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Mark Introduction · Providence Baptist Church - Sermons

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We are beginning today our study of the Gospel according to Mark.
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So if you'll please turn there with me.
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I don't know if you feel this or not, but whenever we begin something new and end something old,
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that's a little bittersweet for me.
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We've just completed our study of Nehemiah, which took us just a couple of months.
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Prior to that, we studied through the book of Romans.
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And each time, I take my little handy ribbon bookmark that came with my Bible here,
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and I keep it right where we're at.
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And that's kind of my go-to spot as I'm studying throughout the week.
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And it's a little painful sometimes to move it from the end of a book to something new.
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The case of Nehemiah really blessed my heart to get to study it,
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and I hope it did yours as we learned from it together.
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I always get to the end, and I wonder, did we wring it dry?
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Did we get everything that it was to get out of it?
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Sometimes I want to start back at the beginning because it's been such a blessing to us
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and just say, this was too good.
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We're going to start over, and we're just going to do it again
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and see what else God would teach us from this book.
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Nevertheless, I do think it's time to move on,
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and we're going to begin our study of Mark.
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And as excited as I am that we did Nehemiah and we're finishing it,
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I'm as equally excited to begin to plow through Mark together.
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To be totally honest with you, and just to show you how very base my mind can be sometimes
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as I begin to ponder what should we do next
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and had a desire to look at one of the Gospels together,
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I started, I picked Mark because it was the shortest.
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The 16 chapters versus Matthew's 28 chapters.
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I just said, yeah, that would be good because, whew, 28 chapters, that's a lot of work.
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Mark, that's how base my mind is, but I've come to see that this was a very particular reason
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that we've come together to study Mark together in these coming months.
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So, let's take a look together simply this morning at Mark 1.1.
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The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
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Join me in prayer.
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Father God, we praise You this morning for Your goodness to us in Christ,
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the One who has taken this debt that we had, that we could not pay.
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We could deposit into it all we wanted, and it would never have been filled,
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would never have been satisfied.
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But Christ has paid that debt on our behalf.
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We praise You for that, that we now have life in Him.
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And we praise You for the Gospel according to Mark, this inspired work,
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written by Mark, moved along by Your Spirit, that testifies to this One, Jesus Christ.
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Father, help this study to enrich our lives individually,
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and to enrich our lives corporately, for Your glory.
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We pray this in Christ's name.
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Amen.
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So, Mark 1.1.
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I get to reread our text numerous times today, which is really wonderful,
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because it's so short.
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The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
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But before we look carefully at this, I think it's important that we get a little bit of background.
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We have some framework to move forward in together.
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And I know that as I study that type of thing, it carries with me,
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because I spend a lot of time each week looking at the Gospel of Mark.
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But I know that you don't.
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Like, you may not necessarily, like, spend a bunch of time each day reading and picking up commentaries
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and studying and meditating on this.
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And so I'll bring it back around.
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We'll fill in some of the details of these things later.
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I don't want to give you a perfect explanation of all of the framework
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and then expect you to remember it in the coming 8 to 12 months, is my guess here.
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So I just want to kind of get your mind going in the right direction as we look at Mark together this morning.
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Mark is one of the three, what are called the synoptic Gospels,
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which that word comes from the Greek word.
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It simply means together seen.
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They include many of the same stories, often in the same sequence, with similar wording.
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This would be Matthew, Mark, and Luke.
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These are the synoptic Gospels.
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It is widely accepted, although we don't know for sure, this can't be factually stated,
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but it is widely accepted that Mark was the earliest written of the Gospels.
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More than likely in the mid to late 50s AD is when Mark penned this book.
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We see evidences of that because Matthew and Luke both seem to borrow heavily from the Gospel of Mark in its structure.
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95% of Matthew, for example, is borrowed from the Gospel of Mark.
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Often the danger with Mark is that we see it simply as the comic book version.
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Some of you I talked to this week, I actually made that comment about,
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that we simply view it as the comic book version or the Reader's Digest,
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for those of you who are older in the crowd, version of the Gospel.
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That's very action-packed. It moves along very quickly.
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There's not a great emphasis on Jesus' words, but rather his actions in the book.
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The temptation with Mark is always to read a story here,
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and then go to the corresponding story in Matthew and preach from that.
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But I know that in this journey together, there's going to be many times I'm just going to want to flip to Matthew,
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where there's a lot more detail and try to flesh it out for you in a greater degree there.
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As such, Mark's often neglected. It's pushed off.
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It's a lesser Gospel in some people's minds.
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But this book is also part of the inspired Word of God.
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This account of the Gospel was penned in this way for very specific reasons,
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and so we must treat it with reverence, right?
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We can't say, hey, Mark, kind of not a detailed guy.
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Let's go read Matthew instead.
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This book was given to us for our benefit together.
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I found it fascinating, and I'm not dogging on MacArthur,
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because this is not what he did or the point he was making,
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but as I was listening to an introductory sermon he preached on Mark,
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he brought to everyone's attention that this was the last book of the New Testament
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he had preached at Grace Community Church.
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Over a 20-year span, he came to Mark last and finally to complete that journey.
