CHAPTER IV.

THE BAPTISM OF JESUS. HIS TEMPTATION.

THE time at length arrived when Jesus should enter on his public work. He had reached the age of thirty years, the period prescribed in the law for the induction of the priests into their of fice. Hitherto he had lived in retirement, undistinguished from the men about him. He had been making no visible preparation for the great duties he was to perform. He attended no distinguished school; he was brought up at the feet. of no learned Rabbi or eminent philosopher; it is not certain that he had learned, as men learn, the very elements of knowledge. Having, therefore, no human attainments to fit him for his arduous office, he must be qualified for it by supernatural endowments. Nothing but the consciousness of possessing these could embolden and enable the lowly Galilean to undertake the religious reformation of his country and of the world.

The time being arrived, he left Nazareth, and went to the place where John was preaching and

Matthew iii. 13. Mark i. 9. Luke iii. 21.

baptizing on the banks of the Jordan. He went, like the rest of the people, to be baptized. Now John and Jesus, being related to each other through their mothers, who were cousins, were probably well acquainted, though they did not dwell in the same place; but John did not know that Jesus was the Messiah. So well, however, did he know the purity of his character, that when he saw him coming to be baptized, he was unwilling to allow it. It is more fit, said he, that you should baptize me, and do you come to me? But Jesus answered, that it was a duty to observe all religious ordinances, and this one ought not to be neglected. He did not need it as a sign of his sinfulness and repentance; but he wished to conform to it, because it was appointed of God. "Thus it becomes us to fulfil all righteousness," he said. John was satisfied with this explanation, and baptized him. Then came the moment for announcing the Messiah to the world. The heav ens opened, and the spirit descended in visible form like a dove, and alighted on him; and at the same moment a voice was heard from heaven, saying, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased."

This was the first public attestation to the Messiahship of Jesus. The arrival of the long-expected prophet was thus proclaimed. John, the forerunner, who had been waiting for him, and

the people who were impatient to see him, were made certain that this was he; and he himself was both assured that he was not under a delusion, in supposing himself the chosen one of God, and received that gift of the spirit, "without measure," which was to fit him for his great work.

Under the influence of this spirit he immediately went up from the Jordan, and retired into the heart of the desert. His mind was full of the thoughts which the greatness of the occasion excited. He went by himself, away from human society, to meditate on the wonders of his condition, to contemplate the labors before him, and to commune with God. From the humble village of Nazareth, from the obscurity of cottage life, he was to go forth as a prophet and preacher, to stand in the city of his people, and amongst the powerful and learned men of his time. He was to leave the labors of the artisan for the toils of a religious ministry, to bear the last messages of God to Judah, and to change the religion of the world. What a moment was this! What wonder that he felt inclined, that he felt it necessary, to seclude himself! He could have no thought for anything but the toils and trials before him, and for communion with his own soul and his Father.

He wandered into the desert. It does not fol

low, because a place is called desert in the Scriptures, that it is therefore wholly wild and savage. It may mean any uninhabited and uncultivated place, even though it were fruitful. The uninhabited places adjoining the towns were called deserts, yet they were frequently excellent pasturage. But the vast wilderness of Judæa, stretching along the Dead Sea to the south of Jerusalem, was, in some parts, extremely desolate. It was barren, rocky, and mountainous. And as Mark says that Jesus was with the "wild beasts," he probably retreated into the wildest of these places, where even fruits and berries could not be found sufficient to satisfy his hunger.

At length he felt the consequences of so long fasting. He was weary and weak. He was hungry, and craved food. And then it was, when thus worn with the fatigue of much watching and abstinence, that he was exposed to the temptations so fearfully described by the Evangelists. The history of those temptations has exercised the minds of learned men, who have explained them in many different ways. It is not necessary here to enter into the discussion of what is difficult. There is enough that is plain. We read, in the Epistle to the Hebrews, that Jesus was "tempted in all points like as we are, yet without sin." So it was in these temptations in the wilderness.

Matthew iv.

Mark i. 12.

Luke iv.

They came upon him when hungry and faint, and when it might seem a small thing to use his power of working miracles, in order to change stones into bread, and satisfy his exhausted nature. But he would not do it, for he felt that the Divine power had been imparted to him for no such selfish purposes. Neither would he yield to the temptation to make himself such a Messiah as the Jews were expecting, and seize upon the kingdoms and glory of the world. This he could easily have accomplished; but it would have been unfaithfulness to God and duty. Neither would he draw on himself the admiration and easy reception of the people, by descending into the midst of them, as if borne on angels' wings, from the pinnacle of the temple. He resisted every suggestion to gratify and aggrandize himself. Neither bodily suffering, nor the offers of worldly greatness, nor the desire of human applause, could divert him from what he knew to be his duty. In these things he was tempted as we are (and they are the temptations to which men most frequently yield), yet it was without sin. He came from them untouched; and he has thus taught us, that true greatness consists in resisting evil, and adhering steadfastly to duty.

There is much in this incident particularly suited to impress and instruct the young. They are just entering on the work of life, as Jesus was