From the Water to the Wilderness

Well, I'm ready to go. We have a wonderful passage of Scripture to dig into today. So, let's get right to it. The title of our study for the sermon is From the Water to the Wilderness. From the Water to the Wilderness. And we're going to begin today by reading two passages of Scripture to set our foundation. The first passage that we'll read is found in Luke 3, verses 21 and 22.

Luke 3, verses 21 and 22. As we continue in our study on Luke, and we come to water here. We come to Jesus' baptism by John in the River Jordan. This is how Luke records that event. Luke 3, verses 21 and 22. When all the people were baptized, it came to pass that Jesus also was baptized. And while he prayed, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended in bodily form like a dove upon him. And a voice came from heaven, which said, You are my beloved Son, and you I am well pleased. Let's stop there. Second passage of Scripture. If you'll move your eyes forward one chapter to Luke 4, verses 1 and 2. Luke 4, verses 1 and 2. Here, Luke picks up the narrative just after Jesus' baptism. He is out of the water, filled with the Spirit from his baptism, and is now almost immediately taken off into a wilderness to fight the temptation presentation by the devil. Luke 4, and this is verses 1 and 2. Here it is.

Then, Jesus, being filled with the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, being tempted for 40 days by the devil. And in those days, he ate nothing. And afterward, when they had ended, he was hungry. Let's stop there. So, here we have it.

These are the two recordings of Luke regarding Jesus Christ, essentially from the water to the wilderness. And we're going to attempt in just a moment to unpack this wilderness event here in Luke 4 in just a moment. But before we do, I think it's important for us to realize first just what this water experience, this baptism of Jesus Christ meant.

And it's particularly important to understand all that the water baptism symbolized just before he would now face his greatest of enemies in the wilderness. Because you'll notice, in fact, Jesus's baptism is occurring, of course, first before the wilderness. So, if you turn back to Luke 3 verse 21, we're going to see that it's almost impossible to truly comprehend the wilderness without first comprehending the water here.

Again, Luke 3 verse 21, when all the people were baptized, it came to pass, Luke 3 21, that Jesus was also baptized. And he prayed while he prayed, heaven was opened. So, he was there along with all the other people in the baptism line here. And he prayed and the heavens were opened. The heaven was torn apart, if you will, to hear the voice of the Father coming down from heaven. And we read of this event and we recognize that this is right at the beginning of his public ministry.

This occurred right at the beginning, tearing open up the heaven, as it were. What does that remind you of? You know, the tearing open of heaven to allow God's voice to come down from it. Well, it may bring your thoughts to another tearing, the tearing of a curtain, a veil, that encountered... and you know, that tearing of the veil, it occurred at the end of Christ's ministry, where Christ bore our sins at his crucifixion.

The tearing of the veil, at that very moment, that thick temple veil then torn in half, that veil which symbolized a separation between God and man. You know, only the high priest could enter in behind that area in the Holy Apollis. Well, that veil tore at that time, symbolizing opening up God, the Father's relationship with all men, all women, to whom he would call.

And so, this water baptism then is a dramatic moment, reminding us and pointing us that one of the reasons Jesus Christ came was to break down all barriers between his Father and mankind. And so, this water baptism is really the beginning of the access to the Father initiated by the Son again, all of it would culminate in that tearing of the temple veil, where we have access to the Father through the Son by the Holy Spirit.

And so, what is happening here in this moment, by Jesus Christ taking his place in line there at the River Jordan, he is coming right down into our circumstances. He's coming down to be with us in the water. This is the moment he's coming to just really intimately and personally identify with us in this way. And in this, he's opening up the relationship to his Father. He is intimately, personally identifying with those who were there to be baptized. Those in line had already had their hearts pricked by John the Baptist. You remember our last message. The sandpaper to the heart had already been applied to them. They had now been convicted of their sins.

They saw their need of repentance and grace from God. And they were following their instruction to be baptized. They were in line. So, these are those they are gathered, looking for forgiveness from God. And so, Christ took his place in line at this moment. And really, so all throughout his ministry, from this moment all the way to the end, it's all entirely, everything is wrapped up in his desire to identify with his creation in every way. And he identifies here first with sinners in their need and they're seeking forgiveness.

