And it came to pass in those days [that] Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee, and was baptised by John at the Jordan.
Mark opens with no birth story and no family line. The first thing we see is a man leaving an obscure northern town to stand in the Jordan among people confessing their sins. Two questions press. Why start here? And why would the sinless One join a baptism meant for the repentant?
Where other accounts give credentials, Mark gives none. The Lord appears, and the work is already under way.
In Matthew we have seen the fullest credentials of the Messiah, from angels and from people. He was born there and then as King of the Jews, in Israel's own land. But in Mark all this is, with equal beauty, absent. There is no preparation but John preaching and baptizing. Then at once the Lord Jesus appears. He is not born, not the object of homage, but preaching. He takes up the work that John soon after laid down when he went to prison.
Another writer draws out what that missing family line means.
He is the Son of God in service. He humbled Himself by His own choice, as no one else ever has, and this is His brightest glory. His poverty makes others rich. That is why the genealogy that comes first in Matthew is not found at all in Mark. Love needs no title to serve, only the power to do so.
Nazareth was not a neutral address. It carried a reputation, and He carried it for most of His life.
There is nothing a person dreads more than being nothing at all. Even to be spoken against is not as dreadful to our poor proud spirit as being unnoticed at all. Yet Jesus spent by far the greater part of His life in that total obscurity. The record holds only one incident from His earliest years until He comes out for the ministry of the word of God and the gospel of the kingdom. And He lived in Nazareth, known as the lowest place in poor despised Galilee. Even a godly Galilean sneered and wondered whether any good thing could come out of Nazareth.
Those hidden years were not empty. One writer reads them as service already under way.
The Servant appears to begin His service. He came out from Nazareth of Galilee. There too, during the hidden years, He had served.
John's baptism was for people admitting their sin. Jesus went to it with them.
God, through John the Baptist, had called His people to repentance. Those in whom His word did its work came to John for baptism. It was the first sign of life and of obedience. Jesus was perfect in life and in obedience. He had come down in grace for the remnant of His people. He goes there, takes His place with them, and receives John's baptism as they did. Touching and marvellous testimony! He does not love from a distance. He does not love only by granting pardon. He comes by grace into the very place where the sin of His people had brought them.
Mark gives no explanation. The Lord's own answer to John supplies one.
Whatever John might think, the way of Jehovah lay through Jordan. Jehovah-Jesus was looking toward those who were poor and of a contrite spirit... The Lord meant, by a public and unmistakable act, to own that way. He answered the one who tried to hinder Him with grace: "Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness"... With special grace He linked John with Himself in the submission that godly service always involves. "It is fitting for us" are His words, for He was now stepping out into public view as the Servant of Jehovah.
Another writer sees the Jordan pointing past that morning to the end of the road.
Now we see Him coming out from Nazareth of Galilee, and Himself baptized by John in the Jordan. This is indeed the pledge by which He devotes Himself to the path of service that lies before Him. It is His "Behold, I have come." The Jordan pictures the death that is "written of Him in the scroll of the book," according to its law of sacrifice.
Heaven answered that lowly step at once.
Jesus comes from Nazareth, the humble and despised place in Galilee, and submits to John's baptism. He did not do it because He had anything to confess. He did it to identify Himself with those souls who in repentance were making a move in the right direction. Just then, before He came out in His public ministry, Heaven showed its approval of the perfect Servant. No one was to misread His lowly baptism.
- Servant — Mark drops the genealogy and the birth account. A servant proves himself by work, not by family line.
- Nazareth — He came from the most despised town, after long silent years. The obscurity was part of the service.
- Jordan — He steps into the water of a repentance He did not need. He joins Himself to those whose hearts God had already touched.
- Righteousness — "It is fitting for us" owns that way as God's way, and ties the messenger to the Master in one act of submission.
- Approval — Heaven's approval comes at once, so no one could mistake His humbling for guilt.
And straightway going up from the water, he saw the heavens parting asunder, and the Spirit, as a dove, descending upon him.
