The Beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ

This morning we start a study about the greatest life that has ever been lived. It is the most studied life, the most analyzed life, the most well-known life of any man in human history. And the reason this life is so well known and well beloved is because it has proven to be a source of truth, life, and power to millions from generation to generation.

It strikes a chord with humanity. There are some stories we read that feel distant. Some of the better stories draw us in and the greatest stories can challenge us or change us or inspire us. But there is no story like the one we are about to study. This is a true story, and as some have called it, it’s the greatest story ever told.

The reason it strikes a chord with us is not merely because it’s compelling history. It’s not merely because it tells the story of an interesting man who ended up a martyr. This story contains in it elements that the starving soul craves. It provides answers to life’s greatest questions: what is God like? How does he deal with humanity? What am I here for? What are my greatest needs? Those who suffer from what C.S. Lewis called the “inconsolable longing” find in this work something that explains why this world is not our home.

I wonder what this study of the life of Christ will do to you.

If you’re not a Christian, I wonder if you’ll be able to listen with an open mind to what is probably the earliest historical account of the man called Jesus Christ, and as you do, I wonder what might happen to you. I wonder if you’ll be like the agnostic Greek scholar Dr. E.V. Rieu. Dr. Rieu had just finished translating Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey into modern English, and at 60 years old, was asked by his publisher to translate the New Testament gospels. He agreed to do it.

When his son heard that he would be translating the gospels, he said, “It will be interesting to see what father makes of the four gospels. It will be more interesting to see what the four gospels make of father.” It didn’t take long. Before the year was out, Dr. E.V. Rieu, lifelong agnostic, committed his life to Jesus Christ and became a devoted Christian.

These stories are endless.

If you are a Christian, I have a pretty good idea how this book will affect you. I believe it will leave you impressed with Jesus, more in awe of him, more in love with him. I believe he will surprise you and wow you. I believe he will change you. How? We all can grow in many ways, but I believe that as we get to know Jesus better and follow him more faithfully he will do with us what he did with his first disciples. As we follow him, he will make us fishers of men.

How many countless lives have been so transformed by Jesus? How many stingy people have been made generous? How many cold people have been warmed? How many curmudgeons have been made to sing with gratitude? This is what Jesus does -- like a electricity to a bulb -- as we connect to him we light up, we grow, we bear much fruit.

How will Jesus Christ change you?

As we enter into this season of study through the gospel of Mark, I want you to think about that question: “How is Jesus Christ going to change me?”

He is alive -- and as we encounter him on the written page, we really encounter him. And no one who encounters Jesus stays the same.

Does your marriage need to be healed? Do you need wisdom for your current situation? Do you need contentment in your difficulties? Do you need courage against opposition? Do you need to be reminded of the tender love of the savior?

Christ works through his work to do transformative work in our lives. How will he change you?

Open your Bibles to the book of Mark. Page 836 if you’re using one of our Bibles. If you don’t have one, keep it, our gift to you.

Mark is the shortest of the gospels. It may be the earliest one written, in the mid 60s AD, roughly 30 years after Christ’s death and resurrection. Mark was a close companion of the apostles. He was with Paul and Barnabas on their first missionary journey, but left in the middle of it, upsetting Paul, to the degree that Paul was unwilling to take him on their second journey.

Mark ended up going with Barnabas on a separate journey, doing more work in different places. By the end of Paul’s life, he seems to have changed his mind about Mark and in Colossians Mark is called useful. He’s mentioned at the end of 1 Peter, and so apparently had also teamed up with the apostle Peter during his ministry.

In fact, several early church fathers -- Papias is the earliest, but Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, and Origen -- all note that Mark simply recorded Peter’s teachings. Though the gospel is called Mark, and it’s true that Mark did indeed write it, Mark simply wrote down everything Peter had seen and taught.

What was the purpose of the gospel of Mark? Why did Mark write it down, perhaps at Peter’s direction? There’s really one obvious reason, and two sub-reasons underneath it. The big obvious reason is that people needed a clear, in print, picture of who Jesus in fact was. That’s the obvious reason: the world needs to know who Jesus really is.

But there were also certain contextual reasons Mark needed to write. First, already there were false ideas of Jesus beginning to infiltrate new churches. Some didn’t think Jesus was truly man. Some didn’t think Jesus was truly God. Some thought Jesus was an emanation. And so Mark wanted to present the factual details of the life of Christ.

