Down to Earth But Heavenly Minded

What Does Matthew Chapter 3 Mean?

Matthew 2 ended with Jesus’ family settling down in Nazareth, shortly after the death of Herod the Great (Matthew 2:19–23). Chapter 3 leaps forward several decades. This passage opens on John the Baptist preaching in the wilderness in the region of Judea. His simple message: Repent, the kingdom of heaven is coming!

Luke’s gospel gives more details about John the Baptist. He was born to aging and previously infertile parents. This was both an answer to their prayers and part of God’s plan to “turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God, and he will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to make ready for the Lord a people prepared” (Luke 1:16–17).

Matthew declares that John is the fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy in Isaiah 40:3. He dressed like Elijah (2 Kings 1:8) and many associated John with that great Old Testament prophet (Malachi 4:5). He ate the food of the very poor: honey and wild locusts, emphasizing repentance and humility. Many people wanted to hear John’s message and travelled distances to hear him speak in the wilderness. Many of those were baptized by John as a symbol of their repentance from sin and readiness for the Messiah’s kingdom (Matthew 3:1–6).

John’s popularity attracts the attention of Israel’s formal religious leaders, the Pharisees and Sadducees. When he saw them arriving at his baptisms, though, he was harsh with them, calling them a brood of vipers. He asks who warned them to flee from God’s coming wrath on those who do not repent from sin. John warned them not to count on being spared simply for being descendants of Abraham. God’s promises to Israel would not keep Him from pruning the fruitless branches. God can raise up more children for Abraham even from the stones if He chooses to, John said (Matthew 3:7–10).

Finally, John spells out what his baptism is for. He baptizes the willing with water as a sign of repentance. He is preparing the way, though, for someone who is far more powerful than himself who will baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire. John is describing the long-promised Messiah, who will bring God’s kingdom to earth, but who will also bring judgment on those who are not faithful to God. He will separate them from Israel as the farmer separates the useful wheat from the useless chaff (Matthew 3:11–12).

Then, suddenly, Jesus shows up. The Messiah about whom John the Baptist has been prophesying finds John somewhere along the Jordan River and asks to be baptized. John resists. He has declared himself unworthy even to carry the Messiah’s sandals. Jesus insists, declaring that in this way they will fulfill the righteous will of God. This might have been a way of foreshadowing Jesus’ sacrificial death and resurrection. Or, it might simply have been a means to formally begin His public ministry (Matthew 3:13–15).

As Jesus emerges from the water, God the Father and Holy Spirit show up, as well. As Jesus resurfaces from the Jordan River, He sees the heavens open up and the Holy Spirit descend, somehow like a dove, to rest on Him. Then He hears the voice of God the Father declaring that Jesus is His Son, calling Christ beloved and saying He is well-pleased with Jesus (Matthew 3:16–17).

This launches Jesus’ work on earth, confirming His role as both the Son of God and the promised Messiah of the Jewish Scriptures.

Chapter Context
Matthew’s story of Jesus jumps forward several decades from the moment when His family settled in Nazareth. This passage finds John the Baptist preaching about repentance in the wilderness and baptizing those who are willing. Crowds come from all around to hear John preach in the look and style of Elijah, including Israel’s religious leaders. John warns them of God’s coming judgment on those who do not truly repent. Jesus arrives and insists that John baptize Him. As Jesus emerges from the water, the heavens break open, the Holy Spirit descends to rest on Jesus in dove-like form, and the voice of God declares that Jesus is His Son. After this baptism, Jesus will be led into the desert to be tempted by Satan, in chapter 4.

Verse By Verse

Verse 1 In those days John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea,

Matthew’s telling of Jesus’ life jumps forward in time between chapters 2 and 3. The apostle reports nothing of what happened from when Joseph settled in Nazareth to the meeting between Jesus and John the Baptist in Matthew 3. Around 25–30 years have passed.

Luke gives a very thorough telling of how John the Baptist came to be born to Zechariah and Elizabeth, both of the priestly line of the Levites (Luke 1:5–25, 39–80), and the important part he would play in preparing the way for Jesus.

Before he was born, an angel of the Lord told John’s father about the man John would become: “He will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God, and he will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to make ready for the Lord a people prepared” (Luke 1:16–17). Matthew’s gospel introduces John the Baptist already doing exactly that.

