The Beginning...
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Introduction
Introduction
Good morning and welcome to Dishman Baptist Church. It’s already been quite the morning around here - with baby dedications, baptisms, missionary testimonies and new classes and curriculums in our life group ministry - it has been very busy to say the least. And now we get one more new start as we begin to study this wonderful book. Earlier this year we worked our way through Colossians and the goal of that study was to present Christ - high and magnified - and to get a very clear picture of His work in salvation. This summer we have spent time going through the promises of the Psalm writers and really their writings that point to the coming of Christ. But now we get the distinct privilege of studying Christ Himself. I think two statements by Charles Spurgeon sum up well the privilege of studying Christ. The first are the first words he spoke from the pulpit at the Metropolitan Tabernacle in London on March 25, 1861
714I would propose that the subject of the ministry of this house, as long as this platform shall stand, shall be the person of Jesus Christ. I am never ashamed to avow myself a Calvinist, but if I am asked to say what is my creed, I think I must reply, “It is Jesus Christ.” The body of divinity to which I would pin and bind myself forever, God helping me, is Christ Jesus, who is the sum and substance of the gospel, who is himself all theology, the incarnation of every precious truth, the all-glorious personal embodiment of the way, the truth, and the life.
The second is the last words that he spoke from the very same pulpit on June 7, 1891
723He is the most magnanimous of captains. If there is anything gracious, generous, kind and tender, lavish, and superabundant in love, you always find it in him. These forty years and more have I served him, and I have nothing but love for him. His service is life, peace, joy. Oh, that you would enter it at once! God help you to enlist under the banner of Jesus even this day!
But I must give us each a warning at the very beginning of this study. I would venture to say that almost all of us have read this book before - and most of us have read it multiple times. With such familiarity there is the possibility to be too casual in our study, to be too familiar with the stories and to say “oh yes, I’ve heard that one before” and miss the beauty of what God has to say to us today. Let’s commit to coming to these passages each week with fresh eyes and look to see not simply the familiar stories but what they reveal to us about the person of Christ.
Every story must have a beginning and this morning we come to the beginning not of a simple story but of a person. Every book must have a beginning. Throughout history there have been some iconic beginnings to books.
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times” immediately identifies Dickens book “A Tale of Two Cities”.
“All children, except one, grow up?” is the start of J.M. Barrie’s “Peter Pan”.
There’s even a novel that starts out “If you’re going to read this, don’t bother.”
The beginning of the book of Mark would rank up with these iconic beginnings.
The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
Even this beginning - so ripe with promise - is often overlooked when it comes to beginnings in the Bible. When we hear the words beginning our minds immediately turn to Genesis 1:1
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
or John 1:1
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
but normally we don’t immediately think of Mark 1:1. Before we dig into why I say this is a great introduction - let’s take a few moments and examine who wrote the book and why it was written. It is church tradition that tells us that this book was written by Mark because just like the other Gospels the author doesn’t choose to identify himself. However, there is ample evidence from the first and second centuries that attribute this book writing to Mark. Writing in 140 A.D. the church father Papias serving as the bishop of Hieropolis wrote “And the presbyter [the Apostle John] said this: Mark having become the interpreter of Peter, wrote down accurately whatsoever he remembered.” And then in 150 A.D., the church father Justin Martyr referred to the Gospel as “the memoirs of Peter” and that Mark had written the book while in Rome.
Mark is a great example of the restorative power of the Gospel. John Mark might be the young man at the end of this Gospel who runs away from Christ’s arrest naked but we definitely know that his mother hosted a church house in the book of Acts. Following Peter’s release from prison by an angel in Acts 12 he goes to the house of John Mark’s mother where they were having prayer meeting on his behalf. Mark accompanied Paul and Barnabas on their first missionary journey but left early in the trip. Paul gives us another clue into Mark’s identity by telling us that he was Barnabas’ cousin in Colossians 4. It was the desire to include Mark on a second missionary journey that led to a split between Paul and Barnabas. Somewhere after that time, Mark and Peter are reunited and their relationship is developed to the point that Peter would later refer to Mark as “his own son” in 1 Peter 5:13. It was during their ministry together in Rome that this book was written.
