The Baptism and Genealogy of Jesus
21 When all the people were being baptized, Jesus was baptized too. And as he was praying, heaven was opened 22 and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: "You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased."
23 Now Jesus himself was about thirty years old when he began his ministry. He was the son, so it was thought, of Joseph,
the son of Heli, 24 the son of Matthat,
the son of Levi, the son of Melki,
the son of Jannai, the son of Joseph,
25 the son of Mattathias, the son of Amos,
the son of Nahum, the son of Esli,
the son of Naggai, 26 the son of Maath,
the son of Mattathias, the son of Semein,
the son of Josek, the son of Joda,
27 the son of Joanan, the son of Rhesa,
the son of Zerubbabel, the son of Shealtiel,
the son of Neri, 28 the son of Melki, the son of Addi,
the son of Cosam,
the son of Elmadam, the son of Er,
29 the son of Joshua, the son of Eliezer,
the son of Jorim, the son of Matthat,
the son of Levi, 30 the son of Simeon,
the son of Judah, the son of Joseph,
the son of Jonam, the son of Eliakim,
31 the son of Melea, the son of Menna,
the son of Mattatha, the son of Nathan,
the son of David, 32 the son of Jesse,
the son of Obed, the son of Boaz,
the son of Salmon, [d] the son of Nahshon,
33 the son of Amminadab, the son of Ram, [e]
the son of Hezron, the son of Perez,
the son of Judah, 34 the son of Jacob,
the son of Isaac, the son of Abraham,
the son of Terah, the son of Nahor,
35 the son of Serug, the son of Reu,
the son of Peleg, the son of Eber,
the son of Shelah, 36 the son of Cainan,
the son of Arphaxad, the son of Shem,
the son of Noah, the son of Lamech,
37 the son of Methuselah, the son of Enoch,
the son of Jared, the son of Mahalalel,
the son of Kenan, 38 the son of Enosh,
the son of Seth, the son of Adam,
the son of God.
Dig Deeper
It’s funny how, at least in the American culture, when we meet someone among the first thing we want to know about them is what they do for a living. This can be discovered by the virtually interchangeable questions of “where do you work” or “what do you do”. Either question works just fine. I can’t help but notice that for many people, though, what they do becomes nearly synonymous for them with who they are. In fact, if you ask the somewhat odd question, “who are you” of someone you whom you have already met to the point that you know their name and they don’t think you’re having some disturbing lapse of memory, they will answer that question by giving you their vocation, such as “I’m a lawyer”. There is an important concept here that I discovered in college. There is a vital difference in understanding what you do, your vocation, and who you are. Whoever you are reading this, you are not a basketball player, or a college student, or a fireman, or a nurse, or a teacher. Those are things that you do, not who you are. When we lose sight of that we begin to take an unhealthy view, in many cases, of ourselves and what we do. Not to overstate the case and create a problem that’s not there for people, but it is important to understand the difference between who you are and what you do for a living.
I have seen many disciples struggle with this same misidentification which is why a passage like the baptism of Jesus is such an important reminder for us. Jesus came to do specific things on the earth as the Messiah. He came to seek and save the lost and to serve men by laying his life down for them. But what allowed Jesus, I believe, to accomplish those tasks so well was that he knew very well his identity. He knew very well who he was and it was that which kept him focused on his mission. If we begin to think of our identity in terms of what we do, it can be easy to lose site of who we really are and we can easily, as time goes on, lose sight of the true motivation that will keep us going in our vocation and keep us balanced in all areas of life.
For Luke, this passage is all about identity. Who is Jesus? Who did he know himself to be and who should we know him to be? Jesus came to John to be baptized by him, that much we know. But the question of why he did it is what puzzles many people. The primary reason that Jesus likely was baptized by John was to demonstrate the truth of John’s message. God was about to act on his promises to create his family of many nations and bring salvation to that family and so people had better get prepared just as John had suggested. At the same time, Luke likely saw this as an anointing of sorts. Just as kings of Israel were anointed by prophets, so was Jesus anointed officially as the Messiah by John through the means of this baptism.
Luke stresses that immediately following the baptism (he doesn’t indicate a time frame so it’s probable that Jesus was still in the water with John) Jesus began to pray. We are never told if Jesus’ prayer was quietly between he and the Father or louder for others to hear, so we don’t know if others also heard the voice that came from heaven. The text simply doesn’t indicate one way or the other. As he is praying, the Holy Spirit descends in bodily form like a dove. The connection here is difficult to ascertain as there are no direction connections in any other Scripture between the Holy Spirit and a dove. We should note that the text does not indicate that the Spirit was in the bodily form of a dove but was in bodily form and that form descended in a dove-like fashion. Some have suggested that the mention of the dove is because a dove was often seen as the herald of good news in this society. If there is a connection that can be made, I would suggest the connection between Noah’s flood and the dove that brought back evidence of life that was soon to come. What we shouldn’t miss as Jesus is anointed by the Holy Spirit, though, is the biblical connection between water and the Spirit. In Genesis 1 we are told that the Spirit was hovering over the water. During the Exodus, the Israelites were led across the Sea by the Spirit that was in the pillars of smoke and fire. Isaiah 44:3 foretold of a time when God would pour out his Spirit and water on the land. Similarly, in Ezekiel 36:25-27, the prophet declared that God would one day cleanse his people with water and give them a new Spirit. This, of course, all seems to lead up to and culminate in the act of being baptized into Christ to receive the gift of the indwelling Holy spirit (Acts 2:38). It seems that God has a long history of connecting water events with his Spirit and we would do well to take notice of it.
