Mark 1:1-8 (Volume 1:Part 1)

Every January we are reminded how deeply human the desire for a fresh start really is.

Research tells us that only about 31–44% of Americans even make a New Year’s resolution. Younger adults are far more likely—nearly half of those ages 18–29—but once you hit 50, that number drops to around 21%. Somewhere along the way, many of us stop believing that change is possible.

And even for those who do make resolutions, the story is sobering.

Most resolutions focus on good things—health, happiness, eating better, saving money. Nearly 80% of goals relate to health, and about 65% involve finances. These aren’t bad desires. They’re deeply human ones.

But here’s the problem: Only about 9% of people actually follow through. Roughly 31% make it past February, and one study suggests nearly 90% fail within the first two weeks.

So what does that tell us?

It tells us we don’t lack desire. We don’t lack awareness. We don’t even lack motivation.

What we lack is power.

We keep trying to manufacture new beginnings from the same old sources—willpower, discipline, optimism—and we’re surprised when nothing really changes.

There is something deeply human about the desire for a new beginning. We mark them with calendars, birthdays, anniversaries, New Year’s resolutions.

We move cities, change jobs, start diets, begin journals, delete old photos—all because something in us longs for renewal.

But the truth is: New beginnings don’t start with better habits.

They start with a better hope.

Now, this year we will slowly walk through the Gospel of Mark. We will take breaks along the way, but Mark is a fascinating book.  I want to point a couple of things out…

1: Mark is the oldest Gospel.  

There have been fragments of Mark found in funerary masks in Egypt as early as 60-70 AD…which means Mark perhaps was written as early as 40 AD….which is astoundingly close to Jesus’ earthly ministry.

2: Mark is theological.

While Mark is the earliest of the Gospels and is the shortest and is often the crudest in terms of being to the point, Mark employs some sophistication and theological development that is astounding.  I can’t get into the details (if you go to my Bible for Grown Ups class next week, I can show you), but it is safe to say that Mark is a theological masterpiece in my view.

3: Mark is all about Jesus.

Mark is not concerned with history (although there is history).  No, Mark’s primary purpose in writing is to demonstrate that Jesus is the son of God, the powerful Messiah and to correct Israel’s expectation.

Israel’s religion had become so works based, habit based

This is why, we will see here in a minute, that Mark does not start with a birth narrative of Jesus, but Jesus’ specific mission…to change the people’s concept of messiah.They believed that they had to be perfect for God to show up. The Jews had a saying that ‘if Israel would only keep the law of God perfectly for one day the kingdom of God would come’

This is the context in which Mark is writing.  Scores of people were leaving the traditional route of religion in Jerusalem, and flocking to a wild-eyed prophet in the desert named John the Baptist.  Their hope in religion that was broken and they were desperately looking for forgiveness and something new.

Mark opens his Gospel not with a birth story, not with poetry, but with a declaration:

BIBLE VERSE

Mark 1:1

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

That word beginning is not accidental. Mark wants us to know from the very first line:

What God is doing in Jesus is not a continuation—it is a decisive new beginning.

The Beginning God Initiates (v. 1)

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

Mark’s opening line echoes the very first words of Scripture:

BIBLE VERSE

Genesis 1:1

“In the beginning, God created…”

Mark is intentionally signaling something profound:

God is doing again what only God can do—creating something new.

This is not self-help.

This is not moral reform.

This is not religious improvement.

This is good news—euangelion—a royal announcement that God has acted.

And notice:

The beginning is not a concept.

The beginning is not a philosophy.

The beginning has a name—Jesus.

New beginnings in the kingdom of God always start with a person, not a program.

II. New Beginnings Require Preparation (vv. 2–4)

Mark immediately introduces John the Baptist, quoting Isaiah:

BIBLE VERSE

Mark 1:2-3

“I will send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way…”

I send my messenger before you and he will prepare your road for you. This is from Malachi 3:1. In its original context it is a threat. In Malachi’s day the priests were failing in their duty. The offerings were blemished and shoddy second-bests; the service of the Temple was a weariness to them. The messenger was to cleanse and purify the worship of the Temple before the Anointed One of God emerged upon the earth. So then the coming of Christ was a purification of life. And the world needed that purification. Seneca called Rome ‘a cesspool of iniquity’. Juvenal spoke of her ‘as the filthy sewer into which flowed the abominable dregs of every Syrian and Achaean stream’. Wherever Christianity comes it brings purification.

That happens to be capable of factual demonstration. The journalist Bruce Barton tells how the first important assignment that fell to him was to write a series of articles designed to expose Billy Sunday, the evangelist. Three towns were chosen. ‘I talked to the merchants,’ Barton writes, ‘and they told me that during the meetings and afterward people walked up to the counter and paid bills which were so old that they had long since been written off the books.’ 

He went to visit the president of the chamber of commerce of a town that Billy Sunday had visited three years before. ‘I am not a member of any church,’ he said. ‘I never attend but I’ll tell you one thing. If it was proposed now to bring Billy Sunday to this town, and if we knew as much about the results of his work in advance as we do now, and if the churches would not raise the necessary funds to bring him, I could raise the money in half a day from people who never go to church…He left a different moral atmosphere.’ 

When the evangelist Billy Graham preached in Shreveport, Louisiana, liquor sales dropped by 40 per cent and the sale of Bibles increased 300 per cent. During a mission in Seattle, among the results there is stated quite simply, ‘Several impending divorce actions were cancelled.’ In Greensboro, North Carolina, the report was that ‘the entire social structure of the city was affected’.

