Prepare ye the way of the Lord (LUKE 3)

As I am participant in my online New Testament class, I am learning many things about Repentance. On the last legs of my mission our focus was on Faith and repentance and I personally added humility to that list of things to search the scriptures for. Now as I take this class I find my self doing the same thing, searching for those evidences of Faith, Repentance and Humility. 

As I was reading our assignment this week I came across Luke 3. At first I thought it was Christ speaking to us then I realized it was his beloved prophet John. Let's just take a moment and realize how spiritual and obedient, faithful and humble this prophet was that came before the Christ. He told of many truths. John was Awesome and the biblical sense of the word. 

He preached of the 'baptism of repentance,' crying out about the plan of Happiness, the plan that all of us take part. As he preaches about the plan , "And all Flesh shall see the salvation of God," (Luke 3:6) he then turns to the multitude and says, 'who told told you that you could flee from this plan, the making the paths straight, the valleys being filled and so on? He was pointing out to them their need to repent before the wrath of God and salvation should come. (Luke 3:7) 

I love what he says next in verse 8:

"Bring forth therefore fruits worthy of repentance..."

'Don't you see,' says the prophet, 'bring forth your fruits worthy to repent.' As I studied this I found that the word fruits could mean things we give because of our actions.  WHAT?! Sometimes Fruit is a representation of children or something we produce, in a sense. That means, here in this sentence he was talking about how Baptism is our action allowing us access to true and worthy repentance! (see also Alma 13:13)

He had just said before that through baptism we can repent and see the salvation of God, as God intended it for us! AND THEN! 

John tells them:

"...and begin not to say within yourselves, We have Abraham to our father: for I say unto you, That God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham."

 I enjoyed the comments made by a classmate saying, "'God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham.' It was definitely a rebuke to the people who believed in their inherent superiority as members of the house of Israel. It seems to me like they relied on who they were and not what they were doing. We should also focus on our own actions and not become complacent in our membership in the Church."

The people focused more on the fact that they belonged to Abraham then what the consequences of the actions would be, and here John is telling them that though they are a chosen people, that can't be passive to the fact that action is required.

 Their faith had been lost in years of practice and preciseness rather performing in faith. This was their chance because God is a loving God, and desires all to return to him. Like my friend above said, we cannot become complacent in or membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day saints. We can't say, we have the restored gospel but I need nothing more. 

But I will tell you, God is able to raise us stones up to greatness. We must remember who we are but not be willing to let that be our safety net. We must continue to act in faith and constantly repent. (as a side note repentace doesn't just mean when you sin you change, it's when others sin against you or when God desires you go so  must change or in other words repent.) 

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Lastly, John was so powerful in his teaching (him having the spirit with him) was questioned to be the Christ. And he humbly answered:

I indeed baptize you with water; but one mightier than I cometh, the latchet of whose shoes I am not worthy to unloose: he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire:

He was humble and not only told of the plan but the most important and essential part of it. That the Christ will be the one who cleanses us. 

As I read through the comments of my classmates this week, the scripture John 3:30 was shared, "He must increase, but I must decrease."

We must all decrease or become humble in order to fully repent and grow our faith in the Savior. We must be baptized and if we already are continue to show that our fruit or baptism is a worthy enough promise to God that we will repent. We cannot slack in our discipleship, in our faith, the fact that we have the Restored church of Jesus Christ on the earth to day.