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And boy, I hope someday I can say,
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this is the last book of the New Testament that I haven't preached yet at Christ Family Church.
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That'd be a real blessing.
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I looked for, as I like to do, MacArthur's commentaries.
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You know he has a commentary on every book of the New Testament except Mark?
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Probably because he wrote a very wonderful one in multiple volumes on Matthew.
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What would he have said that he would have said in a commentary setting?
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That is totally fine, right?
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So again, I'm not dogging on John MacArthur,
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but it's appropriate that we would preach from the Gospel of Mark
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and that we approach it together.
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So as I said, probably, more than likely, the earliest written.
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It's very simple in its format.
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You won't see this so much in the English, but in the original language,
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it's very, very simple in its format.
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Possibly written entirely in Aramaic and later translated into Greek.
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That's a distinct possibility because of some of the way the phrases are translated.
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If not, it was at very least written in very rudimentary Greek.
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It's what's called a socio-rhetorical gospel.
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A better way of thinking of that would be a persuasive biography.
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It contains a lot of the very basic elements of Greek biography,
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as well as some of the very simplest versions of Greek logic.
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So Mark wrote this as a fairly common man, as we'll see here soon,
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for common men.
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It wasn't necessarily meant for the high-minded.
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A persuasive biography.
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When we use that term rhetorical,
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now we mean lofty speech without much meaning behind it,
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meant to convince you of something that you probably shouldn't believe in to begin with.
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We see a lot of rhetoric come out of Washington, D.C., for example.
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That's not the type of rhetoric we're talking about here.
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So we'll use that term persuasive biography.
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And the aim of that persuasion,
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what he is ultimately driving us to, Mark is here,
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was to persuade those who would read this book to become disciple-making disciples.
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To serve the world with the gospel of Jesus Christ to the glory of God.
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That's what he's trying to persuade.
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I can think of nothing higher to persuade people of.
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A good thesis statement for the gospel of Mark is found in Mark chapter 10,
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the last half of verse 43 through 45,
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which says,
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Jesus' words,
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We're going to see this kind of carry throughout the entire book as we study it together.
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Now, how do we know that Mark wrote this?
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As with the other synoptic gospels,
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he doesn't name himself as the author.
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Not like Paul's letters where he begins with a salutation,
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I, Paul.
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Here we don't see that being recorded.
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And it's believed that they did that because they were trying to put themselves in proper position.
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This is not a story about Mark.
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This is a story about Jesus Christ.
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No need for his name to be even included in this.
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So it's been held in Christian tradition that Mark was the one that penned this letter.
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He fits the model of the type of man that would have written in this way.
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And there's some early church records,
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some extra biblical sources that name Mark as the author of the gospel of Mark.
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And therefore, we accept it as such.
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This is a reliable reason to believe that Mark was, in fact, the writer.
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Some of you may have heard this actually being referred to as the gospel of Peter.
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Mark knew Peter very well, spent a lot of time with him.
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Mark himself was not an apostle.
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We're going to look at where we actually find him in the scriptures
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and what we can know about Mark.
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But Mark himself wasn't an apostle.
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He didn't have a firsthand account of the gospel.
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But he spent much time with Peter.
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It's highly likely that this was going on.
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And therefore, you could actually think of it in those terms.
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Some of the evidence of that being the way that Peter's own sin is magnified in the gospel of Mark.
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His failures, there's much made of it here.
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And I believe that Peter wanted people to see how desperately he needed grace in his life.
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So who was Mark?
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Let's turn to Acts chapter 12.
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We're going to step away from Mark for a little bit and we'll come back to it.
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In case you haven't already memorized.
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Chapter 1, verse 1.
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For the sake of time, I'm not going to tell you all the events that have led up to where we are now,
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but we know that the Christian church is now spreading rampantly.
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Actually, the first 12 chapters of Acts could easily be looked at.
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The work of the gospel advancing to Judea and Samaria.
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It's kind of the story of Peter and the way he's doing that.
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The last 16, so from chapter 12, about halfway through towards the end and then on through the end of the book,
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is how the gospel advances to the utmost ends of the earth.
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The way that Paul and these other missionaries begin to take the gospel out.
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And here we see in chapter 12 a bit of a transition.
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So look at verse 1 of chapter 12.
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I'll set the stage for you.
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It says,
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So here we have Herod.
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The king appointed by the Roman government, pleasing the Jews, not all of the Jews,
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but those who were in leadership, by martyring the very first apostle killed.
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That would be James here.
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We've already seen Stephen killed, but this is the first apostle that's killed for his faith, being James.
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And he saw that it made them happy that one of these Christians, one of these followers of the way, was put to death.
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And so to continue to make them happy, he arrests Peter.
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And boy, Peter must have been mighty by the Spirit because it gives him four squads of soldiers to guard him.
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They worked in six hour shifts, which meant he would have been guarded around the clock.
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And the intention was to kill him.
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The very next day, they were going to kill him.
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In verse 6, we see that there were two soldiers guarding him.
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Again, what a dangerous man.
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This man who was carrying the truth of God.
