Matthew 3:13-17 (The Baptism of Our Lord)
St. John, Galveston 1/11/26
Rev. Alan Taylor

+ In Nomine Jesu +

Grace and peace to you, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

    The message this morning is based on the Gospel reading from Matthew 3. It’s the account of Jesus’ baptism by John the Baptist. As I’m sure you’re aware, with any given passage in the Bible there are many different aspects of the passage that could be focused on in preaching. Unlike other times that I’ve preached on this passage, this morning I’d like to focus on John the Baptist, and particularly what the passage says about John regarding Jesus’ request to be baptized by him. In verse 14, John said to Jesus, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?” Jesus responded to John’s objection to baptizing Him, saying, “Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.” After that, Matthew tells us that “he (meaning John) consented.” Those few words in the passage leave us with a few questions. For instance, to what did John consent? And, what does his consent have to do with our lives today?

    I would dare say that when we read about John the Baptist in the Scriptures we don’t generally see ourselves in him. In other words, we don’t tend to relate to John the Baptist as we might relate to other people in the Bible. John, after all, lived out in the desert. He wore camels hair and he ate locusts and wild honey. From the various descriptions of him in the Bible, we get the impression that John was an unusual man, meaning he wasn’t like other people. That being the case, it’s hard for us too to relate to John.  

    This morning though, I’m going to ask you to put yourselves in John’s shoes, so to speak, regarding Jesus and His baptism. To do so, I’d like for you to think about the things John did and didn’t know about Jesus at the time. In doing so, I think we can apply those two categories, what John did and didn’t know about Jesus to our own lives. In doing so, we can relate to John in how we might deal with those situations in our own lives where God calls us to move forward in faith, even though we don’t have a full understanding of God’s ways of what He asks of us.  

    So, let’s start with John. At the time of Jesus’ baptism, what did John know about Jesus? Well, clearly, he knew that God was sending (very soon) the long-awaited Messiah to deliver His people Israel from sin and death. It was, after all, that knowledge of the coming Messiah that formed John’s life and ministry. He also knew that the Messiah would be great, much greater than himself. This is what moved John at one point to say that wasn’t even worthy to carry the sandals of the Messiah. Finally, and this relates directly to this morning’s reading, John knew that the Messiah didn’t need to baptized. After all, John’s own baptism, was a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. John was well aware that Jesus had no need for repentance.

    John certainly knew a lot about Jesus. But he didn’t know everything. For instance, John didn’t know why Jesus wanted him to baptize Him. That just didn’t make much sense to John. He also didn’t know where following Jesus would lead him, which means that he didn’t know that the events of Matthew 11, where King Herod had John beheaded were on the horizon. He didn’t know that Jesus himself would ultimately be rejected, condemned and crucified, nor did he know that Jesus would rise again on the third day and that He would send His disciples into the world to baptize the nations.

    Like John, there are things we know about God and there are things we don’t know about Him. Our knowledge of God is perhaps even greater than John’s, since we have the full testimony of God’s Word that we can read and study. We know, for instance, that Jesus is the Son of God and that He was rejected by those He came to save, but that He was crucified for the sins of the whole world. We also know that He rose from the dead and He ascended into Heaven and that He will return in judgement on the last day. We know that He is gracious and merciful. We know that there is no evil in God. In fact, we know that God isn’t even capable of evil, because “in Him there is no shifting or shadow.” And though these we know about God are all true, we also know that we will face trials in our lives, even persecution, but we also know that Jesus is with us in all things, and that He is also for us.

    All these things we know about Jesus. And yet, like John, there are things about Him that we don’t know. For instance, we don’t know where following Jesus will lead us. Even though we know that following Him may involve suffering, we don’t know what kind of suffering. Neither do we know how long it will last. In His Word, we are promised that “He will work all things together for good to those who love Him and have been called according to His purpose.” But as to the details, how God is going to work things out for our good, we pretty much remain in the dark.

    Where I’m going with all of this, regarding John and how we are like him, in that there are  things we know and the things we don’t know about God, is to those last few words in verse 15 of the reading for this morning, where it says that “he (meaning John) consented.” It’s just a couple of words, but there is a lot in them. John consented in what? Well, he consented to Jesus request, walking, if you will, by faith and not by sight, even though he didn’t understand why Jesus asked him to baptize Him.

    To say that John consented though does not mean that John was in charge of his own faith. He wasn’t in charge of his own faith and neither are you in charge your faith. After all, the Scriptures tell us that Jesus is the “author and the finisher of your faith.” To consent to the things of God doesn’t mean you give God permission to do the things that God already does by divine right. No, it’s not that at all. Rather, it means that, because of what you know about God, about Jesus, you agree to get out of the way. You bow, if you will, to God’s greater wisdom and power.

    Martin Luther had his own understanding the baptism of Jesus. I don’t know that we would call it an article of faith, because there are other explanations of Jesus’ baptism that are viable. Still, as he tended to do in his understanding of the Gospel, Luther honed on God’s grace and ultimately on Jesus’ atonement for the sins of the world. For Luther, Jesus’ baptism was the opposite of any of our baptisms. In your baptism, God took away your sins. And so, St. Paul refers to baptism, as “a washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit.”    

    Jesus though wasn’t in need of washing or renewal. And yet, He told John to “permit now to fulfill all righteousness.” The righteousness that Jesus gives to you and me, is a righteous based on an exchange. And the exchange is this. Jesus takes on your sin and He gives you His righteousness. For Luther, that’s what happened in Jesus’ baptism. The sins of the world, including your sins and mine, were laid upon Jesus that He might ultimately carry them to the cross where He would make atonement for them.

    I happen to agree with this understanding of Jesus’ baptism, but again, it isn’t an article of our faith. What’s more important here, especially since we’ve been looking at this passage from John’s perspective, is God moving us to bow before His greater wisdom and power. It is ultimately what you know about Jesus, as well as, the Holy Spirit which was given to you in your baptism, the enables you to “consent to Jesus.” I suppose, in life, that would look something like this. “Lord, I don’t know why this or that has happened in my life, but these things I know about You. And because I know these things, I walk by faith and not by sight.”

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The peace of God that passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus unto life everlasting. Amen.

+ Soli Deo Gloria +