John, the forerunner of the Messiah, the herald of the kingdom of God, was commanded to baptize in water, (2. His baptism was, therefore, the entrance to the kingdom to be established by Jesus.
In his divine nature, Jesus would not have had need of baptism; in fact, the ordinance would have been an empty ceremony; but Jesus, in his human existence had divested himself of every vestige of specially divine attributes, and become like his brethren in everything but sin. (22). Luke also says the ordinance administered by John was "baptism for the remission of sins." (3:3)