I’m with Them

Notes
Transcript
Have you ever been through an experience and felt incredibly alone? Wishing that someone would be there with you?
It’s the little kid reaching up and grabbing his dad’s hand, and his dad squeezes it, saying “It’s okay, I’m here.”
And all of a sudden, the situation isn’t as bad as it seemed.
Then adulthood comes and we can’t grab our dad’s hand anymore, not really. We have to be adults.
But, we’ve got friends. And sometimes those friends and family members stand shoulder to shoulder with us and say: I’m with her. You’re not going to come near her.
Sometimes, we just want that person to say: I’m with him. I’m with her.
We want someone who will identify with us.
Today, we read about identification. The king of kings saying: I’m with my creation. I’m one of them.
Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to be baptized by John. But John tried to deter him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?”
Jesus replied, “Let it be so now; it is proper for us to do this to fulfill all righteousness.” Then John consented.
As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water. At that moment heaven was opened, 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, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.”
A small, simple passage, but pivotal in the point that Matthew is trying to make in his book.
Before we dive in, would you pray with me?
1. Jesus Is the King
1. Jesus Is the King
First, let’s talk about Jesus. We are going to work through this text from the end to the beginning.
So, all your questions about Jesus getting baptized, just hold onto until we get there.
Jesus was baptized and something incredible happened.
As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water. At that moment heaven was opened, 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, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.”
I can only imagine what this was like for those standing around. For everyone, this was just a regular Jew coming to John to be baptized, just as they all were. They didn’t have the same hesitancy for Jesus’ baptism as John did, and the conversation was rather cryptic, so they didn’t really understand what was going on.
But, can you imagine their surprise when a voice came from heaven?
The words: the heaven was opened speaks for God’s revelation, specifically for deliverance.
In my thirtieth year, in the fourth month on the fifth day, while I was among the exiles by the Kebar River, the heavens were opened and I saw visions of God.
400 years have passed since God had spoken to a prophet. When John began baptizing, people asked him if he was a prophet, and he said that he wasn’t, so they were still waiting.
And then, the heaven was opened and God spoke. He broke the silence to share truth. He did it momentarily when John’s dad. He did it with Mary and Joseph. All of which was pointing to this Jesus. And then, God literally spoke, so that people around heard.
But, before he spoke, the Holy Spirit descended like a dove. It wasn’t a dove. It was like a dove. Important distinction.
Throughout both Jewish and pagan tradition, birds brought favorable omens from deities.
After the flood, the dove came bringing that branch, promising a new world, that Noah and his family would finally come off of the ark. The first step of the covenant that God made with Noah, providing a new world, a new order, a new law.
Here, the dove appeared, coming down on Jesus, pointing to the new world, new order, new law that the Messiah would bring.
And then, God spoke.
A voice from heaven, speaking words that were very familiar to the audience.
I will proclaim the Lord’s decree:
He said to me, “You are my son;
today I have become your father.
This was a Psalm that would be sung at a enthronement of a new king. But, there had not been in a king in Israel for almost 600 years. Over the previous few hundred years, Jewish teacher began referring to this Psalm about when the Messiah would come and bring about the end of the age.
The Jewish hearers could also have remembered Isaiah.
“Here is my servant, whom I uphold,
my chosen one in whom I delight;
I will put my Spirit on him,
and he will bring justice to the nations.
The Messiah, whom God had chosen, would be called the son of God, a servant in whom God delighted, who would suffer in the process of bringing judgment on the enemies of God.
We can’t read this passage separated from the previous three chapters.
Matthew has set up proof about Jesus that has to be contented with.
Three voices have now attested to Jesus’ identity. We have seen how the birth of Jesus fulfilled the prophecy of Scripture. So the voice of Scripture attests that Jesus is the Messiah.
We studied about John last week. The voice of the prophet in the wilderness, just like Isaiah, proclaimed that this man was the Messiah.
And now, the voice of Heaven.
This three-fold testimony is important. The Jews would not believe a voice from heaven alone, because the heavenly voice could testify to others. The heavenly voice may not be from God but from the enemy. The voice is always subordinate to Scripture.
But, here the voice confirms the testimony of both the Prophet and Scripture.
Jesus is not a mere prophet, but the Messiah, the subject of other prophets’ messages.
In other words, he is the king spoken of in Psalm 2 and throughout the Old Testament, the one who would come to bring righteousness and judgment.
But, not only is he the king.
2. The King Identifies with His Subjects
2. The King Identifies with His Subjects
But, he is the king who identifies with his subjects.
Now, we get to talk about that baptism.
Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to be baptized by John. But John tried to deter him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?”
Jesus replied, “Let it be so now; it is proper for us to do this to fulfill all righteousness.” Then John consented.
