Matthew Poole Commentary - Luke 3:3 - 3:3

Online Resource Library

Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | Download

Matthew Poole Commentary - Luke 3:3 - 3:3


(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)

This Chapter Verse Commentaries:





How long the time of John’s ministry was before he was shut up by Herod in prison the Holy Scriptures do not certainly tell us; but it must be very short, for our Saviour’s time was little more than three years, and we hear of his imprisonment in the beginning of our Saviour’s public ministry. All that we have of John’s ministry is to be found either in this chapter, or in Mat_3:1-17, or in Mar_1:1-45, or in the Joh_1:1-51 3:1-36. From them all it appeareth, that the sum of his doctrine was, the necessity of repentance, and faith in Christ, in order to the remission of sins. His pressing faith in Christ is most clearly declared by the evangelist John. Matthew, Mark, and Luke insist more upon his preaching the doctrine of repentance for the remission of sins, and baptism as an evidence of it. Which doctrine or repentance he pressed both from evangelical motives, The kingdom of heaven is at hand, and from legal motives, or arguments of terror, The axe is now laid unto the root of the trees: in this setting an example to all ministers of the gospel, showing them what should be the main subjects of their discourses, for we shall find that our Saviour preached the same doctrine, and in the same method. What is here said we before opened:



See Poole on "Mat_3:2". See Poole on "Mar_1:4". John did not preach that baptism was repentance, or that remission of sins was infallibly annexed to it, but that the way to obtain remission of sins was by repentance, and that baptism was an external sign and symbol of it.