Matthew’s 3rd chapter records Christ’s
baptism by John; that moment inaugurates Christ’s public ministry.
The background is simple enough: John was
performing a baptism of repentance and many queued up to take their turn under
the water. The baptism John offered was meant to signify that the recipient had
confessed and turned from his or her former sinful choices, and was now
committed to God-honoring conduct.
A baptism of repentance demonstrated in a
very public way, to a large crowd of onlookers, that you were a penitent
sinner.
A Ministry of Identification
John’s baptism was popular enough to attract the Pharisees who, never missing a chance for public approval, joined
the lineup of candidates. Their insincerity led John to rebuke and reject them
in the strongest possible terms. But despite that rejection, it would appear
that dozens — perhaps hundreds — of others were being baptized that day.
There was a long, long line of sinners waiting to repent.
Into that line, at a moment in time, stepped one Jesus of Nazareth. There was nothing particularly notable about him
as he stepped forward, so an onlooker could be forgiven if he imagined that
this Jesus was just one of a great many unremarkably-sinful and now repentant
sinners; that Jesus, like so many before him, had come to John for a baptism of
repentance.
The first point to underline is simply
this: Christ began his public ministry by identifying fully with sinners in an
entirely unremarkable way.
A Protest on the Record
So this Jesus of Nazareth steps into the Jordan with John in precisely the same way dozens or perhaps hundreds had
before him. He is ready to be baptized. But John hesitates. He, perhaps alone,
recognizes the incongruity of the sinless Son of God undergoing a baptism of
repentance. “I don’t need to baptize you, you need to baptize me,” he
rightly notes. There is no sin of which Jesus should repent, and John
knows it immediately.
Despite John’s protest, and at Christ’s command, the baptism proceeds. Again, only those who were immediately close
enough to John to hear him speak could possibly have understood that something
very different than all the preceding baptisms had just occurred. The casual
onlooker or the late arriver had no way to distinguish Christ’s baptism from
any other.
But we pause as a second point to say that before the baptism was accomplished, there was a recorded protest that did not
change the outcome in any way. In this case, the protest came from no less a
luminary than John the Baptist himself.
The Father’s Considered Opinion
Then thirdly, Matthew 3 takes us to the scene immediately as Christ had come out of the water. Up until that moment,
the baptism of Christ had been, observably at least, the same as so many others
before; a baptism of repentance. And it would be understandable, perhaps even
forgivable, if you had watched those events and imagined that this Jesus was
simply one of many sinners.
But Matthew records that something very different happened then, something that would be impossible to miss. Verses 16
and 17 record that heaven opened, the Holy Spirit descended as a dove on Jesus
and that a voice spoke: “This is my beloved son, in whom I am well-pleased.”
Those words “well-pleased” tell us that Jehovah’s considered opinion of Jesus
was that his baptism “of repentance” was utterly different than any that had
preceded it — the Son pleased the Father entirely and it was right and
fitting that Christ did so.
So we have three points worth considering in the first of Christ’s baptisms: an identification with sinners, a quiet
protest lodged by a sinner, and thirdly, the demonstrable and undeniable
approval of heaven that differentiated the Lord Jesus Christ clearly from
any other.
Fast Forward Three Years or So …
That event — the baptism that began Christ’s ministry — would be bracketed by another that came at the end of
his public ministry. The Lord himself referred to his crucifixion as a baptism
in Matthew 12:50 and I will not be the first to point out that
baptism pictures death. It is appropriate then that the death of Christ
features the same three elements that were so prominent in his first baptism:
- Firstly, in his death at Calvary on a cross, Christ takes his place among numberless other sinners who were bearing the consequence of sin. The vast majority of onlookers would have seen him nailed to a cross and considered his death sentence to be fitting and appropriate. But scripture reminds us again and again that, unlike those around him on similar crosses, Christ takes his place willingly and with a purpose. “No one,” he could say of his life, “has taken it from me. I lay it down of my own initiative.”
- Secondly, we find an honorable protest. That protest comes from the lips of one criminal among all who stood by, who could say, “This man has done nothing wrong.” But like John’s protest years earlier, this protest too, would ultimately fail to prevent an injustice; Christ died the death of a sinner despite being sinless. His death could easily have been seen to be just the same as so many others who died justly; the only indication of any difference at all was the quiet words of a dying criminal.
- Most significantly, three days later we see God the Father demonstrating that Christ’s death was utterly unlike those numberless others who died under the same brutal Roman system of occupation. The open tomb speaks clearly to the Father’s love of the Son and his judgment that it was “impossible” that death should retain any hold on Jesus longer than the prophesied three days.
Into
Heaven Itself
A scant few weeks later, the Father further
verifies his deep satisfaction with the Son. For then, it is not a tomb that is
opened but rather heaven itself; into a place previously inaccessible to
humankind, Christ ascends — at the Father’s pleasure — into heaven
itself.
There, the Father gives to the Son a name
above every other name and a place above every other place.
The public life of the Son of God is
bracketed eloquently by two baptisms — both speak clearly of Christ’s
willing identification with sinners and of the Father’s clear verification of
the Son’s unique nature.
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