Which brings us to one last issue that we have to address in order to properly place this book in its context. We need to briefly discuss what some theologians have called the “Synoptic problem”. Among the Gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke are referred to as the Synoptic Gospels. Synoptic is a compound word with “syn” meaning together and “optic” meaning “to see”. If you’ve ever read through the Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke you would recognize that these three Gospels share a lot of material in common and the “Synoptic problem” is an effort on the part of scholars to determine who borrowed from who. It is generally assumed that, because Mark is so short, that Matthew and Luke borrowed from Mark. There are several issues with that though - the first and most problematic being that it was generally accepted up until very recently (the 19th Century) that Matthew was the first Gospel written. Another issue is why would Matthew borrow information regarding his own calling by Christ from Mark who wasn’t even there. The facts are that the three Gospels share nearly all the same information and where they do differ the differences are not substantive enough to warrant the idea that there are sources that have yet to be discovered or that the Gospel writers borrowed from one another. What is the best solution to this “Synoptic problem” is to recognize that each of the Gospel writers were inspired by God through the Holy Spirit to write the story independently in a way that would serve His purposes and are in accordance with His mandate of 2 Timothy 3:16-17 that all Scripture is God breathed and is profitable for teaching, for rebuking, for correcting, for training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
And so now with all that introductory and background knowledge we come to the beginning.
The Beginning
The Beginning
Mark really starts out his Gospel with a thesis statement - he is letting us know, and the original Roman audience that his Gospel was intended for, exactly what and why he is writing. He starts off with beginning. And this is a logical statement because of course where else would you start but at the beginning. The beginning of the story, the beginning of the life being chronicled. Except Mark starts at neither of those places.
Like I mentioned in the introduction, unlike John or Moses in Genesis, Mark’s use of the word beginning is not meant to pull our minds back to the beginning of creation. It is not meant to remind us of the original family or original sin or even the first promise of the Gospel found in Genesis 3:15.
Commentators actually take different views as to exactly what Mark’s purpose was in this use of language. Some think that it could be the original title of the letter - that this was the Beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Other’s think, like I just mentioned, that this is really Mark’s thesis statement and that he is laying out the purpose of his writing right from the very beginning.
It seems logical that it really could be either of these two purposes but I think that there is another reason for Mark’s verbiage here. Our modern translations rob a bit away from the language by adding an article and calling it “the beginning” rather than how Mark truly wrote it - Beginning. Αρχη - or beginning. This word can be defined as the commencement of something, as an action, process or state of being or a point in time at the beginning of a duration.
But this is not the beginning of Christ’s life - as Luke and Matthew chose to document. Nor is this the beginning of the salvation story.
I think this is something else. And seeing as this is the first weekend of professional football in the United States, I think we could look at the Super Bowl for a bit of an understanding of what Mark is alluding to here as he says Αρχη. Every year there is a buildup to the Super Bowl. And if you don’t like football - put any event into this blank that you would like - first there’s the season and the ebb and flow of hope and despair that the different teams and fans experience. And then there’s the playoffs until finally there are two teams left. Then the hype really begins - who’s hurt, who’s not, how will this team or this player fair against the other team. There’s ample media coverage. And then there’s even the day of the game. But even that day is not the game.
If this were a wedding there would be the courtship or dating period followed by the oftentimes fumbling proposal and the groom-to-be just hoping that his desired bride will say yes. And then there’s the planning, the invitations, securing a venue, color schemes. And finally the day arrives - but just as the day of the Super Bowl is not the game, the day of the wedding is not the wedding.
Until the ball is kicked off. Until the doors open and the bride appears and begins her walk down the aisle - it’s all just hope.
From the day that Adam and Eve fell in the Garden and the Lord made this great pronouncement
I will put hostility between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. He will strike your head, and you will strike his heel.
