The Beginning of Good news

Intro

Good morning and welcome to a brand new teaching series through the book of Mark.

Before we get into the text this morning I want to share with you why we are starting a 15 week teaching series through this book.

My prayer for all of you this year and for this church is that we would encounter Jesus in profound ways.

Its easy to come to church, week after week, year after year and sort of settle in and say…Well I liked the music this week or I liked the sermon this week

And you get fed and then go on about your week.

But God didn't lead you to come here so that you can observe church…God wants you here so that you can experience him...

So that is my prayer for REC this year…That we would encounter Jesus in a way that we have not encountered him before…

And I want to encourage you to pray that for you and your family and your church. That Jesus would reveal himself more and more and that people would turn to him and put their faith in him

This is why we are doing a study through the book of Mark because if you want to encounter Jesus there is no better place to look than the Bible

Background:

So before we get into the text today, you deserve to know a little bit about the book of Mark

Mark was the first gospel written

There were a number of church leaders in the 1-3rd century who talk about Mark being the interpreter for Peter...

So basically church tradition tells us that this is Peter’s story but with Mark’s literary arrangement and crafting

Clement of Alexandrea, Irenaeus, Origen and many others have all claimed this

But because Matthew, Luke and John came out and they are very beautifully written with what seems like a lot of intentional organization…Mark kind of just looked like a loose assortment of historical information that wasn't really put together too well into a story…

So really for thousands of years Mark was looked at as a historical reference book and it wasn’t until the 1860’s that Markan studies really took off

The reason why I bring this up is that it wasn’t until 160 years ago that scholars started looking at this book differently and really beginning to see the brilliance of the way that Mark wrote

And as we traverse through Mark, I will point out some stuff that Mark does in a literary way that makes these amazing points...

And last point: I am not going to preach every word of the book of Mark…I want to, but one of the unique traits of mark is that he repeats stories…Because he wants you to contrast them…So it doesn’t always work well to just walk right through the text…Some weeks we will do like 8 verses and some weeks we will do 3 chapters But for now, Please open your Bibles to the Gospel of Mark, Chapter 1.

Mark 1:1–15 NIV

The beginning of the good news about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God, as it is written in Isaiah the prophet: “I will send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way”— “a voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him.’ ” And so John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. The whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem went out to him. Confessing their sins, they were baptized by him in the Jordan River. John wore clothing made of camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. And this was his message: “After me comes the one more powerful than I, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie. I baptize you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.” At that time Jesus came from Nazareth in Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. Just as Jesus was coming up out of the water, he saw heaven being torn open and the Spirit descending on him like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.” At once the Spirit sent him out into the wilderness, and he was in the wilderness forty days, being tempted by Satan. He was with the wild animals, and angels attended him. After John was put in prison, Jesus went into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God. “The time has come,” he said. “The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!”

So do you see how quick just the first 15 verses are?

we have 4 stories in 15 verses

and the danger with mark is that they are so fast that you might just breeze right through them without seeing the significance of who Jesus is or what he is doing...

So it is important that we slow down and just look at what is happening here with fresh eyes...

The first thing I want to point out is actually kind of a biblical nerd thing but I wanted to show this to you right up front so that you can look for it as you read the book of Mark...

Mark loves to start with a story....go to another story or two and then pick up that first story again

Its called an Intercalated Pericope…Or what everyone else calls it is the Markan Sandwich.

This is Mark’s writing style and he sandwiches stories in-between one main story to kind of say…Don’t forget that these stories are all connected…Sometimes he uses it so that you will intentionally compare the stories.

So in the first 15 verses Mark talks about John the Baptist preaching....Then he tells two other stories and then picks back up the story of John the Baptist

If you are reading though Mark, you will find this everywhere!

