Mark 3

Intro

What is the gospel? Mark says here that Jesus came preaching the good news of God, good news literally means gospel. That’s a word we say around the church a lot. So what is it? What is the gospel?

I don’t expect everyone in this room to have an answer to that question. We are a church that makes space for people to be in different places in their spiritual journey. Maybe you’re confused, maybe Christianity is new to you, and you really just don’t know. That’s great. We’re glad that you’re here so you can discover the good news for yourself.

I suspect that if I went around the room and asked each of you this question, some of you would use different language to communicate a similar idea. You’d likely say that the gospel says Jesus died for our sins and if we believe in him we can have eternal life.

And that is true. If that’s your answer, you’d be saying something very similar to what the Apostle Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15. Here’s what Paul wrote:

New International Version (2011) Chapter 15

I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. 2 By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you.

New International Version (2011) Chapter 15

For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, 4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures.

Paul said that this message about Jesus, that he died for our sins and we will be saved if we believe this message, that is the gospel. Yes. Absolutely. That’s incredible news!

But what if I told you the gospel is actually more than that? Not less, but it is more. Think about it. In our passage tonight, Jesus came proclaiming the gospel. But he hadn’t died for sins yet. He hadn’t been resurrected yet. So what was Jesus’ gospel if these events hadn’t yet taken place?

The Bible really ties together 3 separate strands of the gospel into one single thread. If you lose any of these strands, you’re missing all that God has said about his good news.

First, the gospel is a message about a historical event. That’s what good news is. It’s news about something that has happened. Jesus came in the flesh. He died. He was resurrected. So the gospel is a message.

Second, The gospel is also a way of salvation. If you believe this message, God will save you from your sins, he will transform you, he will bring you into a safe and loving relationship with himself.

Third, The gospel is also a person. King Jesus has come to reign over his people. He is rulingover his people in peace, righteousness, and justice, and through his ruling power, is beginning to renew all of creation.

If you lose any of these 3 strands, you’re going to reduce the gospel to something God had never intended. And what has tended to happen in Churches in the United States is we have emphasized the gospel as a message of salvation, but we have minimized or forgotten entirely the gospel of the kingdom.

And for that reason, the Christian faith as most of have experienced it has been personal and private. God has forgiven my sins and that’s between me and him; but there is a disconnect between my gospel and the rest of my life. I don’t know how to connect my gospel and my faith to the rest of my life.

So many of us may be utterly confused about how to connect what we believe about God on Sundays to our life Monday through Saturday. This personal and private gospel is how you can have Christians praising Jesus on Sunday and worshipping the president on Monday. It’s why you have Christians posting Bible verses on Social media every day yet they live lives of cruelty toward the immigrant and the poor and the oppressed. It’s why many of us lack a vision for what God is doing in our lives, in our churches, or in our communities.

We need a gospel that says King Jesus has come and has defeated the powers of sin and Satan through his death and resurrection. Now, as his kingdom spreads into the world, Jesus is saving his people and renewing all of creation.

Mark’s account of Jesus and his ministry helps us better understand how the kingdom of God is connected to our gospel message. You see this here in our passage. The very first thing Jesus said in Mark is that there is good news because the kingdom has come. This is the theme of the rest of Mark’s history of Jesus. He showed us what it looks like when the king reigns and moves in the world.

Unfortunately, Mark, nor the rest of the Bible, never gives us a clear definition of the kingdom of God. The Bible rarely gives us definitions. Instead, we most often get principles and pictures. This is certainly true with Jesus’ teaching. With these principles and pictures we can try to write our own definitions about what the Bible teaches, but we can’t capture it all easily.

I’m going to give you a definition this week that will point us to several principles of the kingdom. Next week, we’ll see a portrait of the kingdom through Jesus’ life. Priniciples this week, a portrait next week. My hope is that after these next two weeks, with principles and a portrait, you’ll have a grasp on the significance of the kingdom of God for your life and our church.

Here’s the definition of the kingdom of God I’m giving you for us to work from tonight:

The kingdom of God is the rule of King Jesus over all things through which he saves his people and renews his creation through his supernatural power.

From this definition, I have nine principles of the kingdom to give you tonight. You might hear nine principles and think that sounds really daunting. It’s not as bad as it sounds. They’re all connected. We’ll come back to these ideas throughout this sermon series. You don’t need to get it all tonight. And I’ve written them down for you in your worship guide so you can see them for yourself.

General Principles of the Kingdom of God

The Kingdom is the fulfillment of old promises in a new way through Jesus.

Mark structures our passage as a handoff between John the Baptist and Jesus. “After John was arrested…” Mark is going to give us a flashback to John’s arrest and execution later in Chapter 6. But he’s bringing it up now to show that Jesus’ ministry is connected to John, but its also something completely new.