Matthew describes the time as “in those days.” We can place the scene in this chapter more specifically between AD 26 and 29. The prophet has already taken up residence as a preacher in the wilderness of Judea, which was some rough, dry country located west of the Jordan River near the Dead Sea. His location meant that those who wished to listen had to come to John; he did not go to the high-traffic areas of Israel to be heard by those passing by.

John was called “the Baptist” because baptizing people as a sign of their repentance from sin was a cornerstone of his ministry.

Verse 2 “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”

This gospel jumps forward in time from Jesus’ arrival as a small boy in Nazareth (Matthew 2:23) to the ministry of John the Baptist. At least 25 years have passed. John the Baptist was a prophet specially sent by God to prepare the way for Jesus’ ministry on earth. John—not the same as the author of the gospel of John—preached in the wilderness area of Judea, west of the Jordan River. He delivered one central message to the Israelites, found in this verse.

The word “repent” is metanoeite in Greek, which means “to change one’s heart and mind.” More literally, it means to change direction, to stop going the wrong way and to start going in the right way. It conveys an active change. The chapter will show that John was calling the people of Israel to confess their sins and submit to God’s true law.

John called these people to repent because the “kingdom of heaven” was at hand. John’s Jewish listeners would have been familiar with the idea that a new kingdom would one day be established by the promised Messiah. John will point to Jesus as that Messiah, and to the imminent establishment of His kingdom. John will insist, though, that repentance—turning from sin—was necessary for his Jewish listeners to be included in that kingdom. The mere fact of their Israelite heritage would not be enough. This would have been a new idea to some.

Scholars from different theological traditions have debated about whether this coming kingdom of heaven is best understood as spiritual or physical. The Jewish people were looking for a physical kingdom; they assumed Messiah would overthrow the Romans and establish peace and prosperity in Israel. Jesus’ kingdom, though, would first be spiritual in the sense that He would begin to rule on earth by ruling in the hearts of those who followed Him (John 18:36). Eventually, He will also reign over a physical, political kingdom on earth (Revelation 20:6).

Verse 3 For this is he who was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah when he said, “The voice of one crying in the wilderness:‘Prepare the way of the Lord;make his paths straight.’”

Matthew has introduced John the Baptist as a man preaching a simple message in the wilderness: Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand (Matthew 3:1–2). Now Matthew directly connects John to the prophecy in Isaiah 40:3, “A voice cries: ‘In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord; make straight in the desert a highway for our God.’”

To Isaiah’s original audience, this text was about preparing the literal roadway for the Israelite exiles to return to Judah from captivity in Babylon. Matthew, like the writers of the other Gospels, shows this verse is also about John the Baptist preparing the way of Jesus and those who would follow Him. John’s role was to symbolically “clear the path” for Jesus by calling Israel to repent of sin and turn back to the way of God. If they did so, they would be ready to follow God’s Son. As it was with the proportion of those who returned to Judah from Babylon, only a small percentage of Israelites would turn and follow Christ.

Matthew also continues to make the connection between the experiences of the nation of Israel and the life of Jesus.

Verse 4 Now John wore a garment of camel ‘s hair and a leather belt around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey.

Scripture’s description of John the Baptist intends to show him as something more than just a wild character. Of course, he was wild, indeed. He wore unusual clothing, like a camel’s hair garment with a leather belt, and ate unusual food, such as locusts and wild honey. Matthew’s description also connects John the Baptist to the prophet Elijah, who dressed in a similar way (2 Kings 1:8). Malachi prophesied that Elijah would return (Malachi 4:5).

John’s clothing and diet also connected him to the poor. Wilderness-dwelling people in the Middle East still eat locusts, which are similar to large grasshoppers. John’s simple, frugal lifestyle echoed his message to the Jewish people to humbly confess their sins and repent: to turn back to following God.

Verse 5 Then Jerusalem and all Judea and all the region about the Jordan were going out to him,

John the Baptist became a well-known figure in Israel, known for one clear message: Repent from your sins and be baptized because the coming of the Messiah is near (Matthew 3:1–2). The fact that he preached his message in an area of wilderness didn’t keep the crowds away. People traveled from Jerusalem and all around the region to listen to him and to be baptized by him.

Of course, almost nobody knew that John would identify Jesus as the long-promised Messiah of Israel. They also did not know that the kingdom Jesus would establish would come first to the hearts of those who follow Him and only much later would take the form of a political kingdom on earth.

Verse 6 and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.

