Prepare the Way
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
If you have your Bibles let me invite you to open with me to the book of Mark.
We will begin reading in verse 1 this morning and we will read through verse 8.
Last week we were introduced to the author of this book and some of the theme of this book.
Mark was an eye-witness of so much of God’s work in the 1st century.
We learned last week that…
It was at Mark’s house where the Last Supper was likely hosted.
It was Mark’s house where the Spirit fell after Jesus’ resurrection.
Mark traveled with the apostle Paul to plant churches throughout the empire.
Mark traveled with Peter and ministered with Peter in the city of Rome.
When Mark writes this gospel, he does so as an eye witness to many of the things in this book, or he does so while recording Peter’s eye witness testimony.
But this morning, as we continue to ease into this book, I want you to consider the historical recipients of this book.
I want you to consider the first readers of this gospel.
In the year AD 64, a fire burned in the city of Rome for seven days causing severe devastation.
Think about the city of New Orleans after hurricane Katrina, and then consider even more devastation than that by way of fire.
80% of the city burns, businesses are burned, homes are burned, lives have been lost, and many people have no where to turn.
There is some speculation that the Roman Emperor Nero actually started the fire himself.
but whatever the case may be, Nero needed someone or something to blame…
And the Christians fit the bill perfectly.
They were a strange group.
They rejected the pantheon of Roman gods, so many accused them of being atheistic.
They were oddly set apart.
They did not participate in the parties, or the pagan celebrations.
They had their own little gatherings where they talked about their leader who had died on a cross.
They would hangout with the lowest of social classes in society… and thus were an easy target.
So Nero blamed the Christians for the fire, and instituted the first organized wide scale persecution of anyone who called themselves a Christian.
Nero became increasingly insane throughout his reign as emperor.
He would execute his prisoners creatively.
He was famous for clothing his prisoners in bloody animal skins, and then letting loose wild and starving dogs.
He would feed Christians to lions, crucify them in masses, and on some occasions he would wrap them in tar, tie them to poles in his garden and light them like a lamp.
Christians were forced to flee the city, or meet in hiding.
Anne Marie and I went to Cairo Egypt, and found that in many of the ancient tombs, there were often Christian paintings on the walls, where Christians under persecution would have met in these tombs for worship as they were on the run from similar persecution.
This is the scenario in which many of the first readers of the gospel of Mark would have been introduced to this work.
They were very much in exile, in the wilderness, and wondering if this could really be how Jesus intended for their life to look.
Can you imagine with me, meeting under the cover of night in Rome, or perhaps outside of Rome in the outskirts of the city, and someone arrives with a copy of Mark’s good news message about Jesus....
1 The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
Now with that context in mind, lets continue to read Mark’s introductory prologue, and then lets pray for understanding.
1 The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
2 As it is written in Isaiah the prophet, “Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way,
3 the voice of one crying in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight,’ ”
4 John appeared, baptizing in the wilderness and proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.
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.
6 Now John was clothed with camel’s hair and wore a leather belt around his waist and ate locusts and wild honey.
7 And he preached, saying, “After me comes he who is mightier than I, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie.
8 I have baptized you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”
Lets Pray
Truth #1 The Gospel was God’s Plan from the Beginning
Truth #1 The Gospel was God’s Plan from the Beginning
Verse 1 introduces us to Mark’s thesis - Jesus is the Son of God, the Christ, is the good news.
Verse 2 explains, this is not something brand new, rather it is the fulfillment of something old.
Mark begins with the familiar phrase… “as it is written”
And he immediately directs the reader’s attention to Scriptures written hundreds of years before Jesus’ arrival.
He directs the reader’s attention to promises made by God and promises fulfilled in Jesus.
God’s People are no stranger to suffering.
They are no stranger to exile.
They are no stranger to the wilderness wanderings while waiting for God’s promises to come to pass.
