Introduction

Hello church! Did you know that in the New Testament God speaks audibly only three times? I’m referring to God the Father. He speaks out loud where more than one person heard him exactly three times. And guess what? Each time it’s the same message: he is confirming the identity of Jesus as his Son.

Today we’re going to look at a passage of scripture from the Gospel of Matthew, the story of Jesus getting baptized. It’s an interesting story and some interesting things happen.

Main Teaching

Jesus arrives at the Jordan River to be baptized by John, and right off the bat he encounters a small problem: John resists. It doesn’t sit right with John that he should baptize Jesus! It should be the other way around — Jesus to baptize John. Why would John resist?

John admitted just a few verses earlier that when the Messiah arrives, he will “baptize with fire and the Holy Spirit” and that John himself wouldn’t be worthy to “carry his sandals” (Matthew 3:11). John wasn’t baptizing with fire and the Holy Spirit, but with water for repentance of sins. And, John knew that Jesus didn’t need to repent of any sins or confess any skeletons in his closet. John’s baptism of water and repentance paled in comparison to the coming Messiah’s baptism of fire!

John wanted what Jesus had to offer and felt Jesus didn’t need what he himself had to offer. So, he resisted. When we don’t understand the ways and methods of God, we resist. We hesitate because what God is doing is counterintuitive.

Peter was another notable person really good at resisting God’s counterintuitive ways. At one point Peter tried talking some sense into Jesus when, ”Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must suffer many things at the hands of the elders, chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day raised to life again. Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. ‘Never, Lord! This shall never happen to you!’” (Matthew 16:21-22).

At the Last Supper, the night before Jesus is crucified, Peter resists yet again: “Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power, and that he had come from God and was returning to God; so he got up from the meal, took off his outer clothing, and wrapped a towel around his waist…and began to wash his disciples’ feet…He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, ‘Lord, are you going to wash my feet?…you shall never wash my feet.’” (John 13:3-8).

Why were John and Peter so quick to resist what Jesus wanted to do? They resisted Jesus’ baptism, Jesus going to the cross, and Jesus washing their feet.

The simple truth is that God’s ways are not our ways. “‘For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,’ declare the Lord” (Isaiah 55:8).

This means God’s ways are often counterintuitive. To be counterintuitive means to be contrary to our expectations but yet still very true.

Here’s an example: the work of Abraham Wald during WWII. Wald was a statistician who was asked to help the British Royal Air Force (RAF) figure out where to add armor to their planes to protect them from getting shot down. Adding too much armor would make the plane too heavy, and adding too little armor would keep the planes vulnerable, so there had to be a balance. The planes needed extra armor, but the question was where do you put it?

After reviewing the data, Wald recommended adding the extra armor to the parts of the planes that usually sustained no damage. Read that again! Wald recommended adding the extra armor to the parts of the planes that usually sustained no damage. Huh? Why would he recommend THAT?

His data —the only data available— was based solely on planes that returned from battle. These planes had bullet holes in places where the plane could sustain hits yet still keep flying. The planes that did NOT return from battle were probably hit in different areas causing them to crash. Wald recommended adding armor to the places where returning planes had NOT been hit.

Isn’t that brilliant? And it’s counterintuitive ... View this full sermon with PRO Premium

The simple truth is that God’s ways are not our ways. “‘For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,’ declare the Lord” (Isaiah 55:8).