We were discussing this passage in our pastor's study group this past week up in Lancaster. A member of our group told the story of a very prominent family in his last congregation who managed to bring back a couple of gallons of genuine Jordan river water with the notion of using it for family baptisms. They saved it and were intending to bring it to the church every time a family member was baptized. Now I don't want to get into the fouled up theology that runs with the idea that Jordan river water is somehow better for Baptism than other water. It obviously doesn't matter.
Water is water.
What makes water a Baptism is the Word of God that is connected to it. The only reason for mentioning this was that those two gallons of Jordan river water were so miserably foul and filthy, the pastor said you hardly wanted to stick your hand in it, let alone pour it on someone. That gives us a somewhat less than romantic, though realistic, picture of what was happening with Jesus. He was entering the cesspool of our sin, the foul effluent of our sinful hearts, and He was making it clean with His own flesh and blood. Like the rod of Moses that made the bitter waters of Marah sweet in the wilderness, Jesus was making a sweet and cleansing water.