Welcome to Holy Mass
Volume 4 Issue 2
10/11 January 2026
Baptism of the Lord
One of the few things we can say with certainty about Jesus is that he was baptized by John. The early church found this awkward because it made Jesus appear subordinate to John, yet the event was too widely known to ignore. That discomfort explains why the Gospels describe it so differently: Mark states it plainly, Luke refers to it indirectly, John focuses only on the Spirit descending, and Matthew tries to soften the implication by showing John protesting that Jesus should be the one baptizing him. All of this convinces me that Jesus truly did submit himself to John’s baptism as a sign of commitment to what God was doing among the people.
This raises an important question: why did Jesus choose this path? Jesus himself praised John as unlike anyone who came before him. John’s power was not merely his dramatic lifestyle or fiery preaching, but his ability to awaken people to the nearness of God’s reign and move them to change their lives. At the height of John’s influence, Jesus stepped forward and asked for baptism, publicly identifying himself with John’s vision and mission.
I imagine Jesus’ baptism as the culmination of a long inner journey. Like many before and after him, he must have wrestled with his vocation, searching the Scriptures for meaning and direction. The way Isaiah’s servant songs later shaped the disciples’ understanding of Jesus suggests that Jesus himself may have prayed with those texts, hearing God call him “my servant” and sensing a mission already forming within him. The psalms, too, likely shaped his prayer: “Here I am, Lord; I come to do your will.” From this flowed his conviction that obedience of the heart mattered more than ritual sacrifice.
Jesus’ decision to begin with John and then move beyond him shows me that discernment was not a once-off moment but a lifelong process. He listened, adapted, and allowed the Spirit to lead him into new and unexpected directions. His baptism reveals his full identification with our human searching, our fragility, and our need to listen deeply for God’s call.
Remembering Jesus’ baptism reminds me that he truly became one of us. And because we are baptized into him, we share not only his grace but also his freedom — the freedom to love, to change course, and to trust that we, too, are beloved and pleasing to God.