Mark tells us that Jesus came to Judea (Mark 1:5) from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John (Mark 1:9) in the Jordan near where it empties into the Dead Sea. An interesting fact about Mark’s narrative is that we don’t have any evidence here of John’s unwillingness to baptize the One mightier than he (Mark 1:7; cp. Matthew 3:14-15). Consider for a moment what John may have been thinking, as recorded by Matthew. John was to prepare the people for the coming of the Messiah, who was to remove the sin of the world (John 1:29; cp. Genesis 3:22-24) or in a covenantal context, the sin that caused the Lord to divorce Israel, and, thereby, bring in the New Covenant. In what context, therefore, was John to understand the One, who was to do such a thing, to be in need of baptism? If baptism was done to prepare, or to wash one who needed to change his life or his attitude toward God, why would it be done to the One mightier than I (cp. Mark 2:17)?
I believe the answer to this question lies in the understanding that the word translated repentance in Mark 1:4 and 2:17, although related to repentance, it doesn’t mean repentance from sin. It simply means change. For the Jews it meant to repent of their attitude toward sin, toward life and toward God. However, for Jesus, it meant as far as his coming from God is concerned, that he was willing to change and forgive the sin of the world (John 1:29) and the sin that broke the Lord’s covenant he made with Israel. Jesus’ baptism represented his willingness to remarry the Jews and take away their sin that separated them from God, and this is brought home in the next verse in Mark.
Immediately after Jesus was baptized, he came up out of the water, and John saw the heavens opening (G4977; schizo, i.e. ‘open,’ ‘split’ or ‘sever’). The Greek is in the present, passive participle, meaning the action was then taking place before John’s eyes. Matthew and Luke used a different Greek word (G455; anoigo), which simply means to open (Matthew 3:16; Luke 3:21). Matthew’s verb is in the aorist, passive, indicative, which means the heavens were opened at a specific point in the past, and from Mark’s perspective they were opened at the time of Jesus’ baptism. So, Mark 1:10 tells us that John saw the heavens opening before his eyes, but Matthew records a simple action that took place in the past. That is, not only were the heavens opening, they opened up completely, and John saw it take place.
Luke uses the same verb (G455) as Matthew, but he puts it in the aorist, passive, infinitive, which means much the same as Mathew’s account, except it is put in the context of Jesus’ prayer (Luke 3:21). In other words, Jesus prayed for the heavens to be opened, undoubtedly in fulfillment of the prophet’s prayer: “Oh that you would rend the heavens, that you would come down…” (Isaiah 64:1). The writer of the Gospel of John, also, uses the Greek word anoigo (G455) at John 1:51 where Jesus, speaking to one of his disciples, told him that he would : “see the heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man.” The Gospel of John puts the word in the perfect, passive participle, and this means that not only did Jesus pray for the heavens to open (Luke 3:21), and not only did John see the heavens parting (Mark 1:10), and not only did they open up completely at Jesus’ baptism (Matthew 3:16), but they opened and remained open (John 1:51; cp. John 1:29-34).
So, three of the Gospel narratives use the Greek word anoigo (G455) to describe the heavens opening, but Mark uses the word, schizo (G4977), which not only points to them opening but they were ripped open. All three Synoptics use this word to say the veil was ripped open at the time of Jesus’ death (Matthew 27:51; Mark 15:38; Luke 23:45). In other words, the heavens, represented by the veil in the Temple, were ripped open. They were closed in Genesis 3:22-24, represented by the flaming sword at the entry of the Garden, where Adam and the Lord openly spoke with one another. At Jesus’ baptism, they opened to him, and after his crucifixion, we were enabled to take advantage of the fact they were open (Hebrews 4:16).
Mark then tells his readers that the Spirit, in a physical shape (Luke 3:22) and as though it were a dove, descended from heaven until it touched and remained on Jesus (Mark 1:10), which was the sign given to John, that this was, indeed, the Messiah (John 1:29-34). What the sign represented was that God was at this very moment anointing Jesus for his New Covenant ministry (Isaiah 11:2; 42:1; 59:21; 61:1)
Finally, a voice came forth from the heavens, which in the context of verse-10, were now open, and voice was heard to say: “You are my beloved Son, in you I am well pleased” (Mark 1:11; the personal pronoun is present in the Greek). The phrase begins like the phrase in Psalm 2:7. The second Psalm was sung at the anointing of the kings of Judah, and at his baptism Jesus was anointed by God as the Messiah (cp. Matthew 2:2; 21:5; 27:11; John 1:49-51; 12:13, 15; 18:37). However, Mark adds “In **you** I am well pleased,” or, in other words, ‘in you’ in contrast to everyone else; ‘in you’ and not in any other, “I am well pleased.”
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