Christ's Gospel Proclamation
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Introduction
Introduction
Welcome to Dishman Baptist Church. It is a privilege and an honor to worship with you this morning. I missed the chance last week to reminisce a bit - this weekend is the one year anniversary of our first visit here. It seems so surprising to me that that was already a year ago. So much has transpired over the last 12 months. It is as humbling and as daunting a task to be here today as it was a year ago. To have the privilege of opening God’s Word with you and to explore the depths of what He has for us in each and every passage of His Word. And that is what we are here to do this morning so if you would - please open your Bibles with me to Mark 1 and we’ll be looking at verses 14 and 15 this morning.
Just a bit of background before we read the text for those who have missed a week or are joining us for the first time. As we’ve looked at the beginning of this book over the last three weeks we’ve noticed that Mark is building an introduction that is leading us somewhere. It started off with his great introduction statement in verse 1 where he wrote
The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
Then he took a small step back to demonstrate how the prophets pointed to the events that would transpire - to the voice of one crying out in the wilderness and how this voice found a body in the person of John the Baptizer. It’s important to note that John was not called the Baptizer because he was the first Baptist or because it was his last name but instead it was a way to designate him and separate him from the other John’s. What we also saw was that the prophecies, while they did point to the forerunner, primarily promised that arrival of God as the King of His people and how this pointed to Christ’s divinity. In keeping with his description John did come baptizing with a baptism of repentance and pointing the people to the hope of a greater one who would come after him. John the Apostle records John’s answer regarding whether he was the Messiah this way
He didn’t deny it but confessed: “I am not the Messiah.”
“What then?” they asked him. “Are you Elijah?” “I am not,” he said. “Are you the Prophet?” “No,” he answered.
“Who are you, then?” they asked. “We need to give an answer to those who sent us. What can you tell us about yourself?”
He said, “I am a voice of one crying out in the wilderness: Make straight the way of the Lord—just as Isaiah the prophet said.”
Last week we finally came face to face with Jesus. The Messiah that Mark had proclaimed, that the prophets had promised, that John had prepared for and pointed to was present with His people to be baptized. And what we learned was that, while John’s baptism for most people was one of repentance, Christ’s baptism was more of a coronation ceremony designating and affirming Him as the promised King and Messiah. Then His temptation was orchestrated by God to prove His impeccability or that He couldn’t sin but also to confirm God’s sovereign plan for salvation and that nothing would prevent His plan from happening. So now we come to this morning’s passage. I was originally going to title this message - a message 4000 years in the making - but that seemed a bit long. These are the first spoken words recorded by Christ in the book of Mark and so they’re pretty important. Many of us - when we get news of any type - cannot wait to share it. We instantly grab our phones or someone’s ear and want to share it. Most of us can’t wait 4 seconds to share good news. Imagine having the best news ever and having to wait to share it. The words that you would use to deliver that news would be very significant. So with that in mind lets look at what Mark has written for us today.
After John was arrested, Jesus went to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God:
“The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!”
It may sound strange to you that I would say what Mark has written for us - it is important to study these words, it is equally important for us to understand that these are the words that Mark was inspired by the Spirit to write down and record for us, they may not be the exact words that Jesus spoke. This shouldn’t shake your faith in the inerrancy or inspiration of Scripture because we know what Paul wrote in 2 Timothy 3:16 that all Scripture is God-breathed and therefore is trustworthy. We also know, as we’re going to look at in a moment, that these are not the first words that Jesus spoke in public ministry but they are the first words that Mark has chosen to record. We should remember, as we go through this book, that ancient biographical rules were much different than our current ideas and so Mark was not concerned with getting everything chronologically correct as it pertained to Christ’s life but instead only sought to include what was necessary to get his particular view of Christ’s life across.
