S121P3 – The Savior’s many faces: the faithful son
Mt. 3:13-17
Then Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan to be baptized by him. And John tried to prevent Him, saying, “I need to be baptized by You, and are You coming to me?” But Jesus answered and said to him, “Permit it to be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.” Then he allowed Him. When He had been baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water; and behold, the heavens were opened to Him, and He saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting upon Him. And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”
His son had made him smile many times over the years. There was so much his son did as a boy and later as a man that let him know that he had raised a good kid. None of those moments brought out his smile like the day he drove by the school while running errands. While most of the kids were running around the playground, his son was nowhere to be found. He was not on the swings, on the sliding board, or in the sandbox. Then, he spotted the boy from behind, and he seemed to be waking very slowly away from all his classmates. As dad turned the corner and looked from another angle, the picture became clear. That was the slow and heavy stroll of a boy pushing the wheelchair of the one child who could not run with the pack.
The Father was well pleased by the Son for many reasons, and I wonder whether this statement made before a crowd of witnesses was about the moment as well as the ministry. Jesus began his ministry after being baptized by John, a mortal man with no authority over him. I read these words from God and hear two things. First, I hear the Father giving a general approval of his perfect Son who faithfully walked in obedience always. Second, I hear God speaking about the moment the divine Christ symbolically took a place more lowly than that of mankind, giving up his divinity to join the likes of corrupted flesh for the sake of redeeming the broken by suffering what they deserved. This baptism was an act of submission to the plan that would humble him beyond compare.
Jesus’s submission to John at the moment of his baptism symbolizes to me the first physical sign of his voluntary agreement with the Father’s plan. It is a foreshadowing of Jesus’s further departure from the heavenly place He deserved to occupy. He already had come down to our level in the likeness of sinful flesh, but He would descend even further than this Earth before his work would be completed. I hear the Father expressing his joy at having a Son who would take that step in love regardless of what this great sacrifice would cost. Father, give us a measure of the humility and love that brought Jesus to our world, pleasing You as a son who lives to honor his father.