So why was Jesus baptised?

I don’t know.

But it must be something to do with this:

Mark 1:2-8 leaves us with two expectations of what God is about to do. From Mark 1:2-3 (quoting Isaiah 40), God is about to bring his people back through the wilderness to the promised land; he is about to remake his people. From Mark 1:7, he is “the stronger one than John” who will operate on his people’s hearts by his Spirit to bring about true repentance. There is no clear indication from Mark 1:2-8 that either “the Lord” or “the stronger one” is anyone other than God himself. We’re not looking for a human being (yet).

Then one particular human being, Jesus of Nazareth in Galilee, comes to the wilderness and is baptised. We see God’s Spirit fall on him. Mark 1:2-3 requires a little more thought here.

John is clothed like Elijah and Elisha. Elisha’s ministry began with him coming West across the river Jordan – he is the new Moses, bringing the people into fresh life as the people of God. Elisha then instructed a man who was unclean in God’s sight (Naaman the leper) to wash in the Jordan and become clean again. John comes, dressed like this Elisha, to ask the people to (i) wash away their sins in the Jordan, and (ii) come out of the waters of the Jordan into the land. John is a new Moses / Elijah / Elisha, inviting the people of God to cross the Red Sea and become the people of God anew, and then inviting them to cross the Jordan again and enter the land. This is new beginnings for the people of God.

Jesus comes to John and submits to this minsitry. The only difference is that he leaves the Jordan east not west. He, unlike the people, does not come out of the waters of the Red Sea straight back into the land. He needs to spend a period of 40 days in the wilderness first, and then enter the land. Jesus has a 40 day period between the two sea-crossings. God brings Jesus back through the wilderness, across the Jordan (“passing through the waters”), into the land.

So: Mark 1:2-8 leaves us with the expectation that God is about to reconstitute his people by sending his Spirit to them, and by bringing them back to the land out of the wilderness. The next thing Mark records, is God doing those two things for Jesus. God is going to remake his people, and by Mark 1:13, we’ve seen him do it for one person: Jesus. The people of God is now Jesus, from Nazareth in Galilee.

Mark doesn’t explain straight away how others might come to be a part of the reconstituted people of God. John’s ministry is preparatory – he tells people to follow the “stronger one” who will bring forgiveness of sins by the Spirit of God. By the end of Mark 3 it will be clear that this is Jesus. In 1:16-20 it will become clear that one responds to the arrival of the kingdom by following Jesus.

So Jesus is baptised. He is the new people of God. Many will follow after him, and also enter God’s new people. Many will become a part of God’s new people by being “in him” who is the true people of God. Both perspectives are true. But that is for later. What is clear at this stage is that Jesus’ baptism marks him out; as he passes through the waters, God identifies him as the new people of God. He is where God’s people will be found.