Now the majority of our time together this morning will be spent in verse 15 but there are some observations that we need to make regarding 14. Mark uses a different phrase than what he has been using to introduce these verses to us. Our translation glosses over them but in the Greek there is a little word και at the beginning of several of the verses we’ve been looking at over the last few weeks - in his typical rapid fire style Mark has moved from event to event. In verses 5,6,7,9,10,11,12 and 13 we could read an “and” at the beginning of each of those verses. Essentially it would read something like - John came baptizing and the whole Judean countryside was going out to him and he wore a camel’s hair garment and He proclaimed “One who is more powerful than I am is coming after me.” And in those days Jesus came to be baptized and as soon as He came up out of the water and a voice came from Heaven and immediately the Spirit drove Him into the wilderness and He was in the wilderness… Mark, introducing a new section and a new focus for his Gospel account, changes his wording to “now after” or as our translation has it just “after”.
Up until this point he has been laying his groundwork for Christ’s earthly ministry. He has been giving us enough background information to get to the point that he promised in Mark 1:1 - the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. And so now he says after - a statement that is meant to provide two details for us. The first is that some time has passed since Jesus was baptized and His temptation took place. About six months have passed. The other point that Mark is trying to make is to point us back to John’s statement that “One who is more powerful than I am is coming after me” - and Mark is now going to spend the rest of this book revealing that One to his readers and to us.
Some significant events have transpired in the last six months that we should not overlook. Christ didn’t come to the Jordan to be baptized, then experience the temptations and then hide away for awhile until John’s arrest. He has been to Jerusalem where He cleansed the Temple the first time (an event that He will have to do again and that we’ll study when we get to Mark 11), has His evening meeting with Nicodemus and then travels back through Samaria meeting the woman at the well until He arrives back in Galilee. During this time there was some overlap between John’s ministry and Christ’s. The Gospel of John tells us that Christ originally leaves Judea and heads towards Galilee because of some sort of perceived competition between His ministry and John the Baptists. The Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John and so Jesus chose to remove Himself from the scene rather than to appear to have His ministry in competition with John’s. It was also during this time that John made his great statement to his own disciples that “He (meaning Christ) must increase, but I must decrease”. (John 3:30).
And so Mark tells us that after John had been arrested - and we may think this is a rather pedestrian comment because our translations have made it that way but it is a very significant comment both for John’s ministry and later for Christ’s. It is another example of how John prepared the way for Christ to the cross and eventually His death. The Greek word here is παραδιδωμι (paradidomi) and it has several meanings but the meaning or sense it carries in this passage is “to be handed over”. The verb here is also in the passive tense and it is what is known as a divine passive - in essence meaning that what Mark is saying here is that “after God delivered John over” or “handed John over” Jesus came into Galilee. This same verb and tense is used by Christ in Mark 10:33 when He tells His disciples
“See, we are going up to Jerusalem. The Son of Man will be handed over to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn him to death. Then they will hand him over to the Gentiles,
Just as Jesus will be, John is handed over to the secular world for several reasons. John’s mission was completed. He had prepared the way for Christ’s arrival and now the King was present. In John 3, John the Baptist uses the metaphor of a wedding to demonstrate that his time would be coming to an end saying that “the groom’s friend, who stands by and listens for the groom, rejoices greatly at the grooms voice. So this joy of mine is complete.” (John 3:29) Another is the consistent demonstration of Scripture that all those who are called to stand up for the truth will experience persecution. God demonstrates His sovereign control of both John’s and Christ’s ministries to accomplish His purposes. This should be a great comfort to us as Christians that our good God, even when events may seem contrary to our desires, is moving everything together for His purposes and ultimately for our good.
God again demonstrates through Christ’s arrival and the location of His ministry that this New Covenant will be anything but what the people would expect. It was always a little intriguing and frustrating to me after you all extended the job offer to me when I would talk to people about moving here they would always make a comment about the rain. It’s almost as if people outside of Washington don’t realize that there’s a whole other state besides Seattle and the Seattle area. Yet this is exactly how the 1st century Jewish society thought about Jerusalem. For Christ to center most of His ministry in Galilee would be like someone coming to Spokane instead of Seattle. To the outskirts, the region that people mispronounced and even looked down upon a bit.
