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Saturday, January 13, 2018

THE CEREMONY COMING BETWEEN

THE CEREMONY COMING BETWEEN
  


 Between these periods there came the solemn and significant ceremony of the baptism. As Jesus left that in His life which was preparatory, and entered upon the actual work of the ministry, He devoted Himself to the ul­timate issue of His work, that namely, of identification with men even to death. His being baptized was an act by which He consented to take His place among sinners. John's baptism was that of repentance. There was no room for repentance in Jesus, and yet because of His de­votion to their redemption, He took His place with them. This will be referred to again in subsequent considerations. It is named here as helping to explain the value of the su­pernatural manifestations accompanying the baptism. As in the act of baptism He yielded Himself, a sacrifice and an offering; the opened heavens, the descending dove, the living voice, each having its own significance, unite in the attestation of the perfection of the One so yielding Him­self, to the mightiest phase in the purpose of God, that of redemption by the way of sacrifice. The significance of this threefold fact may be considered briefly.
THE OPENED HEAVENS suggest the perfections of the thirty years, and declare in sacred sign and symbol that no act of His has excluded Him from the fellowship of the perfect. Heaven which must forever exclude whatsoever is imper­fect could have enfolded Him without the violation of any principle of the Eternal Holiness.
THE DESCENDING SPIRIT in the form of a dove was a recog­nition of the character, the Spirit, the disposition, of this Man, which lay behind the outward expression in conduct. Never anywhere else, is it recorded that the Spirit de­scended in the form of a dove. It rested upon Christ as the symbol of purity and of meekness. And yet it was also His anointing for the work of the three years. Seeing that the Spirit of anointing, which was preparation for the future, came in the form of a dove, which sealed the past; the fact was signified that the ministry in public would be exercised in the strength of, and carried forward in the Spirit of, the purity and the meekness which had character­ized the past.
Superadded to these signs there was THE SOUND OF THE LIVING VOICE. First in identification of this Person as the One Who was referred to in the prophetic writings, and in the words of the Psalmist,
“I will tell of the decree:
Jehovah said unto Me, Thou art My Son;
This day have I begotten Thee . . .
Kiss the Son, lest He be angry, and ye perish in the way." (Psa. 2:7, 12)
The great word coming out of the old economy is "the Son." Now at the baptism God says, "Thou art My be­loved Son." (Luke 3:22)
Thus the description has reference to His office, and appointment and anointing for service. The second part of the Divine pronouncement declares that God is well pleased in Him. This sets the seal of the Divine appro­bation upon the thirty years, and declares therefore the perfect fitness of the approved One for the carrying out of the work of the three.
Thus the thirty years of privacy merge into the three years of publicity, by the way of solemn and significant ceremony.
By these last articles the baptism is placed in its relation to these two periods in the ministry of Jesus. The next article will deal more fully with the perfections of the thirty, and the following one will indicate more fully the true meaning and value of the three.


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