Jesus Accepts His Calling

MEMORY SELECTION: “The spirit of the Lord shall rest upon Him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord.” —Isaiah 11:2

SELECTED SCRIPTURE: Mark 1:4-13

IN HARMONY with last week’s lesson, we know that Jesus was aware of the very unusual circumstances of his birth. This, together with the natural brilliance of his mind and his knowledge of the Old Testament prophecies, would lead him to know that he was destined for a very special place in God’s arrangements. He also recognized the necessity of keeping the law perfectly and that God had time features to his plans.

Jesus stated, after John the Baptist was imprisoned, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand: repent ye, and believe the Gospel.” (Mark 1:15) And the Apostle Paul, in Galatians 4:4,5, stated, “But when the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the sonship.”—Diaglott

When Jesus came to John at Jordan, he was endowed with the mental and moral perfection that had once been Adam’s in the Garden of Eden. But he was a man, and being a man he was not able to discern spiritual things. The Apostle Paul states, “But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: … neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” (I Cor. 2:14) So, while Jesus understood much and knew the Scriptures, he did not know the hidden things of the Lord’s arrangements nor the specific role that he was to play in these arrangements.

In the account of Jesus’ baptism recorded in Matthew 3:16, it states, “And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and, lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he [John] saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him [Jesus].” With the enlightenment of mind that accompanies spirit begettal, the text says that the “heavens were opened unto him”; that is, the effulgent light of the Holy Spirit was focused on the things that were hidden to the natural man.

The 40th Psalm is a beautiful prophecy concerning the attitude of Jesus’ mind when it became clear to him as to what his role was to be in God’s plan: “Many, O Lord my God, are thy wonderful works which thou hast done, and thy thoughts which are to us-ward: they cannot be reckoned up in order unto thee: if I would declare and speak of them, they are more than can be numbered. Sacrifice and offering thou didst not desire; mine ears hast thou opened: burnt offering and sin offering hast thou not required. Then said I, lo, I come: in the volume of the book it is written of me, I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea, thy law is within my heart.”—Ps. 40:5-8

When Jesus realized, through the enlightenment of the Holy Spirit, that the sacrificial arrangements that were instituted under the Law Covenant were really pictures of him, that it was the Heavenly Father’s will that he yield himself as the anti-typical sacrifice for sins, he stated, “Lo, I come to do thy will, O my God.”—Heb. 10:8,9

In Hebrews the 9th chapter the Apostle Paul points out (vs. 9) that the sacrifices and the tabernacle were figures “for the time then present” that could not make him that did the service perfect. These things stood only in meats and drinks and divers washings and carnal ordinances imposed on them until “a period of emendation.” (vs. 10, Diaglott) “But Christ having become a high priest of the future good things, by means of the greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made by hands, that is, not of this creation; he entered once for all, into the holy places, not indeed by means of the blood of goats and of bullocks, but by means of his own blood, having found age-lasting redemption. For if the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling the polluted, cleanses for the purification of the flesh; how much more shall the blood of the Anointed One, who through an aionian spirit, offered himself spotless to God.”—Heb. 9:11-14, Diaglott

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