Today we consider an incident, which in the view of some, caused embarrassment in some quarters of the early Church: Jesus’ baptism in the Jordan river. This incident — rather like the story of the woman caught in the act of adultery -reveals something rather shocking and scandalous about Jesus. Since the baptism instigated by John the Baptist was expressly for repentance and Jesus had no sin, why did the Lord insist on being baptized? In Matthew’s record of the incident John the Baptist basically protests and resists this action of the Lord’s.
The reason Jesus was baptized was to identify fully and completely with the human race he came to redeem and save. Jesus’ baptism marks the day when he publicly identified with sinners. He was about to take upon himself the work of being the Savior of the world. He would do so by identifying with sinners and taking their sins upon himself. So, when sinners were in a queue to be baptized, Jesus joined the queue. At the moment of Jesus’ baptism God revealed himself as Three Persons in One God, Blessed and Holy Trinity.