In the Old Testament, there were all sorts of hints about God’s kingdom. God was worshipped for being king over his people and over creation. There were hints that eventually all the other nations would come and join the people of Israel as part of God’s kingdom. There were hints that a king, a descendant of the great king David, would rule forever over God’s people.

But nobody had any idea how all of that was really going to work. And this is why everyone was so confused about Jesus. He didn’t match their expectations.

So, while Jesus is connected to these old promises of God in the Old Testament, he fulfills them in an entirely new way that no one could have expected.

This is why Jesus said in Luke 16:16, The Law and the Prophets were proclaimed until John. Since that time, the good news of the kingdom of God is being preached, and everyone is forcing their way into it.

This principle is important if you’re going to understand how to read the Bible for yourself. You need to understand Jesus in light of the Old Testament, but you also need to be able to see what he’s doing can’t fit neatly into Old Testament expectations.

I’ll give you one more reason why this is important. There are many people today who are trying to fit Christianity into very Old testament Jewish ideas. So you have some who think that all of the Old Testament promises for a nationalistic kingdom are still true today. They’re not. You have some who think there are promises for the Jewish people that aren’t true for anyone else. There are other groups, like the Black Hebrew Israelites, who are trying to read Jesus back into an ethnic reading of the Old Testament. But we don’t only read Jesus backwards we read him forward. And we have to make room for him to do new things, even with our expectations for him today.

The Kingdom is God’s spiritual reign over all of Creation.

The Kingdom of God is not a place. It’s not a nation. It’s not a state power. It’s not an organization. The Kingdom is God exercising his spiritual power over all of creation.

Look at what Jesus said in Luke 17:20–21 “Once, on being asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus replied, “The coming of the kingdom of God is not something that can be observed, nor will people say, ‘Here it is,’ or ‘There it is,’ because the kingdom of God is in your midst.””

You see what Jesus was confronting right? People were expecting Jesus to create a triumphant, powerful force or state through which he would reign over all the nations.

Jesus said don’t think that. Don’t desire that. My kingdom is in your midst, it’s among you. There’s no outward institution or power you can point to to say, that’s the Kingdom.

The Catholic Church would say their church is the kingdom. So if you’re a Catholic, you’re in the kingdom. If you’re not a Catholic, good luck. Other churches teach similar ideas.

Jesus doesn’t teach that though. Jesus won’t latch his kingdom on to any one nation, ethnicity, or church. The kingdom of God is in our midst, because Jesus is ruling over all of creation, not one nation, not one church.

The Kingdom is how God is healing the world.

In fact, he’s not just ruling all of creation, he’s healing creation. Look at what Jesus taught about the kingdom in Matthew 13:31–33 “He told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches.” He told them still another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed into about sixty pounds of flour until it worked all through the dough.””

Tiffany what happens when you get just a little bit of yeast in some dough? The whole thing is activated. The whole thing comes to life.

What happens when you get one little mustard seed in a field? It becomes life to all the creatures.

What do you think Jesus was teaching us about the kingdom in these lessons?

You get a little bit of the kingdom in your life, there’s going to be healing. You get a little bit of kingdom in your church, everyone is going to come a little more alive. You get a little bit of the kingdom in your neighborhood, and you’ll find peace among neighbors. There will be justice and equity.

The kingdom brings renewal as Jesus rescues his creation from the effects of sin and the power of Satan.

What would happen if Haughville could say, “The kingdom is in our midst?” That’s the vision of this church. What does it look like when the kingdom comes to Haughville? Life. Healing. Renewal.

Principles of the Kingdom of God for You

The Kingdom is here, but the world is still hurting.

Is Jesus bringing renewal? Yes. But it’s not total. And it’s not complete. Look at what Jesus says in Mark 1. He didn’t say, “The kingdom of God is here.” He said, “The kingdom of God has come near.”

Jesus’ kingdom is here, but not all the way. Not until he returns again, which has promised to do. We see glimpses of his kingdom where people are putting their faith in Jesus. We see glimpses of his kingdom when lives are changed, when relationships heal, when people work for justice in their community.

But we’re not going to see that healing in its entirety. Can Jesus heal your sin, your addiction, your shame? Absolutely. But you’ll probably still carry a scar.

Can Jesus restore relationships? Yes. But its not immediate, and there may always be certain boundaries with people that just won’t be repaired in this life.

Will Jesus bring justice to Haughville? Yes and Amen! But it won’t be complete. Not until he returns.

So we have to be a people who can make room for hope and sorrow to exist together.

We have to be able to praise God and lament our broken hearts before him.

We have to be a people who work to see the gospel spread and for justice to come with sober mindedness about the world we live in.

The Kingdom is your most valuable possession.

Although the our experience of the kingdom is incomplete in this life, it will still be our greatest possession. Jesus said again in Matthew 13 that the kingdom is worth selling everything we own in order to possess the kingdom. That’s how valuable the kingdom is. Nothing on earth compares.