Isaiah chapter 40 , which Mark now quotes, was written for the comfort of God’s people who were living under the oppression of Babylonian captivity… much like the first reader’s of mark dwelled under the oppression of Rome.
God’s people had been displaced,
they were surrounded by idol worshipping Babylonian culture,
and they were longing for a better day.
And Isaiah promised a better day, where they would be freed from the kingdom of Babylon.
Turn with me to Isaiah 40 from which Mark quotes and listen to Isaiah’s hope filled words.
3 A voice cries: “In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord; make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
4 Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain.
5 And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”
6 A voice says, “Cry!” And I said, “What shall I cry?” All flesh is grass, and all its beauty is like the flower of the field.
7 The grass withers, the flower fades when the breath of the Lord blows on it; surely the people are grass.
8 The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever.
9 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!”
10 Behold, the Lord God comes with might, and his arm rules for him; behold, his reward is with him, and his recompense before him.
11 He will tend his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arms; he will carry them in his bosom, and gently lead those that are with young.
Every Israelite boy and girl would have grown up knowing this promise…
- that the glory of God would one day be revealed,
- that God himself would tend his flock like a shepherd,
- and that the days of the exile would come to an end.
In fact the last paragraph of the last prophecy in the Old Testament is a prophecy about God’s Kingdom breaking into the world and overthrowing man’s kingdom.... so that God’s people never have to live in exile again.
turn with me to Malachi 4 and hear the last prophetic words that were heard in Old Testament history.
1 “For behold, the day is coming, burning like an oven, when all the arrogant and all evildoers will be stubble. The day that is coming shall set them ablaze, says the Lord of hosts, so that it will leave them neither root nor branch.
2 But for you who fear my name, the sun of righteousness shall rise with healing in its wings. You shall go out leaping like calves from the stall.
3 And you shall tread down the wicked, for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet, on the day when I act, says the Lord of hosts.
4 “Remember the law of my servant Moses, the statutes and rules that I commanded him at Horeb for all Israel.
5 “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes.
6 And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction.”
There is coming a day where God’s enemies will be destroyed
and God’s people will have their hearts turned to God.
There is coming a day of healing.
There is coming a day of rejoicing !
But, following this prophecy, there were four hundred years of prophetic silence.
For four hundred years, there was no prophet in Israel,
no word from God....,
no sign of his promises fulfilled...
It was believed according to Malachi 4:5...., that God’s next move was to send a prophet to proclaim that the last days had arrived.
According to Malachi, He was either going to be Elijah himself, or he was going to be a prophet like Elijah.
Elijah was a powerful prophet in the book of 1 and 2 Kings.
He confronted evil kings,
preached a powerful message of repentance,
and was often exiled in the wilderness of Israel.
Check out one description of Elijah in 2 Kings 1:7-8
7 He said to them, “What kind of man was he who came to meet you and told you these things?”
8 They answered him, “He wore a garment of hair, with a belt of leather about his waist.” And he said, “It is Elijah the Tishbite.”
Now consider Malachi’s prophecy
5 “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes.
6 And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction.”
God made a promise, that a prophet would come before the end, and he would announce the way of salvation, and turn the hearts of God’s people.
Now with all of that background and all of that Old Testament anticipation…back to Mark 1:2.
2 As it is written in Isaiah the prophet, “Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way,
3 the voice of one crying in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight,’ ”
4 John appeared, baptizing in the wilderness and proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.
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.
6 Now John was clothed with camel’s hair and wore a leather belt around his waist and ate locusts and wild honey.
Truth #1 The Gospel Was God’s Plan from the Beginning
Truth #1 The Gospel Was God’s Plan from the Beginning
With a voice crying in the wilderness, God broke the silence with the prophetic voice of a man named John the Baptist.
He apparently was a powerful preacher who was drawing massive crowds not in the city streets but out into the wilderness.
He sounded like Elijah.
He dressed like Elijah.
