All four gospels describe Jesus as present at John the Baptist's ministry of baptism.
The Gospel of Mark begins with the Baptism of Jesus by John the Baptist, which Biblical scholars describe as the beginning of Jesus' public ministry. According to Mark, Jesus came to the Jordan River where John the Baptist had been preaching and baptising people in the crowd. In Luke, Jesus is merely another member of the crowd that had come to see John, and is baptised by an unnamed individual that may or may not be John. While Matthew and Mark report that Jesus seeks out John to be baptised by him. After Jesus had been baptised and rose from the water, Mark states Jesus "saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. And a voice came from heaven, 'You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased'"[22] Luke adds the chronological details that John the Baptist had begun preaching in the fifteenth year of Tiberius Caesar, c. 28 [23] and that Jesus was about thirty years old when he was baptised [24]. Matthew adds to the other accounts by describing an attempt by John to decline the baptism, saying that it is Jesus who should baptise John. Jesus insisted however, claiming that baptism was necessary to "fulfill all righteousness."[25] In John's gospel it is John the Baptist who has the vision of the dove/Holy Spirit and who recognises Jesus as being "the lamb of God" and the Christ, while the actual baptism is not explicitly mentioned.
Following his baptism, according to Matthew,[26] Jesus was led into the desert by God where he fasted for forty days and forty nights. During this time the devil appeared to him and tempted Jesus to demonstrate his supernatural powers as proof of his divinity, each temptation being refused by Jesus with a quote of scripture from the Book of Deuteronomy. In all, he was tempted three times. The Gospels state that having failed, the devil departed and angels came and brought nourishment to Jesus.
Mark's account is very brief, merely noting the aforementioned events, but giving no details about them, not even how many there were. Matthew and Luke, on the other hand, describe the temptations by recounting the details of the conversations between Jesus and the devil.
Both the Baptism and the Temptation are included in Matthew, Mark and Luke (the Synoptic Gospels) and the Gospel of the Hebrews (noncanonical Gospel), but there is no mention of these events in the Gospel of John.