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Two soldiers bound with chains on either side.
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And we see this amazing work as the church is praying for him.
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An angel is sent in, looses the chains, leads him out of the prison.
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Guard's still sleeping.
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Leads him out of the prison.
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He thinks that it's a dream.
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The gates are opening for him.
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He just has no idea what's going on.
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Thinks it's a total dream.
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Verse 9 says he thought he was seeing a vision.
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Verse 11 says,
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But when Peter came to himself, he said,
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Now I am sure that the Lord has sent his angel and rescued me from the hand of Herod
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and from all that the Jewish people were expecting.
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Verse 12,
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When he realized this, he went to the house of Mary, the mother of John,
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whose other name was Mark,
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where many were gathered together and were praying.
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So there's the very first mention.
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A man known by the name of John Mark.
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His Hebrew name was John.
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His Greek name, his Roman name was Mark.
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So you'll probably hear me refer to him often as John Mark today.
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And then in the future, we'll just call him Mark.
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But this is the very man that penned the gospel according to Mark.
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Notice here, the only mention of him is to clarify who Mary is.
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It seems like just about everybody, as part of the gospel account, was named Mary.
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So here we have which Mary I don't really know,
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but we do know that she's the mother of John Mark.
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So Peter goes to a place that's familiar to him.
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We're going to see in just a moment that this is the place that these people,
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the church were gathered earnestly praying on his behalf.
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So we know then, because he goes to this place, it's a familiar place to him,
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it's where the church is meeting, that he knew John Mark.
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Peter and John Mark knew one another.
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At very least, that he was the kid sitting in the corner in Mary's house.
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This is where we see him for the very, very first time.
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The story gets so incredibly fascinating.
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For the sake of time, I'm not going to read it all to you.
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You may be familiar with it.
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Peter knocks on the gate of the courtyard,
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and a servant named Rhoda hears his voice,
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and she's so excited, because they're inside praying for him.
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She's so excited, she doesn't open the gate.
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She goes running back in,
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and here we see this incredibly faithless church call her insane,
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tell her it's probably his angel,
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and they don't go out to open the gate.
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That really made me thankful as I was reading this this week
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that God uses even our faithless prayers to accomplish things just the same,
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because they didn't expect that God would actually do this work to deliver Peter.
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So Peter goes in, he meets with them.
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So there's the completion of that,
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but this is the first place we see John Mark.
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Now, down in verse 25 of chapter 12,
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we see it recorded,
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and Barnabas and Saul returned from Jerusalem
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when they had completed their service,
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bringing with them John,
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whose other name was Mark.
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We're going to see some evidence later on
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that John Mark is the cousin of Barnabas.
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So here they go,
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they're in Jerusalem,
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they've met with the church,
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the church is advancing everywhere,
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and now they return from Jerusalem,
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they're headed to Antioch,
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and they take with them John Mark.
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Here's our guy.
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Now chapter 13.
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Now there were in the church of Antioch
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prophets and teachers,
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Barnabas,
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Simeon who was called Niger,
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Lucius of Cyrene,
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Menaon a member of the court of Herod the Tetrarch,
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and Saul.
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While they were worshipping the Lord and fasting,
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the Holy Spirit said,
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Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul
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for the work to which I have called them.
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Then after fasting and praying,
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they laid their hands on them
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and sent them off.
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Here's the commissioning
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for the very first missionary journey
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of Paul and Barnabas.
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Verse 4.
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So being sent out by the Holy Spirit,
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they went down to Seleucia,
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and from there they sailed to Cyprus.
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When they arrived at Salamis,
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they proclaimed the word of God
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in the synagogues of the Jews,
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and they had John to assist them.
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Now at this point,
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we don't really know a whole lot about him.
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But we see,
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we'll see later,
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cousin to Barnabas,
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goes along with them.
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He's the son of Mary,
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the church meeting in their home.
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And then we see that he goes along
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on this trip to assist them,
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which more than likely means
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that he was a humble man,
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he wasn't a teacher,
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he wasn't being sent out
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to proclaim the gospel,
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he was being sent out
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to serve alongside
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and bring to deacon
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these apostles that were going out,
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to come alongside them
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and provide for their need,
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to track down the food,
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to look for shelter
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in this journey along with them.
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So probably,
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I'm conjecting at this point,
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but probably a man
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of very simple means,
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which is an encouraging thing to me,
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because I am no Paul
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and I am no Barnabas.
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So he goes with them.
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Skip down to verse 13.
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Now Paul and his companions
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set sail from Paphos,
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some really nutty things
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happened in Paphos,
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and came to Perga in Pamphylia,
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and John left them
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and returned to Jerusalem.
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And John left them
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and returned to Jerusalem.
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So he doesn't go back to Antioch,
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he's now bailed on the mission journey,
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he doesn't go back to Antioch,
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but instead goes back
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to his original home,
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back to Jerusalem.
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He disappears for a little while.
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He doesn't show up
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in the record anywhere
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until we get to chapter 15.
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A bunch of accounts,
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Paul and Barnabas' travels,
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the advancing of the Gospel.
