For this is he that was spoken of by the prophet Esaias, saying, The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.
Ver. 3. For this is he which was spoken of] Whether these be the words of the Baptist or the Evangelist, it appears not, skills not: the most say, of the Evangelist concerning the Baptist.
By the prophet Esaias] Thus one Testament infolds another, as those wheels in Ezekiel; and the law preacheth faith in Christ, as well as the gospel, Romans 10:6,7 .
The voice of one crying] Loudly and lustily; lifting up his voice as a trumpet (βοωντος, boantis, vociferantis), or as the sound of many waters. Likewise St Paul was ordained to be a crier, 1 Timothy 1:11; (κηρυξ), and so is every faithful preacher,2 Timothy 4:2. He must cry and be instant, stand to the work, and stand over it (επιστηθι). Sta cum diligentia, Stand with care, saith the Syriac there, clangite, clamate, Shout, proclaim, Isaiah 58:1; Jeremiah 4:5. Ye have to do with deaf men, dead men, living carcuses, walking sepulchres of themselves. Clames etiam ut Stentora vincas. Now, therefore, as our Saviour lifted up his voice when he said, "Lazarus, come forth," so must Christ's ministers (when they speak to such as lie rotting and stinking in the graves of their corruptions) cry aloud, "Awake, thou that sleepest, and stand up from the dead, that Christ may give thee light," Ephesians 5:14. Ecclesia (the Church) is a word in use among the Athenians, and signifies an assembly of citizens, called out of the multitude (as it were) by name, or in their ranks, by the voice of the public crier (εκκαλειν), to hear some speech or sentence of the senate. The Church, in like sort, is a company called out of the kingdom of Satan by the voice of God's ministers, as it were criers, to hear the doctrine of the gospel revealed from heaven. There are that observe, a that John Baptist entered upon his calling in the year of Jubilee, which used to be proclaimed by a crier with the sound of a trumpet, and that in allusion thereunto he is called, "The voice of a crier."
Prepare ye the way of the Lord] Suffer the terrors of the Lord to seize upon your souls: take not up bucklers against the strokes of God's law, bring not your buckets to quench the motions of his Spirit, knocking at your hearts by the hammer of his word; make much of the least beginnings of grace, even those they call repressing, since they prepare the heart for conversion. "Open the everlasting doors, that the King of glory may come in," that "Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith." As Esther leaned upon her two maids when she came before the king, so let the soul lean upon the attrition of the law and contrition of the gospel; so shall the King of glory stretch out the golden sceptre of his grace, and we shall live. As John Baptist was Christ's forerunner into the world, so must repentance be his forerunner into our hearts; for he that repenteth not, the kingdom of God is far from him: he cannot see it for his lusts that hang in his light.
Make his paths straight] (ετοιμασατε. Heb. פנו, Isaiah 40:3. Viam apertam et oculis intuentium conspicuam facite. Obstant enim affectus mundani, &c. Erasmus.) Walk exactly, precisely, accurately, by line and by rule; Eph 5:15 walk as in a frame, make straight steps to your feet, or else there is no passing the strait gate; so strait, that as few can walk in it, so none can halt in it, but must needs go upright. Plain things will join in every point one with another; not so, round and rugged things. In like sort, plain spirits close with God's truths, not those that are swollen, &c. The old heart will never hold out the hardship of holiness.
a Rolloc. in John 1:15 .