I find the stages in Jesus' life quite similar to our own Christian life. I could see how our conversion and baptism is similar to Jesus' own baptism. I could see how we can associate God's pronouncement that Jesus is His Son in whom He is well pleased with how God declares us righteous by faith when we believe and is baptized. In other words, this is God's justification or declaration that we are His children on the basis of faith. I can see that God the Father has also declared Jesus as His Son on the basis of faith during the Lord's baptism when He has yet to do anything. I could see why Jesus said this was to fulfill all righteousness as if to show that God's declaration of Him as the beloved Son was not due to His obedience towards the Law but instead due to His faith to follow what the Father had told Him to do. I could see how this justification by faith that Jesus is God's Son will in the end be proven correct through God's resurrection of Jesus. The resurrection in the end confirms what God has pronounced earlier during the baptism. And God confirms this not by what Jesus has accumulated by the merit of His works, but by the faith that Jesus had which produces works of love, namely His death on the cross ultimately. I could see that this is related to how we should live as Christians after we believed. We need to continue in the faith, submitting our will to the Spirit just as Jesus did to the Father even to the point of death on the cross in order to be finally confirmed as God's children through the final resurrection which Paul had also longed for. Thus, I can understand better the meaning of justification by faith in our current stage of Christian life and the final justification or confirmation that we are indeed God's children as pronounced initially during our conversion. This happens when we are resurrected in the end after a life of work-producing walk of faith to hear once again God declaring us as His people in the final judgement.
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