“And John bore witness: ‘I saw the Spirit descend from heaven like a dove, and it remained on Him. I myself did not know Him, but He who sent me to baptize with water said to me, ‘He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain, this is He who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’ And I have seen and have borne witness that this is the Son of God.”
In the previous verse, John the Baptist mentioned how He did not know who the Messiah was going to be, but he went out in faith to do what God commanded him to do. It is now shown at the end of this passage how John knew who the messiah was going to be—by baptizing Him and the interaction of the Holy Spirit in that act. God’s command to baptize unfolded into a twofold plan: one was to call the people to repentance for the Messiah coming, and the other was to reveal the Messiah.
The author shows in this passage that there was a physical action when Jesus was baptized. The Holy Spirit descended on Jesus and remained. It is interesting that there is a distinction that the Holy Spirit remained and this was not only a sign to John that this was the Messiah, but that means there must have been others the Holy Spirit descended on and it did not remain. This is significant because it shows us a glimpse of how the Holy Spirit operated before Jesus died and rose again to usher in the church age. Jesus is the one, however, that the Holy Spirit remained on because—as John the Baptist testifies to—this calls Him out to the people as the Son of God.
The last piece to note is what has been pointed multiple times with this first account in the gospel. John the Baptist was a man specially called out from God and one who followed the calling of God all the way until his mission from God was complete. He was a man of faith during a turning point in history who understood God’s mission for him and did what God called him to do.
We cannot ever hope to be like John the Baptist in what he did because he was a man special to history, but he is an example of how to bring the gospel to people and the first one that we have in the New Testament. This is what we can hope to gain for ourselves in this retelling of history, the gospel has to be the center of our ministries and where God calls us to serve. John the Baptist was called to baptize people with water and tell them to make straight their path not just to do the action but because of who was coming. Through the gospel, he preached the good news of the King, Jesus. We must remember this for ourselves; the gospel must always be front and center not just something we know but preach to ourselves and everyone else on a daily basis, about the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.
If you are not a Christian, the same message stands for all time. There is not a chance to make yourself right before God or be able to stand before a Holy God and be accepted except through the acceptance of the blood of the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. That is what Jesus Christ did on the cross, and through that sacrifice He allowed us to receive the Holy Spirit who remains with us because of that sacrifice just like it remained with Him when He was first baptized.
The Traveling Mountains 
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