the word "unquenchable", for it does not reveal the duration
of the punishment. Dr. A. Plummer's comment is:
"(the word) does not necessarily mean that the fire will burn for ever; still less that it will
burn, but never consume, what is in it; but rather that it is so fierce that it cannot be
extinguished. Here it is expressly stated that the worthless material will be consumed."