Sunday, 12th January, Baptism of the Lord, Feast

Matthew 3:13-17

Then Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan,
to be baptized by him. John would have prevented him, saying, ‘I need to be
baptized by you, and do you come to me?’ But Jesus answered him, ‘Let it be so
now; for it is proper for us in this way to fulfil all righteousness.’ Then he
consented. And when Jesus had been baptized, just as he came up from the water,
suddenly the heavens were opened to him and he saw the Spirit of God descending
like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from heaven said, ‘This is my
Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.’

Commentary

John’s mission was to prepare his fellow
Jews or the inauguration of the messianic kingdom, expected and eagerly awaited,
for centuries. His baptism, a washing of the people in the Jordan waters, was
an outward sign of their inner repentance, and a turning of their hearts to
God. Jesus had no sins of which to repent, and his heart was always with God.
He was God in human nature, but he wished to be associated with all pious Jews,
and so, like them, to be baptized by John. This was his way of inaugurating the
messianic era.  

Christ, our beloved Saviour, began his
messianic mission, the mission of enabling the whole human race to be sons of
God and heirs of heaven, with an act of self-humiliation. His insisted on going
through John’s baptismal rite even though he had not sin to repent of. He did
this because he was the representative of all sinners, and had come “to take
away the sin of the world,” and in order to set sinners of all time an example
of true humility and true repentance. 

During the Christmastide just ended, the
Sunday lessons from holy scripture have reminded us, again and again, of the
humiliations Christ endured on earth for our sake. The greatest of these was
the incarnation, God taking the nature of man, the Creator becoming a creature,
the master making himself a slave. Add to this, the reception he got when he
came among us, his birth in a stable, his cradle a manger, his forced flight
into Egypt, his life of poverty in the despised town of Nazareth, where he
earned his meager livelihood by the sweat of his brow like the most ordinary of
men. 

All this was for men and for you! He
suffered all of this, and much more, notwithstanding the face that, as God, he
foresaw the ingratitude he would received in return, from the vast majority of
those for whom he suffered. All of us here today have shown him our share of
this ingratitude. We have not only forgotten to thank him, but we have
positively offended him by our sins. We have grumbled and complained, and
perhaps open rebelled, when he asked us to follow him on the path of
humiliation and suffering, which he trod before us for our sake. 

What human benefactor, what fellow-man, who
had put himself to great inconvenience, and caused himself humiliation and
personal suffering in order to help us, would not wash his hands off us,
forever, if our return was forgetfulness, thanklessness, ingratitude and even
insult, in return for all he had done for us? And could we blame him? But God
is not a human benefactor. His love, his mercy, his understanding and sympathy,
are not finite and limited like those of men. His love is for sinners, as well
as for saints. It is reaching out to us every day and every hour of the day,
recalling us to a sense of duty, a sense of gratitude, and indeed a sense of
self-interest in our eternal welfare. 

Meditate for a few moments today on the
lesson of this Gospel reading. Think of the magnitude of the humiliations and
the sufferings that Christ, God’s Son, endured in order that you could have
eternal happiness. Your own earthly troubles, your worldly aches and pains,
will then appear small in comparison. Instead of upbraiding God for letting them
happen to you, you will welcome them as his means of making you more like his
beloved Son, and so more worthy to be among the brother and sisters of Christ
who will share his heaven with him for all eternity. Amen.