Add parallel Print Page Options

Then everyone will see how God can save them.” ’[a]

Crowds of people were going out into the wilderness. They wanted John to baptize them. He told them, ‘You are like dangerous snakes! God is angry. You are trying to run away from him. But he will soon punish people like you. You have to show that you are sorry. Change how you live. Stop doing things that God does not like. Do not begin to say to yourselves, “We are in the family of Abraham. God will surely not punish us.”[b] Listen! God can take these stones and make children for Abraham out of them![c]

Read full chapter

Footnotes

  1. 3:6 See Isaiah 40:3-5. Isaiah was using a picture to show people what would happen when the Lord was ready to come into the world. At that time, people mended the roads before a ruler arrived. Isaiah showed that someone would prepare the way for the Lord to come. John the Baptist was that person.
  2. 3:8 The Jews knew that they were God's special people. But how they lived was important to God. God wanted them to live good lives. At that time, many of them did not seem to understand that. When they did not obey him, he was angry with them. He was ready to punish those people, if they would not obey him.
  3. 3:8 The Jews called themselves ‘children of Abraham’. God had used Abraham many centuries before to start their family.