Matthew 3:17
and behold, a voice out of the heavens said, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well-pleased.”
Since the end of the Old Testament, God had not spoken. Up to this point His speaking to man had primarily been through the voice of the prophets. When the gospel opens both Mary and Joseph are spoken to by an angel. In communication to Joseph, God once spoke in a dream. To the Priest, Zacharias, John-the-Baptist's father, it was through an angel. Here, in the above passage, we are at the baptism of Jesus when He was baptized by John the Baptist. Having requested that John baptize Him, Jesus comes up out of the River Jordan and the above verse describes the scene. God spoke. There are times in the Old Testament that God spoke in an audible voice, that should be noted. The most famous and tied directly to this scene would be in Genesis 22:2.
Genesis 22:1-2
Now it came about after these things, that God tested Abraham, and said to him, “Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” He said, “Take now your son, your only son, whom you love, Isaac, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I will tell you.”
Abraham was told by God that He must sacrifice Isaac. In our above text, in Matthew, we see God doing the same thing He asked Abraham to do: Sacrifice His only Son. God uses an audible voice to mark this occasion and to set a new precedent. From this point on, God would speak to us through His Son. Note the writer of Hebrews words:
Hebrews 1:1-2
God, after He spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways, in these last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world.
The truth we need to know is that God speaks to us. God communicates to us. God's Word is His message to us. God spoke to Jesus coming out of the water, not for Him, but for us. God wants us to know that Christ WAS and IS the final Word to us. In John we have it stated even more clearly:
John 1:14
And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.
This is John's way of saying that the glory Christ received as the Spirit descended upon Him at the baptism is God's acknowledgment the Jesus was the word made flesh. God speaks and His final word is Jesus. God was pleased with Jesus act of living a sinless life to be our perfect sacrifice and provides us with unconditional redemption; the forgiveness of sins. God speaks!!
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