The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Mark 1:1
And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. Mark 1:10
Just three weeks ago we heard the angel announce to Mary she would have a baby. On Christmas day we celebrated the birth. Last week we heard the story of the magi coming to worship that Child. But today we go out to hear John the Baptist. He invites us to be baptised. We see Jesus, the grown man being baptised.
Mark does not waste time with stories of birth or wondrous stories of Magi. He has no time for poetic prologues.
Mark starts: Beginning of the Good News, of Jesus Christ, son of God. It is like a headline for a news paper article. It is something to catch your attention quickly to make you read more. There is a loud urgency in Mark’s Gospel. It is loud because those words were more likely to have been written referring to Caesar.
Good News Caesar Augustus, son of God 1.
would be a normal headline in those day. Mark wants us to hear that Jesus is the messiah, the Christ. That his life is truly Good News because he is the son of God. Hopefully Mark has our attention now.
The only introduction to Jesus comes from a fore runner. A forerunner was someone who came in front of the king telling everyone to get out of the way in much the same way as a police motorcycle might ride in front of the Prime minister’s car.
John the Baptist comes as a prophet in the wilderness. John comes calling the people of Israel to baptism.
Yes the people of Israel would use ritual bathing if they had done something that made them “unclean”. John goes beyond calling them unclean. He doesn’t want them to come and cleanse them selves but to come and be baptised. He wants them to see themselves as gentiles needing to be baptised to be children of God.
In Baptism preparation we read from Ezekiel 37 of God’s desire to wash the people with pure water. They are returning from Exile in Babylon. I will take out your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. All the hardness of heart that led them into exile is removed. In its place they are given new life, a heart of flesh. John the Baptist calls the people of Israel to return from the spiritual exile, to repent and be baptised. They are to be immersed into the life of God. They are to be God’s people once again.
Mark the Evangelist wants to make it loud and clear that Jesus is the Christ, the son of God. John the Baptist call all to repentance. Be ready to meet and receive the son of God.
I think there are three implications in this for us today. There is an invitation to hear the Good News and respond. There is a call to be both prophets and evangelists. Finally there is assurance that God is in our midst.
Let’s start with the invitation. Good News of Jesus Christ, son of God. Mark wants us to hear about Jesus. Mark writes with urgency. He uses the word immediately over forty times in the Gospel.2. In my mind it is like Mark is trying to tell us the biggest, the best news of all time. I think he wants us to know Jesus so we can share in the joy and the life that comes from knowing Jesus. He wants us to enter into the community of believers who follow Jesus.
The invitation includes being immersed in the healing restorative waters of baptism. The invitation includes knowing we are forgiven. We can enter fully into the presence of God. We enter into a community of friends. We should not be misled into thinking this community is a group of holy righteous people. The very nature of the invitation is that you come as you are. Certainly response to the invitation requires repentance. But even as you are blurting out the words of repentance you are being embraced by love.
So if there is anyone here who would like to accept the invitation of grace today, come forward at the time of Communion and ask for a blessing. Then speak to me after the service. It may be appropriate to renew your baptism or to be confirmed.
Now if Mark’s urgency to proclaim his message suggests the biggest and best news worth embracing. It also suggests it is the biggest and best news worth passing on. Sadly when we have been Christians for many years we become complacent with our own faith. We don’t always think to use the opportunities to share the good news.
I was chatting to someone on Friday who told me how he became a Christian. He had been in England studying and wished to stay on. He went to see a Government official seeking to extend his visa. She explained there was nothing she could do. He asked, is there anybody who can help. At first the woman said no. But as he was walking away she said I know one person who can help. Excitedly he asked who. She said Jesus Christ. He thought what a loony. Then he said Jesus is for good people I’m a sinner. To which the woman replied. Jesus came for sinners. My friend left three hours latter but he said it was like time had stood still as she shared her faith with him. He said he caught a glimpse of the great love of Jesus. That conversation changed his life.
I guess many of us are frighten of that first thought he had, What a loony. No one wants to be thought of as a loony. But perhaps we forget about that initial glimpse of the love of God. If we can get past our own foibles we can help people see the love of God. Certainly the Australian culture is not the easiest culture to talk about faith. On the whole the worst that will happen is that people will laugh at us.
Now let’s reflect on the last implication from the Baptism in Mark’s Gospel. Mark says Jesus saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending. Mark later uses the same word for the taring of the curtain in the temple when Jesus dies. The image of the heavens being torn apart means that God is no longer distant from humanity as the Hebrew people had pictured him. In Jesus God is present. As Luke puts it in his Gospel, God is with us, Emanuel.
Some times our faith gets put to the test and we find it hard to know where God is when life falls apart around us. I think of the couple who lost their 17 year old son a week after graduating or the couple whose marriage disintegrates after more than 20 years. People of faith still experience deep pain. The heavens irreparably torn apart and the cuirtain in the temple torn apart suggest God is with us permanently. Pain will be real but we are not alone in the pain.3.
Elizabeth Achtemeier commenting on the first reading says
God confronts the power of nothingness, evil, void, emptiness, darkness in our text, and changes it all into good and order, light and life. From the beginning, our God confronts death and changes it into life by his mighty word.
John the Baptist calls us from the chaos and pain in our lives to the light and life of Jesus. Mark proclaims that this same God of creation is present with us in Jesus Christ. His word continues to confront the evil and emptiness bringing life and light. Some times it may take weeks, months or even years for the deep pain to be transformed. Throughout those weeks and months and years Jesus is present with us in the pain.
We heard Mark declare with urgency the Good news of Jesus Christ the Son of God. We saw John calling all to a baptism of repentance.
The invitation is for all of us to be baptised into Jesus. We are called to preach that same Good News for others also to glimpse the love of God. Even if all hell breaks loose God is with us.
Let us pray.
Lord Jesus you led the way into the waters of Baptism
Thank you for drawing us to your father.
Fill us with your spirit that we may passionately proclaim the faith. Amen.
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