Stepping Into the Water With Us

As the Christmas season draws to a close, the Church leads us to the Jordan River—quiet, dusty, and crowded with sinners seeking a new beginning. And there, astonishingly, we find Jesus. The sinless One stands among the broken, the weary, the repentant. He joins the line of those longing for mercy, not because He needs cleansing, but because we do.

This is the mystery we celebrate on the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord: Jesus steps into the water not to be changed, but to change everything.

He approaches John the Baptist as a beggar, carrying not His own sin but our misery. He lowers Himself into the waters of repentance so that no human heart will ever again be too far, too stained, or too ashamed to come to the Father. In His baptism, Jesus makes our return possible. He opens a path home.

And heaven responds.

“After the Lord was baptized, the heavens were opened, and the Spirit descended upon him like a dove, and the voice of the Father thundered: This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”

This moment is not only a revelation of who Jesus is—it is a revelation of who we are becoming in Him. The same Spirit that rests upon Christ is poured into us. The same voice that names Him “Beloved” speaks over every person baptized into His life. The Father’s delight is no longer distant or reserved; it is given, freely, to His sons and daughters.

In His baptism, Jesus shows us how to live:
with humility, with courage, with a heart turned toward the Father.
He acknowledges His Father publicly so that we will never hesitate to do the same.

And so the Christmas season ends not with sentimentality, but with mission. The Child in the manger now stands in the river, ready to begin the work of redemption. The light that shone in Bethlehem now shines on the banks of the Jordan, calling us to follow.

As we remember this feast, may we hear the Father’s voice again—speaking not only to Jesus, but through Him to us:
You are my beloved. I am pleased to call you mine.

May that truth shape the way we walk into this new season of Ordinary Time: grounded in love, strengthened by the Spirit, and unafraid to step into the waters where Christ has already gone before us.