Last Sunday we studied the Transfiguration of our Lord as He stood before His three closest disciples – Peter, James and John. We learned that His body became “dazzling white” and His face “shone bright as the Sun”. Not only that, but God the Father spoke to the disciples identifying Jesus for all time as “my son, in whom I am well pleased”.
Today we are going to take a look at another event that God orchestrates to give us evidence of the fact that Jesus Christ is who He says He is, God the Son. Since St. Patrick’s Day is near, let me tell you a story about the baptism of the Irish king Aengus by St. Patrick many years ago. St. Patrick led the king into the river to be immersed and during the ceremony St. Patrick leaned on his pointed staff and accidentally stabbed the king’s foot. After the baptismal ceremony was completed, St. Patrick looked down, saw the blood, realized what he had done and begged the King’s forgiveness. St. Patrick asked King Aengus, “Why, oh king, did you suffer the pain in silence?” The king replied, “I thought it was part of the ritual.”
This morning’s Gospel lesson is about the baptism of our Lord, Jesus Christ. This event is recorded in each of the Gospels written by Matthew, Mark and Luke, so the early Church saw it as of great importance. The man known as “John the Baptizer” was a man set apart from the norm of the day. He went about the desert wearing camel-skin robes, a large leather belt, and had a peculiar diet of locusts and honey. Also, what set John apart from the other preachers of the day was that he preached a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sin. John also had chosen to preach, not in the cities, towns and villages, but rather, he did his preaching in the desert wilderness. Even so, his message found a huge audience. We are told that all of the people of Judea, including those from Jerusalem, went out to hear him preach.
Josephus, a first century Jewish historian, estimated that as many as 300,000 people heard John preach! There were people from all walks of life there to hear what John had to say. Among those present were the religious leaders of the day (although they were there simply for the show and had no interest in John’s message), some fishermen from Galilee (who became John’s disciples and later disciples of Jesus Christ), and one thirty- year-old carpenter from the village of Nazareth. Now those religious leaders would have immediately been recognizable in the crowd. They would have stood out because of their flowing robes and high-on-the- horse, haughty mannerisms. But the Galilean carpenter, named Jesus, simply looked like another guy come to listen to and take in the wild-eyed preacher in the desert.
John had been telling the people that there was one coming who was greater than he, whose sandals John was not even worthy to untie (a job that was given to the lowliest of the slaves). That one was, and is, Jesus Christ. We are told that when Jesus came up out of the water after being baptized by John, all Heaven literally broke loose. The skies parted, the Holy Spirit of God descended in a form “like a dove”, and landed on the shoulder of Jesus. God the Father spoke once again saying to Jesus so that all who were there would hear, “You are my son, whom I love. With you I am well pleased.” At the center of it all stood Jesus of Nazareth being revealed to all as God the Son!
When Jesus first approached John to be baptized, John recognized who Jesus was and initially refused to do it. John correctly stated that it was he who needed to be baptized by Jesus, not the other way around. John was a sinner, while Jesus was not. Jesus was the perfect Son of God. So that brings us to the question, if Jesus is God the Son, why does He need to be baptized? Does the Son of God need to repent of sin? No, He does not! Jesus had never, has never, and will never commit a sin.
So why does Jesus do it? Jesus Himself gives us a clue in Matthew’s Gospel. We are told there that after John refuses to baptize Him, Jesus responds, “Let it be so now. It is proper for us to do this to fulfill all righteousness.” What did Jesus mean by that? Jesus, by submitting to being baptized was demonstrating for us that baptism is a sign of complete dedication to the following of the will of God the Father. For everyone else who came to John for baptism, a change of direction in their life was required. Hence, the need for repentance of their old sinful ways and their turning to God’s way of life. For Jesus, baptism was simply the public declaration of His love for God the Father and that Jesus was totally committed to following the will of the Father.
It was this total dedication to God the Father that Jesus, God the Son, kept focused on all the way to the cross on Calvary’s hill. Do you remember Jesus’ words in the Garden of Gethsemane when He knew that His impending death by crucifixion was very, very near at hand? Jesus cried out in prayer to the Father, “Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me. Yet, not my will, but your will be done!” This was the ultimate submission to the will of God the Father, to go to the cross for our sakes in order to reconcile us to the Father. It was horribly painful nonetheless. Jesus knew He was about to suffer unspeakable agony, yet Scripture tells us that Jesus did it, “for the glory set before Him.”
