As the Carpenter’s Son came to John, the prophet who had baptized both peasant and plutocrat, whose powerful message of repentance and judgment had taken his country by storm, whose name was a household word in all Israel, who could even have had most of his countrymen believing he himself was the Messiah, was suddenly beside himself with humility as he gazed upon Jesus of Nazareth. All the rest that John baptized came confessing their sins. Now, as the prophet, whose eagle eye had seen through the hypocrisy of the Pharisees and Saducees when they came, looked upon this One and saw that He had no sin to confess.

"Was the baptism of John from heaven or from Men?" This question, asked by Jesus, went virtually unanswered on the day He asked it. That’s because He spoke to a group of leaders of Israel who came to Him in the temple to question Him about His authority to preach. The trap they had set for Him, as with all those before it, had failed to trip. "If we say, ‘From heaven,’" they reasoned among themselves, "He will say, ‘Why did you not believe him?’ But if we say, ‘From men,’ all the people will stone us to death, for they are convinced that John was a prophet."(1)

Indeed, the people were convinced that John was a prophet. From the southern reaches of Judea to the north end of Galilee, "they all held John [the Baptist] to be a prophet."(2) By now his name was a household word. The people sensed that God had at last, after His long silence, visited them with a man of God like the prophets of old - like the stories handed down from their ancestors prior to the captivity. They all knew the prophecy that Elijah must come before Messiah to restore the hearts of the fathers to their children and the children to their fathers.(3) Now in their day it was coming to pass.

Like probably every other city and town of the region, the streets of Nazareth buzzed with talk of this one from God – John the Baptizer - who had awakened every latent hope of promise within them. Now, from among the streets of that city, a thirty year old carpenter’s son packed up His belongings, kissed His mother goodbye, and set out on a journey southward which would not only change His own life, but would change shape of the world forever. This was not a trip motivated by curiosity. Neither was He compelled to go and join up with John because He wanted to become one of his disciples. No. This was the prompting of the Holy Spirit, urging the One who was virgin born to be about His Father’s business of redemption. Oh the questions we would love to ask about that time Jesus embarked upon His ministry!

Of course, to these and similar questions, the word of God is silent, and it is probably best that we should be, too. What Jesus was thinking as He traversed the distance from Nazareth in Galilee to the area of the Jordan where John was baptizing, we simply do not know. He arrived at the place, according to the gospel writers,(5) and submitted Himself to be baptized by the great prophet.

Skeptics and infidels have had a heyday of concocting surmise about the prior relationship between Jesus and John. It seems that in every place where there is a gap in the Scriptural account that leaves room for speculation, they are right there injecting their poison, conceived to cast doubt.

Of course, none of these speculations is true. As the Carpenter’s Son came to John, the prophet who had baptized both peasant and plutocrat, whose powerful message of repentance and judgment had taken his country by storm, whose name was a household word in all Israel, who could even have had most of his countrymen believing he himself was the Messiah, was suddenly beside himself with humility as he gazed upon Jesus of Nazareth. All the rest that John baptized came confessing their sins. Now, as the prophet, whose eagle eye had seen through the hypocrisy of the Pharisees and Saducees when they came, looked upon this One and saw that He had no sin to confess. This prophet who, in his aversion for sin, would later, at the risk of his own life, put his finger in the face of king Herod and tell him, "It is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife," looked at this One from Nazareth, standing before him for baptism, and said, "I have need to be baptized by You, and do You come to me?"(6) How well John knew Jesus before this time has long been a question among Bible students. "I did not recognize Him,"(7) John would later testify, yet the word he used for "recognize" does not signify a total lack of identification, but rather a lack of exact knowledge. Surely John knew of Jesus. They were related. Their birthdays were only six months apart. Their mothers had spent time together during their pregnancies – a relationship however, that could not have continued very long because of the great age difference between Elizabeth and Mary.(8) Also to consider, John had spent his life in the deserts in the south and Jesus in a small town in the north. It may have been years since their families had been together. Whatever it was that John recognized in Jesus though, it was enough to convince him that immersing the Nazarene as he had others wasn’t at all appropriate. So he declined. He wasn’t going to baptize Him.