People travelled some distance to come and hear the preaching of John the Baptist in the wilderness (Matthew 3:1–2). The odd-looking preacher spoke and acted like the prophets of Israel’s history, especially Elijah (2 Kings 1:8), who some suspected had returned to Israel in the form of John the Baptist (Malachi 4:5; John 1:21).

John’s message was simple and clear: The kingdom of heaven was near. Messiah was coming. Confess and repent of your sins. Demonstrate your commitment to leading a holy life by being baptized. Many people were doing exactly that, confessing their sins and being immersed by John in the Jordan River during an ongoing series of public baptisms.

John’s baptism wasn’t exactly the same as the Christian baptism practiced later in the church (Acts 18:25; 19:3–6). It was—like Christian baptism—a symbolic religious rite meant to declare a person’s agreement with God about his or her sin. The main purpose of John’s baptism was to publicly declare a renewed commitment to live as God had commanded in the law. Being immersed in the water and raised up out of it seems to have symbolized the cleansing of sin and escaping God’s judgment.

Verse 7 But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?

John the Baptist was attracting large crowds from all around the region (Matthew 3:1–2). People were traveling from Jerusalem and all Judea to hear him preach (Matthew 3:5). Many of those who came confessed their sins and were publicly baptized by John to symbolize their repentance from sin and commitment to lead holy lives in preparation for the coming of the Messiah (Matthew 3:6).

This seems to have caught the attention of Israel’s religious leaders. It’s unclear from the text why the Pharisees and Sadducees had come to the wilderness to hear and see John’s baptism. Were they there to repent and be baptized themselves as a religious act or were they there to observe and decide if they agreed with John’s teaching about the coming Messiah? Checking on John’s message would have been part of their spiritual duties (John 1:19–28); however, other gospels show these men are more interested in refuting John than in learning from him.

The Pharisees and Sadducees did not like each other very much. Pharisees were religious leaders and teachers more closely connected to the common people at the local level of the synagogues. They set the tone for everyday religious life in Israel. Highly respected and even feared, they held themselves—and others—to very strict standards when it came to following the law. They also developed a system of rules that went beyond the inspired law of Moses.

The Sadducees were a much smaller group of wealthier priests and religious aristocrats. They held different views than the Pharisees on key spiritual issues. Sadducees were committed to protecting their power. They were known for their cooperation with Rome’s occupation and were resented by the people.

John the Baptist clearly did not fear or admire either group. He calls them a brood of vipers, the same term Jesus will later use when talking to the Pharisees (Matthew 12:34). This name connects them to the deceiving serpent in the garden of Eden. John asks them who warned them to flee from God’s impending wrath? John saw in his prophecy of the coming of the kingdom of heaven as good news for those who lead holy lives but terrible news for those who continued in sin. His words show that he saw Israel’s religious leaders as sinful and unrepentant.

Verse 8 Bear fruit in keeping with repentance.

John the Baptist’s message to Israel was designed to bring comfort to some and discomfort to others. He proclaimed in the wilderness, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 3:2). This was both a promise and a warning. It meant that God was about to begin His rule on earth, bringing justice and vindication for those Israelites who were faithful to Him and judgment for those who were in rebellion. This was true even though the kingdom would be grounded in the hearts of Christ’s followers (John 18:36) and only in the very end times become a political, physical reality (Revelation 20:6).

In the previous verse, John spoke directly to Israel’s religious leaders who had come to see and hear him. He called them a brood of vipers and asked who had warned them to flee from God’s coming wrath. Now he tells them what it will take to be spared: They must repent in their actions and not just their words.

John tells the Pharisees and Sadducees that their repentance must bear fruit. In other words, it will not be enough to be seen publicly agreeing with John and being baptized by him in the Jordan River. Repentance means to change your mind and turn around, to head in a new direction. They must change their teaching and practice in leading the religious lives of the people of Israel. If the change is genuine, it will produce measurable results. It will bear fruit.

In the following verse, John will describe one error in their thinking and teaching.

Verse 9 And do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father,’ for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham.

Israel’s religious leaders are hearing a warning: God’s coming judgment is coming against them. John the Baptist now adds that they have made a wrong assumption about how God will deal with His people Israel. They had been operating under the idea that God would not focus His wrath on Israelites, the children of Abraham.

