And lo a voice from heaven, saying, This is
my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. (Matthew 3:17)
Jesus
Christ begins his public ministry with a seemingly weird and unexpected action.
He decides to go to the shore of the Jordan River to get baptized by Prophet
John. In fact, people would come to John in order to admit that they were
sinful and deprived of God’s grace. Those people yearned for spiritual renewal
and repentance. It was precisely what St. John called them for: And he came into all the country about
Jordan, preaching the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins; As it is
written in the book of the words of Esaias the prophet, saying, The voice of
one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths
straight. (Luke 3:3-4).
Why did
Lord Jesus go to the Jordan River to be baptized from John, given that He was
absolutely sinless, according to the doctrine of the Orthodox Church based on
Divine Revelation? We may find a very profound answer in some worship hymns of
the Baptism of the Lord, following the time-honored maxim Lex orandi est lex
credendi (the law of prayer is the law of faith).
1. Consecration of Waters
O ye
faithful, let us hymn the magnitude of God’s benefactions toward us; for having
become man for the sake of our transgressions, He Who alone is pure and
incorrupt, Who sanctifieth me and the waters, and crusheth the heads of the
serpents in the water, is purified in the Jordan with our purification.
Wherefore, let us draw forth water with gladness, O brethren; for the grace of
the Spirit is invisibly imparted to those who draw it forth with faith, by
Christ God, the Savior of our souls. (Sticheron
of the Baptism of the Lord, tone 6, during the great consecration of water)
During
the entire service of the Baptism of the Lord, church hymns keep repeating that
when the Savior descended into the waters of the Jordan, He purified waters by
his divinity. What does it mean? And why does water need purification? In fact,
the world is literally contaminated with sin and lies in wickedness. When Jesus
walks into the waters of the Jordan, He performs his first exorcism, his first
purification of the matter poisoned by the sin, his first transformation of the
creation, which groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now (Romans
8:22). The Church of Christ keeps doing what her Head once did even now: She
purifies everything; She transforms matter and the cosmos itself with her
Sacraments and rituals, and brings it to God, for She deems it the purpose of a
redeemed human to transform the matter and to dedicate it to the Creator.
2.
Destruction of Evil Forces.
Thou
didst bow Thy head before the Forerunner, and didst crush the heads of the
serpents. Having come to the streams, Thou didst illumine all things, that they
may glorify Thee, O Savior, the Enlightener of our souls. (Sticheron on Now and Ever: Lord, I Have
Cried of the Theophany Vespers)
We often
hear about the Lord crushing the heads of the serpents in water. What are those
serpents? They are mentioned not only on Theophany Day but also during all
blessings of water, including every Sacrament of Baptism. Do some spiritual
entities or beings swim in the water font in the middle of a church before the
consecration of water? That’s what Protopresbyter Alexander Schmemann, an
outstanding liturgical scholar and theologian of our time, has to say about it:
“Matter is never neutral according to Christian worldview. If it isn’t attached
to God, i.e., not interpreted and used as a means to interact with God, as a
way of living with him, it turns into a carrier and dominion of demonic powers.
It is not surprising that the rejection of God and religion goes hand in hand
with materialism, which claims that it possesses the latest scientific
‘knowledge’. The unprecedented war against God, which has taken hold of more
and more of the so-called civilized world lately, happens in the name of that
‘scientific truth’. It is not accidental, either, that pseudo-religiosity and
pseudo-spirituality are more often than not based on rejection of matter and
therefore of the world itself: the matter is viewed as evil, which is a
blasphemy against God’s creation. Only the Bible and Christian faith view the
matter as something that’s essentially good but on the other hand also a tool
of human downfall and enslavement to death and sin, by which the Satan stole
the world from God. Only in Christ and by his power can matter be liberated and
become the symbol of God’s glory and presence, the mystery of his action and
unity with man, again.” (Protopresbyter Alexander Schmemann, Of Water and the
Spirit).
3. Fulfillment of the Law.
Desiring
to fulfill that which Thou hast established from before time, O Lord, Thou
didst accept ministers of Thy mystery from among all creatures: Gabriel from
among the angels, the Virgin from among men, the star from among the heavens,
and the Jordan from among the waters, wherein Thou didst destroy the iniquity of
the world. O our Savior, glory be to Thee! (Sticheron
on Glory at Litya, tone 8. All-Night Vigil of Theophany)
Although
the Lord didn’t need to be baptized because He had never committed any sin, He
nevertheless allowed John the Baptist to baptize him, in spite of the fearful
protest of the Forerunner - I have need to be baptized of thee, and comest thou
to me? (Matthew 3:14). He did it for our sake because our nature, which the
Savior had assumed, was in need of Baptism and purification from the ancient curse.
Also, the Lord came not in order to break the Law but to fulfill it. John’s
Baptism was the last Old Testament ritual because John the Baptist was the
greatest and the last prophet of the Old Testament who proclaimed God’s will,
which all people had to abide by. The Lord replies to St. John, Suffer it to be
so now: for thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness (Matthew 3:15).
4. Apparition of the Holy Trinity. Epiphany.
Christ is
baptized. He cometh up out of the waters and leadeth the world up with Himself.
And He beholdeth the heavens opening, which Adam closed to himself and to those
with him. And the Spirit beareth witness to His divinity, for He maketh haste
to come to His like. And a voice is heard from heaven; for the Savior of our souls
is borne witness to from thence. (Sticheron
on Litya of the All-Night Vigil. By Cosmas of Maiuma)
The
Baptism of the Lord marked one of the greatest apparitions of the Godhead in
the history of the humankind, hence the ancient name of this holiday, Epiphany.
The Lord reveals himself as the Holy Trinity, the Father, and the Son, and the
Holy Spirit, while at the same time being One God. The doctrine of the Holy
Trinity is the most marvelous and majestic truth of Christianity made known by
Jesus Christ. The Holy Trinity is the absolute plenitude of goodness, love,
harmony, and agreement, which constitutes His greatest beauty and freedom. Most
strikingly, every individual of any age and any rank is called to enter the
relationship with the Triune God and let the Lord into their heart. The love of
the Holy Trinity will animate everything and everyone around that person.
To sum
up, we can say that the Lord was baptized by John in the waters of the Jordan
River in order to purify water and to pave the way for the restoration and
purification of the created world. Today, every Orthodox Christian who is
vested with priestly grace can do what Jesus once did by putting his fingers
into the baptismal font and making the sign of the cross with them. Moreover,
all Christians are able to perform the great Sacrament of Baptism in extreme
cases. If we recall that we are the universal royal priesthood, as Holy Apostle
Peter said, we can transform the entire Cosmos with our prayer, multiply love,
crush invisible serpents, and purify ourselves, our food, and our houses with
the Holy Hagiasma, that precious gift that the Lord gives us on this day.
Christ came to the world to fulfill the Law of God and to bring grace into the
world. He came to us in order to reveal the Mystery of the Holy Trinity, to
redeem us from our sins, and to pour God’s love into our hearts. Let us exclaim
Amen happily and accept His gift.
By John Nichiporuk,
a Bachelor of Theology,
specialized in Biblical Studies.
The Catalog of Good Deeds, 2019
CONVERSATION