So, if you're going to understand the baptism of Jesus Christ, it'll help you to know that when he went down to be baptized in the Jordan River, he knew himself to be the sin bearer. Again, he takes his place alongside sinners, goes down to where they are, expresses his solidarity with them as their Savior. And in standing there in the river, those waters that would cover these repentant men and women, symbolically washing their sins away, he then would allow that same water symbolically polluted with their sins to wash over him as he would immerse as a perfect Savior in those same symbolically polluted waters. You know, there's great meaning in this. And so again, he identifies with those sinners in this way to come down to them. And we know when we're baptized and we make that commitment, it is very humbling. But in many ways, when we go down into the water, we are rising up as a new creation. We're rising up to God, looking for an outstretched hand from Jesus Christ to pick us up as new men and new women, as a new creation. So we're rising up in many ways. While Jesus cries, if you will, he stoops down. He is emptying himself in so many ways and being in that exalted position next to his Father.

So I don't have the words to convey the immensity of this moment, but if you think about it in terms of identification, I think it will help us. Christ, at his baptism, is unlike any other religious figure. He's not a mere religious guru. He's not a mere religious teacher, although he was a teacher, of course. He wasn't one who just came down to the clouds, shouted out nice little sayings and wisdom advice to his creation so they could take them and scramble around and try to apply them to their lives. You know, but he all the time stayed removed? No, not at all. He comes and takes his place right there alongside, shoulder to shoulder, with the sinners he came to save and identifies with them in this way. So, you know, those there would have had some measure of understanding, perhaps, if God would have revealed this to them. They were there needing forgiveness of their sins. Jesus Christ, of course, the perfect, perfect in every way, coming down to identify in their predicament. So, he was just making it plain he loved them. He loved those in line. He loves us. And so, this is the Jesus Christ to whom we're introduced. I am here to identify with you in every way. That's what Jesus would have said. And so, then it's understandable, included in the identification, is all the spectrum of human experience. So, if this was one of Christ's purpose to identify with this creation, to get right down there in them, then he's going to, in that process, identify in every spectrum of human experience. That's why, when Jesus walked the earth, there is suffering in his experience. That's why there was humiliation in his experience. That's why there is rejection, their struggle. That's why, in the process, there is choice. There was choice presented to him. He had to choose to whom he was going to serve. And so, included in his desire to identify with his creation, there then also would be a wilderness in his experience. A wilderness. A tempter who would come to get him off track of what his purpose was. And so, in turning to Luke 4, we now read, understandably so, that filled with the Spirit, perhaps barely dry from the baptism waters, he moves forward in his experience of identifying with his creation. And he is now being presented with struggle and temptation. He's presented with all the lures, lures and pools of sin, so that he'd be able to identify with and ultimately, so that he'd be able to truly aid us in our temptation and in our test moments. So, he voluntarily puts himself in the crosshairs here of this great adversary. And so, his baptism is foundational to understanding the wilderness. That's kind of one of the points we want to make today. And so, with the water event, that will help us better connect with this wilderness event to them. And this is a process of Jesus Christ identifying with his creation. So, the wilderness event begins here in Luke 4, verse 1 and 2. Let's read this again.

Luke 4, verse 1 and 2. Then, Jesus, being filled with the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, being tempted for 40 days by the devil. And in those days, he ate nothing. And afterward, when they had ended, he was hungry. Let's stop there again. So, there it is. 40 days, Luke says, tempted by the devil in the wilderness. This was not... This wilderness area and the probable area in which it was in, it was not an appealing area by any means. It would have been located between the central plateau of Judea and the Dead Sea. This whole area spans some 35 miles by 15 miles. Dreadful place. You would want to avoid this place at all costs. Unimaginable place for Jesus to be without food for 40 days. And I wonder if you find verse... the end of verse too interesting. It says, he ate nothing for 40 days. Okay, got it. And then Luke writes, he was hungry. Why did Luke write, he was hungry? You know, why mention that? As we've been doing this study, we know Luke was a doctor. Very meticulous. He's not going to write anything that's not effective for our edification. So, why mention that?

Well, I think it was to really... it was a word to a group of individuals who had emerged, who were putting forth a heresy that Jesus wasn't quite human. They put forth a heresy that he was really more divine than human. They would say things like, well, I saw him walking on the beach and he left no footprints. You know, he's just... he's really God presenting himself in just the form of being human. You know, so the naysayers would say, 40 days, 400 days, no big deal for someone divine. And so they tried to make him so much God to make him less than human. Why would they want to do that? It was a powerful technique because the devil wants us to not identify with Jesus Christ. And so if they can diminish his true humanity, if Satan can do that, they can diminish his identification with us truly and diminish that personal relationship that we're to have with him. You know, Satan wants to close up the heavens, as it were. He wants to shut off that access to his father, to Jesus's father.