He preached the message of Elijah, and of Malachi, and of Isaiah.
He was preparing the way of the Lord.
He was preparing the people’s hearts for the message of Christ.
He was showing that promises made by God, are promises that will be fulfilled by God.
How encouraging this must have been for the first readers, who were now in the wilderness of a new exile, and waiting on God’s promises.
John came preparing the way of the Lord
But how?
What was the God-inspired message, that needed to be heard and responded to in order to receive the good news that Jesus was bringing into the world?
How does one “prepare the way of the Lord?”
What is the WAY of the Lord - the path down which God travels to meet you where you are and bring you into his good news?
4 John appeared, baptizing in the wilderness and proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.
Truth #2 The Way of the Lord is Repentance and Forgiveness
Truth #2 The Way of the Lord is Repentance and Forgiveness
Prophets throughout the Old Testament were often known for their sign-acts.
They would do something visual which carried with it symbolic power to the message being preached.
Consider Jeremiah for example, who purchased a pot and then smashed it on the ground in front of the people as a symbol for the destruction that was coming.
1 Thus says the Lord, “Go, buy a potter’s earthenware flask, and take some of the elders of the people and some of the elders of the priests,
2 and go out to the Valley of the Son of Hinnom at the entry of the Potsherd Gate, and proclaim there the words that I tell you.
3 You shall say, ‘Hear the word of the Lord, O kings of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem. Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold, I am bringing such disaster upon this place that the ears of everyone who hears of it will tingle.
10 “Then you shall break the flask in the sight of the men who go with you,
11 and shall say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord of hosts: So will I break this people and this city, as one breaks a potter’s vessel, so that it can never be mended. Men shall bury in Topheth because there will be no place else to bury.
The breaking of the flask was a sign-act, a visual symbol of the message being preached.
John the Baptist’s sign-act, however, was cooperative.
He called upon his listeners to participate in the sign-act of baptism as a visual and physical testimony to a spiritual reality.
three words are especially important in verse 4 - repentance, forgiveness, and baptism.
Not only is repentance, a summary of John’s message, it is a summary of Jesus’ message as well.
Verse 15 articulates Jesus’ first words in the whole book.
15 and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.”
Later it is the summary of the message that the disciples preach.
12 So they went out and proclaimed that people should repent.
The word repent literally means to - “change your mind” or to “reconsider your purpose”
To repent is to have a shift in how you relate to God, to yourself, to your sin, and to each other.
It is a life changing turn from the way of destruction to walk down the path of life.
In order to have a total reorientation of thinking and acting, however, you must first admit that you need changing.
There is a humility that accompanies true repentance that is most clearly expressed in confession.
This is why the word repent is often partnered with the act of confessing sin.
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.
This is the WAY you prepare to meet the Lord.
This is the path of good news.
This is the door way into relationship with Christ, and it is the path we walk for the rest of our lives.
John was calling people to honestly confess their sins, and renew their allegiance to the one true God.
The word baptism - means to be immersed.
John was calling people to publicly confess their sins, and symbolize their comprehensive change of mind and life..., by being fully immersed by the waters of the Jordan river and then rising out of the water to walk in repentance.
The way of the Lord that Jesus would call people to was life altering, world view shaping, and comprehensively purpose changing.
To become a Christian is to confess sin, and to embrace a new Lord who will lead you into a new life.
Jesus would call people to himself with the simple words, “Follow Me”
but those simple words meant so much.
He would call people to value Jesus more than life itself.
34 And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.
35 For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it.
He would call people to love God with everything they had.
29 Jesus answered, “The most important is, ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.
30 And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’
The Gospel of Mark, time and time again, will teach that true salvation, can never be less then confession and repentance - total change of mind and purpose.
And no gospel is sweeter than this.
John and Jesus’ call to repentance is a call of marvelous grace.
Sometimes we can think of the words like repent and confess through a negative lens as if these are bad words in Christianity that we must hear once and then move on from.....
