Kingdom's Keys Fellowship
Where God's Kingdom Meets Man's Heart.
Lent 1 Why Was Jesus Baptized?
Why Was Jesus Baptized?
As we start Lent we need to remember Jesus was baptized before He went into the wilderness. Why should He be baptized? Here is the picture of perfect humanity in the flesh. He began perfectly because He was conceived perfectly by the Holy Spirit of God in His mother Mary. When John the Baptist tries to back off baptizing Jesus because he didn’t feel worthy enough, Jesus responded, “Let it be so now; it is proper for us to do this to fulfill all righteousness (Matt.3:15).” Why baptism for Jesus? Four reasons stand out in His reply.
First, ‘let it be so now’ means being right has a starting point and that starting point is always right now, the present moment. Every present moment is a ‘now.’ There is never a moment that does not begin with a call to be right. Jesus is telling us that all our ‘nows’ are fulfilled in Him if we let Him be Lord of our hearts.
Second, ‘it is proper for us to do this’ indicates there is a joint obedience of baptizer and the one baptized, humble submission before God and one another. Humility is defined by Jesus. Humility always means yielding to God and His Word’s direction in the presence of others regardless of their spiritual condition.
Third, ‘to fulfill’ meant to complete what Jesus had begun, which would be realized when He said on the Cross, ‘It is finished.’ Only Jesus knew the way to fulfill His Father’s will for all humanity and that would be His spiritual and physical sacrifice on the Cross. He would give His life for others to show the way of the Cross is the ‘now’ of being right, being faithful.
Fourth, ‘all righteousness’ meant everything that being right includes---being right with God, being right in our mind and heart and being right among others. That ‘right’ was what Jesus modeled. Baptism was the first step in the mission He was to complete on the Cross, that is being right in everything, in thought, in decision and behavior, from the moment of birth, all through His life and in His death. No one before or since has ever been right like He was right.
Baptism is the beginning of our spiritual recovery and restoration. When we ask Jesus into our heart He gives us the outward and visible sign of baptism to assure us that we are on an inward and spiritual journey with Jesus as Lord. It is a journey in being right sustained and maintained by God’s grace through faith. This is the first step in reconciliation. God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself One heart at a time.
The next step Jesus took in the Spirit was to face the devil’s temptation in the wilderness. He fasted forty days and forty nights to prepare to face the devil’s temptations. That experience is what we will look at next. Stay tuned.
As we start Lent we need to remember Jesus was baptized before He went into the wilderness. Why should He be baptized? Here is the picture of perfect humanity in the flesh. He began perfectly because He was conceived perfectly by the Holy Spirit of God in His mother Mary. When John the Baptist tries to back off baptizing Jesus because he didn’t feel worthy enough, Jesus responded, “Let it be so now; it is proper for us to do this to fulfill all righteousness (Matt.3:15).” Why baptism for Jesus? Four reasons stand out in His reply.
First, ‘let it be so now’ means being right has a starting point and that starting point is always right now, the present moment. Every present moment is a ‘now.’ There is never a moment that does not begin with a call to be right. Jesus is telling us that all our ‘nows’ are fulfilled in Him if we let Him be Lord of our hearts.
Second, ‘it is proper for us to do this’ indicates there is a joint obedience of baptizer and the one baptized, humble submission before God and one another. Humility is defined by Jesus. Humility always means yielding to God and His Word’s direction in the presence of others regardless of their spiritual condition.
Third, ‘to fulfill’ meant to complete what Jesus had begun, which would be realized when He said on the Cross, ‘It is finished.’ Only Jesus knew the way to fulfill His Father’s will for all humanity and that would be His spiritual and physical sacrifice on the Cross. He would give His life for others to show the way of the Cross is the ‘now’ of being right, being faithful.
Fourth, ‘all righteousness’ meant everything that being right includes---being right with God, being right in our mind and heart and being right among others. That ‘right’ was what Jesus modeled. Baptism was the first step in the mission He was to complete on the Cross, that is being right in everything, in thought, in decision and behavior, from the moment of birth, all through His life and in His death. No one before or since has ever been right like He was right.
Baptism is the beginning of our spiritual recovery and restoration. When we ask Jesus into our heart He gives us the outward and visible sign of baptism to assure us that we are on an inward and spiritual journey with Jesus as Lord. It is a journey in being right sustained and maintained by God’s grace through faith. This is the first step in reconciliation. God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself One heart at a time.
The next step Jesus took in the Spirit was to face the devil’s temptation in the wilderness. He fasted forty days and forty nights to prepare to face the devil’s temptations. That experience is what we will look at next. Stay tuned.
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