So lets take this slowly

Mark 1:1 NIV

The beginning of the good news about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God,

So this first line is the only line that we can point to in the book of Mark and say...Ok that’s Mark’s own commentary…This is from his point of view

So I am doing the first 15 verses today…But right away I want to show you something that Mark does that if you are reading the book of Mark you will surely notice

Mark loves to build these sandwiches SANDWICH GRAPHIC

The Gospel

The prophesy of John the Baptist

John the Baptist and Jesus

Jesus Baptized by John

The Temptation of Jesus in the wilderness

John in Prison

Jesus Preaches the gospel

The reason why I even bring this structure up to you is that many of you will be in small groups and many of you will be reading the gospel of mark on your own and you should look for these little design patters that Mark has built his gospel with

See this one is trying to say…1. Everything in this book is good news

But then pay attention to everything that happens in the first 15 verses because this is the gospel! Mark is kind of screaming at you: Pay Attention!

Ok so there is one other little technical thing that I need to bring up in understanding the book of Mark…So when Biblical writers are writing something....Just like when you are writing a paper in school you might have had a number of books out and you are looking at these books and taking from them and writing a paper...

Well back in Mark’s day, you didn’t site sources exactly, you did it loosely like…You would say..>As its written…then you would copy down what it said...

Many scholars believe that Mark was using something called the Septuagint…Which is simply the Greek version of the Old Testament. It might be all that he had available to him…But that is important because you can match up really specific verses with what Mark is talking about

So in the Greek Version of the Old Testament we see the Phrase “good news everywhere concerning the Messiah…That he will restore God’s people…That he will bring God’s people back to himself....That God will come...

You don’t see it much in the Hebrew bible but the exact translation is there for the LXX all over the place.

So Mark Says that this is the good news about the “Son of God”

This Phrase “Son of God” is so impotrant…Mark does not want you to be confused about who he is talking about

In one sense the entire book of Mark is a big Markan Sandwich because it starts with the pronouncement that Jesus is the son of God and ends with a Roman Soldier looking up at the cross saying, “Surely, this was the son of God”

But See, Mark is brilliant in his writing because he is setting up what his Gospel will all be about...

See any avid reader of the Old Testament would have gotten something probably right away…We don’t always get this becau

Israel was called “The son of God” (Exod 4:23; Hos 11:1)

Israel is called to be a light to the nations (Isa 42:6; 49:6)

God intended Israel to rule over the nations (Deut 15:6; 26:19; 28:1; Rom 4:13)

Because of Israel’s sin they were exiled to suffer at the hands of a foreign power. (Isa 2:6–8; Ezek 7–9; Jer 13:10)

The prophets foretold Israel’s resurrection (Ezek 37)

So When Mark says....This man is the son of God: if you know your Old Testament then you have the whole story line right here…This is who this man is and will be…This is what is destined to happen to Jesus

That Jesus is the true king…He is the light of the world, he will rule over the nations…He will suffer at the hands of a foreign power not for his sin but because he took our sin on

And then when all looks lost. He will rise again...

So when Mark is saying…Hey this is good news about the son of God, he is saying a lot!

This is not a small introduction…He wants you to know what is about to happen!

Mark wants you to know that all this old testament scripture and story are coming to live in the person of Jesus.

Ok that was verse one...

Jesus is Yahweh incarnate

Mark 1:2–8 NIV

as it is written in Isaiah the prophet: “I will send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way”— “a voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him.’ ” And so John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. The whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem went out to him. Confessing their sins, they were baptized by him in the Jordan River. John wore clothing made of camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. And this was his message: “After me comes the one more powerful than I, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie. I baptize you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”

So how do we know that Jesus is Yahweh incarnate?

Mark is quoting from Isaiah: Prepare a way for the “Lord” the Lord is Yahweh…The creator God

So Mark talks about John…And what mark records is that there is this absolute revival happening down by the river and people are coming from all over confessing their sins…and being baptized

But John’s whole message is that You haven’t seen anything yet! The one who comes after me…I am not even worthy to untie the guys sandals…And you have to understand that tying and untying sandals is like the lowest of low servant Jobs...

Because John says…I am baptizing you with water but this guy is going to pour out the Holy Spirit

This is so massive…because the only one who can pour out God’s holy spirit is God himself…Yahweh This is all over the Old Testament, (Joel 2, Isaiah 44:3, Ezekiel 37, 39)

The New International Version Chapter 2

I will pour out my Spirit on all people.