There has been 4000 years of hope, despair, righteousness and sin all building to this moment. There was the Abrahamic covenant when Israel was promised a land and this was repeated to Isaac and Jacob. This hope seemed to dim as the people moved to Egypt and languished under the Egyptian rule and slavery for four hundred years. But then Moses came on the scene and maybe he was the promised seed that would once and for all crush the serpent’s head. He even received the Mosaic covenant to provided a law for righteous living among the people - surely this would be him. But then he too failed.
And there was another 400 year period, after the promised land had been secured under Joshua, when the people would be near to God and then wander away requiring rescuing and they ended up in such bad affairs that at the end of that period this pronouncement could be made of the nation that was meant to demonstrate God to the world
In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did whatever seemed right to him.
And then a king did come on the scene - first in the person of Saul and then David. And another promise, this one to David, the Davidic Covenant that promised that one of his seed would remain on the throne of Israel forever
But my faithful love will never leave him as it did when I removed it from Saul, whom I removed from before you.
Your house and kingdom will endure before me forever, and your throne will be established forever.’ ”
And again the question was - where is the one promised, where is the seed. Then the nation and the line of kings failed. The kingdom was split and king after king came and went. Some honored the way of David and served God but most didn’t and the people of Israel and Judah were eventually conquered and exiled away from the land they had been promised.
But God was still faithful and they were returned through Nehemiah and Ezra. The walls of Jerusalem were rebuilt and the temple restored. And yet there still seemed to be no seed.
Can you feel the tension. I mean we have a hard time waiting for 2 weeks for the Super Bowl, for however many months transpire between the proposal and the wedding, I mean sometimes we even struggle waiting for the few seconds that it takes someone to text us back.
And then Christ was born - the angels announce it to the shepherds - and surely this would be the beginning that Mark would point to. And it was, of a sort, the Messiah had been born but until he steps onto the scene in ministry, until he begins to preach it is still only a potential Gospel. Now hear me - there was no doubt that Christ would step onto the scene and do what He had come here to do. Just as there’s no doubt now in September that come February there will be a ball teed up and there will be a Super Bowl, but until that kick off takes place the Super Bowl is still just a potential game.
Mark’s pronouncement here - Αρχη - beginning should ring out and ring clear that the time that has been long awaited is come - and it’s not simply an event but it’s good news and it’s good news about a person. Let’s move on.
The Gospel
The Gospel
Mark says that this is the beginning of something - and that something is what he terms the gospel. It is important to pause here on these words because in all four of the books that make up this genre of writing it is only here in the book of Mark that the term is applied to the overall writing or purpose the author has set forth. Matthew calls his writing an account
An account of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the Son of David, the Son of Abraham:
Luke calls it a narrative
Many have undertaken to compile a narrative about the events that have been fulfilled among us,
John doesn’t classify what he is writing except to say at the end of his record
Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of his disciples that are not written in this book.
But these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.
So it is significant that Mark uses the term good news here and that it then becomes the genre classification for the first four books of the New Testament.
Outside of the Bible the word Gospel or ευαγγελιον was used for any form of good news that might be brought. It carried particular weight in the political or military realm where the word was a technical term meaning “news of victory”. The messenger would be ushered in, his spear decked with laurels, his head crowned with the same and he would pronounce the good news of some great victory on the field of battle.
In Mark’s day the word had also taken on great significance for the predominant “emperor cult” in Rome. The emperor was believed to be a divine ruler who could control nature, dispense healing, serve as a protector and bring good fortune. The birth of a new emperor would be accompanied by the sending out of the good news the ευαγγελιον that a new emperor had been born.
When Roman inscription dating back to 9 B.C. illustrates this. It reads
Mark 1–8: The MacArthur New Testament Commentary Chapter 1: The Herald of the New King (Mark 1:1–8)
Whereas the Providence … which has ordered the whole of our life, showing concern and zeal, has ordained the most perfect consummation for human life by giving to it Augustus, by filling him with virtue for doing the work of a benefactor among men, and by sending him, as it were, [as] a saviour for us and those who come after us, to make war to cease, to create order everywhere … and whereas the birthday of the God [Augustus] was the beginning of the world of the glad tidings that have come to men through him.…
But here Mark’s use of the word takes on greater significance. Just as his use of the word beginning to mark the momentous commencement of the redemption of mankind, his use of the word Gospel would mark the royal declaration from the throne room of God that the good news promised by the angels at Christ’s birth and instituted by His birth was coming to pass as well. The use of the word Gospel here in his letter immediately would strike his early listeners, and should strike us now as well, that all that follows is going to be a royal pronouncement, a royal decree that the King of Kings has arrived. And it would immediately clue his readers into the fact that it is not Caesar.
