Luke 3:21-38 – Christ’s baptism, ministry and family tree

John’s baptism, as we have discovered, was one of repentance. Jesus is perfect and sinless and had nothing to repent of. Yet He willingly submitted Himself to John’s baptism to identify with us sinful man. His baptism points us to a key truth, i.e., He is the divine Son of God. After His baptism God spoke from heaven, affirming that Jesus is His beloved Son, in whom He is well-pleased. So we see that Jesus is God’s begotten Son, He is divine.

In talking about Jesus’ baptism, Luke’s primary focus was not so much the baptism but what happened after it. So in this passage we see several important facts. Firstly, after Jesus was baptized, He was seen praying. This helps us to see that Jesus was very reliant on God. This was demonstrated throughout His life and ministry. He would pause from His busy schedule to pray. If He needed to pray so must we. Like Him we must make this spiritual exercise a regular part of our life. Secondly, when he was praying, dramatically the heaven above Him opened. There was no barrier between Him and God. We must seek to have an open heaven above us as we live and serve the Lord!  Thirdly. He was anointed by the Spirit who descended upon Him like a dove. Like Him we need the Spirit to come and indwell and fill us. We must seek to be sensitive to the leading of the Holy Spirit. Fourthly, the voice from heaven affirming God’s delight in this His begotten Son.  

When we get to the family tree of Jesus, we get to see the ancestry of the human side of Jesus’ family. So that we will know that He is not only fully God, He is also fully man. Haven’t we often wondered about what lessons we can take away from genealogical accounts in the Bible? Truthfully, aren’t these passages in the Bible that we would gloss over? Yet in this account of the Lord’s genealogy there are many interesting truths. We find in His family line people such as Judah and David. Messiah must be from the line of David, this authenticates that Jesus’s credential as the Messiah. He is from the line of Judah and not from the priestly line of the Levite. This reveals the fact that the origin of His priesthood is not earthly. As the author to the Hebrews said, His priesthood is from the line of Melchizedek. His priesthood is an eternal one. Besides, this family tree traces Jesus ancestry back to God. This is to say that He essentially is God’s Son. It’s interesting that in this list of Jesus ancestry, Adam is said to be God’s son. This tells us how God longs for a son when He created Adam. Like His yearning for a son in Adam, He also yearns for us to be His sons and certainly his daughters.

Verse 23 tells us that at age 30 Jesus began His ministry. At 30 we are in the prime of life, will we also give the prime of our life to serve the Lord Jesus?  Like Him, let’s give God the prime of our life. Let’s not run the errand of the world when we have the zeal of a youth, and then labor up the heavenly hill with weary feet and slow. Let us never offer the world the zeal of our prime and then to God the fainting ashes of our hearts!