Satan wants the curtain to stay intact, you know. He didn't want Jesus to come and break down the barriers between Jesus's father, God the father, and man. So Luke says, oh, and by the way, yeah, he didn't eat for 40 days, and I'm just here to tell you he was hungry. He experienced all that 40-day fasting would be for a human being. So let's think about now this first attempt by Satan here and really bring it to our experience. We want to identify with Jesus Christ in these attempts by Satan. These are our attempts, Satan's attempts on us. So verse three is the first attempt. Here it is, Luke records, and the devil said to him, Jesus, if you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread. So this is one of the first points of identification here. So let's think about this.

Where are we at this point? Jesus had just now appeared in the Jordan River. He's baptized. Spirit descends upon him in the bodily form of a dove. Heaven's tear open. Boys from the Father, you are my beloved Son, in whom I'm well pleased. Jesus must have said to himself, this is all wonderful. I've been preparing for this time. This is the beginning of his ministry. Here we go.

Here we go where? Well, here we go to a barren, desolated wilderness.

Whose idea was this? Well, he was led by the Spirit, by God the Father, who directed him there by the Spirit, by that power. Here he is not eating on top of it. First day not eating, second day not eating, third day not eating, fourth day not eating. 40 days.

And in the midst of all that, you have this, he's out there, isolated with the greatest of adversaries. So, I bring up that because, listen, it is in light of the fact, it is in light of him just going through this incredible water moment, in light of that, that God leads him to this amazing struggle. At the outside of his baptism, Father pleased with him. He now faces this incredible struggle. And so the devil comes and says, if you are the Son of God.

So does this connect with you? Where in your personal journey, in your personal spiritual journey with God, have you looked at your dreadful circumstances and wondered, I don't even know if I'm a son or daughter of God. Allow me a little conjecture with this conversation between Jesus and the devil here. But what Satan is saying here is now, if you are the Son of God. And I say, if, come along with me here, Jesus. I say that purposely because that was quite a scene there at the Jordan. You know, heaven opens up, dove, spirit, voice from heaven. You are my son in who I'm well pleased. You know, I don't know. Not sure about that. I just want to suggest to you, Jesus, that perhaps what you thought happened didn't happen. Because after all, if you were the Son of God in whom the Father was well pleased, don't you think things would be going a lot better for you than the way they are now? You know, I mean, just up out of the Jordan River and not a day or two in it. And here you are, the most wretched place going through the most tremendous trial, no food, seemingly forsaken, and He's left you out here with me, Satan would say.

I don't know. So if you are the Son of God, why don't you grab one of those stones and turn it into you know, a loaf of bread. You know, a little bit of conjecture there. But I think, you know, with this particular identification temptation, we really want to identify with Jesus in this moment here and really relate ourselves to it. Many commentators say that this temptation is simply to provide for physical need. And I think it is. That's part of it. But I think perhaps the fullness of this and how we can identify with us, the identify, it's an identification in the temptation for dissatisfaction. Let's identify with this. Are you dissatisfied with God because of the circumstances you're in? We can identify with dissatisfaction. We are here. What's happening in our lives? Perhaps at its essence. This is also an identification temptation point for us regarding impatience. You know, can you identify with being impatient with regards to the circumstances you're in? Perhaps it's an identification point regarding doubt. And I think that's a big one. You doubt your position as a son or daughter of God because of the circumstances you're in. Can you identify with that? Jesus was presented with this to doubt the Father that He loves Him as He finds Himself in the most devastating circumstances. To doubt that the Father knew what was best for Him. He's identifying with us now, feeling forsaken, buffeted, the worst of days.

And when doubt creeps in, all of a sudden the temptation is to feel like you are alone and that God has forsaken you. And so what are you going to do? You're going to take things into your own hands. You are going to go at it alone without God.

And then, you know, the devil says essentially, why deny yourself, Jesus? Why limit yourselves to the law of humanity? You're the Son of God, after all. Why risk salvation with an authoritative word? You could call out and make this a whole bakery if you wanted to, you know.

