3:1 We jump forward in time quite a bit in this verse. In the Book of Luke, we learn that John the baptist is 6 months older than Jesus so we can deduce that a 6 month old baby was likely not preaching or baptizing in the river!
3:2-6 John calls for people to repent without hesitation lest they miss their opportunity to inherit all that God has promised His children. All of us go wayward at certain points in our lives and by repenting, we are not chanting meaningless words, we are genuinely sorry for creating darkness in places where we could have been more positive and productive in the service of light. If you're really, honestly sorry for something not-so-great that you've done or thought against another person, God will know without having to hear you verbally speak it.
A lot of important scripture is carried out in the Jordan river, I'm thinking specifically of Exodus, so it becomes a place for a strong metaphor. John 4:14 tells us that God is our eternal spring of water and therefore being cleansed by water is symbolic of being cleansed by Him. It is not the action itself of being baptized that is rewarding or important, it is the decision made to publicly, un-apologetically and completely accept God. Can that happen without actually dipping oneself in water? Common sense tells me yes, but the act itself can still hold meaning.
3:7-9 John gets angry with these two groups of people: the Sadducees and Pharisees who arrived at the Jordan not to repent and baptize themselves but instead to mock and pretend to be honest and worthy men - which they are not. John basically tells them to scram and stop polluting such precious circumstances with their nonsense. They claim to be of the genealogy we learned about in Chapter 1, descendants of Abraham. John, knowing of Abraham's goodness and faith is disgusting by these men trying to compare themselves to him. "You're fooling no one," John seems to imply, the true God is so mighty he could turn these stones into living people and you're so foolish to believe He or I could be tricked by your words.
3:10 Here is a common metaphor in the Bible: men/women represented as trees. Our works, our good deeds and our bad deeds are symbolic of the results our actions yield. If we produce bad fruit, God will cut us down (so to speak). He will ensure that we cannot continue to produce rotten things because He always protects His children who produce good fruit: patience and forgiveness, love and kindness. And if being cut down isn't enough of a metaphor, God cuts your bad-fruit producing tree down and then burns until is is nothing more than ash, incapable of harming anyone anymore.
3:11 John the baptist shows his humility. He acknowledges and tells everybody that the work he is doing is for God, that he is a servant of goodness and not actually God himself. God will ultimately baptize all of us: either with his loving, Holy Spirit or, for the wicked, with the fire which will mute them to nothingness. (Side note: A study for a different day but I do not believe in Hell. I believe fire is a metaphor for ridding of evil, of God blotting out wicked. I do not believe in eternal hell-fire and neither does the Bible!)
3:12 John reiterates that God will rid the bad and keep the good. People need to hear it over and over again and in many different ways before it will sink into their minds.
3:13-17 This is a really special end to Chapter 3. Jesus requests that John baptize him and John is astonished by the request. John is humble, he knows what Christ will accomplish, he knows Who Christ is from and believes that Jesus should do the baptizing... not be the baptized! But Jesus is in an infinite amount of ways, our example, and it is important to Him that we see baptism (repenting and accepting God) as the way to true light and life. Christ is not too proud or arrogant to undergo anything that He expects us to undergo.
God formally acknowledges and claims Christ upon His baptism. God is always with us, He is as present with us as we are with Him, and as seemingly absent with us as we are with Him. When we formally acknowledge Him and claim Him as our father, he formally acknowledges us and claims us as His children. He does not break that vow, EVER... but we often do.