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They return to Jerusalem,
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Paul and Barnabas do,
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to participate in this council
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that forms,
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that meets together,
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because the Judaizers
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were coming in
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to these Christian fellowships,
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and they were saying to Greeks,
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if you're to be found right with God,
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this Jesus thing is great,
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believe that,
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but you also must be circumcised.
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You also must keep the law
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as a sign of the covenant
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between God and you.
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They met together
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to set this straight.
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Paul and Barnabas
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go to be part of this
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as missionaries to the Gentiles,
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they wanted to be involved
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in this activity.
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And after this,
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verse 36 of chapter 15,
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and after some days,
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Paul said to Barnabas,
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let us return and visit
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the brothers in every city
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where we proclaimed
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the word of the Lord
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and see how they are.
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Let's go back the route
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we went before
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and let's check in
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on all of these churches,
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all this Christian fellowship
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that has begun to happen.
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Verse 37,
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now Barnabas wanted
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to take with them
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John called Mark.
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But Paul thought it best
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not to take with them
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one who had withdrawn
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from them in Pamphylia
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and had not gone with them
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to the work.
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And there arose
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a sharp disagreement
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so that they separated
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from each other.
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Barnabas took Mark with him
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and sailed away to Cyprus.
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Now the language here
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gives us key
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that Paul's feelings
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about this man
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as well as the Greek word
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withdrawn
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means that John Mark
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bailed on the first missionary journey
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because he was afraid.
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He said,
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I did not sign up for this.
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I did not know
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that this was where
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you were going to lead me.
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And he bailed.
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He was a coward.
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He jumped off.
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He got out of the situation
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altogether.
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And here we see
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that there's an argument
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that arises.
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Barnabas sticking up
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for his cousin.
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It's been a couple of years.
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Maybe he's grown up.
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Maybe he just needs
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a second chance.
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Paul who says,
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I don't want people with me
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who are going to be cowardly.
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I don't want them with me.
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And so they disagreed
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and they went there
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separate ways.
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I'm not here to give you
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commentary on that.
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I don't really know
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what was right and proper.
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But here we have
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Barnabas and Paul
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split directions.
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Barnabas takes Mark with him.
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Paul takes Silas.
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And the gospel continues
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to advance in this way.
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Now at this point
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we don't see any record
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in the New Testament narrative
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about Barnabas
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for two years.
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It doesn't show back up.
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We don't know exactly.
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We know they went to Cyprus.
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We don't know exactly
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what happens.
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John Mark
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disappears from the narrative
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for ten years.
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No clue what happens
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to our little John Mark.
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What he's out there doing.
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What's going on with him.
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Now in the meantime
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I think you're familiar
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with much of the story.
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A lot of the further advancing
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of the gospel.
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Paul is thrown in prison.
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In Rome.
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There's a first imprisonment
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he's thrown in Rome.
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This is the place
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that he wrote the letters.
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The books we now call
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Ephesians, Colossians,
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Philemon,
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and Philippians.
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And guess where
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John Mark shows up.
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Turn to Colossians 4.10.
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I love this.
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Ten years he's gone.
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What is he doing
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in this ten year period of time?
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We know he went with Barnabas
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to Cyprus.
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What next?
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What happened?
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Philemon verse 20.
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Oh excuse me.
22:56
Colossians 4.10.
22:57
There's Paul writing
23:00
to the church.
23:02
Aristarchus,
23:03
my fellow prisoner,
23:04
greets you.
23:05
And who?
23:06
Mark,
23:07
the cousin of Barnabas.
23:09
This is where we learn
23:09
that it's Barnabas' cousin.
23:11
Concerning whom
23:12
you have received instruction,
23:13
if he comes to you,
23:15
welcome him.
23:18
If I get the opportunity
23:20
to send to you
23:21
John Mark,
23:24
welcome him.
23:26
They had endeared
23:27
themselves to one another
23:29
once again.
23:30
There had been some
23:30
reconciliation on their part.
23:33
And in fact,
23:34
the evidence that
23:35
John Mark was growing
23:37
in faith,
23:38
he would have not been
23:39
in a Roman prison
23:39
had he not been
23:40
bold for Christ.
23:42
So,
23:43
how did he get?
23:44
He went from Jerusalem
23:45
off to Cyprus
23:46
with Barnabas.
23:46
How did he get to Rome?
23:47
We don't know.
23:48
But somehow,
23:49
he was enough of a threat
23:50
to the empire
23:51
as he was advancing
23:52
the gospel
23:53
that he gets thrown
23:53
in prison
23:54
with Paul,
23:56
right?
23:56
The apostle of apostles.
23:57
Here's little John Mark
23:59
sitting next to him
24:00
in prison.
24:01
And they have
24:02
apparently reconciled
24:04
to a great degree.
24:06
Philemon,
24:06
verse 23.
24:08
Let me just read
24:08
this one to you.
24:09
He says,
24:10
Epaphras,
24:10
my fellow prisoner
24:11
in Christ Jesus,
24:12
sends greeting to you
24:13
and so do Mark,
24:14
Aristarchus,
24:15
Demas,
24:16
and Luke,
24:16
my fellow workers.