Unlike His presentation for His baptism, Christ doesn’t come into Galilee quietly. Instead He comes preaching and proclaiming the good news of God. In his Gospel account John tells us that He was welcomed in Galilee because of the things He had done in Jerusalem during the Passover. The significant piece of information that we gain from this verse is the gospel that Jesus is bringing has been subtly shifted from the gospel of Jesus Christ in Mark 1:1 to now the gospel of God. Mark is reiterating for his readers that this good news that he has promised is not simply the announcement of another human king or a human kingdom which will, as all the others were, be superceded by a greater king and kingdom later. This was the announcement, the proclamation, of the King of Kings and the ushering in of the final Kingdom that would reign supreme for all time.
And so now Christ comes proclaiming the good news of God - and he does so in three defining statements. The time is fulfilled, the kingdom of God has come near and repent and believe the good news.
The Time is Fulfilled
The Time is Fulfilled
Writing to the church in Galatia many years later Paul would write these words
When the time came to completion, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law,
Much the same as Jesus came proclaiming in Galilee - the time has been fulfilled. The waiting was over, the long awaited Messiah had arrived. Even the word for time here is significant. It is the word καιρος (kairos) and instead of speaking to clock time, which is referred to by the word chronos (where we get the word chronograph from), but instead is speaking of a specific point in time. It’s not even so much pointing to the end of one time period and the beginning of the next. It is more the fulfillment of the promises made throughout the Old Testament that are now being realized with the advent of Christ to the earth.
There are several factors that made this time in history most propitious for this moment. Just as promised in King Nebuchadnezzar’s dream several empires had swept across the Near Eastern landscape with the Romans following the Babylonian, Persian and Greek empires. Now the power of the Roman military had quelled all opposition and the pax Romana or Roman peace was the order of the day. The Roman empire had built or rebuilt roads and major communication and commercial hubs so that information, people and goods could flow throughout the Empire with relative ease (at least by 1st Century standards). The existence of a common language throughout much of the Empire would ease the spread of the Gospel.
And so the time was fulfilled - the environment was perfectly suited for the coming of the Messiah. Even the verb choice here - fulfilled is in the perfect tense meaning that it has been definitively completed and fulfilled - demonstrates the finality of this statement. There was no need to continue to look because the Messiah was present. Paul would also write about this in Ephesians 1:10
as a plan for the right time—to bring everything together in Christ, both things in heaven and things on earth in him.
The time promised to the Old Testament saints had been fulfilled - the promised moment in time had come and Christ was present - and not only Christ but the Kingdom of God as well.
The Kingdom of God
The Kingdom of God
Christ preaches not only that the time has been fulfilled but also that the Kingdom of God is at hand. This is an interesting term for Christ to use because the phrase “the kingdom of God” doesn’t occur anywhere in the Old Testament. The concept is there to be sure but that specific phrase is not. It is the same as how we’re given pictures of the Trinitarian nature of the Godhead throughout Scripture but the term “the Trinity” never occurs.
In the Old Testament wisdom and prophetic books there are many passages that refer to God as the King of Israel.
The Lord will reign forever and ever!
I am the Lord, your Holy One, the Creator of Israel, your King.
And the King of all the earth
The Lord sits enthroned over the flood; the Lord sits enthroned, King forever.
They will speak of the glory of your kingdom and will declare your might,
informing all people of your mighty acts and of the glorious splendor of your kingdom.
Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom; your rule is for all generations. The Lord is faithful in all his words and gracious in all his actions.
Then I said: Woe is me for I am ruined because I am a man of unclean lips and live among a people of unclean lips, and because my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of Armies.
And while the rule of the Lord is repudiated by the Israelites when they requested a human king there are many instances in the prophets that promise that God shall become the King and rule over the nation
The moon will be put to shame and the sun disgraced, because the Lord of Armies will reign as king on Mount Zion in Jerusalem, and he will display his glory in the presence of his elders.
Saviors will ascend Mount Zion to rule over the hill country of Esau, but the kingdom will be the Lord’s.