Yes, Jesus’ baptism was a public declaration of His total commitment to God the Father, all right. But it was also something more. Jesus’ baptism was a visible sign that His earthly ministry was beginning. Both John and God the Father confirmed Jesus’ unique call to public ministry for the world’s salvation. It was done to let everyone know that God the Son had come to stand with sinners, not to stand in judgment of them. That time will come, but for now He had come to stand in our place, to take on our sin, and to pay the price of our punishment.
Jesus being baptized was to show us that He not only stands with us, He stands for us. Jesus was not only baptized Himself, but He commanded baptism for all people of all ages. But do not be deceived. There is nothing magical in the water used for baptism. The submersing in, pouring or sprinkling on of water, is not what brings salvation! Hear me again, it is not the act of baptizing that saves a person’s soul. How do I know that? The thief on the cross was never baptized, yet when He confessed Jesus as Lord and asked to be remembered by Jesus when He entered His Kingdom in Heaven, Jesus replied, “This day, you will be with Me in Paradise.”
This does not reduce the importance of baptism one bit. For our baptism is an outward sign of our inward commitment to God. At baptisms that take place today the same thing happens that happened at Jesus’ baptism. All of Heaven rejoices and Heaven opens up as the Holy Spirit descends on the person being baptized in order to create or strengthen faith. God the Father says, “This is my adopted child, whom I love. I am well pleased with him/her.”
It is there at our baptism or confirmation that Holy God claims sinners as His children. As a result of our acceptance of Christ as Lord and Savior, all of our sins are forgiven. Hear it again; all of our sins are forgiven. Not just the sins we committed in the past, but even those that we may slip and commit in the future.
So after Satan causes us to stumble, he stands before God to question our status as Christians. Satan will point to our grumbling. Satan will point to our greediness. Satan will condemn our lustfulness. Satan will point to all of our failures to live godly lives and then he will ask how we can claim to be God’s children. We can claim to be God’s children because at our baptism, at our acceptance of Christ as Lord and Savior, God made us His adopted children!
Baptism is God’s declaration and promise to us, not our promise to Him. When a child is adopted he/she does not take an oath about being faithful to their new family. It is the parents who make that oath of love and faithfulness to their adopted child and it is the parents who pay the legal fees to seal the adoption. In the same way, at the times that we doubt our standing in God’s eyes, we just need to look back on our baptism or confirmation and remember what happened there. The Holy Spirit came to us and God the Father said, “You are My child.” The Father can say that because Jesus, God the Son, paid for our adoption with His blood.
Now, am I saying that because we have been baptized and/or confirmed, because we have publicly declared that Jesus has died for us and all of our sins are forgiven, we have a green light to live life any way we want to? There are those who will say that because all of our sins are forgiven, even the future sins, it doesn’t make any difference how we live or what we do. It is straight from Satan that these types of thoughts occur. He will try to tempt all of us in this way from time to time. When he does, remember this: John and Jesus preached a baptism of repentance, not recklessness.
When the Pharisees and the Sadducees showed up to be baptized, they had no remorse whatsoever about their love for money and power. John said to them, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath?” He was saying that if those religious leaders were truly sad and repentant about their sins and were honestly seeking forgiveness, they would turn from their sinful ways. But since they had no desire to do so, God’s judgment remained upon them.
So we need to realize that we are not perfect, but we are forgiven. When we stumble and fall, and we will all stumble and fall from time to time, no matter how hard we try not to, God will remain faithful to forgive us so long as we are not willfully going about our sinful ways with no intention of repenting and turning back to God. To those who have truly accepted Christ as Savior and Lord, that is an awesome promise. To those who have merely paid lip service to accepting Christ as Savior and Lord, yet continue to willfully plan and live a life in direct opposition to His teachings, baptism is not a blessing; it is a curse.
At His baptism, Jesus was revealed by God the Father to be God the Son, the Savior of the world. In our baptism or confirmation, we have been made by God the Father to be adopted brothers and sisters of the Christ. Since that is what we are, let us turn from our petty arguments, our pride, our stubbornness, our self-centeredness and all other sayings, deeds and actions that displease God and live as the children that God has declared us to be. Christ died to give us this chance. Let us not refuse it. Amen.