"Permit it at this time; for in this way it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness,"(9) Jesus told him. With those words, the reluctant Baptist and the Lamb of God Who takes away the sin of the world waded out into the murky water of the Jordan River and the Lord was immersed.

Then as Jesus came up out of the water, the heavens were suddenly opened. Both John and Jesus saw a manifestation of the Holy Spirit. A form like a dove descended upon Jesus and remained on Him. Yet this was no passing bird that just happened to light carelessly on a human shoulder. The event caused the lights to come on for John. His recognition was instantaneous. He remembered the prophetic word spoken to him by God Himself: "He upon whom you see the Spirit descended and remaining upon Him, this is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit."(10) And then suddenly, as if to drive home the obvious point, a voice, coming out of heaven, said, "You are My beloved Son, in You I am well-pleased."

John later would say of that day on the Jordan, "And I have seen and borne witness that this is the Son of God."(11)

We continue this morning with our series on the life of John the Baptist and come now to John’s baptism of Jesus. Matthew, Mark, and Luke all give accounts of the event. John mentions certain elements of it as well. We’ll use Matthew’s account as our base camp this morning and reconnoiter from there. I’ll be reading Matthew 3:13-17 from the New American Standard Version:

Then Jesus arrived from Galilee at the Jordan coming to John, to be baptized by him. But John tried to prevent Him, saying, "I have need to be baptized by You, and do You come to me?" But Jesus answering said to him, "Permit it at this time; for in this way it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness." Then he permitted Him. And after being baptized, Jesus went up immediately from the water; and behold, the heavens were opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove, and coming upon Him, and behold, a voice out of the heavens, saying, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well-pleased."

Some very important truths about Jesus’ deity can be seen in this and the other accounts of His baptism by John. They’re well worth our time to point out, so that’s what I want to do in this message.

The passages that describe Jesus’ baptism are first:

After His death, but before His ascension, Jesus would say to His disciples in Matthew 28:18-19: "All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit…."

These three, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, are often referred to by Christians as the Trinity. While the term itself is not biblical, the concept surely is, though it is a bit difficult to define in human terms. Most would agree that "the Trinity" describes the three Persons of the Godhead – the "Three in One," – the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, coequal and coexistent from eternity. The Bible doesn’t give a great dissertation on the nature of the Trinity. It simply assumes it as the story unfolds. Yet we can certainly glean enough to help us at least grasp the concept – which is important for every Christian to know.

Could you adequately explain the doctrine of the Trinity to someone if you were asked? Could you explain it to a Muslim, for instance, or a Jehovah’s Witness, both of whom reject it? In fact, Muslims teach that the concept of the Trinity is an uninspired addition to the Bible. Could you explain why it is not? If not, pay attention to what I’m going to point out. If we’re Christians, we need to understand the nature of our God.

Here in Matthew 3:13-17, we see God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, all present at Jesus’ baptism.

God the Son, Jesus Christ, is baptized in the Jordan River by John. Elsewhere the Son is declared to be equal to God the Father. For instance, in John 10:30, Jesus said, "I and the Father are One." He said to Philip in John 14:9-10, "He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how do you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me?" Paul said of Jesus in Philippians 2:6, referring to His time on earth, that "though He [Jesus] existed in the form of God, he did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped." So, on the day that John baptized Jesus, he was baptizing One who was equal to God the Father.

Here in the account of Jesus’ baptism we also see God the Holy Spirit, descending in the bodily form of a dove, upon the Son. The Holy Spirit, too, is presented in Scripture as coequal to the Father. Acts 5:3-4 tells us Luke’s account of the death of Ananias and Sapphira. There we read, "But Peter said, ‘Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit, and to keep back some of the price of the land?’" Then in the very next verse Peter, an inspired Apostle, says, "You have not lied to men, but to God." Peter’s assessment was that when Ananias lied to the Holy Spirit, he lied to God.

