The Heavens Opened

Could heaven behold such grace unmoved? Impossible. "And straightway coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens opened [cleaving asunder] and the Spirit like a dove descending upon Him." What meaning that act of baptism had in the mind of God! "And there came a voice from heaven, saying, Thou art My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." As John says, "Him hath God the Father sealed." It is not merely the fact, but "he saw," etc., which is here recorded.
Though truly God, He was man; though a Son, He became a servant and was now about to enter into His ministry He receives the Spirit as well as the recognition of His Sonship. He had justified God's sentence on Israel, and call to Israel. In grace He had joined the souls who had bowed to it in the waters of Jordan. But this could not be without the answer of the Father for His heart's joy in the path He was about to tread. The one was the fulfillment of every kind of righteousness and not legal only (this in grace, for there was no necessity of evil in His case). The other was His recognition by the Father in the nearest personal relationship, over which His submission to baptism might have cast a cloud to carnal eyes.