But it seems for Luke that this all is leading up to the declaration that Jesus is his Son, the one that he love, and with whom he is well pleased. It seems that each phrase here contains important allusions back to passages in the Old Testament. The mention of Jesus as Son is an allusion back to the messianic Son in Psalm 2:7. Psalm 2 does not imply that the Father was not the father of son until a certain day but rather that there would be a specific day where that relationship was revealed. There are obvious connections as well to the idea of Jesus being the Son of God, an idea we’ll return to shortly. The next allusion comes from Isaiah 42:1 where God promises to put his Spirit in a public and visible way on his servant so that he may bring justice to the nations. The best way to understand the “servant” mentioned throughout Isaiah 40-55 is that in some ways this was to be the role of Israel as God’s servant and son but Israel shirked that role and so the Messiah would come to fulfill it and complete it. The final allusion comes likely from Isaiah 41:8 where there is connection between the loved servant being the one who was chosen. Behind all of this, there are surely echoes of Genesis 22 where Abraham is asked to offer the one and only son whom he loved.
When we put all of those allusions together we begin to get a good idea of who Jesus was in the sense of his identity. He was the chosen Messiah who would fulfill the vocation of Israel as God’s servant. He would be the one that God loved and would be the Son of God. The phrase “Son of God” has thrown many people off over the years and is worth the time to consider briefly. There are two different strands of usage for the phrase “Son of God” in the Old Testament. The phrase was used on a few occasion to refer to angels (Gen. 6:2: Job 1:6; 2:1); although the term when applied to angels is always in the plural). The phrase was also used to describe Israel as God’s firstborn son (Ex. 4:22). The New Testament writers appropriated that title and applied it to Jesus who called himself the Son of God on several occasions who came to reveal YHWH of the Old Covenant as the Father, the Son and the Spirit. To add to matters, as we see here, in verse 38, Adam was also called the son of God.
But what did the phrase “Son of God” mean in first century Jerusalem and what does it tell us about Jesus’ identity? The first thing that we must do is rule out a few options. The identification of Israel and Adam as son rule out the possibility that the phrase refers only to angels. Yet, the phrase does not refer only to the nation of Israel so it cannot be just nations. The use of the phrase to describe angels and Israel rules out that the term can apply to any or all humans or those that were born through some specific fathering act of God.
We must look for something that ties all of these entities together. To put it succinctly, “Son of God” was a term that was given to one whose source was directly from God. The angels came directly from God. Israel was directly created by God as a people and a nation. Adam came directly from God as did Jesus, who was sent by the Father to be the Messiah, the Son of God. For the Jews of Jesus’ day, however, they had come to use the term almost exclusively to apply to the coming Messiah. For Jesus, though it meant more than that. Not only are Sons of God directly manifested from God, it is also an indication of being in the image of God. Adam was created in the image of God but lost some of that image when he sinned and so his own sons were born in his image (Gen. 5:3) and could no longer be called sons of God. Israel was created to be God’s firstborn son, the possessor of God’s promises and inheritance but they forfeited that position as a nation as well and never fulfilled the role of being the true son of God. Jesus, however, was the image of God (2 Cor. 4:4; Col. 1:15) and could rightly be called his Son. He would fulfill the role of the firstborn, meaning the one to whom the promises of inheritance would be passed. All that God had promised to Abraham would be given to Christ. What would soon become clear is that those who would trust Christ, die to themselves, and enter into his life through baptism into Christ (Acts 2:38; Rom. 6:1-10) would begin the process of being restored to the image of God (Col. 3:10; 2 Cor. 3:18; Eph. 4:21-24) and have the right to call God our Father (Rom. 8:15; Gal. 4:6; Jn. 20:17) and be called the sons of God (Matt. 5:9; Jn. 1:12; Rom. 8:14, 19, 21; Gal. 3:26; Phil. 2:15; 1 Jn. 3:1, 2, 10; 5:2; 19). Through the sacrifice of the Messiah, those who enter into his life can actually become sons of God as ones who have been reborn with God as our direct source.
The idea of identity leads in to the list of descent that Luke gives here. There is much more to be said here than can possibly be discussed in this format but suffice it to say that Luke’s primary purpose is to demonstrate that Jesus is not only the descendant of Abraham, and thus a rightful human heir to the promises of Abraham, but he goes beyond that (Luke likely felt that Abraham was so entrenched as being the father of the Jewish people that he wanted to go beyond that to connect with a universal heir) as a direct descendant of Adam and thus could serve as the savior of all people from all nations. Much has been made of the differences between Luke’s line and Matthew’s, more than we can consider here but we need only mention that we cannot ever be certain as to the reason for the differences but there are several reasonable solutions to explain the differences. Probably the most attractive explanation is that the differences are the result of one gospel writer tracing the physical descent while the other traces the legal descent caused by levirate marriages such as described in Deut. 25:5-10 (another much-argued explanation is that Matthew presents Joseph’s line while Luke presents Mary’s). What we must remember, though, is that Luke has already let us know that Jesus’ important identity is as the true Son of God whose true genealogy comes from the miraculous conception. The earthly descent listed here simply give him the legitimate status he needs from a human perspective to carry out his role as the Messiah.
To seek and save the lost and reconcile them into God’s family was what Jesus would do, that was his mission, but that was not who he was. As a man, he was positionally the Son of God. In the same way, we are called to be followers of Jesus and walk as he walked (1 Jn. 2:6) which means that are mission is also to seek and save the lost. But our mission must come from our identity and not become our identity. If we believe our purpose is to evangelize, we are in danger of having it become a grind and begin to question “who we are”. But if we know our identity as the sons of God brought into his family though the Messiah, then we will be spurred on by the gratitude of that gift to invite others into the family of God.
Devotional Thought
Have you ever thought of the differentiation between your identity in Christ and your mission in Christ? How does firmly knowing your identity change your perspective on the mission that we have been allowed to share in to seek and save the lost?
No comments:
Post a Comment