And second, Mark wrote during the 60s. The infamous emperor Nero was ruling in Rome. His first five years of rule were responsible, but after that, he went off the rails. His behavior was maniacal: childless couples were heavily taxed, he would make false accusations and of the rich and then confiscate their wealth, he would invite people to commit suicide at public banquets -- but at this point much of his bizarre behavior had nothing to do with Christians.

It all changed in AD 64 when a fire swept through Rome that took many lives and destroyed many buildings. At the point, the people turned against Nero, claiming that he had set the fire and that he was “fiddling while Rome burned.” It was then that Nero’s devilish plan was hatched: he would blame the Christians (who were already misunderstood and marginalized).

The Roman historian Tacitus wrote around this time what was happening:

“Nero fabricates scapegoats - and punished with every refinement the notoriously depraved Christians (as they were popularly called)...First, Nero had self-acknowledged Christians arrested. Then, on their information, large numbers of others were condemned -- not so much for incendiarism as for their anti-social tendencies. Their deaths were made farcical. Dressed in wild animal’s skins, they were torn to pieces by dogs, or crucified, or made into torches to be ignited after dark as a substitute for daylight.”

These kinds of things were going on in the Roman empire at the time, and Mark, as scholars note, is writing to Christians in Rome.

In other words, Mark is writing to suffering, persecuted Christians who need to see their suffering savior. In Mark’s gospel they see that nothing they could experience was foreign to the experience of their Savior. He went hungry. He was tempted in the wilderness. Mark even includes specific details like in 1:13 which states there were wild animals in the wilderness while he was being tempted -- Roman Christians would have known the threat of facing wild beasts in the arena. In Mark they read of a Savior who was mislabeled and misunderstood, a Savior who was betrayed and tortured.

Jesus’ teachings about taking your cross would not have been metaphorical to Mark’s readers. They had likely seen some friends take up their crosses to be crucified under Nero’s insane regime. Mark showed them their savior, as a humble, suffering servant.

We aren’t being persecuted in the same way Mark’s readers were. Not yet at least. But we have the same needs. We need to know the person and work of Christ. We need to see his humble suffering and be encouraged to press on.

If we fast forward to today, the names have changed but the fundamental issues haven’t. The reality is that we live in a world ravaged sin. We see it in every nation, in every government, in every city, in every household, in every marriage, in every child, in every human heart. It is the principle of sin -- Nero is evil but it’s sin that makes his so. Persecution is scary but it’s sin that fuels it. Sin is the biggest problem in the universe. It is a plague on the earth, a scourge, a disease, and everyone is touched by it, and it is the fundamental reason for all pain, all suffering, all dysfunction, all despair, all sadness.

Sin is the problem with our world. We try to understand it, because if we can understand sin, it will help us understand the gospel of Mark.

First, Sin began in the angelic world. Sin did not originate in Genesis 3, with the serpent. We have to go further back to find its origin. Several passages indicate that the very beginning of all sin, of all rebellion, started with an angel.

According to Ezekiel 28, this was a mighty angel, perhaps the greatest of all God’s angels. He was beautiful, wonderful, a bedazzling creature of highest rank. He was beautiful and glorious, he was the ruler of the hosts of heaven, possibly the something like the Prime Minister of the universe. There were no higher creatures than him-- but there was God.

And In his greatness, he wanted to dethrone God. Ezekiel 28:17 “Your heart was proud because of your beauty; you corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor.”

Satan was cast out of heaven, yet retained his power of the world. He is referred to as the “god of his world” (2 Cor. 4:4), “the prince of the power of the air” (Eph. 2:2). 1 John 5:19 says “the world world lies in the power of the evil one.”

So this dazzling creature, created to stand in the very presence of God, to run the universe in service to God, turned against him. His power was even demonstrated in his fall, because according to Revelation 12:4, he somehow persuaded a third of the angels to come with him, to wage war against God. I don’t know if that means Satan was such an awesome creation that ⅓ of the angels actually felt he had a shot at winning.