But this is a huge part of THE GOOD NEWS.
Christian, we have the privilege of repentance.
In the book of Acts, Luke actually describes repentance as a gift of God that is granted to us.
18 When they heard these things they fell silent. And they glorified God, saying, “Then to the Gentiles also God has granted repentance that leads to life.”
God has not left us to walk down paths of destruction.
God has not left us to be deceived by the twisted perspective of our sin nature.
He has granted us the opportunity, the gift of total life and mind and heart transformation.
He has granted us the freedom of confessing our wrongs and our shortcomings…
Baptism is not only a symbol of one’s total commitment to the Lord… It is a symbol of the Lord’s work to totally cleanse us of all sin.
The good news message is that you are free to confess sin,
you are free to confess your need for repentance,
because the promise of God is total cleansing,
and total forgiveness of all your sins.
This is the good news.
God has invited you to turn away from destructive paths,
to walk the path of life,
and receive total forgiveness.
Truth #2 The Way of the Lord is Repentance and Forgiveness
Truth #2 The Way of the Lord is Repentance and Forgiveness
4 John appeared, baptizing in the wilderness and proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.
People were flocking to John the Baptizer and his message of forgiveness…
But John was always quick to clarify… that there was nothing special or saving about the water baptism…
John was calling people to respond with this symbolic act of faith and repentance.... but the real work....
the real saving work....
the real heart changing, soul cleansing work… was a different kind of baptism that John was incapable of performing....
John’s ministry was simply pointing beyond himself to the person, work, and ministry of Jesus, the Son of God.
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.
6 Now John was clothed with camel’s hair and wore a leather belt around his waist and ate locusts and wild honey.
7 And he preached, saying, “After me comes he who is mightier than I, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie.
8 I have baptized you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”
Truth #3 God’s Messengers Point Beyond Themselves to Someone Greater
Truth #3 God’s Messengers Point Beyond Themselves to Someone Greater
John was an amazing man.
He drew a crowd.
He saw many people repent and believe...
He was the fulfillment of prophecy written hundreds of years before.
But the amazing thing about John the Baptist was not John the Baptist...
It was he who John the Baptist was pointing too.
There was a humility in the John the Baptist that recognized his role in the kingdom of God almighty.
He was not the one who could usher in the Kingdom.
He was not the one saving any one.
He was was not the one who could bear the sins of the world.
He was not the one who could secure their forgiveness.
He was no the one who could change anyone’s heart.
But he was pointing his hearers to the one who could.
He was pointing to someone mightier than him....
someone so unbelievably worthy, that John considered himself not worthy of performing the lowest of servant tasks.
In those days, one’s sandals would become disgusting after walking through mud and animal dung covered streets and when someone would enter a house, they would not want to loosen their own shoes.... so it was a task reserved for the lowest of servants in the social pecking order.
But John says, such a task would be an honor of which he is not worthy .
John was baptizing with water… but the one coming would baptize with the Holy Spirit of God.
Now I want you to pause here and consider the the theological weight behind this statement.
Whoever was coming, was going to have the authority and the ability to immerse someone into the very spiritual life of God, the Spirit of Holiness, the Holy Spirit.
This outpouring of God’s Spirit was a significant feature of the Old Testament expectation.
3 For I will pour water on the thirsty land, and streams on the dry ground; I will pour my Spirit upon your offspring, and my blessing on your descendants.
26 And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.
27 And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.
In Isaiah and Ezekiel, it is clearly God himself who has the power to pour out his Spirit.
but listen to what one commentator writes...
The Gospel according to Mark John the Baptizer: Forerunner of Jesus (1:2–8)
That is an extraordinary declaration, for in the OT the bestowal of the Spirit belongs exclusively to God. John’s declaration, according to Mark, transfers the bestowal of the Spirit to Jesus, once again indicating that, as the Greater One, Jesus will come in the power and at the prerogative of God
Jesus was coming not just to offer the opportunity to repent, believe, and be forgiven.
