Matthew 3:7-10 NIV records, “But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to where he was baptizing, he said to them: “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.” https://bible.com/bible/111/mat.3.7-10.NIV

Who does John call a brood of vipers? The religious leaders, the believers in God, those who claimed to be in a right relationship with God through their relationship with Abraham. What were they lacking? First, they were lacking repentance before God. They believed they were already accepted by God because of their obedience and pedigree. They failed to understand that true obedience is humbling ourselves before God in recognition of His perfection, our sinfulness, His grace, and our need for pardon. They were not God’s children by virtue of their birth or their belief but must become God’s children by humility and faith. This led to the second problem, the lack of work produced by repentance. The religious were obeying what they considered the laws of God to keep themselves in the favor of God. The works that God requires are faith in Him for salvation alone and not by any human performance except the Man Jesus, Who alone is God. This work is again a humbling ourselves before God, a full surrender to His Deity and Lordship by living a life of sacrificial love and service to God and men for helping all men become reconciled to God just as Jesus did. It is a relationship with Jesus, not Abraham, religion, or law, that the religious need for entering eternal life. This relationship is marked by being born again of the Spirit and not by living according to the law for justification before God. We who are believers in God are warned in this passage to be humble before God, to seek Jesus alone for our right standing before God, and to demonstrate that relationship to Jesus by living as Jesus lived in humility, sacrifice, and service before God to reconcile men to God.