Israel’s religious leaders, of all people, should have known better. Throughout Israel’s history, God had brought judgment on His chosen people for their unfaithfulness to Him. He had always saved a remnant: a small proportion of the people. He had never broken any of His eternal promises to the nation, but that did not keep God from bringing judgment on most of the Israelites living at any specific time.

John’s warning, though, goes beyond that simple truth. He tells the Pharisees and Sadducees not to presume that the arrival of the kingdom of heaven means they will not be judged. While it is true that God will save a remnant of Abraham’s seed, John adds a curious statement: God is able to raise up new children of Abraham even from these stones. He may have been pointing to the stones in the Jordan River. This is wordplay. In both Greek and Aramaic, the word for stones is very close to the word for children.

John’s statement goes beyond suggesting that God will spare a remnant of the biological children of Abraham from His judgment as He sets up His kingdom. In truth, through the coming of Jesus as King, God will add those who trust in Christ to Abraham’s line even though they are not directly descended from him. This parallels Jesus’ statement in a later argument with the Pharisees (John 8:31–38).

Verse 10 Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.

As prophesied (Isaiah 40:3), John the Baptist had been declaring his message to Israel in the wilderness: Repent, for the kingdom of heaven in near. Perhaps surprisingly, some of Israel’s religious leaders had come to the wilderness to see and hear John for themselves. They were likely shocked at his public response to them.

John called them a brood of vipers and asked who had warned them to run away from God’s wrath (Matthew 3:7–9). If they truly repent, John said, they will produce different results by their changed actions. Now he describes just how close God’s judgment is. The coming of Messiah’s kingdom is accompanied by the arrival of God’s wrath against the unfaithful. John describes the axe of God’s judgment as being “even now” at the root of the trees. The religious leaders may have recognized John’s reference to Scriptures like Isaiah 10:33–34 and Jeremiah 46:22.

John has already told them not to expect to be spared merely because they are descended from Abraham. God will always keep His promises to Israel, but He is not bound to spare every Israelite from His wrath. Those who do not bear good fruit—by leading holy, faithful lives—will be pruned from the tree. They will be cut down and thrown into the fire as dead branches from a tree are removed and used for fuel.

Verse 11 “I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.

Isaiah 40:3 was meant, in part, to predict the coming of John the Baptist. His primary role was to prepare the way for the coming of the long-promised Messiah, the one he has said would bring God’s kingdom to earth. In prophesying the arrival of that kingdom, John has urged his listeners to repent of their sins and be publicly baptized by him in the Jordan River as part of their commitment to live faithfully to God (Matthew 3:1–2).

Now John makes clear again that he is not the Messiah. His baptism is not the same as that of the One who is coming after him (Acts 18:25; 19:3–6). John says his baptism is for repentance, turning from sin to live in faithfulness to God. All who want to be spared from God’s wrath must repent, but eternal salvation requires that change of heart be tied to faith in Christ (John 3:16–18).

John describes the One to come as mightier than he is. John knows he was sent by God to proclaim God’s message, but he does not believe himself in any way equal to the Messiah. In fact, John says he is not even worthy of carrying the Messiah’s sandals (Mark 1:7). This was quite a statement at this time in history, when sandal-clad feet were especially filthy and thought to be dishonorable. Only the lowliest servant would be asked to carry sandals, and John understands himself to be unworthy of even that position in service to Jesus.

The baptism ushered in by Christ will be different from John’s baptism of repentance. John declares the Messiah will baptize with the Holy Spirit and with fire. This would likely have been exciting news to John’s Jewish listeners. In Jewish minds, the Holy Spirit had been absent from Israel for generations. The fact that the coming Messiah would baptize those who had repented with the Holy Spirit would have been a promise of great power to come. It would also have been a mysterious statement.

Jesus, of course, did send the Holy Spirit to baptize believers after His resurrection on the day of Pentecost. The evidence of the Holy Spirit on that day included “tongues of fire” that rested above each person (Acts 2). John’s reference to fire here may have referred to a purification that would come with Messiah’s baptism.

Verse 12 His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”

John the Baptist, like the prophets of Israel’s history, called the people to repent of sin and live in faithfulness to God. Unlike those others, his message was that the Messiah, who would bring the kingdom of heaven to earth, was near. The Messiah would baptize those who followed Him with the Holy Spirit and fire, but He would also bring judgment on those who did not follow Him (Matthew 3:1–2, 11).

