The Pulpit Commentary — Matthew — Volume 1 — Section 98

Vers. 1-15.-The appearance of John the BapUst. The interval between the last verse of the second chapter and the first verse of this chapter measures the period of the life of Christ stretching from his earliest childhood to bis entrance on his public ministry, or close _th~reupon. Meantime we are here brought to the time when appeared one of the most distmctly marked, most honoured, characters of all history. John the Baptist, son of Zacharias and Elisabeth, was the child of prophecy. He was one of the noblest expressions, if not the very noblest, of the true prophet in his character and work. And as he sealed the testimony of his life with bis life's blood, it waR given him to win the brilliant crown that a.waits the prophet and martyr united in one. This is not the place for anything resembling a dissertation on the prophetic character in general, nor on the life and character of John the Baptist in particular. '!'his only is proposed here, to give expression t.o what may seem the leading suggestions of this chapter as to" one ea.lied as was" John the Baptist, prophet and herald of the Teacher, the Example, the Saviour of the world. Let us remark respecting John the Baptist that- I. HE WAS NOT MERELY CALLED TO BE A PROPHET WHEN THE TIME CAME-THE TIME OF BIRTH, OF TRAThLNG, A~--0 OF ENTRANCE UPON PUBLIC LIFE--BTTT HE WAS ANNOUNCED, AND HE WAS THE SPECIALLY ANNOUNCED, OF PROPHECY. (Vera. 2, 3.) 1. 'l'his circum- stance places John the Baptist in a very small and select number. Many prophets there had been, and many things did they prophesy; but they did not prophesy of many persons. 2. The circumstance must equally stamp with a special peculiarity the prophet so announced. For such a man there must be some very special work. 3. 'l'o be long foretold by prophecy must wonderfully stretch the usefulness, or at all events the use, of the person so foretold. Through centuries his name is ordained to be a power. Faith attaches itself to it; hopes cluster round it; love invests something in it. 4. The fact itself must act as a lesson of non-merit and of non-boasting to the person who is all the while exalted by it. A man may be betrayed, perhaps, to think that what be is and what he does, and the consequences and results of his character and doings, are to his own praise (as, if these are wrong, they certainly redound to hill own blame); but the use that came of him before ever he was must be all the work of a higher power. He can take nothing to himself for this. 5. In the light of the fulfilling of prophecy, the advent and career of John the Baptist is not only an evidence in the matter of revealed truth, but it is a leading, first-class evidence. It multiplies by a thousand the force of impression of that kind of evidence, when compared with all that results from tl,e fulfilment of a mere event foretold. lL TRE FAITHFUL ATTITUDE OF HIS OUTER LIFE TO HIS VOCATION OB. MISSION, 'l'he kingdom of God is indeed not meat, ne>r drink, nor dress. Yet these may have a tale to tell. They rarely fail, in fact, to bear testimony one way or another, '!'hey serve to a larcre deo-ree the part of a test of the mind and the spirit that rule in any one, and certainly not"least in one, a large portion of whose life is lived in public. 1. Plainness of dress, abstemiousness in diet, a strict if not severe hold upon the habit of life, shall neither constitute conclusive evideaoe of the inner life, nor constitute under any circum- stances merit; but if the man be honest in these outside "appearances," they do con- stitute virtue, and are an evidence of wisdom and of goodness; even as thei1· opposites, ostentation, intemperance, vanity, and heedlessness, are faults that soon hnsten to number themselves in the rank of vice and sin. 2. In the dress and diet of John the Baptist there may sometimes seem to be an approach to the ostentation of austerity. We may correctly hold that a certain prodamation of temperateness and severity was intended to be heard. But as these were real, of ostentation there was nothing. 'l'he degeneracy of many a day, many a period, the extremes of "purple and fine linen" and "rage," betokened a state of things that required to have most plainly preached, the plainest gospel of plain dress, plain foo,J, and plain, simple manner and speec~. on. III. 1-17.J THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST. MATTHEW. 87