As we discussed last week, John was presenting a unique baptism to the Jewish people. Normally, a non-Jew would baptize himself in the Jorden when he converted to Judaism. But, John was baptizing Jews who came in repentance, symbolizing a new life, a recommitment to the covenant with God, a pointing forward to the new life God promised with the coming Messiah, whenever he would come.
Part of the baptism was a confession of sins, a detail of how the particular Jew had turned from God and why he needed to come back to God.
In this context, Jesus, the prophesied Messiah, came to John to be baptized by him.
And John does a double-take:
But John tried to deter him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?”
The Messiah was perfect. He was the sinless sacrifice.
He was assigned a grave with the wicked,
and with the rich in his death,
though he had done no violence,
nor was any deceit in his mouth.
He didn’t need to be baptized for repentance. Furthermore, he was the one would baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire, as John said in the previous passage:
“I baptize you with water for repentance. But after me comes one who is more powerful than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.
John looks at this situation, Jesus standing in the water, expectantly before him, and says: this isn’t right.
But, Jesus answers rather enigmatically:
Jesus replied, “Let it be so now; it is proper for us to do this to fulfill all righteousness.” Then John consented.
Again, Jesus is sinless. How does baptism fulfill all righteousness?
Through baptism, he identifies with his subjects in obedience and suffering.
His “baptism is the key event in unfolding everything that will eventually be entailed in rightly relating the world to God.”
In his baptism, he fulfills the Biblical patterns and predictions about the Messiah. John has prepared the way for him. The Spirit comes down on him. The Father endorses the Son in a voice from Heaven.
Through his baptism, he proclaims and exemplifies the righteousness preached by the prophets.
He is obedient to the call of the Father on the Messiah.
Just as we, his subjects, are called to be obedient.
Not only was he obedient, but pointed to suffering.
He had no sin to confess, yet he shows humility by being baptized by a sinner, just as he was birthed by a sinner. His ministry was to the lowly, yet repentant people. The remnant in Israel, the remnant in the world.
And through the baptism, as he is plunged under the water and coming back up, he shows the path that his humility and suffering will take, even to this death, burial, and ultimate resurrection.
He suffers the death that all of creation should suffer, so that he might reconcile us to the Father.
The King identifies with his subjects, in obedience and suffering.
3. The Subjects Should Identify with the King
3. The Subjects Should Identify with the King
Having a king who is willing to identify himself with his subjects should have subjects who return the favor.
The world is full of stories of royalty who sneak out of the palace to understand the lives of their subjects, and how those subjects are endeared to their ruler because of this love.
But, when faced with the real story about the King of Kings coming to earth and identifying with his creation, the world tries to stop their ears and run in the other direction, at the least. Others try to show how Jesus really is true.
But, that doesn’t really work. Because they try to say that he isn’t really the king of kings and lord of lords.
However, he definitively said that he was the king of kings and lord of lords, the Messiah prophesied about.
So, there are only three options, as CS Lewis puts it: Either Jesus is a liar, which really doesn’t play well with him being a good teacher. Or he is a lunatic, which doesn’t play well with the good teacher thing either. Or he is the Lord. He is who he says he is.
We can’t sit on the fence about him. Either he is who he says he is, or he isn’t and we completely write him off.
Unfortunately for those who write him off, the proof is stacked on the said that he is telling the truth. Even secular writers, even Jewish writers, during the time of Jesus said that something was different about this man.
Which is why so many people followed him.
Are you following him? He came from Heaven, lived among us, experiencing our life, yet without sin, dying for us, paying the penalty for our sins, so that we might have a relationship with him.
So, that when we go through the suffering of this life, we could know that we are not alone but have a God who identifies with us.
So, that when we know what is right, but are having a hard time being obedient to him, we know that we have a God who identifies with us.
Are you following him? It’s so easy. We don’t have to go through a bunch of hoops or rules.
If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.
Have you believed on him? Have you received that gift?
That’s the first step in identifying with him. That’s the process of salvation.
But, there are more things about identifying with him.
He was baptized to identify with us. We are to be baptized to identify with him.
At the end of Matthew, he records what happened right before Jesus ascended into heaven.
Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
We are to be baptized to identify with him. Through being immersed in the water, we who are his followers identify with his death and when we are raised out of the water, we identify with his resurrection.
We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.
We identify with him by placing our faith in him, following him in salvation. We identify by public baptism, showing the decision that we made in our hearts.
We identify with him by the lives that we live.
I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection from the dead.
We live lives of holiness, showing the power of the resurrection our lives as we say no to sin and everything else that tries to steal the throne in our lives, trying to dethrone Christ as the king of kings and lord of lord.
We live lives of holiness, embracing the suffering that comes from those who are radical followers of Jesus, because the world doesn’t like pious people.
We do it, because he did it for us.
We identify with him, because he identified with us.
He is king. He is my king. He is your king. May we proclaim it until he comes again.
Today, we get to proclaim it through communion.