John here declares that the one to come after him, the Messiah, will come with His winnowing fork in His hand. A winnowing fork was used to toss freshly harvested wheat into the air, where the useless chaff could be blown clear by the wind. The heavier wheat would fall back to the ground and be gathered up. In John’s metaphor, the wheat represents those who repent and follow the Christ, while the chaff symbolizes those who reject Him. John declares the unbelievers will burn with unquenchable fire, referring to the eternal judgment of God’s wrath mentioned by the Old Testament prophets (Isaiah 34:10; Jeremiah 7:20), as well as by Jesus (Matthew 5:29).

Context Summary
Matthew 3:1–12 introduces John the Baptist, preaching and baptizing in the wilderness of Judea near the Jordan River. John, dressed in camel hair and a leather belt in the style of the prophet Elijah, has a simple message: repent because the kingdom of heaven is coming. Crowds come from miles around, including even Israel’s religious leaders. John calls those leaders vipers and warns that Messiah will bring the wrath of God against the unrepentant. The Messiah will baptize the repentant with the Holy Spirit and fire. The trees that do not bear fruit, spiritually speaking, will be cut down and burned.

Verse 13 Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John, to be baptized by him.

Matthew now introduces Jesus, the subject of his gospel, for the first time as an adult. When last we heard of Him in the gospel of Matthew, Jesus was a small child living in the disreputable town of Nazareth in Galilee (Matthew 2:19–23). His parents had settled there to keep their distance from Jerusalem and the region of Judea, where a former king had tried to kill Jesus as a baby (Matthew 2:13–16).

Since Jesus arrives on the scene from Galilee at around 30 years old, most scholars assume that He had lived in Galilee up until this point in his life. He finds John preaching and baptizing somewhere along the Jordan River. Jesus wants John to baptize Him.

We know from Luke that John and Jesus were extended family through their mothers; Mary and John’s mother Elizabeth were related (Luke 1:36). Both men were born by the intervention of God. Jesus, of course, was conceived by the Holy Spirit, making Him the Son of God, the long-promised Messiah. John’s birth was also predicted to his father, Zechariah, by an angel. This was despite the married couple being past the normal age of having children. The angel told Zechariah that John would do exactly the work Matthew has described of him so far. John would “make ready for the Lord a people prepared” (Luke 1:17).

Now the Lord Jesus Christ and John meet face to face in an unexpected way. That is, John did not expect this request from Jesus.

Verse 14 John would have prevented him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?”

Jesus has arrived at a place along the Jordan River where John the Baptist is preaching to Israel with the message, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 3:2). John has been baptizing those willing to publicly repent of sin and renew their commitment to live in faithfulness to the Lord.

John recognizes that Jesus is the very Messiah he has been preaching about. We don’t know when John discovered this. He may have been taught it as a child, accompanied by his parent’s explanation of the circumstances of Jesus’ birth (Luke 1—2). In any case, John resists the idea that he should baptize Jesus. He had said of the Messiah, after all, that he was not even worthy to carry His sandals (Matthew 3:11).

As a prophet of God, John had the authority to baptize the people of Israel as a sign of their repentance before God. He could not imagine he had the authority to baptize the Messiah. Also, he likely understood that Jesus had no sin to repent from. Nor would God’s Promised One need to declare a change of mind to the people. From John’s perspective, there was no point in such a baptism!

John, as a humble man, was aware of his own sinfulness. He declares that he needs to be baptized by Jesus, not the other way around. By this, John may have meant that he wanted Jesus to conduct his own baptism of repentance. Or, perhaps, he wanted Jesus to baptize him with the Holy Spirit and fire as he said the Messiah would do for those who repented (Matthew 3:11).

Jesus explains His insistence on being baptized by John in the following verse.

Verse 15 But Jesus answered him, “Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.” Then he consented.

John has been preaching a simple message: Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near. He has been baptizing those who repent from their sin in order to be ready for that kingdom to arrive (Matthew 3:1–2). Now the King of that kingdom has come to John and asked to be baptized, as well. John resisted, saying he was the one who should be baptized by Jesus (Matthew 3:13–14).

Jesus insists. His explanation is not immediately easy to understand. He tells John “it is fitting for [them] to fulfill all righteousness.”

