And now the time arrives, when he who was to come, appears. "Then cometh Jesus from Galilee to Jordan, unto John, to be baptized of him." From the retirement of distant Galilee, where he had passed his youth in study and labor, and in docile subservience to his parents, Jesus, having entered upon his thirtieth year, which was the age of induction into the priestly office among the Jews,* travelled to Bethabara, and presented himself to his relative to be baptized. How eventful was this meeting between the son of Elizabeth and the son of Mary! They whose births had been announced by the angel Gabriel, and who had since lived apart in holy seclusion and quiet duty for thirty years, were now brought together by the call of God in the presence of assembled multitudes, and this was the first public interview between the commissioned herald and the anointed prince, between the messenger and the Redeemer. When John heard the request of Jesus to be baptized, he at first forbad, or refused him; for though he was not yet certified of his being the Christ, yet he was probably acquainted with the wonders attending his birth, and with his life of entire purity and holiness. Therefore he meekly remonstrated, "I have need to be

* Numbers iv.

baptized of thee, and comest thou to me?" But Jesus, who would commence his ministry with a public and solemn ordinance, and regardful, perhaps, of the usage by which the sons of Aaron were washed with water before they commenced the functions of the priesthood,* answered, “Suffer it to be so now; for thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness." Thus urged, or, it may be, commanded, John could no longer hesitate, and the two moved down through the silent crowd into the expectant stream, and its waters, more consecrated than consecrating, were poured on the Saviour's head.

"Old Jordan smiled, receiving such high pay

For those small pains obedient he had spent,
Making his waters guard the dryed way

Through wonders when to Canaan Israel went;
Nor does he envy now Pactolus' streams,

Or eastern floods, whose paths are paved with gems."t

As Jesus came up from the river, the heavens were opened to declare his mission to the earth, the spirit of God descended with a dove-like motion upon him, and a voice was heard pronouncing, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.". From this moment the ministry

*Exodus xxix. 4.

† Joseph Beaumont.

of Jesus commenced, and, "being full of the Holy Ghost, he returned from Jordan, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness,"* where he fasted and was tempted.

As we know that Jesus was thirty years of age when he began his ministry, and that this was the age prescribed by the Jewish law as the proper time for the commencement of sacred functions, it is probable that John began his ministry at the same age, and being six months older than Jesus, we may draw the conclusion that he had been six months preaching and baptizing, when that manifestation of the Messiah took place which was the great end of his baptism.

At the expiration of our Saviour's sojourn in the wilderness, he returned to Bethabara, and took up his abode in that neighbourhood. About the same time, the great council of the Jews, moved by the celebrity of John, and the surmises of the people concerning him, and being yet ignorant of the appearance and claims of Jesus, sent a formal deputation to the Baptist, to ascertain what he was, or assumed to be. "And this," says the evangelist John,† "is the record," or rather the testimony, or free profession, “ of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from † John i. 19.

*Luke iv. 1.

And he

Jerusalem to ask him, Who art thou? confessed, and denied not; but confessed, I am not the Christ." With decided and earnest re

iteration he refused the kingly title. “And they asked him, What then? Art thou Elias? And he saith, I am not." Though he did come in the spirit and power of Elijah, yet as he was aware that they intended to inquire whether he was Elijah himself, according to their notions, restored to earth to precede the Messiah, he was too honest to reply except in the negative. They pursued their interrogatories. "Art thou that prophet?" They asked him, in the pertinacity of their opinion that some one or another of the ancient prophets was to reappear in person, whether he was such a prophet. And he still answered, "No." Then, having exhausted their suppositions, and unwilling to go back to Jerusalem without some satisfactory answer, they said unto him, "Who art thou? that we may give an answer to them that sent us. What sayest thou of thyself?" The look of the Baptist, the humble and yet rapt and holy expression of his countenance, may be imagined but not described, with which he said, in the sublime words of Isaiah, and standing in that forest by the flowing waters of Jordan, “I am the voice of one crying in the

с

wilderness, Make straight the way of the Lord." It was immaterial what he was in person, or in name; - he was only a voice-a voice in the wilderness but yet a voice proclaiming to the world, and proclaiming truly and solemnly"Make straight the way of the Lord."

As John had denied being either of the persons suggested, the deputation asked, in surprise, and perhaps with anger, why then he undertook to perform the important office of baptism. In answer, John declared, as he had before, that his baptism was but outward and introductory, whereas his successor and superior would baptize with a holier and mightier baptism. He intimated, moreover, that this exalted personage, though they knew him not, was even then among them. And thus he publicly declared to this official deputation, the actual arrival of the Messiah.

The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him, and made him known to the people who were then assembled, by that memorable exclamation, "Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world!"* He then went on to say, that this was he, who coming after him was yet before him; that he did not at first know

*John i. 29.