Mark 1:14-15; The purpose and Proclamation of Christ

Scripture: Mark 1:14-15

"Now after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee, proclaiming the gospel of God, ad saying, “the time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel””

Do you recall John the Baptist? The one that opened up the gospel of Mark? He had now served his purpose. Now, the nature of Mark's gospel is shown evidently here. Mark's aim was to give testimony of Jesus Christ in the fewest words possible. Here we see 3 things regarding the start of Christ's ministry. 

John the Baptist had served his purpose

There has been this resurgence in the church today, and I don’t think it’s for the better. We find more so today than before, people that preach a message that indicates that we must check some boxes on the “I can go to heaven if” list. For the sake of illustration, let’s look at the ministry of John the Baptist. His concern was never with “how much more can I do,” rather it was “this is all I must do.” For John the Baptist, what he was meant to do was preach the message of the Baptism of repentance. One of the most profound things about this was that John the Baptist was fairly well known in that area. People knew who he was, some thought he was even the messiah (John 1:25). However, John the Baptist knew that he was not the Christ (that should be everyone’s understanding at all times) John the Baptist knew that he was only meant to serve as the preface to Christ’s ministry story. The person of John the Baptist and his ministry is the part that people might read, but usually don’t focus much on. We find that John the Baptist doesn’t amount himself even as a common slave (Mark 1:7). John didn’t think that he was needed after Christ had come. In John 3, John the Baptist doesn’t desire to keep hold of anyone as a disciple after Jesus has begun his ministry. The purpose of John the baptist was to bring people to repentance to prepare their hearts to turn to Christ. John had served his purpose, to prepare the way of the Lord, and then to be thrown in prison. John the Baptist knew that his purpose was to prepare hearts for Christ and to be simply a series preface to Jesus’ ministry. 

John had served his purpose.

Jesus began his purpose

Here Mark doesn’t waste any time regarding the details of John the Baptist or his imprisonment. He simply wanted to point out that Christ had fulfilled everything that needed to be accomplished before he started preaching his message. Beginning with His Baptism by John (the one that taught that he wasn’t even worthy to undo Christ’s sandals) and the Temptation of Christ. The time was fulfilled, not because there was a checklist for Israel to complete, not because John the Baptist baptized the right amount of people. The time was fulfilled because Christ had been anointed in his baptism and tempted in the wilderness, now it was time for the message of the gospel to go forth. 

Jesus now brings about the completion of John’s message. John was preaching the baptism of repentance, which takes place in the heart, but now Jesus was preaching an even greater message than John the Baptist. Jesus wasn’t just preaching repentance; Jesus was now preaching that there is repentance and that the kingdom of God was now available through repentance and belief in the gospel. This kingdom isn’t the kingdom of God because the earth becomes perfect like heaven (that’s a doctrine that is only found in the new creation after the final judgment), but because the king of the world was making Himself available to the unbelievers that lived in the exile from Christ’s kingdom. Christ was preaching that the exiles would soon be able to enter into the kingdom of heaven and receive salvation because the king of creation was there, Jesus Christ.

Jesus preached his purpose

Now that Christ has begun declaring that the kingdom of God is at hand, Christ quickly moves on to how we can enter into the kingdom of heaven. There is so much to unpack in this one verse, but I want us to focus on this: Christ was declaring that the kingdom of heaven was available, but it doesn’t say to everyone. Jesus says to repent and believe the gospel. The gospel has become tarnished and ravished because we, as humans, want to place our own qualifications to enter into Christ’s kingdom. We want to be able to say “anyone can get into heaven” or “it isn’t religion; it’s relationship.” Now, I’m not saying that following Jesus isn’t relational in some respects. However, we must understand that our relationship with Christ is impossible if we don’t recognize that we are far from Holy and that God is. God is perfectly holy in all three persons He is perfectly holy, even Christ incarnate is holy. Because God is perfectly Holy, we have a serious problem. A perfectly holy God hates sin! He even hates sinners (Psalm 5:5-6) So, how could we ever enter into the Kingdom of God if we are unholy? We can’t enter the kingdom of heaven unless we place our trust in Christ. We put our faith and trust in Him to save us from our sin because we are not able to save ourselves from our sin by any works oo the law. We must repent and believe the gospel, the good news. Christ’s purpose was to bring people into the kingdom of God through repentance of sin through the atoning work that he would do on the cross. If we don’t believe that we are sinners, we deny the truth of Christ (1 John 1:8) and can’t inherit the kingdom of heaven. Christ preached his purpose.

The Gospel that is preached

Now, I’m sure that there are people that would say, “this isn’t Christianity because God is love, and He can just let people into heaven as they are.” Listen, this gospel is what allows us into the kingdom of heaven, once again, not something that is physically here. Christ never said, “the Kingdom of God is at hand, so come, everyone, just as you are.” Christ is preaching the need to repent and believe the gospel to enter into the kingdom of heaven. Repentance means to turn away from sin. Turning away from what is displeasing to God (sin), and turning to His Son to receive forgiveness from those sins. I would contend that we must turn away from our idolatry, we worship ourselves as perfect or “not that bad”; understand that the unbeliever will not recognize their need for a savior if they think they make the cut. Now, we repent and turn away from who we are (this isn’t an extensive explanation) the sinner that we once were and the sin we once loved, and turn to Christ. We now depend on his righteousness because we have none. What are we to believe? That we can only enter the kingdom of heaven through Christ. In the gospel of John Jesus describes himself as the door into the sheepfold (John 10:9-16) the way the truth and the life (john 14:6) John the Baptist didn’t even believe that the kingdom was a city without a gate, he knew that there was to be a turning to the Christ who could open the door to the kingdom of God. The door is opened through repentance and faith. He doesn’t say that there is any other way. We must believe that it is only through his righteousness that we could ever hope to be welcomed into the kingdom of God by God. 

Now, if you aren’t a Christian, we can only receive the righteousness of God through the saving work of Christ’s death on the cross. Understand that this isn’t something that we “do” to get into heaven. We don’t merely pray a prayer and be done with the whole experience. We are saved by the blood of Jesus, and when we turn fro our sin and turn and put our faith in Christ’s salvation, we then submit our lives to Jesus as the King of kings and Lord of all lords. To receive Christ, we must turn from our life of sin and turn towards the righteousness of Christ in repentance and faith. And when we confess with our hearts that we need the righteousness of Christ, we can ask that Christ would make us clean and forgive our sins. As a result of repentance from our sin, and putting our faith in the work of Christ, He will not only forgive us our sins and allow us into the kingdom of heaven, but he will make us more and more like Christ by baptizing us with his Holy Spirit and mark us as His own. He then marks us as His children. Now, we must trust that Christ, through his work on the cross, will be faithful to forgive our sins and give us citizenship in the kingdom of heaven. And if there is one thing that we can rely on, it is that God is always faithful to his people. Now, as Christ said this hear his words, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.”