How many is one-third? We get hints of the great number of angels throughout Scripture. In Luke 2 at the announcement of Jesus’ birth there appeared a “multitude of angels.” God’s is sometimes called the “Lord of Hosts” which refers to a great number of heavenly hosts. In Revelation 5:11 John hears the “voice of many angels, numbering myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands”-- literally the Greek says 10,000 times 10,000, and thousands of thousands”-- but 10,000 was the highest number in the Greek language, so it might be like saying, “Billions and billions.”

Think about it. One third is significant. Satan, in his majestic position in the universe, somehow turned a huge portion of God’s creation against God, incited a massive, cosmic rebellion. And these armies of Satan are leveling their attack against God himself. He is the target. It’s the throne of the universe they want.

Sin originated in the angelic world, but it has permeated every human being. Sin enters the world through Adam’s sin, and Adam’s sin nature is now passed on to every person after him. And that’s why the Bible says we’re “dead in our trespasses and sins” we’re “darkened in our understanding” we’re “deceived” in our minds.

We can sum up the problem of human sin with two similar phrases: total depravity and total inability.

Total depravity. That does not mean that every person is as bad as they can possibly be. (1) that the inherent corruption extends to every part of man’s nature, your mind, soul, body; and (2) that there is no spiritual good, that is, good in relation to God, in the sinner at all, but only perversion.

Total inability. This does not mean that man can’t do any good in any sense -- common grace means people can do good things. What we mean by total inability is this:

(1) that the unrenewed sinner cannot do any act, however insignificant, which fundamentally meets with God’s approval and answers to the demands of God’s holy law; and (2) that he cannot change his fundamental preference for sin and self to love for God, nor even make an approach to such a change. In a word, he is unable to do any spiritual good.

So here’s our world. Riddle with this tragedy of sin. Ruled by the enemy of God and the adversary of our souls. Swarming with demons who want nothing more than to see God’s image-bearers suffer in eternal torment. Crawling with people who are totally depraved in their sin, dead, dark, deceived, dysfunctional -- and totally unable to do anything about it.

This is why that human religion doesn’t work. Every religion is about human accomplishment. And this is why the gospel is far superior -- it is the announcement of divine achievement. It is the announcement of how God is dealing with sin. That’s why people are drawn to the gospels -- deep down they know they’re sinners and deep down they know they will stand before God and be judged. And Jesus Christ gives them the true explanation of the world.

Let’s read the first verse: “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” The central word here is gospel.

That word is too common today for us to understand what’s going on here. The Jews of the time would have been familiar with it. It was used in their Greek version of the Old Testament, the Septuagint. Listen to Isaiah 40:9-10 “Go on up to a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good news; lift up your voice with strength, O Jerusalem, herald of good news, lift it up, fear not; say to the cities of Judah, ‘Behold your God!’ Behold, the Lord God comes with might, and his arm rules for him, behold, his reward is with him, and his recompense before him.”

Here’s the picture of herald the good news -- the gospel -- and it’s the idea that suffering will cease, enemies will be vanquished, and peace will reign -- why? Because God is coming to rule. This is what every Jew longed for -- God to save Jerusalem and set up an everlasting kingdom.

Romans would have also understood the word “gospel” this way. An inscription was discovered from 9 BC announcing the birth of Caesar Augustus, and it calls him “a savior for us and those who come after us, to make war cease, to create order everywhere...and whereas the birthday of God [Augustus] was the beginning of the world of the glad tidings that have come to men through him.”

Even these pagan Caesar worshipping Romans had used the word gospel, and to them it was an announcement of a royal figure who would “make wars cease” and “create order everywhere.”

The word finds its origins in the military world, where a messenger would come with glad tidings that the war is over, peace reigns, the enemy is defeated. The word expanded to have even greater connotations: it was the dawning of a new age, the beginning of a new era, a new epoch of peace and victory.

And this is the word Mark uses: here is the gospel of Jesus Christ. In a world harassed by God’s great adversary the devil, in a world diseased and dying from sin, Mark has an announcement of good news, of victory, of the dawn of a new era, of the coming of a new epoch, and it is the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

The good news -- the announcement of a victory, the dawn of a new era, the coming of a reign of peace and righteousness. It is the gospel of Jesus Christ.

God’s answer to the problem of humanity, the problem of human rebellion and sin, is Jesus Christ.

All the swirling chaos caused by sin, all the tragedy and destruction, all the dysfunction -- what could possibly overcome this cursed world? Jesus Christ.

