Jesus’ request to be baptized by John the Baptist caused unique problems, both for John and for Christians who came later. One Bible historian reports that “There is evidence that some early Christians found Jesus’ baptism somewhat embarrassing, either because it implied that Jesus, like his fellow Israelites, needed to repent, or because it implied that Jesus was in some sense subordinate to John.”
John the Baptist himself seems to have had a similar intellectual conflict when Jesus showed up at the Jordan River—to the point where John actually tried to talk Jesus out of the baptismal request (Matthew 3:14). In spite of all that, Jesus shrugged off John’s objection—and any embarrassing implications associated with it—and insisted on being baptized as a demonstration of his ritual obedience to God’s will.
[BKB, 79, 81]
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