Jesus was bringing the spiritual ability to do so by way of miraculous Holy Spirit immersion.
He would cause people to be born again,
and indwelt by the very Spirit of God so that they would walk in the spirit of repentance day in and day out.
and John the Baptist saw himself only as a pointer to this coming person and work of Jesus...
And so should we see ourselves in this way.
We Christians are messengers in the wilderness, unworthy to untie the sandals of our savior, but we have been given the gracious task of pointing beyond ourselves to only what Christ can do!
John the Baptist’s message serves as sort of a prequel to the themes that are to come.
John’s posture of humility and sevanthood, is exactly what Jesus calls us to embrace.
42 And Jesus called them to him and said to them, “You know that those who are considered rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them.
43 But it shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant,
44 and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all.
45 For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
We church are called to lives of servanthood that point beyond ourselves to someone greater and to something greater…
And even in our pursuing obedience to that command… we do so only by the power of the Holy Spirit that Jesus himself grants us.
Conclusion:
John’s message, and his example, are placed here early in the book so that we might be confronted not only with who Jesus is… but how we are to respond to him.
John the Baptist did not preach so that his hearers might gain more knowledge. He preached so that they might respond to what they hear.
So how do we respond?
Three Takeaways:
Confess and Repent For the Forgiveness of Sins
According to John, the way of the Lord is paved with things like, humility, confession of sin, and repentance.
Have you ever responded to God in this way?
Have you ever confessed your sin, asked for forgiveness through the penalty Jesus paid for you, repented from your sin, and publicly proclaimed it through baptism?
I say this with all due respect, and I do not mean to throw stones....
But the Roman Catholic doctrine of infant baptism is not represented in the Scriptures.
God has called you as a thinking and responsible adult to repent and believe,
and to be baptized by immersion into water as a symbol of symbolize that reorientation of your life and the forgiveness you have received.
If you refuse to obey this command… you refuse to obey the very first and most basic command of being a disciple of Jesus.
19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,
Perhaps you are here this morning and you need to repent and trust Jesus as your Savior for the first time and by taking steps toward baptism.
#2 Embrace Humility and Repentance as a Way of Life
This is the way of our Lord.
We should be people who are quick to admit our own short comings,
quick to receive the blame,
quick to be honest about what we do not know or cannot do.
We are free to admit things like that, because of the gospel of Jesus Christ
He frees us from having to pretend that we are perfect.
He frees us from the exhausting toil of getting other people to look at us and to think we are better than we actually are.
I absolutely love an interaction that John the apostle records about John the Baptist in John 3.
Some of his disciples come to John the Baptist and they are complaining because more people are now going to hear Jesus rather than John
26 And they came to John and said to him, “Rabbi, he who was with you across the Jordan, to whom you bore witness—look, he is baptizing, and all are going to him.”
27 John answered, “A person cannot receive even one thing unless it is given him from heaven.
28 You yourselves bear me witness, that I said, ‘I am not the Christ, but I have been sent before him.’
29 The one who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom’s voice. Therefore this joy of mine is now complete.
30 He must increase, but I must decrease.”
John utilizes an analogy.
He says to be frustrated about everone’s eyes being on Jesus is comparable to being a groomsmen in someone’s wedding and being frustrated when the doors swing open in the back and the bride locks eyes with her groom rather than looking at you and how good you look in your suit.
#3 Rejoice Over the Work of Christ
In this passage Jesus is depicted as the one coming who will pave the way of deliverance from exile.
He is the promised one of the old testament.
He is the one who is mighty to save by bestowing the power of the Holy Spirit upon us and in us and through us.
We are unworthy to untie his sandals,
yet he took the full wrath of God on himself for our salvation and three days later rose up from the dead and guaranteed our eternal life.
Rejoice that this Jesus grants us things like repentance.
Lets Pray