After celebrating the Baptism of the Lord, the liturgy leads us to delve deeper into the mystery of baptism as immersion in the Holy Spirit. In this commentary on the Sunday Gospel (John 1), Friar Luciano Audisio invites us to listen to the testimony of John the Baptist—“This is the Lamb of God”—as a key to understanding forgiveness not as a conquest, but as a gift: being immersed in the very communion of God.
The next day: faith is born from the memory of the encounter
After celebrating the Baptism of the Lord, the liturgy continues to lead us along the same path: that of water, that of baptism, that of gradually discovering who Jesus is. It is not about repeating the same thing, but about going deeper. Because water has always been a sign of purification, of new life, of encounter with God. But today the Gospel invites us to discover that this baptism in water opens us to something much deeper: a true immersion in the Holy Spirit.
The Gospel according to Saint John begins this passage with an expression that seems simple: “the next day” (Τῇ ἐπαύριον). But in the fourth Gospel, nothing is accidental. That “day after” is not just a date on the calendar: it is a spiritual key. In a sense, all faith is always lived “the next day,” after an experience of God. All of Scripture was written “the next day,” as a memory of an encounter that at the time was often not fully understood. The experience of God often disconcerts us, even seems obscure to us. But when we return to it, the next day, we discover that it was the Lord who was there, passing through our lives.
On that “day after,” John sees Jesus coming: «he sees Jesus coming toward him» (βλέπει τὸν Ἰησοῦν ἐρχόμενον πρὸς αὐτόν). John the Baptist does not seem, at first glance, to be someone especially tender. His style is harsh, his word demanding, his life radical. And yet, beneath that hard exterior lies a very fine spiritual sensitivity, an extraordinary capacity to perceive the passage of God. It is no coincidence that his name, יוֹחָנָן, means “God is tenderness.” John is the man capable of recognizing that God comes with infinite tenderness, and of pointing it out where no one expected it.
“This is the Lamb of God”: sacrifice, servant, and forgiveness
And then he pronounces a decisive phrase: «This is the Lamb of God» (Ἴδε ὁ ἀμνὸς τοῦ Θεοῦ). It is an expression that we repeat in every Eucharist, perhaps almost without thinking about it. But in it, the entire history of salvation is condensed. In Aramaic, the word ṭalyāh (ܛܠܝܐ) means both “lamb” and “servant.” By saying that Jesus is the Lamb of God, John is uniting two great currents of the Old Testament: that of the lamb sacrificed in the temple, offered continually, and that of the Servant of YHWH who gives himself totally for his people. Jesus is the definitive sacrifice, the one who gives himself and makes all other sacrifices unnecessary.
We know that “sacrifice” means sanctum facere, “to make sacred.” Sacrifice not only consecrates the offering, but also sanctifies the one who presents it. Therefore, in every Eucharist, when the Lamb of God is given to us, we do not attend an external rite: we are sanctified, introduced into a living relationship with God. Jesus is the Lamb who makes us sacred, who returns us to communion.
But, as we said before, ṭalyāh also means “servant.” And this touches the deepest heart of Israel, because all the people have desired to be servants of God. In our culture, the word “servant” sounds negative, as if it implied a loss of dignity. However, in the Bible, serving is the highest form of love. Love is not just feeling: it is action, dedication, service. Jesus is the Servant of God because he is Love made life. He is what Israel wanted to be and did not fully achieve: the servant who loves to the extreme.
That is why the Gospel adds: «This is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world» (ὁ αἴρων τὴν ἁμαρτίαν τοῦ κόσμου). The verb αἴρω does not only mean “to take away” in the sense of eliminating, but also “to bear upon oneself.” Jesus does not eliminate sin from the outside: he assumes it, he bears it, he shows solidarity with our wounded condition. And here it is important to understand what the Bible means by sin. Sin is not simply breaking a rule; it is, above all, breaking the relationship with God, diverting life from its true objective. It is putting the energy of the heart into a wrong end. The authentic objective is love, it is God himself. Sin consists of replacing it with something else, in ceasing to love, in ceasing to serve, in ignoring or destroying the life of the other.
Jesus, as the Lamb of God, takes away sin because he reorients us, returns us to the lost direction, allows us to walk again towards love. He shortens the distance between God and us, and restores the broken relationship.
Baptized in the Spirit: entering into the embrace of God
John also says: «I baptize with water» (βαπτίζειν ἐν ὕδατι). Water, in Israel, was a sign of purification and of the way. Ritual ablutions helped to become aware of the need to return to God. But John announces something new and definitive: «He will baptize in the Holy Spirit» (ἐν πνεύματι ἁγίῳ). It is no longer a matter of us trying to purify ourselves to reach God; it is God himself who comes to meet us. Forgiveness is not conquered: it is received. It is a gift.
To be baptized in the Holy Spirit means to be immersed in the infinite embrace between the Father and the Son. The Spirit is that love that unites them, and entering into Him is entering into the very communion of God. That is the forgiveness of sins: not only being absolved, but being embraced, reintegrated, returned to the relationship.
Since then, water becomes a sign of this immersion in the Spirit. Every time we bless ourselves with holy water, we remember that we have been immersed in that love, that we live sustained by that embrace. And every Eucharist places us again before the same question: can I say today, with truth, “This is the Lamb of God”? Only those who have experienced that encounter, even if it has been small and silent, can recognize it. And whoever recognizes it, walks again.