But look at this, verse 4. This is His answer. And this is our answer. And when we find ourselves in those moments, verse 4, but Jesus answered Him saying, it is written, man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God. Okay, so this is, you know, we don't live solely by the physical bread here. You know, we do have this physical need, but our real need comes, it is spiritual. It's the Word of God. This is a quote, we won't turn there, but it's actually a quote from Jesus looking back to Deuteronomy 8, verse 3. In that context in Deuteronomy 8, it is the wilderness provision. So Deuteronomy 8 is all about the wilderness wanderings. So it's another wilderness where God is providing them daily manna. He's making sure their shoes don't run out. He's giving them their daily provisions, what they need every day in the wilderness. So that's the reference here. And it serves as a reminder, when you're in these circumstances, don't doubt that you are God's child. Don't doubt that he's still with you every day, and he's going to be providing for you every day. That's the point here in him referencing that in Deuteronomy. Don't feel impatient. Don't feel dissatisfied. God promises that he will give us our daily provisions, but he's he's preparing us for a future land, you know, a spiritual promised land. It's more than just these physical. Yes, I'm going to give you physically what you need, but what I'm, why I have you in the wilderness is for something far bigger, and it's effective for that. I haven't left you. I'm still here, you know. And so man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God. What he's saying is I'm not going to live solely responding or reacting to my physical circumstances. I'm going to live by the word of God. I know God is directing my steps through the hills and the valleys. I know he knows I'm here. I know he knows I'm hungry. I know he knows you're here, Satan, buffeting me. But I'll tell you what I'm not going to do. I'm not going to go it alone. I'm not going to do what you say, because I know that my father will provide for me. And if I go it alone, I'm going to be moving outside of his will. And to move outside of his will, it shows a lack of faith. And I know that's not the right way to go. So I'm not going to depend on my own devices. I'm going to depend on God's purposes in my life. This is a wonderful identification point for us. Because in a short bit after this, Luke's going to record later in the other Gospel writers that Jesus is going to look at the disciples and say, why are you worrying about your clothes? Why are you worrying about what you're going to eat? You know, don't worry about those things. And without this wilderness experience, they would have been able to legitimately turn to Jesus and say, well, that's easy for you to say. You don't understand. No, he'd say, no, I do understand. I went 40 days with my greatest of adversary without food in the most barren, remote land you could think of. You know, you think about Jesus at this time. He would have been displaying all the physical results of this. He would have been famished. He would have been paled. He would have been gaunt. You know, all these things in this wilderness experience. So it's a powerful point of identification. You know, this is Jesus Christ. He stands in the valleys with us. And when no one understands, he does. He identifies with us in all aspects.

So perhaps that first identification point will be meaningful to you.

Maybe the second one, it will be meaningful to you as well. Let's look at this. The second presentation of temptation to Jesus is found here in chapter 4, verse 5 through 7.

Here it is. So here's the second identification point that we can identify with Christ.

Then the devil, verse 5, taking him up on a high mountain, showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment in time. And the devil said to him, All this authority I will give you and their glory, for this has been delivered to me, and I give it to whomever I wish. Therefore, if you will worship before me, all will be yours. Okay, let's stop there. So the devil proposes to Jesus Christ that he should receive all these things with a compromise to him, make a pact with him. Why don't you bow down toward to me? I can give you all this now, all this gratification now.

You can have it now immediately, immediate gratification. You can have this without any pain, without waiting. So how do we identify with this? Be thinking about this. Jesus was presented the proposition to achieve glory, riches, satisfaction, indulgence, all without struggle and suffering. I think this is a very powerful point of identification with us. So the devil says, I have a route that I can offer you where there's no self-sacrifice. You can have it all now. Okay. Definitely, you don't have to take up your own cross. Definitely, you don't have to have self-sacrifice. Definitely, you don't have to have a delay. You know, I think this is a particular point of identification with our young people. I can remember my late teens and twenties. That broad road was there. And I had this narrow road that I had been offered, you know, exposed to, had been giving calling from my family. My family was called to God's church. So I had the narrow road and I had this big road. This one offered to me self-sacrifice where I couldn't do everything I wanted to do. And then there's this broad road of self-indulgence. Take it all now. It's a powerful one here. You can have this without all the crucifixion stuff, Jesus, without all the suffering stuff, without the narrow road, without self-sacrifice. So what is Jesus' response? Verse 8. Verse 8. And Jesus answered and said to him, Get behind me, Satan, for it is written, You shall worship the Lord your God, in him only shall you serve. So rather than the path of no suffering, Jesus chose self-denial sacrifice. It was a self-sacrificing love. It was a narrow road. So how can we identify with this today? The devil comes to us today and he says, You don't have to believe all that stuff about the narrow road. Don't take up your own cross. Why self-sacrifice now? Don't do that. This way is much easier. You can indulge now.