The good news of the Gospel prepares you for life change.

Before Jesus appears, preparation must happen.

John doesn’t preach comfort.

He doesn’t preach affirmation.

He preaches repentance.

John is not coddling them.  He is challenging them that a spiritual life demands repentance.  Out of a life of repentance flows grace.

BIBLE VERSE

Mark 1:4

4 John appeared, baptizing in the wilderness and proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.

Repentance is not about shame; it’s about direction. It literally means to turn around.

You cannot walk into a new beginning while facing the old direction.

This is why new beginnings often feel uncomfortable:

They require honesty. They require confession. They require letting go of who we’ve been pretending to be.

John’s message reminds us:

Grace does not bypass repentance; it makes repentance hopeful.

III. New Beginnings Happen in the Wilderness (vv. 4–5)

BIBLE VERSE

Mark 1:5

5 And all the country of Judea and all Jerusalem were going out to him and were being baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. 

John appears in the wilderness. Between the centre of Judaea and the Dead Sea lies one of the most terrible deserts in the world. It is a limestone desert; it looks warped and twisted; In the Old Testament it is sometimes called Jeshimmon, which means The Devastation.

There is a wild description of him here:

BIBLE VERSE

Mark 1:6

Now John was clothed with camel’s hair and wore a leather belt around his waist and ate locusts and wild honey.

So did Elijah (2 Kings 1:8). To look at the man was to be reminded, not of the fashionable orators of the day, but of the ancient prophets who lived close to the great simplicities and avoided the soft and comfortable luxuries which kill the soul.

There was the food he ate—locusts and wild honey. It so happens that both words are capable of two interpretations. The locusts may be the insects, for the law allowed them to be eaten (Leviticus 11:22–3); but they may also be a kind of bean or nut, the carob, which was the food of the poorest of the poor. The honey may be the honey the wild bees make, or it may be a kind of sweet sap that distils from the bark of certain trees.

These descriptions of John are juxtaposed against the pomp and circumstance of the elite religious leaders in Jerusalem who lived in luxury.

The wilderness in Scripture is not just geography—it’s theology.

It’s where Israel wandered.

It’s where Elijah was refined.

It’s where God strips away false securities.

The wilderness is where distractions die and clarity is born. People listened to John because he told them in their heart what they knew to be true…they were sick and needed a spiritual healing.

The people of Israel were well aware that for 300 years the voice of prophecy had been silent. They were waiting for some authentic word from God. And in John they heard it.

This healing would not come in Jerusalem. They leave the city and go out to him.

New beginnings often require us to leave what feels familiar and safe.

God rarely does His deepest work in places of comfort.

He does it where we are dependent.

And here’s the grace of it all:

God meets us there.

IV. New Beginnings Demand Humility (vv. 6–7)

John’s appearance is strange—camel’s hair, leather belt, locusts, wild honey. But his message is clear:

BIBLE VERSE

Mark 1:7a

“After me comes one more powerful than I…”

John knows his role. He is not the center. He is the signpost.

True repentance always leads away from ourselves and toward Christ.

John says:

BIBLE VERSE

Mark 1:7b

“I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the straps of his sandals.”

That was the work of the lowest servant. It was the work of a slave.  The roads were unsurfaced. In dry weather they were dust-heaps; in wet weather rivers of mud. To remove the sandals was the work and office of a slave. John asked nothing for himself but everything for the Christ whom he proclaimed.

New beginnings require humility because pride always tries to make us the hero of our own story.

But Christianity begins when we finally stop pretending we can save ourselves. This was the essence of Israel’s religion.

This is why Jesus says these words in Matthew:

BIBLE VERSE

Matthew 11:28-30

Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

Or these words…

BIBLE VERSE

Luke 5:31-32

31 And Jesus answered them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. 32 I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.” 

Jesus only comes to those who are humble enough to recognize their spiritual condition.

But when he comes…he promises healing.

V. New Beginnings Are Empowered by the Spirit (v. 8)

BIBLE VERSE

Mark 1:8

“I baptize you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”

Here is what John was saying.

John can wash the outside. Jesus transforms the inside.

If you are old enough, you might remember your mom attempting to clean the inside of you.  If you were like me and had a potty mouth, perhaps your mom shoved a bar of soap in your mouth to help clean the filth coming out of you.  

John is saying, you don’t need water to clean you, but something far deeper.

Water can symbolize change. The Spirit produces it.

This is the difference between religion and the gospel.

Religion says: Try harder. The gospel says: Receive power.

A new beginning is not you becoming stronger.

It is you being made new.

The Holy Spirit doesn’t just forgive your past— He empowers your future.

My favorite verse in the Bible, I quote it often:

BIBLE VERSE

2 Corinthians 5:17

17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. 18 All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; 19 that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. 20 Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. 

Notice how this being made new, changes everything about you…even the purposes of your life.  New means brand new not just fixed.

Conclusion: The Beginning Is Still Happening

Mark doesn’t say this was the beginning. There is no past tense. He says this is the beginning.

Because every time Jesus is welcomed, a new beginning starts.

Some of us need a new beginning from guilt. Some from exhaustion. Some from sin we’ve hidden too long. Some from religion without life.

And here is the good news: Jesus does not wait for you to clean yourself up. He meets you in the wilderness and brings heaven with Him.

The beginning of the gospel is not behind us. It stands before us— calling us to repent, to believe, and to step into the new life God is already offering.

“If anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here.”

New beginnings have a name. And His name is Jesus.