24:19
Paul had now
24:20
linked arms
24:21
with Mark
24:22
for the sake
24:23
of the gospel.
24:24
Isn't that precious?
24:25
He shows back up
24:26
in this way.
24:28
And then again,
24:28
in Paul's
24:29
second imprisonment,
24:31
the very last letter
24:32
that he ever wrote
24:33
to Timothy,
24:33
2 Timothy,
24:35
chapter 4,
24:36
verse 11,
24:37
the very end
24:38
of his life here,
24:39
he writes to Timothy,
24:40
Do your best
24:40
to come to me soon,
24:41
for Demas,
24:43
in love with this
24:43
present world,
24:44
has deserted me
24:45
and gone to Thessalonica.
24:47
Crescens has gone
24:48
to Galatia,
24:49
Titus to Dalmatia,
24:50
Luke alone is with me.
24:52
Get Mark
24:53
and bring him with you
24:54
for he is very useful
24:55
to me
24:56
for ministry.
24:58
So here's this worker
24:59
who's come alongside Paul
25:01
and has given him
25:03
the service.
25:05
Do him for the work
25:06
of ministry.
25:08
Isn't that precious
25:09
to see the reconciliation
25:10
taking place there?
25:11
I long
25:13
to be
25:14
with Mark,
25:15
the one that he
25:16
would want nothing
25:16
to do with
25:17
on the second journey.
25:18
No!
25:19
He's a coward.
25:20
Leave him behind.
25:21
I'm taking Silas.
25:23
It's the very one
25:24
that he asked Timothy
25:26
to bring along
25:27
with him
25:28
for this work.
25:31
This ministered to me
25:32
to see
25:32
that God used
25:34
a man
25:35
who bailed
25:37
on the mission
25:37
to pen
25:39
one of the four
25:41
gospels,
25:41
one of the four
25:42
accounts of the life
25:43
of Jesus Christ.
25:45
There's hope for us yet,
25:47
isn't there?
25:48
In all of our failure
25:49
that God would work
25:50
and move
25:51
in us.
25:52
Because you know
25:53
that recovering sinners
25:54
are the only type
25:55
of people there are?
25:57
People who have
25:58
failed
25:59
and made mistakes.
26:00
It's the only type
26:01
of people
26:02
that there are.
26:03
Mark turned
26:04
from his cowardice
26:05
to boldness.
26:07
Otherwise,
26:07
he wouldn't have been
26:08
in this prison.
26:09
He wouldn't have
26:09
worked alongside
26:10
Paul.
26:13
We are recovering
26:14
liars.
26:15
I hope,
26:16
turning to truth.
26:17
We're recovering
26:18
thieves,
26:19
becoming honest.
26:21
We're recovering
26:22
murderers.
26:23
The case of Paul.
26:24
Paul himself
26:25
is recovering
26:26
murder.
26:27
We're recovering
26:28
idolaters,
26:29
turning from worship
26:29
of ourselves
26:30
and turning to the worship
26:31
of God.
26:34
So this is the
26:35
background of Mark.
26:38
It's likely,
26:39
I worked really hard
26:40
on trying to make
26:41
this a fact for you,
26:42
I just couldn't
26:43
quite do it.
26:44
There's too much
26:44
maybe in the equation.
26:47
But it's likely
26:48
that Mark
26:49
penned this gospel
26:50
while he was sitting
26:51
in the Roman prison
26:53
alongside Paul.
26:55
An interesting thought
26:56
to have,
26:56
that he sits in prison
26:57
and he thinks,
26:58
what can I do
26:59
for the sake of the kingdom
27:00
and the Spirit
27:01
impresses upon him
27:02
to write down
27:03
the gospel.
27:04
And I like to think
27:05
that he was checking
27:06
with,
27:07
that's right,
27:08
isn't it?
27:08
Like,
27:09
can you confirm this?
27:10
Yeah,
27:10
we're doing this well.
27:11
We're moving along.
27:12
We're getting this down right.
27:14
This may have been happening
27:15
at the very same time.
27:17
And so Mark starts
27:18
his gospel account
27:19
with the beginning
27:21
of the gospel.
27:22
The good news
27:23
of Jesus Christ,
27:25
the Son
27:26
of God.
27:27
Right?
27:28
This one,
27:29
this person
27:30
who had delivered him
27:31
from his sin,
27:33
even this sin
27:34
of cowardice,
27:35
of bailing out
27:36
on the mission
27:37
that was set
27:37
before them.
27:39
So why do we
27:40
study the gospel accounts?
27:42
Why do we
27:42
continue to preach
27:44
to one another
27:44
the gospel?
27:46
It's because we need
27:46
to hear it.
27:47
Why are we going
27:48
to look at this?
27:48
I think most of you
27:49
are probably pretty familiar
27:50
with the life of Jesus.
27:52
Why should we take time
27:53
and work hard,
27:55
labor,
27:56
some of us more
27:57
than others,
27:58
but to labor
27:58
to really understand
27:59
what this book
28:00
means for us.