Hebrews 9:14 refers to the Holy Spirit as the "Eternal Spirit." Eternality is a characteristic of God the Father. Deuteronomy 33:27 says, "The eternal God is our dwelling place…." and Isaiah 9:6 speaks of the "Eternal Father."

So here we see in the baptism of Jesus, the presence of God the Spirit.

And here in the account of the baptism of Jesus we also see God the Father, addressing the Son, and declaring "This is my beloved Son, in Whom I am well-pleased."(12)

But didn’t God explain Himself as "One" to Israel in the Old Testament? Yes, He did. Deuteronomy 6:4, Moses said, "Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God is one!" In Deuteronomy 4:35 he said, "He is God, there is no other besides Him." This singular emphasis was probably necessary because God’s people were in the midst of a culture that worshipped many gods and had fallen into idolatry. Later however, with the coming of the New Testament, God further revealed Himself as not one only, but as three persons, three parts of a Godhead that are so close, so unified, that they are one.

Question: Is this shift between the explanation of God in the Old Testament and God in the New Testament credible or is it a contradiction? Do Christians worship a different God than the Jews did or did the Jews also worship a triune God? One need only check out the earliest book of the Bible to find the answer. In Genesis 1:1-2 we read, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. And the earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep; and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters." Note the mention of God and the Spirit of God.

Further, the Hebrew word translated "God" in Genesis 1:1 of our English version is "Elohim." It is actually a word that is plural in Hebrew.

Twenty six verses later, in Genesis 1:26, with regard to the creation of man, we read, "Then God said, ‘Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness….’" Who was God talking to? Genesis 1:1 that we just read suggests He was speaking to the Spirit and if one is willing to pull in a New Testament passage at this point, Colossians 1:16 tells us, referring to the Son, that "By Him [the Son] all things were created." Thus, at the creation, as at Jesus’ baptism, we have the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

A few chapters later, in Genesis 3:22 we read, "Then the Lord God said, ‘Behold, the man has become like one of Us, knowing good and evil…."

Again, the word "God" here is the Hebrew "Elohim" which is plural, and which fits with the statement, "the man has become like one of Us."

How can something singular be spoken of as plural? That’s the nature of what we’re talking about – the Trinity – three in one.

Another allusion to the Trinity in the Old Testament is found in the familiar words of Isaiah 9:6 where we read,

The Son will be called "Mighty God" and "Eternal Father." You see, the concept of the Trinity is not unique to the New Testament, though in the New Testament we do have a much clearer understanding of it.

We see then at the baptism of Jesus, God the Father and God the Spirit giving their endorsement and witness to the authority of God the Son.

But there is another testimony of the deity of Jesus in the accounts of Jesus’ baptism by John. We see also:

I refer to what is found in the Apostle John’s account of the events surrounding Jesus’ baptism. We haven’t time to read the whole thing but in John 1:30 we read the words of John the Baptist referring to Jesus: "This is He on behalf of whom I said, ‘After me comes a Man who has a higher rank than I, for He existed before me.’" John was actually six months older than Jesus, so how could it be said that Jesus existed before John? The only way is to realize that God the Son, along with God the Father and God the Spirit, existed before He came to this earth.

I’ve already shown you several passages that speak of the eternality of the Son. Isaiah 9:6 refers to the Son as the "Eternal Father." In the New Testament, John 1:1 is a clear statement of Jesus’ eternality. It says, "In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God." Verse 14 of the same passage identifies the "Word" as Jesus.

You see my friends, it is really true that when we read of Jesus as He manifested Himself on earth among men, we are reading about God. "No man has seen God at any time," wrote John the Apostle in John 1:18, "the only begotten God, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has explained Him."

Jesus is the real deal - more than man – more than prophet. He is deity. He is God. No wonder the greatest prophet of them all refused at first to baptize Him!

The most controversial statement in the whole world today may be the statement that Jesus Christ is God. People don’t mind calling him a great man. They don’t even mind acknowledging Him as a messenger from God. But when it comes to acknowledging Him as God, that is where they want to get off the train. Yet true Christians everywhere acknowledge just that.

