December 7, 2025 Grounded & Growing: From Repentance to Growth | Isaiah 27:1-6; Psalm 84; Matthew 3:1-12

Today we will reflect on Isaiah 27:1-6; Psalm 85; Matthew 3:1-12, From Repentance to Growth. Our world is full of prickly weeds—full of sin. We are all sinners, whether we want to admit it or not. While this is an uncomfortable truth, we need to sit in that reality. We need to take off our rose- colored glasses and truly look at the world and look at ourselves. This is where the Advent journey takes us. It is a journey among dangerous dragons, prickly weeds, and a warning from John the Baptist that judgement is coming. We need to understand our need for a Savior before we celebrate Christ’s first coming and eagerly anticipate Christ’s second. When we are able to be real about our sin, we are able to better appreciate what Jesus experienced on our behalf so that we might experience God’s forgiveness and grace.

Transcript

From Repentance to Growth

Isaiah 27:1-6; Psalm 85; Matthew 3:1-12

When Isaiah’s writing here, Israel is in exile in Babylon because of their faithlessness to God in failing to follow his way, preferring their own ways and the ways of the other nations instead. These ways, as we reflected on last week, failed God’s call to live justly and walk in righteous ways with each other. Here in Isaiah 27, we see the Lord punishing Leviathan, the gliding serpent and monster of the sea, an echo back to how Satan took on the form of a serpent to tempt Eve and Adam into sin and disobedience. Isaiah associates the serpent with the sea, a place of chaos for Israel who were more connected with the wilderness. The sea is a picture for the Israelites of the chaos sin brings; the power of the storms is like the storms sin brings into our lives. Sin is always associated with brokenness and destruction. So how do we find our ways to fruitful vineyards, to the Lord’s unfailing love in Psalm 85 where the psalmist is searching for the Lord’s peace and salvation? 

Matthew introduces us to John the Baptist, cousin of Jesus, who came to prepare the people for Jesus’ coming and ministry. John’s message was simple and blunt; he called the people to repent by confessing their sins and turning back to God. He had his harshest words and strongest calls to repent for the Sadducees and Pharisees ho were showing up to check out this wild prophet who was baptizing people in the Jordan River, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not think you can say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. The ax 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. “I baptize you with water for repentance. But after me comes one who is more powerful than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor, gathering his wheat into the barn and burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire.” 

John’s hard on them because the Pharisees emphasized faithfulness to Torah, including the study of scripture and extreme obedience to the law. They were influential leaders in Israel and created additional laws and requirements on the people, which leads Jesus to later charge them with placing heavy burdens on the people that God did not. But they also used these laws to benefit themselves, leading Jesus to call them hypocrites because they didn’t recognize or acknowledge their own sin, only focusing on the sins of everyone else. 

What is repentance? How do we live repentance out in our relationship with Jesus? In the Hebrew there are 2 words that are used for repentance: nāḥam, which means ‘to be sorry, change one’s mind’ and šûḇ which means ‘to turn back, return’. In the Old Testament, especially by the prophets, the call from God is for humanity to return to their covenantal dependance on God. They’re called to turn back to the way of living with God and each other in the way God gave them at Mount Sinai and in the spirit of the other covenants God made with them. The picture of repentance is of changing your direction away from your goals and destination and heading back and walking with God as your goal and destination. 

Pilgrim’s Progress is an example of what our journey through life is like. It’s a story by John Bunyan about a man called Christian who journeys from the City of Destruction to the Celestial City. It’s a story that represents the Christian life, where each person, place, and event represents spiritual concepts and challenges. Bunyan shows the burden of sin that Christian must carry and how the path to God involves faith, perseverance, and overcoming obstacles like temptations and despair. Repentance looks like getting back on the path to God by confessing when we fail, and then putting our eyes back on Jesus and trusting the way he taught us live shaped by faith and trust in him and the Father.  

John, when he calls the people to repentance, uses the Greek word metanoias, which combines the send of both Hebrew words and means ‘to change one’s mind’ and to ‘feel remorse or regret.’ Repentance is not just feeling sorry about what you did or thought, it’s about changing the direction of your heart from you wants and desires, your ways of thinking, what you believe, and embracing Jesus as your Lord and Saviour, filling your mind and heart with his teaching, looking at how he lived out God’s will and the spirit of God’s will; filling your ears with Jesus’ teachings, and your hearts with the Holy Spirit’s voice, and turning away from the voices that blast at us from our culture, trusting Jesus and who he’s calling us to be as his disciples. It can be hard to tune out the social media noise and chaos that uses conflict, anger, hatred, and division to shape how we live in and understand our world. It’s amazing how easily these voices grab us, how quickly we believe in them and turn away from Jesus’ way. Christians are not immune to the spirit of hatred spewing out at us. 

John calls for the Pharisees and Sadducees and followers of God and Jesus to produce fruit that grows out of repentance. John baptized people as a step of repentance into a new life and identity, washing away their old life for a new life of obedience. What does that look like for us as we’re called to repentance and turn back to Jesus? When we look at our lives and choices, we find ourselves choosing against Jesus regularly, choosing to listen to other voices instead of the Holy Spirit’s. 

Isaiah uses the imagery of briers and thorns for sin. in our verses today, Isaiah’s pointing ahead to Jesus’ return when one of two things is going to happen: the dragon or serpent will be destroyed and Jesus is going to either find a fruitful vineyard or thorns and briars that will be thrown on a burn pile. Jerusalem was surrounded by vineyards which represented blessings while briers and thorns often come up in Jesus' parables as signs of Satan's and evil men's work. Fire is often used as a description of judgment, and later in the New Testament an image of hell. Repentance leads to growth and fruitfulness; it turns away God’s wrath and anger.

Repentance begins with confession, with being honest with yourself and God that you are a sinner. Our tendency is to minimize our sins, think about Jesus’ parable of the Pharisee and tax-collector praying. The Pharisee praises himself to God while the tax-collector humbly confesses he’s a sinner in need to God’s grace and forgiveness. We need to see that we all need a saviour as we journey to the manger, and as we wait for Jesus’ return. As we journey through the danger of serpents and thorns, we also hear John the Baptist’ warning that judgment’s coming. This is why confession needs to be paired with some hard work in our lives and hearts. Isaiah talks bout fruitful vineyards, but those vineyards need constant weeding and feeding in order to grow healthy fruit. We’re called to do weeding in our own hearts, lives, and minds, called to repentance, confessing our sins, walking in obedience to the way of Jesus. The Holy Spirit can help us identify the weeds and thorns in our lives and hearts, will help us in the weeding; help us flourish and grow into fruitful followers of Jesus as we wait for his return. 

Paul shows us what the fruit of the Spirit, what a fruitful soul vineyard looks like in Galatians 5:22–25, “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.” A fruitful soul vineyard, filled with these virtues that reflect who God is, takes regular cultivating, weeding, and feeding. We feed this fruit through attention to the Spirit, to regular study of the scripture, time in prayer, and gathering together with others to encourage and build each other up in these virtues. We don’t do this in our own strength, we need to remember that the Lord is our keeper, that he provides what’s needed to grow and provide a harvest of righteousness and faithfulness, helping to prepare the way for his return.

How are tending to your vineyard, are you rooted in the promises of God, trusting in Jesus and the power of the Spirit? John the Baptist warns, “Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees; therefore every tree that does not bear good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.” Repentance leads to peace and flourishing and life as we eagerly wait for Jesus’ return.