28:03
I like the C.S. Lewis quote
28:04
I came across this week.
28:06
He said,
28:07
we have to continually
28:08
be reminded
28:09
of what we believe.
28:10
We have to continually
28:11
be reminded
28:12
of what we believe.
28:13
No belief
28:14
will automatically
28:15
remain alive
28:16
in the mind.
28:17
It must be fed.
28:20
No belief just
28:21
pops up
28:22
and stays there.
28:23
You have to feed it.
28:24
We have to continue
28:25
to preach the gospel
28:26
to ourselves.
28:28
We have to keep
28:28
pumping it in
28:29
to our very living
28:30
so that we will
28:31
respond appropriately,
28:32
so that we will
28:33
worship God rightly
28:34
in this world.
28:36
That's the value
28:37
of coming to this book.
28:39
To peer in 16 chapters
28:41
at the life of Jesus Christ
28:43
and the way He came
28:44
as a servant
28:45
and poured Himself out
28:46
for the church.
28:49
Because we're meant
28:50
to model this very activity.
28:52
Christ is our high standard,
28:54
our high goal.
28:55
He is the one
28:56
that we're driving
28:57
to be like.
28:58
In Sunday school
28:59
this morning
28:59
we talked a little bit
29:00
about this
29:01
as we're studying
29:01
the attributes of God.
29:04
Don't try to be like me.
29:07
I hope to set
29:08
some example for you
29:09
in trying to be like Christ.
29:12
But if you try
29:13
to be like me,
29:14
you can accomplish that.
29:16
You can get
29:17
to this stature.
29:19
Because it's not
29:19
much of a stature.
29:20
Try to be like Christ.
29:21
And spend your life
29:23
doing that.
29:24
I am far from perfect.
29:26
I need grace.
29:28
Christ perfect,
29:30
holy,
29:30
set apart.
29:31
He walked this earth
29:32
to show us
29:33
how we ought to live.
29:35
He is the high mark,
29:36
the high goal.
29:37
We have to be
29:38
continually reminded
29:39
of what we believe.
29:40
Because no belief
29:41
will remain alive
29:42
in the mind.
29:43
It must be fed.
29:46
So He tells us here,
29:47
this is the beginning.
29:49
The sentence,
29:49
the beginning
29:50
of the gospel,
29:52
the good news.
29:55
I'm sure he had
29:55
in his mind
29:56
Old Testament Scriptures.
29:57
He saw that Jesus Christ
29:59
was the fulfillment
30:00
of so much promise.
30:03
He was the reality
30:04
of so much shadow.
30:07
Finally,
30:08
fully,
30:09
the kingdom of God
30:10
has arrived.
30:12
Isaiah 49
30:14
says,
30:15
Go on up
30:15
to a high mountain,
30:17
O Zion,
30:18
herald of good news.
30:19
Lift up your voice
30:20
with strength,
30:21
O Jerusalem,
30:22
herald of good news.
30:23
Lift it up,
30:24
fear not.
30:25
Say to the cities
30:26
of Judah,
30:27
behold,
30:28
your God.
30:29
This is what Mark
30:30
is saying.
30:31
Mark is this
30:32
herald of good news
30:33
and he's saying
30:34
to us,
30:35
behold,
30:36
your God.
30:38
Isaiah 52,
30:39
7,
30:39
How beautiful
30:40
upon the mountains
30:41
are the feet
30:42
of him who brings
30:43
good news,
30:44
who publishes peace,
30:45
who brings good news
30:46
of happiness,
30:48
who publishes salvation,
30:49
who says to Zion,
30:50
your God reigns.
30:52
This is what he's coming
30:54
to tell us about.
30:55
The good news
30:56
of Jesus Christ.
30:59
That we were once dead
31:01
but we now have life
31:02
in him.
31:04
This is what he's coming.
31:05
This debt that we could not pay
31:07
has been paid
31:08
on our behalf.
31:10
We have been ransomed.
31:11
We have been adopted.
31:13
We have been delivered.
31:14
We're justified
31:15
in God's sight.
31:16
We're clothed
31:17
in Christ's righteousness.
31:18
This is the good news.
31:20
That eternal damnation
31:22
was ours
31:23
and now eternal glory
31:24
belongs to us
31:25
because of Christ.
31:26
The good news.
31:28
I hope it's good
31:28
to you this morning.
31:31
The good news
31:32
of Jesus Christ,
31:34
right?
31:35
Jesus,
31:35
the Hebrew name
31:36
Yeshua,
31:37
was a very modern,
31:39
excuse me,
31:39
a very common name
31:41
in this day.
31:41
Lots of Joshua's
31:43
out there,
31:44
right?
31:45
It means though
31:46
God is salvation.
31:48
What a fitting name
31:49
for our Lord.
31:50
God is salvation.
31:52
And we attach so often
31:54
this Greek word
31:55
Christos,
31:56
Christ,
31:57
to it
31:58
because it means
31:58
he is the
32:00
anointed one.
32:02
So Jesus,
32:03
the anointed one.
32:04
Not your buddy
32:05
down the street,
32:06
Joshua,
32:07
right?