On that day the Lord will become King over the whole earth—the Lord alone, and his name alone.
All the land from Geba to Rimmon south of Jerusalem will be changed into a plain. But Jerusalem will be raised up and will remain on its site from the Benjamin Gate to the place of the First Gate, to the Corner Gate, and from the Tower of Hananel to the royal winepresses.
People will live there, and never again will there be a curse of complete destruction. So Jerusalem will dwell in security.
There was always a “near/far” view taken by the prophets as they addressed Israel before the Exile. There was always a near term judgement as in the defeat of Israel by the Assyrians prophesied by Amos but also a long term day of the Lord judgement that would take place far in the future. This was in spite of the popular opinion of the day that there would be a day of success and blessing when the glory of David’s kingdom would be restored and Israel would achieve complete victory and domination of its foes.
The intertestamental period brought a shift to the focus of Jewish thought from the near to the far. During these silent years the Jewish nation, following the example of Ezra, was very focused on keeping the letter of the law and not compromising the way their ancestors had. And so there was an expectation that the Lord would vindicate His people and that He would restore the pre-Exilic kingdom. And yet what happened was continual persecution and oppressive leadership under several different world powers. As a result much of the view during the intertestamental period turned toward the longed for day when the Lord would return and establish His kingdom amongst His people. Instead of the near/far views of the prophets these writers took a deistic view that said that God had turned them over and removed Himself completely from affairs - watching but not intervening. Consider these words from an apocalyptic book saying God “remained unmoved, though He saw it, and rejoiced that they were devoured and swallowed and robbed, and left them to be devoured in the hand of all the beasts.” Following the Babylonian captivity God was perceived to be inactive in history. History was surrendered to evil and all salvation was thrust far into the future.
It was into this environment that Christ comes preaching the Kingdom of God has come near.
The kingdom of God will be an important theme throughout Mark. Christ will refer to or teach on the Kingdom of God ten other times in this Gospel. It is important also to recognize that when Christ refers to the Kingdom of God that He returns to the prophetic view of a near/far realization of the kingdom. He has two different realizations of the Kingdom in mind and interpreting the verses depends on what Kingdom He is talking about at the moment. There are two separate realizations of the Kingdom that Christ is referring to here. There is the spiritual kingdom of God and the actual physical kingdom. We see the spiritual kingdom referred to in Mark 10:14-15 where Christ teaches
When Jesus saw it, he was indignant and said to them, “Let the little children come to me. Don’t stop them, because the kingdom of God belongs to such as these.
Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.”
and also in Mark 12:34
When Jesus saw that he answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” And no one dared to question him any longer.
The spiritual kingdom of God is what is ruling right now - the powers of hell and Satan have been defeated and while the struggle and the battle still rages within human hearts, and Satan and his minions still hold control over the earth, the kingdom of God will ultimately prove to be triumphant because it has already won. This is the promise that was delivered to us in Colossians 1:13
He has rescued us from the domain of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of the Son he loves.
We are right now members of His spiritual kingdom and no one can take us out of that. This is the spiritual kingdom of God.
Then there is the promise of the physical kingdom of God that all those who have been adopted into the family of God will be a part of. This is the promise of the book of Revelation in both the millennial kingdom rule of Christ and the final eternal kingdom in the new heaven and earth promised at the end of Revelation
Then he showed me the river of the water of life, clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb
down the middle of the city’s main street. The tree of life was on each side of the river, bearing twelve kinds of fruit, producing its fruit every month. The leaves of the tree are for healing the nations,
and there will no longer be any curse. The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants will worship him.
They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads.
Night will be no more; people will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, because the Lord God will give them light, and they will reign forever and ever.
This is the kingdom that Christ is referring to in Mark 14:25 when He institutes the Lord’s Supper
Truly I tell you, I will no longer drink of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.”
And there is only one way to enter this kingdom - the twin rails on which the Christian faith runs - Repentance and Belief.