Scholars have offered many interpretations of Jesus’ explanation. The most widely held view is that Jesus had no sin to repent from, but had come to earth to die on behalf of the sins of humanity. Baptism would identify Him with that sacrificial role and symbolize His coming death and resurrection. In this way, baptism would allow Jesus and John together to “fulfill all righteousness” by publicly foreshadowing the way all sin can be forgiven. This would also serve as an example for Christians to follow later (Acts 18:25; 19:3–6).

A simpler possibility is that it was just God’s will for Jesus to be baptized by John. Jesus may be saying to John that they will be “fulfilling all righteousness” in the sense of doing what God wants—of doing the right thing. In other words, Jesus may have been saying to John, “We’re going to do this because it’s what God wants us to do.”

In either case, John immediately agrees to baptize the Messiah.

Verse 16 And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him;

Jesus, the Messiah, in His first recorded public appearance in Matthew, finds John the Baptist somewhere along the Jordan River and asks the prophet to baptize Him. John resists and then agrees to participate (Matthew 3:13–15). Some interpreters see this as the moment Jesus formally began His mission on earth, culminating in His sacrificial death for the sins of humanity, followed by resurrection and ascension Christian baptism certainly serves as a symbol of death, followed by resurrection: a new beginning.

God the Father immediately responds to Jesus’ baptism in a powerful way. As Jesus emerges from being fully immersed in the water of the Jordan River, the heavens are opened. Jesus sees God the Holy Spirit descending from heaven like a dove and coming to rest on Him.

It’s unclear from this descriptions in the other Gospels whether only Jesus saw the heavens opened and the Spirit descend. This might have been witnessed by everyone present. Or, perhaps it was only perceived by Jesus and John (John 1:32). Luke does specify that the Holy Spirit took solid, bodily form (Luke 3:22). However, the phrase “like a dove” can either refer to the visual appearance of the Spirit, or to the manner in which the Spirit descended. As such, it’s not explicitly clear that the Holy Spirit looked like a literal dove.

Regardless of such details, the Spirit coming to rest on Jesus served as a powerful confirmation that Jesus was being empowered by God. That confirmation is made even more explicit in the following verse.

Verse 17 and behold, a voice from heaven said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”

Perhaps as an act of obedience to God, or as foreshadowing of His sacrificial death, Jesus asks John the Baptist to baptize Him in the Jordan River (Matthew 3:13–16). In the moment that Jesus resurfaces, He sees the heavens open and the Holy Spirit descend “like a dove,” to rest on Him in a bodily form (Luke 3:22).

It is unclear if only Jesus and possibly John the Baptist saw the action in the heavens and the arrival of the dove-like Holy Spirit (John 1:32). It seems clearer that all who were present at Jesus’ baptism heard the voice of God, however. Matthew quotes God’s voice as saying, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”

All three members of the Trinity are involved in this moment. God the Son, in human form, is joined by God the Holy Spirit in dove-like form, while the voice of God the Father calls down from heaven. This is one of the most potent examples of the mystery of the Trinity in the Bible.

What God says in this moment makes the claim of the Bible crystal clear: Jesus is the Son of God. This firmly confirmed to all who heard it that Jesus is the Messiah, sent by God to fulfill the prophecies and begin to establish His kingdom on earth.

The tenderness of God the Father toward Jesus reveals His character. He describes Jesus as beloved and says that He is well pleased with Him. God’s love, even for His own Son, is central to who He is. It also adds heartbreak to the sacrifice God is making in offering the life of Jesus for the sins of humanity.

Context Summary
Matthew 3:13–17 describes Jesus’ baptism by John the Baptist. Jesus arrives at the site of John’s baptismal ministry somewhere along the Jordan River. John resists, but Jesus insists that His baptism is meant to fulfill all righteousness. As Jesus emerges from the water, He sees the heavens open, and the Holy Spirit descends to rest on Him in a dove-like form. The voice of God the Father declares that Jesus is His Son and that He is pleased with Him. Jesus’ ministry is both confirmed and revealed on earth.

Chapter Summary
Matthew introduces John the Baptist as a fulfillment of Isaiah 40:3. He is the voice crying in the wilderness as he prepares the way for the Lord. John calls the crowds who travel to hear him to repent from their sins. The kingdom of heaven is close! He also warns of God’s judgment, specifically on Israel’s spiritually-barren religious leaders. Finally, the Messiah he has been speaking of arrives and insists that John baptize Him. When he does, the heavens break open, the Holy Spirit comes to rest on Jesus, and the voice of God the Father says Jesus is His Son and that He is pleased with Him.