As testimonies to Jesus’ deity, we’ve seen His part in the Trinity in the account of His baptism by John. We’ve seen His eternality. We see thirdly:

I have already pointed out to you that when it came to spotting a phony, John the best there was. When the Pharisees and Saducees started hedging on their repentance, the eagle eyed prophet called them on it. In fact, you might remember that he called them in their hypocrisy, a "brood of vipers." John could spot a phony. But when Jesus came for baptism, he realized that this was no phony!

Here is Matthew 3:13-14 again: "Then Jesus arrived from Galilee at the Jordan coming to John, to be baptized by him. But John tried to prevent Him, saying, ‘I have need to be baptized by You, and do You come to me?’"

Jesus didn’t qualify for John’s baptism of remission of sins because He had not sinned – and John could see that.

Why then was He baptized? His words on the subject are very clear in Matthew 3:15: "Permit it at this time; for in this way it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness."

While baptism was not a part of the Law of Moses, it was something revealed from heaven that man was called upon to do. Thus Jesus, obedient in all ways to the will of the Father throughout His life, submitted to it, though He was sinless. In this way it "fulfilled" all righteousness.

Sinlessness is a characteristic of deity. Jesus Himself said so. It is what was behind His question to the ruler who called Him "Good teacher" in Luke 18:19: "Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone." The point, of course, was to get the man to recognize the Lord’s deity.

The sinlessness of Jesus is also born out in several other places.

Hebrews 4:15 says: "We do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who was tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin."

John says in 1 John 3:5: "…In Him there is no sin."

Peter said in 1 Peter 2:22, "Christ also suffered for you, leaving you and example for you to follow in His steps, who committed no sin, not was any deceit found in His mouth."

2 Corinthians 5:1 tells us that God "made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf…."

We see three truths about Jesus’ deity in the passages that describe His baptism by John. We see His part in the Trinity, His eternality, and His sinlessness. All of these testify to Jesus’ deity. And all of them fit perfectly with the statement of John 1:34: "I have seen, and have borne witness, that this is the Son of God."

As we close, let me read to you some statements that were considered to be wise and accurate in their day, yet they turned out to be very mistaken.

"Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5 tons." - Popular Mechanics, forecasting the relentless march of science, 1949.

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." - Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943.

"I have traveled the length and breadth of this country and talked with the best people, and I can assure you that data processing is a fad that won't last out the year." - The editor in charge of business books for Prentice Hall, 1957.

"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home." - Ken Olson, President, Chairman and Founder of Digital Equipment Corp., 1977.

"640K ought to be enough for anybody." - Bill Gates, 1981.

Each of these statements of prominent people sounded like the voice of wisdom in its day. In time though, they turned out to look ridiculous.

Here’s another statement that has the same potential:

"Yes, Jesus was a great moral teacher who changed the world, but He was certainly not the Son of God."

A lot of people today think that this is a wise and sophisticated statement. But a day is coming when all those who have believed it are going to be made to look very foolish. Don’t be one of them!

Footnotes: Use your back button to return to your place.

1. Luke 20:4-6
2. Matthew 21:26
3. Malachi 4:5-6
4. John 1:29
5. Matthew 3:13-17; Mark 1:9-11; Luke 3:21-22; John 1:29-34
6. Matthew 3:14
7. John 1:33
8. Elizabeth was "advanced in years" (Luke 1:7) while Mary was probably in her teens or early twenties.
9. Matthew 3:15
10. John 1:33
11. John 1:34
12. Matthew 3:17

Dave Redick is Minister of the Hwy 20 Church of Christ in Sweet Home, Oregon and Editor of The Preacher's Study. He may be reached at pstudysupport@comcast.net.

Copyright © 1996-2008 by The Preacher's Study. Permission is granted to subscribers to use this document in total or in sermon preparation in the context of the local congregation only. Publishing it in a book, on the Internet, or anyplace beyond the local congregation is prohibited.

All Scripture quotations and references are from the New American Standard Version unless otherwise stated.

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