32:07
But Jesus Christ,
32:09
the anointed one.
32:11
We have since,
32:12
because of some
32:13
Greek linguistic versions,
32:15
we can rightly say
32:17
and pronounce
32:17
this word
32:19
Jesus.
32:20
And we have,
32:21
as the Christian church,
32:22
given that name
32:22
to him.
32:24
Right?
32:24
We have said,
32:24
this is Jesus.
32:25
We name our kids
32:26
Joshua,
32:27
right?
32:27
With the same root.
32:28
We don't call him
32:28
Jesus.
32:29
Some cultures do,
32:30
right?
32:30
But we tend to do that
32:33
because this is the name
32:33
that we've reserved
32:34
for him alone.
32:36
God is salvation.
32:38
This is the one
32:39
by which
32:39
that salvation comes.
32:42
And then he calls him
32:43
the Son of God.
32:46
Now,
32:47
it's a doctrine
32:48
that we won't get into
32:49
this morning
32:49
in its entirety.
32:51
But if you remember
32:52
from our study of Nehemiah,
32:54
we saw a very interesting
32:55
use of language
32:56
as the people
32:57
came together
32:58
to worship,
32:59
that they went out
33:00
and they called together
33:01
the sons of the singers.
33:03
Do you remember
33:03
us talking about that?
33:05
We talked about
33:05
how this language
33:06
was a common
33:07
Hebrew way
33:08
of stating
33:09
that someone
33:09
was in the same
33:10
order as.
33:12
So in Nehemiah's day,
33:14
they weren't going out
33:15
and looking for
33:15
the offspring
33:17
of the singers,
33:19
the kids
33:20
of the singers,
33:21
but they were looking
33:22
to those who belonged
33:23
to the order of
33:24
the singers
33:25
to come together.
33:27
And as an aside,
33:28
I said,
33:28
have you ever considered
33:29
Jesus being called
33:30
the Son of God
33:31
in that regard?
33:33
We don't
33:34
because we don't
33:35
really understand that.
33:36
This is not our
33:36
cultural context.
33:38
But they would have
33:38
fully understood.
33:41
Both the Hebrew
33:41
and Greek mind
33:42
would have seen
33:43
this thing,
33:44
the Son of God,
33:45
and seen that Jesus
33:46
is in the same
33:47
order of God.
33:48
This title would have
33:49
meant that he possesses
33:50
equality with God,
33:52
that he is God
33:53
himself.
33:54
This is a great
33:56
declaration of
33:57
Jesus Christ's deity.
34:00
God sent in man's form
34:03
to minister to us.
34:06
Phenomenal.
34:07
Absolutely phenomenal.
34:09
And the insane thing to me
34:11
beyond that
34:12
is that we are now
34:13
called in Christ
34:14
sons and daughters
34:15
of God.
34:17
Which is not to say
34:18
that we have equality
34:19
with God,
34:20
but we are now
34:21
created in the
34:22
order of.
34:24
Right?
34:24
Made in his image.
34:27
Destroyed by sin
34:28
but now restored
34:29
in Christ.
34:31
Our hearts
34:31
turned back
34:32
towards him.
34:36
Martin Luther,
34:36
the great reformer,
34:37
said,
34:37
it is not
34:38
imitation that makes
34:39
sons.
34:40
Going through the motions.
34:42
Doing the religious
34:42
thing.
34:43
It is not imitation
34:44
that makes sons.
34:45
It is adoption
34:46
that makes us
34:48
imitators.
34:50
The preciousness
34:51
of that truth
34:52
because our hearts
34:53
have been
34:54
regenerate.
34:55
We have now been
34:56
made in the order
34:57
of God.
34:59
And this is Mark
35:01
coming to us
35:03
to pen this
35:04
gospel.
35:05
I don't know
35:06
if any of you
35:07
felt kind of the
35:07
shock,
35:08
and I did,
35:08
when I,
35:09
like,
35:09
this is Mark,
35:10
the guy that
35:11
bailed on Paul,
35:12
I forgot his name.
35:13
Right?
35:13
I knew a guy bailed
35:14
on Paul and Barnabas
35:15
for cowardice.
35:16
I remember that.
35:17
I remember the story.
35:18
I remember they got
35:19
an argument about it.
35:20
But it was Mark,
35:22
the guy that got
35:22
to write the gospel
35:24
according to Mark.
35:26
Look at the grace
35:28
in his life.
35:29
The outworking
35:30
of the gospel.
35:32
Beloved,
35:32
that is the same
35:34
grace that we have.
35:36
And take people
35:37
who are not worthy
35:38
of God's favor.
35:40
That we can do
35:41
nothing to earn it.
35:43
You may have some
35:43
weight and burden
35:45
on your back.
35:46
Some thing that you
35:47
have done or not done
35:48
that you should be doing
35:49
that is weighing you
35:51
down this morning.
35:52
Take a note
35:53
from the book
35:54
of Mark.
35:55
Look at who he
35:56
was,
35:57
and then who he
35:58
became
35:59
by the grace of God.
36:00
Right?
36:00
A coward
36:01
who bailed on the mission.