You know, it's in one of the things I want to get across to our young people is yeah, this life, this physical life, we are glorifying God. That's the point. We're only serving God. We're not going to self-serve. I'm not going to do everything just self-gratification today because I'm actually serving God. And the way I serve him is the parameters that he's given me in the Bible. And it does make for, in some ways, a more difficult physical life. It's challenging. Self-sacrifice is challenging.

But the remarkable thing is that God says, if you do these things, you'll be preparing for this next life where I'm just going to share my glory with you. I'm going to give you so much. I'm going to pour out to you. But I need to prepare you for that. So self-sacrifice is a way of me putting my character in you so that when my son returns, I'm going to raise you up and you're going to just have the most glorious eternal life. So I am going to ask you to self-sacrifice now. I'm going to ask you not to gratify all the fleshly desires. I'm going to ask these things. I will pour my glory onto you coming. So serve me now. But the remarkable thing is, here's the irony of it all. When I was gratifying myself in different ways and taking that broad road rather than the narrow road, I was miserable. In my heart of hearts, I was actually miserable. It seemed like I was satisfying all my fleshly desires. But in the end, it was deceiving because it left me more empty. And the remarkable thing is when I went down what was the narrow road and the self-sacrificing road, I became the happiest I've ever been. It was just a remarkable thing. So that's the irony of it all. What seems like self-sacrifice in maybe a less attractive way of life, it actually gave me more than this road presented. It's a remarkable thing. And I've been through both sides, so I can tell you. I can tell you. It's a remarkable way that we can identify with Jesus Christ. So if you're going through those struggles of you, boy, you're tempted to go down or you've been going down a broad road and you need to get on the narrow road, reach out to the one who can sympathize with you. He can. He was tempted in this way. He was presented with this temptation. He has the power to help you overcome. So that's awesome. That's awesome. The third point of identification here, and the final one, comes in verses 9 through 11. This is a point of identification with us in the wilderness. So now the devil is going to lead him up to Jerusalem, have him stand on the highest point of the temple. This is an interesting one. Verses 9 through 11. Then he, the devil, brought him, Jesus Christ, to Jerusalem, set him up on a pinnacle of the temple, and said to him, again, here's the if, if you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, for it is written, you shall he, the Father, shall give his angels charge over you to keep you, and in their hands they shall bear you up lest you dash your foot against the stone. So I stop there. So throw yourself down. It is written that the Father will give angels charge over you. They'll keep you from even stubbing your toe. You know, they're gonna swoop in and keep you from hitting. So this is the third confrontation point.

Create a situation in which the Father will be forced to come to your aid. Okay? Create a situation, Jesus, where the Father will be forced to come to your aid. That's kind of the essence of this. Cause the Father to react and therefore test him, and you're going to be testing his love and his care for you.

So in my actions, so I'm going to dive, and in that I'm going to expect the Father to show me love and to keep me from hitting the concrete, you know. And the context of this is in the temple. This is fitting. The temple represented God's presence and protection. So the temple was just represented presence and protection from the Father. Psalm 91, which we won't turn there, but Psalm 91, which is what the devil's quoting.

It is also kind of a protection psalm. It begins with, He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High. So the shelter represents protection and care from the Father and love. So all this makes sense and is related. So that's the quote here from Psalm 91. He shall give angels charge over you and in their hands they shall bear you up, lest you dash your foot against the stone. So the devil tries to do this and tempt him in this way.

Tempt Christ to participate in testing the promises of God.

So let me paraphrase a little bit a conjecture here. You know, if you're so trusting in His love for you, well, He won't keep you from dashing your foot. And you're a man of faith, you know, He might have said, you trust your Father. You may prove that faith in your Father here. This is a pretty unique temptation here. Why don't you jump? You know, we don't know if there were crowds there assembled at the temple. They would have seen the Son throw Himself off, you know, 450 feet down the Kindred Valley. And just before He hits, the Father swoops in and, oh, He must have been the Father's Son, you know. You can prove that in this way.