Mark gives no family tree and no birth story; he goes straight to the Jordan, where the Servant steps into the water and heaven answers Him. Why is the sky torn open, why does Jesus Himself see it, and why does the Spirit come as a dove?
Mark uses one word here that will come up again and again in his Gospel. It fits a servant who never delays.
The Servant appears to begin His service. He came out from Nazareth in Galilee. There too, during the hidden years, He had served. The Servant was completely sinless, and yet He was baptized in the Jordan. He showed His perfect willingness to take the sinner's place in death, in obedience to the Father's will. Verse 10 has the word "straightway" for the first time in Mark. It is the word that marks this Gospel, describing how prompt His service was. The anointing by the reception of the Spirit follows.
The word translated "opened" is stronger than it looks.
Now notice the expression used: "he saw the heavens being torn open" — that is what the word "opened" means, they were torn apart. It was as if God hurried to proclaim what His heart had found in His own Son; He tears the heavens open... the heavens are torn apart to let the whole mind of heaven out in its indescribable delight in Jesus Christ.
Heaven opened here for the opposite reason it later opened for Stephen, one of the first followers of Jesus.
The heavens were not opened to disclose an object there, as in the case of Stephen. On the contrary, heaven had found an object upon earth — the sinless and obedient Jesus. To Him came the voice, not of an angelic choir as to the shepherds on the plains of Bethlehem, but of the Father Himself... In this way, as Man, He was assured that God delighted in Him. So He began His ministry as the Servant of Jehovah, fully aware in Himself that He was the Son.
The form the Spirit took says something about the Person He came upon.
And then you have the seal, the Holy Spirit descends on Him. Notice the words, "the Spirit like a dove descending upon him" — that is the form the descending Spirit took, no doubt expressing what He was in His own Person. The dove, as you know, was the bird of sorrow and the bird of love. So it was a fitting picture of what our Lord Jesus Christ was in His own holy, precious, glorious Person.
The dove also recalls the dove Noah sent out over a flooded world.
When the dove was sent out for the third time she did not return, but it is not added that she found rest for the sole of her foot. Clearly she found somewhere to perch. We believe those words are left out because there is a picture here, one that comes to light when we reach Matthew 3:16. When the Lord Jesus came, there was at last found One on whom the Spirit of God could permanently rest, and not before.
The Spirit coming down on Him is the anointing, and Jesus later pointed back to it.
And all this came about. God "anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power" (Acts 10:38). This anointing gave Him credentials no one could question. The Lord pointed to them at Nazareth, when He announced that another prophecy about Himself was fulfilled: "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor," and so on (Isa. 61:1; Luke 4:18). Only this Gospel says that Jesus Himself saw the Spirit given. John the Baptist saw it too, though we know of no one else, as John 1:32, 34 and Matthew 3:16 show; Luke 3:22 names no witness.
What happened at the Jordan is not only about Him.
And now where is He, the Servant, He who humbled Himself, who has His place with His poor people, the poorest of His flock? Heaven is open, the Holy Spirit descends on Him, the Father owns Him as His Son. He is the model of the position He has taken for us by redemption... For us too the veil is torn, and heaven is open. We have been anointed and sealed with the Holy Spirit as Jesus was... Jesus was such in His own proper and full right, worthy of being so in Himself; we are brought in by grace and redemption.
- At once. Mark's word for "immediately" appears here for the first time and sets the tone of the whole book: the Servant moves without delay.
- Torn. Heaven was not just opened but torn apart — God hurrying to say aloud what His heart had found in His Son.
- Found. For Stephen, heaven opened to show an object above; here heaven opened because it had found its object below.
- Rested. No resting place is recorded for Noah's dove; the Spirit at last found One on whom He could remain.
- Shared. He was anointed as Servant by right; those who believe are anointed and sealed by grace, with heaven open to them too.
And there came a voice out of the heavens *Thou* art my beloved Son, in thee I have found my delight.