Repent and Believe
Repent and Believe
This is the core of Christ’s message - the main point. And it is something that many of us have been hearing ever since we were in Sunday School. Yet it seems too simple for us to really grasp. Is this really all there is - to repent and believe in the good news? And when Christ is talking about the Gospel what Gospel is He talking about?
First the steps to salvation as Christ preached them. Repentance comes from the Greek word μετανοεω (metanoeo) and it means a change of direction. Many of us have heard that it is simply a change of mind - that if we just change our minds about our sin that we will be saved. But it is more than that. It is coming to the realization that the price for every sin that I commit was exacted on the body of Christ. And that my debt is so large that there is no way that I can bear up under the required payment of that debt. It is also more than simply coming to hate our sin. Charles Spurgeon said it this way
1191A man may hate sin just as a murderer hates the gallows, but this does not prove repentance. If I hate sin because of the punishment, I have not repented of sin. I merely regret that God is just. But if I can see sin as an offense against Jesus Christ, and loathe myself because I have wounded him, then I have a true brokenness of heart
We must come to the point where we see our sins as offenses against a holy God and realize that the only just punishment for an offense against such a holy and high being is death. The punishment must fit the gravity of the offense. And once we come to that realization then we willingly desire to turn from our sins. Once we become as Christ said in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5
“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for the kingdom of heaven is theirs.
Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.
We are poor in spirit because we recognize our inability to pay for the sins we have committed and we are mournful that we have sinned against such a holy God. And it is to Him that we most owe our repentance. Yes we owe those who we have wronged an apology and we should rightly seek their forgiveness but in the economy of salvation our deepest repentance is owed solely to God.
In his great Psalm of repentance for his sin with Bathsheba and the killing of Uriah, David wrote these words
Against you—you alone—I have sinned and done this evil in your sight. So you are right when you pass sentence; you are blameless when you judge.
It is against God alone that we sin and it is to Him we should repent.
But Christ’s Gospel is more than simply turning away from something - it is also a turning towards something. That is the second rail on which this great doctrine runs. We must place our faith in Christ and believe solely in His righteousness for our salvation. And this is most often where we fail. We are happy to allow Christ to be our savior and to repent toward Him but when we are really pressed we don’t fully believe Him that what He has paid for is eternally secure - or that what He has paid for has a requirement on us.
Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones has a great quote about our unbelief
Gems from Martyn Lloyd-Jones Belief
I once heard a man use a phrase which affected me very deeply at the time, and still does. I am not sure it is not one of the most searching statements I have ever heard. He said that the trouble with many of us Christians is that we believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, but that we do not believe Him.
You see Christ’s Gospel runs on two tracks - repentance and belief. He is both Savior and Lord. We have to believe in Him that what He says He will do and that what He commands He means for us to accomplish. We must turn from our sin and turn to Christ. As John wrote in 1 John 1:9
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
and Paul wrote in Romans 10:9
If you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
We must do both.
Conclusion
Conclusion
Christ came preaching in a place that no one would have expected Him, preaching a message that no one was expecting to hear. They should have been prepared and ready - but they missed it. Have we missed it the same way? Have we, despite hearing this Gospel message preached over and over, week after week, missed it as well? Are we still looking for the kingdom to arrive in the fashion we want it? The Jews were looking for a political messiah who would cast off the burden of Roman governorship and reestablish the kingdom of Israel - I think we in this day are looking for more of an emotional, personal messiah who will restore our self-esteem and value and at the same time cast off our debts and health issues and make us successful and emotionally secure. We’re good with Him being our advisor or a confidante but we don’t really want to submit to Him as both Lord and Savior.
We must come to Christ as He is and to the message that He preached. We must not hate our sin because we simply fear the consequences of that sin, we must hate it because of what it cost our beautiful Lord. And we must completely put our trust in Him and what He has said He would do on our behalf. Christ came preaching a message of hope that many in His day missed - let us not miss it as well. Because as we’re going to find out next week - there is a requirement for each of us in this Gospel proclamation as well.