But look at this, you know, verse 12. Here's the response. Verse 12. And Jesus answered and said to him, verse 12, It has been said, You shall not tempt the Lord your God. So why did He respond in that way? You know, God had given Him no word to jump and dive off the temple edge in this way. This was not in the Father's will. God had given Him no word to do this. And anytime we step outside the Father's will, we're stepping in a space outside of the Father's will.

By doing so, we would be testing, in a sense, we would be looking to God to protect us while we are outside His will. So, I believe the point of identification is this with us.

You might say to yourself, you know, I don't know if I can really relate to this one. That seems a little separated from my personal experience today. Well, I'll tell you, it may be more related than you think because if you're like me, you take these kind of dives every day. For example, we take these dives and we still expect, we take dives outside of God's will and we still expect God to catch us. Very often He does, mercifully. It is dives, for example, taking a job opportunity, which perhaps would cause you to work and break the Sabbath, perhaps.

That's a dive. So, I'm going to take this dive, but I'm still going to expect you to protect me and keep me from dashing my foot. Entering into a relationship which you know does not have the approval of God's Word. You know, God, I want you to bless this.

I'm going to take this dive. I know it's outside of your will, but somehow, consciously or subconsciously, I'm going to expect you to catch me before I hit. What is your dive? What dives have you taken in the past? How did it work out for you? What current dives are you taking today, perhaps? You know, I can relate to this. I know you can, too. Are you going to test God that He will bless you, even moving outside of His will?

Testing Him by making the dive, but still expecting Him to catch you? You know, with the remarkable thing, again, God's very gracious. I can't tell you how many times He has caught me when I was making a dive outside of His will. He's so gracious. He does it all the time. There have been the times which He's allowed me to hit. Rock bottom. Boom! And I'm very grateful for those moments as well. So I'm grateful for the times He's so gracious, catches me. I'm also grateful for the moments in which He's allowed me to hit.

Because sometimes those rock bottom hits are most effective in helping us realize where our safety is, where our protection is, how we can't... We don't have joy in life living outside His will. So God, in His wisdom, is very gracious, and He knows when to catch us, and sometimes when to allow us to fall. We can pray for mercy. We pray for understanding and awareness that we're taking dives. And then once He gives us the awareness, we ask that He'll catch us.

He'll give us that grace. That's good. And He will, often. But He's so loving and wise. He knows how to... work in a son or daughter's life in just the right way to help them get back on the path.

So this is a wonderful identification point, I believe. So Jesus can identify with you in this way. And He says, you shall not tempt the Lord your God. So if you're in a dive, you will not tempt the Lord your God. So if you're in a dive or about to take a dive, let those words come to you. You shall not tempt the Lord your God. And you'll find if you don't take that dive, God will work it out in a different way. Then maybe you never even anticipate it.

Well, let's conclude this wilderness experience here. It concludes here, verse 13. Verse 13, Now when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from him until an opportune time. If you look at the scriptures, they do come again and again. And it really is these three bullets in the devil's gun. They come so often, these three points of identification. They come in different forms, but these are really three major points of identification to us. Questioning whether we're a son or daughter of God. Doubting. He has his best interest in mind.

Wanting our kingdom now. Indulging now. And living outside of his will. But still wanting him to catch us. So these come over and over again in the Gospel records. But despite all the attempts of the devil, we know, of course, Jesus emerges there at the end. Victorious.

His victory opens the victory to us. We, the power of the Holy Spirit comes to us, and it helps us in these moments. That's why he said, It's actually to your benefit that I leave, because I'm going to send a helper to you. And my father and I are going to live in you through that spirit, that power, and help you in that way. So that victorious spirit lives in the individual who is baptized. And that's the wonderful thing.

How is that spirit available to us? Well, the Great One. Jesus Christ came into our circumstances. There at the Jordan, he took his place in line with the sinners. Baptized, knowing himself to be the sin-bearer, alongside the sinners who he came to save. He came down where we are, immersed himself in the river, expressed his oneness with us, sinners as our Savior. And then, by immersing himself in the wilderness, he came to us to understand and sympathize and identify with us in every way. So how thankful we are that he made this journey from the water to the wilderness.