The voice at the Jordan comes as Jesus steps out of thirty years of obscurity into public work. Heaven does not stay silent about Him. Three questions follow: who does the voice speak to, how strong is the word "beloved," and what is God looking at when He says He is pleased.
Matthew records the words as "This is my beloved Son" (Matthew 3:17). Mark and Luke record "You are." The wording differs because the purpose differs. Here the Father speaks straight to His Son.
"I have found my delight." That is, delight in the self-humbling of Jesus, seen in His submission to the baptism. This does not leave out the Lord's earlier life on earth, nor His condition before He became man… Here we have the outward attestation of the sonship, given for the Lord's own enjoyment. So in Luke 3:22. In Matthew 3:17 the Spirit records the voice as spoken to the Baptist.
The Father spoke to the Son, but others stood within hearing. One man's whole later message rested on what he heard that day.
How did John the Baptist learn that He was the Son of God? For revelation alone teaches that. Had he not heard the Father's voice speaking to His Son at His baptism in the Jordan?… The Father directed that word from heaven to the Son, but surely John heard it. Special revelation had taught John that this One would baptize with the Holy Spirit, and he could declare it with certainty. With equal certainty he could proclaim the Sonship, having heard the Father's own words to His Son.
The word translated "beloved" is not a soft adjective. In the language of the day it carried the force of only.
"Beloved Son." Compare Mark 1:11 and 2 Peter 1:17; so also in Matthew 17:5. In Luke 9:35 the best-attested reading is "chosen," which in Semitic languages is very much the equivalent of agapētos, "beloved." In Hellenistic Greek that word was a synonym of monogenēs — only-begotten.
Scripture says almost nothing about the years before the Jordan. This voice tells us what those hidden years were like.
The curtain drops at that moment on His life at Nazareth, and we see no more of Him until He reaches His thirtieth birthday. Then we learn what kind of life He had lived behind that veil. As He came out into public ministry, the heavens opened and a voice from the excellent glory declared, "This is My beloved Son, in whom is all My delight." So for thirty years God had been able to look down on Him, and in His every thought and word and deed He had found fullest delight.
So what was the Father pleased with — the work Jesus was about to do, or the Man Himself?
It is clear that Jesus was the delight of God as man. This was not merely because of a work that was going to be done. God owned the Person Himself… They must not mistake or misinterpret His baptism. For them it was the baptism of repentance, but for Him it was wholly in grace. He had nothing to own… "With you I am well pleased" — not only "I am," but "I have been." It looks back, and is not about the present moment only.
Mark's account keeps Jesus before us as the Servant. Men would not value His service, but heaven's voice supported Him in it.
Mark in his gospel tells us that Jesus "saw the heavens being torn open." This gospel presents the Lord Jesus as the Servant. His was a service of infinite grace and love, and it meant giving His life (10:45). Yet men did not value that service. The Father's voice said, "You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased." Would not that sound be the comfort and support of this blessed Man, as He walked a path of devotion to God and love to man?
What happened over Jesus at the Jordan sets the pattern for His people. One difference never disappears.
Never had heaven so opened before; never had there been on earth an object which He could own as making His good pleasure. Now there was. For us too the veil is torn, and heaven is open. We have been anointed and sealed with the Holy Spirit as Jesus was; the Father has owned us to be His beloved sons already in this world. Jesus was such in His own proper and full right, worthy of being so in Himself; we are brought in by grace and redemption.
- Addressed — The Father speaks to Jesus, not just about Him. Mark and Luke give "You are," Matthew "This is." John the Baptist heard enough to preach the Sonship later.
- Beloved — "Beloved" here stands close to "only-begotten"; it marks Him out as the one Son, not one among many.
- Delight — "Well pleased" looks back over thirty hidden years at Nazareth, and over His self-humbling in baptism. God owns the Person before any work is done.
- Sustained — In the Gospel of the Servant, this voice is the support of a Man whose service the world would not value.
- Shared — Open heaven, the Spirit, and the Father's welcome are His by right. They are ours by grace and redemption — the same place, on different ground.