We should not miss the importance though of how the word was used with respect to a person. The good news proclaimed regarding Caesar’s birth was not the event itself but instead it was the person that it heralded. We have a tendency in our age to pare down the Gospel to simply be the good news about the event that saved sinners - that it is the event and not the man. And to some extent this is true as Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 15
Now I want to make clear for you, brothers and sisters, the gospel I preached to you, which you received, on which you have taken your stand
and by which you are being saved, if you hold to the message I preached to you—unless you believed in vain.
For I passed on to you as most important what I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures,
that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures,
and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the Twelve.
But even here Paul is careful to characterize the Gospel as being that Christ died for our sins. In the book of Mark as we study through this great book we must be careful, as I’ve already mentioned, to make sure that we see the Person who is the good news and not simply be caught up in the information that surrounds and encompasses Him and what He did. For Mark the Gospel is the good news of a person - as he is going to introduce Him now.
Of Jesus Christ
Of Jesus Christ
This is good news about someone. And Mark’s words here would have immediately shocked his audience. Remember he is writing to Roman Christians in the center of the emperor cult when Caesar is considered to be the son of God. For Christians to now take that title and apply it to a Jewish troublemaker who had been crucified on a hill outside Jerusalem was nothing short of treason. It is why some Christians were put into the gladiator’s arena, or fed to lions, or run through in the marketplace because they would not confess that Caesar was lord. Instead they confessed that Christ was Lord.
Mark says that this Gospel, this good news, is the good news of the advent of Jesus Christ the Son of God. This triple identification covers every part of Christ’s person and mission here on earth.
His human name was Jesus. Given to Him at His birth it meant “Yahweh is salvation” and it pointed to His reason for coming.
Christ is a title - it is the Greek version of the Hebrew term Messiah. It is the royal title given to the One that was promised in Genesis 3:15 and waited for all these years. It also pointed to the divinely appointed kings of Israel pointing to the Davidic covenant that Christ would ultimately fulfill.
Finally he calls Him the Son of God - speaking of Christ’s lineage and right to reign over all the universe. As we looked at last week through Psalm 110 it was through and for Christ that all things were made and have their being. Yet He is also going to be the servant King that we will see throughout the book of Mark. This Son of God humbled Himself to empty Himself, setting aside His divine attributes for a time and submitting to the Father’s will to come to earth to be the good news that had been promised to all of mankind.
Conclusion
Conclusion
This is the Gospel that we will be studying - but it is also a comprehensive statement that sums up all that we need to know for salvation. This is the Gospel, not of our own efforts, but of Jesus Christ. This is the truth that He had come and that His ministry had begun.
As Mark starts off this Gospel message with Beginning note that even though there will be an intermission at the end of this great book - when Christ ascends into Heaven - there has not been an ending written. That day is still in the future. The end is sure - it is the promise that all those who believe in this Gospel will be saved and all those who do not, who die in their sins will be sent into the eternal fire and separation from God where they will experience the eternal wrath that is the just punishment for their sins.
And yet today there is the promise - not that one day a Messiah will come - but that He has come and if we, like those children who were baptized today confessed, will place our trust in Him, in His sacrifice and payment for our sins and not attempt to achieve salvation in our own power but rely on His efforts for us then we too can be saved.
We are embarking on a great journey through this Gospel and we will see many things that Jesus did - but we mustn’t forget that the greatest thing He did was to get to the end of His ministry and to die on the cross as a propitiation or payment for our sins so that we could have His righteousness given to us and be seen as clean and holy before God. This my friends is the Good News that Mark is going to proclaim to us throughout his Gospel.