36:02
And actually,
36:03
up to this point,
36:04
the mission hadn't even
36:05
been that bad.
36:06
There was a guy
36:06
that was possessed.
36:08
Paul let him have it.
36:10
Drove out some demons.
36:11
And that's when
36:12
John Mark bailed.
36:14
Right?
36:14
They had yet to be
36:15
shipwrecked and beaten
36:17
and stoned
36:17
and all those things.
36:19
Right?
36:19
That hadn't even
36:19
happened yet.
36:20
And he bailed.
36:21
And here he is
36:22
in a Roman prison
36:23
likely writing down
36:25
the account
36:26
of the life
36:27
of Jesus Christ.
36:29
Do you think Mark
36:30
would have had
36:30
any notion
36:32
when he bailed,
36:34
walked himself
36:35
back to Jerusalem
36:37
in shame
36:37
that he would affect
36:39
countless millions
36:41
of believers
36:42
with his gospel account.
36:44
A phenomenal,
36:45
phenomenal way
36:46
that God used him.
36:48
God uses us all
36:49
in phenomenal ways.
36:51
Whether it's
36:51
quite like
36:52
writing a gospel.
36:55
But he uses us all
36:56
to be sure.
36:58
I'll say to you again,
36:59
Mark's aim was to persuade
37:00
those who would read
37:01
this book
37:02
to become
37:02
disciple-making disciples.
37:04
Right?
37:05
He was a patron
37:06
of Christ.
37:07
A follower of his way.
37:08
Devoted to him
37:09
in every regard.
37:11
And he wants that
37:12
to be the reality
37:13
for us as well.
37:15
He wants us to serve
37:16
the world
37:16
with the gospel
37:17
of Jesus Christ
37:18
to the glory of God.
37:19
This is the thing
37:20
in which he's trying
37:21
to accomplish.
37:22
Now as I kind of
37:23
mused over
37:24
the possibility
37:25
that John Mark
37:27
was sitting in a Roman prison
37:28
with Paul,
37:30
that he's writing
37:31
down these words
37:32
led by the Spirit,
37:33
Peter's giving to him,
37:34
that we could possibly
37:37
see some parallel.
37:38
It's possible, right?
37:39
That they may have been
37:40
desk buddies
37:41
writing
37:42
conjecture
37:45
entirely.
37:46
But turn to Philippians
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chapter 2.
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I just want to show you
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some similarity
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here.
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This is not meant
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to blow your mind
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just to be an encouragement.
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It's just another
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good presentation
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of the gospel truth.
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We could very simply
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outline the gospel
38:10
of Mark.
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This is probably
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the simplest outline
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that could possibly
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be put on it.
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But we could see
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Jesus came
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as a servant
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chapters 1-13.
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Jesus died on a cross
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chapters 14-15
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and Jesus was exalted
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to glory
38:25
chapter 16.
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There is much more
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complexity to the book
38:29
itself.
38:29
But if you want to look
38:30
at it in its simplest form
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Jesus came as a servant
38:32
chapters 1-13
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Jesus died on a cross
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14-15
38:36
and Jesus was exalted
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to glory
38:38
chapter 16.
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Let's look at
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Philippians chapter 2.
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So,
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if there is any
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encouragement in Christ,
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any comfort from love,
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any participation
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in the Spirit,
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any affection
38:50
and sympathy,
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complete my joy
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by being of the same mind,
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having the same love,
38:56
being in full accord
38:57
and of one mind.
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Do nothing from rivalry
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or conceit,
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but in humility
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count others more
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significant,
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than yourselves.
39:04
Let each of you
39:05
look not only
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to his own interests,
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but also to the interests
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of others.
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Have this mind
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among yourselves
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which is yours
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in Christ Jesus,
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who,
39:13
though he was in the
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form of God,
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did not count
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equality with God
39:17
as a thing to be grasped,
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but made himself
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nothing,
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taking the form
39:21
of a servant,
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being born
39:23
in the likeness
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of men.
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Chapters 1-13.
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Jesus came
39:27
as a servant.
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verse 8,
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and being found
39:32
in human form,
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he humbled himself
39:33
by becoming obedient
39:34
to the point of death,
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even death
39:37
on a cross.
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Chapters 14-15,
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Jesus died
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on a cross.
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He was cursed
39:42
to hang on a tree.
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Therefore,
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God has highly
39:47
exalted him
39:48
and bestowed on him
39:48
the name
39:49
that is above
39:50
every name,
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so that the name
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of Jesus
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every knee
39:53
should bow
39:53
in heaven
39:54
and on earth
39:55
and under the earth,
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and every tongue
39:57
confess that Jesus
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Christ is Lord
39:59
to the glory
40:00
of God,
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the Father.
40:01
And there we see
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Jesus Christ
40:03
being exalted
40:04
to glory
40:04
as it's recorded
40:05
in chapter 16.
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So,
40:07
a way of seeing
40:08
and outlining
40:09
the content
40:11
that we get to
40:12
move through together
40:12
as we look together
40:14
at the gospel
40:15
according to Mark.
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Let's pray.