Your sons and daughters will prophesy,

your old men will dream dreams,

your young men will see visions.

29 Even on my servants, both men and women,

I will pour out my Spirit in those days

Mark doesn't want you to be mistaken about who Jesus is

Many people today even will try and confuse you on this point, literally there are people who will knock on your door and call Jesus God but they mean a god

People in our culture today will just regard Jesus as a good moral teacher or as a positive force in history

But he is so much more than that, Jesus is Yahweh himself, stepping out of heaven

And you can not me mistaken on this point…Your salvation depends on it!

So what is Yahweh doing?

Jesus is leading a new exodus

Mark 1:9–13 NIV

At that time Jesus came from Nazareth in Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. Just as Jesus was coming up out of the water, he saw heaven being torn open and the Spirit descending on him like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.” At once the Spirit sent him out into the wilderness, and he was in the wilderness forty days, being tempted by Satan. He was with the wild animals, and angels attended him.

Now when most people read this its like Ok…Jesus was baptized and then he went into the wilderness…

But Mark is linking this whole event back to two other events that happen in the old testament

The first thing is that when the text says that Jesus saw heaven being “torn open” the word that Mark uses is “schizo” and that just happens to be the same word that the Greek Old Testament uses when it describes the miraculous parting of the Red Sea

And so when we look back to Moses taking Israel through the Red Sea and then the sea crashing down on Pharoah, what we have to understand is that this is a judgment on the gods of Egypt

Mark wants readers to see that a new exodus event is happening.

The kingdom of God is back, and this time it will not fail because it’s being led by the visible Yahweh, now incarnate as Jesus of Nazareth.

The imagery is even more startling when we factor in Jude 5, a passage we looked at earlier in this chapter.

Jude 1:5 (ESV)

English Standard Version Chapter 1

5 Now I want to remind you, although you once fully knew it, that Jesus, who saved a people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe.

What Mark is saying is that the baptism of Jesus is a new parting of the red sea…But this time it is not Moses leading, it is Yahweh…And as you watch this scene unfold

And the spirit descends as a dove (It is a sign of new creation) Just like when the flood waters receded and a dove came with an olive branch to Noah

There is a voice from heaven and Jesus is present…It is one of the places where we see the trinity in the Bible.

So then Jesus goes into the wilderness…Just like Moses...

But where Moses eventually fails the test and has to die there and not enter the promise land

Jesus overcomes the temptations of satan and he passes the test

And all of this is the good news

But what is this new exodus from?

It is clear…We are in exile from God because of our sin...

All of humanities relationship with God is flawed because humanity loves evil and we keep going after that...

And Jesus is leading humanity back to a right relationship with God by conquering sin and overpowering the forces of evil in this world.

Mark 1:14–15 NIV

After John was put in prison, Jesus went into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God. “The time has come,” he said. “The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!”

In Jesus we have Yahweh step out of heaven

and he tells the world…The time is come

the new king is here

this is good news

Next week Jesus will go on to show the power of what Yahweh can do

Demons flee from him

Sickness goes away

Sin is banished before him ‘

This is the son of God the Eternal father stepping out of heaven and taking flesh on

So Jesus says two things...

Repent & believe

I think this is a great place to pause right here and finish on these two words...

What is the response to the creator God walking among humanity...

Repent & Believe.

Repent is a simple command, it simply means to change your mind.

Repent that your way is the right way

Repent from your ideas

Repent from what you think is right and believe

And then he says Believe: You know in our culture, the word believe seems like a cognitive exersize…It seems like something that you do mentally.

In our culture it is totally acceptable to say that you believe something and act differently…That is insanity

What Jesus says is to change your mind and then act on it!

So Mark starts his Gospel and he says

Yahweh Incarnate is standing here in front of you…This is who Jesus is...

he is destined to die and raise again

He is leading a new exodus from sin…and he wants you to join him…Abd the way that happens is by repenting from the way you do life by default and believing that he is the son of God...

Response

Maybe that is you today!

Maybe you need to repent and believe that Jesus is who he says he is