And be honest -- it’s easy to see the problems of the world out there -- but can you be honest about the problems within? Doesn’t your conscience tell you something’s wrong? God made that conscience, and you can’t ignore it without paying a high price. Haven’t you experienced failure? Don’t you sense the guilt you have before God?

What -- or better yet -- who can fix you? Who can transform you? Who can forgive you? Who can save you? Jesus Christ.

God’s solution to the chaos of the world, the tragedy and destruction and the shame and the guilt and the turmoil is this: Jesus Christ.

The greatest problem in the world is sin. And the greatest need in the world -- and the greatest need of your heart -- is real, vibrant, intimate relationship with Jesus Christ. It changes everything.

Who is this Jesus?

A person, a man. He was born of a virgin, as the other gospels indicate. His name, given by God (Matt. 1:20-21) is the Greek version of the Hebrew Joshua, which mean Yawheh saves, or Yahweh is salvation. His name means God saves.

He is Jesus Christ. It’s not his last name. In Greek it’s Christos, and it’s the Greek equivalent of the Hebrew word for Messiah. It means “anointed one,” and it’s used to refer to divinely appointed kings in Israel -- but it eventually became the word to refer to the single great ruler who would come at the end of the age and set up the kingdom of God.

He is called the “son of God.” This is an incredibly bold claim. This is an outright claim to divinity. This isn’t a hint, hint. This is in your face. This man is the one in nature with God. He is coeternal and coequal with the Father. He is the second person of the trinity, God the Son, and is worthy of all worship, honor, and praise.

Charles Hodge says it like this:, ...The Scriptures, with equal clearness, declare that Christ was truly God...All divine names and titles are applied to Him. He is called God, the mighty God, the great God, God over all; Jehovah; Lord; the Lord of lords and the King of kings. All divine attributes are ascribed to Him. He is declared to be omnipresent, omniscient, almighty, and immutable, the same yesterday, to-day, and forever. He is set forth as the creator and upholder and ruler of the universe. All things were created by Him and for Him; and by Him all things consist. He is the object of worship to all intelligent creatures, even the highest; all the angels (i.e., all creatures between man and God) are commanded to prostrate themselves before Him. He is the object of all the religious sentiments; of reverence, love, faith, and devotion. To Him men and angels are responsible for their character and conduct. He required that men should honour Him as they honoured the Father; that they should exercise the same faith in Him that they do in God. He declares that He and the Father are one; that those who had seen Him had seen the Father also. He calls all men unto him; promises to forgive their sins; to send them the Holy Spirit; to give them rest and peace; to raise them up at the last day; and to give them eternal life. God is not more, and cannot promise more, or do more than Christ is said to be, to promise, and to do. He has, therefore, been the Christian’s God from the beginning, in all ages and in all places.

Friends, Jesus is our God, and Mark begins with the most wonderful news: he has come to save.

These words: Jesus Christ, Son of God -- introduce to us this book, and introduce to us God’s solution to the deepest problems in the world and in our hearts, they introduce us to the savior. He is Jesus - a man who will save God’s people. He is Christ, the long awaited messiah king who will eliminate the curse and set up the kingdom, and he is God himself, entering his creation.

What does this mean? God won’t sit around and allow his world to live in darkened and damaged and deceived forever. He will not allow his people to be maltreated and maligned forever. He will not allow his creation to be cursed forever. He is not indifferent. He is not aloof.

The gospel of Mark tells us this: God cares, and God has come in Christ. Mark is the story of what God incarnate did. It is more about his works than his words.

In fact, if someone were to ask you, “What’s the big deal about Jesus?” You could answer several different ways and be right. You could say, “He came to seek and save the lost.” That’s right. You could say, “He came to do the will of his father in heaven.” You’d be right. You could say, “He came to build his church,” and you’d be right again.

Jesus says in Mark 10:45 “The son of Man came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

The world polluted by sin, totally depraved and totally unable to do anything about it, people who cannot save themselves -- are offered a savior. Jesus came to give his life as a ransom. That means this: he came to take upon himself the sins of his people, to bear them to the cross, to pay for them himself, and then rise again. You are welcome to trust in Jesus Christ -- he came to save lost and hopeless sinners. Trust him, and be saved.