And you see this in the response of these first disciples that Jesus called. Andrew, Simon, James, and John, they didn’t know anything about Jesus other than he said the kingdom had come, so they’re going to follow. They left everything to follow jesus.

Now, let me tell you what this does not mean. You don’t follow Jesus in the kingdom by leaving your job to go be a pastor or a missionary. That was a unique response for these disciples.

It does mean that your whole life must be impacted by the kingdom. All of life must be oriented toward the kingdom. If the kingdom is where Christ reigns, then there is no area of your life that is off limits. If the kingdom is where Christ is bringing healing, then there is no area of your life that must not be renewed.

You don’t ever get time off from the kingdom. The Kingdom is where Jesus is making you into the person you are destined to be. You don’t get time off from that. You don’t get to be a knucklehead out there but then pretend to come into the kingdom in here.

If the kingdom is your most treasured possession, your life will start to reflect that. Your finances and generosity will reflect that. Your behaviors. Your time. Your relationships. Your habits. I’m not saying your sinless or perfect. No way. I’m not. I’m a huge work in progress.

But is there a direction in my life that’s moving deeper into the kingdom? Thanks be to God, I think so. What about you?

The way into the Kingdom is by turning from pride, selfish strength, or evil deeds and by moving toward Jesus.

Jesus told us very clearly the way into his kingdom. Repentance and faith. How do I possess the kingdom? Repentance and faith. That’s it.

The word repentance means a turning from sin, from selfishness, from pride, from evil deeds. To have faith is to believe in Jesus and move closer toward him.

The way into the kingdom is to move away from sin and to move toward Jesus. But I want you to notice how Jesus communicated this message to us.

What Jesus is holding out for you is not a message of, “Look how rotten you are, you’re pathetic, you better come to me or else.” No!

His posture is to say, “The kingdom has come! The king is here! I am here! There is life and peace for you here. I want to give this to you. Will you take this from me? Then leave your old ways behind and experience new life with me.”

Principles of the Kingdom of God for the Church

I switched the first two principles around here from what you have in your outline.

The Kingdom should be most noticeably found in the life of local churches.

Jesus is king outside the church, but his rule should be most noticeable inside the church. If we are a people whom he has redeemed, and if his kingdom is our treasured possession, then that should be more noticeable here than anywhere else.

Look at how Jesus connected this in Luke 12. Do not be afraid, little flock - who is Jesus’ flock? His church. Its us.

Why shouldn’t we be afraid? God has given us the kingdom.

How should we respond? Sell your stuff and take care of the poor.

We are the people Jesus has chosen to make his kingdom most evident in the world. Our life together validates the message we proclaim. If we say that Jesus is king, that should be evident in the way we treat each other and engage the world. If we say that Jesus has forgiven us of our sin, our neighbors should experience us as people who are humble servants.

Jesus is King over all of life, not just church life.

If the Kingdom is God’s spiritual reign over all of creation, then Jesus is King over all of life, not just church life.

There is a mistaken idea out there that God is going to let this world burn, so we shouldn’t care about it. You know, people say the church is like a lifeboat. Get on the lifeboat, because the rest of the world is sinking.

The Bible doesn’t teach that anywhere. Quite the opposite.

Look at what Jesus says in Revelation 21. This is Jesus speaking when, someday in the future, he returns to bring his kingdom in its fullness. Jesus says, “I’m making everything new.” He doesn’t say, “I’m going to make a new everything.” Do you see?

He’s not going to make a new world. He’s going to make this world new.

Jesus cares about all of life, not just church life. His gospel, therefore, has a message for all of life, because Jesus intends to make all of life new. So that means that the gospel of our church - if we are obedient to the kingdom - will have relevance for life outside this church. Our gospel must impact the way we work. It must impact our families. Our neighborhood.

Our gospel has a message for politics. For business. For policing. For housing. For education. For art. Everything!

So we’re not just going to be Christians in a church who surrender our community to the destruction of sin. We won’t do it because we know that Jesus is king.

We participate in the Kingdom by following Jesus out into the world.

How did these first disciples respond to Jesus’ call? They followed. They went wherever he went. And as we’ll see next week, Jesus’ mission tended to focus on the people and places the world most overlooked. He goes to the demon possessed. The crippled. The terminally sick. People society had rejected.

Because those are the people and places where Jesus loves to show his kingdom power. And that’s where we have to follow him.

Which, I want to say, I admire so many of you in this room, because this is how you already live. Some of you, you’re struggling to get by, but you share everything you can with others. You rush to help people that everyone else has rejected. You’re merciful. You’re kind.

I admire you all so greatly. You show me more of the beauty of the kingdom every week. With that, I say to us, lets keep going. Jesus is king. He rules over us with peace, justice, and righteousness. There’s no turning back. Only forward. Only forward. Let’s pray.