The Baptism of Jesus - MATTHEW 3:13-17

Then Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan, to be baptized by him. John would have prevented him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?” But Jesus answered him, “Let it be so now; for it is proper for us in this way to fulfill all righteousness.” Then he consented. And when Jesus had been baptized, just as he came up from the water, suddenly the heavens were opened to him and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from heaven said, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.”

Commentary

Things are moving really fast in the third and fourth chapter of Matthew, so I want to summarize for you their entirety. Our reading is the second half of chapter 3. In the first half, we are introduced to John the Baptist. We are told he appeared in the wilderness of Judea preaching repentance. He wore camel's skin and ate locusts and honey. He was a wild man. And when the Pharisees and Sadducees came for baptism, we get the famous quote, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?” Immediately on the heals of that encounter, Jesus himself shows up and sees the Spirit of God descending on him.

That's the end of chapter 3, and chapter 4 starts up immediately with the 40 day fast in the wilderness and the temptations by the devil. When Jesus returns from the wilderness, he hears that John has been arrested, and when he hears that news, he leaves his home in Nazareth and goes to Galilee, the land of the Gentiles. There he calls Peter and Andrew as his first disciples, and goes throughout Galilee preaching and healing. His fame spreads throughout Syria. And that is Chapter 4 in its entirety.

I am glad I read chapters 3 and 4 straight through. I think it gives us a picture of a real man. His calling by God, his struggle with discerning what that call really means, and his successful start of a ministry in a foreign land. Much of that gets lost when we chop it up into little verses.

When Jesus comes to John, he has not yet even started his ministry. He is an unknown. It is easy to miss that fact because John recognizes him immediately for who he is. We do not have enough here to be sure, but I think we can make a case for the idea that Jesus himself at this point did not know who he was. He is just going to the Jordan like everyone else because John's message pulls at him.

The scripture as written would argue otherwise. To John's reluctance, Jesus answers, “Let it be so now; for it is proper for us in this way to fulfill all righteousness.” I am choosing to ignore that line. It is explainable only if you assume that Jesus was, right from the start, the all knowing Son of God. That assumption robs him of all the glory of being a mere man. I am going with the idea that he just shows up to be baptized. From that starting point, when he comes up out of the water and sees the Spirit of God descending on him, and hears a voice from heaven saying, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased”, now we have a story worth getting excited about. Now, Jesus is not just going through the motions in order to fulfill all righteousness. Now, Jesus the man is being told by God that he is to become the Son. What an unfathomable honor! But what does it mean? How is it to be lived out? Help!

Now the 40 days in the wilderness makes sense. It is going to take 40 days for Jesus to come to grips with this news. It is going to take 40 days and some serious tempting by the devil for Jesus to make the leap from Son of God as envisioned by Isaiah to Son of God as envisioned by God.

But he does, and when he gets home the first thing that hits him is the news that John has been arrested. We don't know how much that news played into Jesus' actions. Perhaps he was still pondering his next move, perhaps he already had his plan. We don't know. What we do know is that with John in prison, Jesus takes the step to live up to John's preaching. But he is cautious enough to leave home first.

That fact tends to get lost in the details. But the fact is that Jesus had a very successful ministry in Galilee with Peter and Andrew and no grief from the Pharisees. His decision to return to Nazareth and set his sights on Jerusalem is another whole story.

So let's return to the 5 verses actually given to us for today. What do they say. Well I would propose they tell us that God does talk to mere humans. And when He does He is likely to start with encouragement. How come we don't hear him? I think the answer is in the 40 days of wilderness. God's proposals are almost always preposterous. We don't hear them because we don't believe them. Most people, given the experience Jesus had, would probably just tell themselves that the sun had gotten to them in the long walk from Nazareth to the Jordan. But Jesus takes 40 days in the wilderness to let it sink in.

If we truly want to follow the call of God, we are going to have to recognize that is likely to be preposterous. It will not be what we expected. In at least some very significant ways it will not be what we wanted. It will call us to days in our own wilderness before we can embrace it with conviction.

Lord help us to face the wilderness.