Then a voice came from heaven, "You are My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased"

 

 The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.  As it is written in the Prophets:

"Behold, I send My messenger before Your face, 

Who will prepare Your way before You."

"The voice of one crying in the wilderness:

'Prepare the way of the LORD;

Make His paths straight.'"

John came baptizing in the wilderness and preaching a baptism of repentance for the remission of sins.  Then all the land of Judea, and those from Jerusalem, went out to him and were all baptized by him in the Jordan River, confessing their sins.  

Now John was clothed with camel's hair and with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey.  And he preached, saying, "There comes One after me who is mightier than I, whose sandal strap I am not worthy to stoop down and loose.  I indeed baptized you with water, but He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit."

 

It came to pass in those days that Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee, and was baptized by John in the Jordan.  And immediately, coming up from the water, He saw the heavens parting and the Spirit descending upon Him like a dove.  Then a voice came from heaven, "You are My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." 

Immediately the Spirit drove Him into the wilderness.  And He was there in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan, and was with the wild beasts; and the angels ministered to Him.

 

- Mark 1:1-13 

 

Yesterday we read that as the disciples discussed the experience of the two on the road to Emmaus with the risen Christ, Jesus Himself stood in the midst of them, and said to them, "Peace to you."  But they were terrified and frightened, and supposed they had seen a spirit.  And He said to them, "Why are you troubled?  And why do doubts arise in your hearts?  Behold My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself.  Handle Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have."  When He had said this, He showed them His hands and His feet.  But while they still did not believe for joy, and marveled, He said to them, "Have you any food here?"  So they gave Him a piece of broiled fish and some honeycomb.  And He took it and ate in their presence.  Then He said to them, "These are the words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things must be fulfilled which were written in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms concerning Me."  And He opened their understanding, that they might comprehend the Scriptures.  Then He said to them, "Thus it is written, and thus it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day, and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.  And you are witnesses of these things.  Behold, I send the Promise of My Father upon you; but tarry in the city of Jerusalem until you are endued with power from on high."  And He led the out as far as Bethany, and He lifted up His hands and blessed them.  Now it came to pass, while He blessed them, that He was parted from them and carried up into heaven.  And they worshiped Him, and returned to Jerusalem with great joy, and were continually in the temple praising and blessing God.  Amen.

 

 The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.  My study Bible comments that gospel (in Greek εὐαγγέλιον/evangelion, literally meaning "good news" or "good tidings") is a reference not to Mark's writings per se -- but rather to the story of the life, death, and Resurrection of Jesus Christ.  That is, it is the good news of our salvation.  Beginning, my study Bible writes, points to the opening events of Christ's public ministry given here in Mark's Gospel.  Specifically, it begins with the preparation by the Lord's forerunner, St. John the Baptist, and Christ's encounter with him. 

 

As it is written in the Prophets:  "Behold, I send My messenger before Your face, who will prepare Your way before You." "The voice of one crying in the wilderness:  'Prepare the way of the LORD; make His paths straight.'"   Mark the Evangelist quotes from Malachi 3:1 and Isaiah 40:3, indicating John the Baptist's highly significant place in salvation history.  John the Baptist's ministry is the fulfillment of these cited prophecies.  Mark reminds us that for the first Christians, the Scriptures were the Old Testament Scriptures; there was no New Testament when this -- the earliest dated Gospel -- was written.  

John came baptizing in the wilderness and preaching a baptism of repentance for the remission of sins.  Then all the land of Judea, and those from Jerusalem, went out to him and were all baptized by him in the Jordan River, confessing their sins.  John preaches a baptism of repentance for the remission of sins.  In the Greek, the word for repentance (μετάνοια/metanoia, pronounced "metanya" in Greek) means "change of mind."  This call to repentance was traditional for prophets, but John calls people to preparation for the Messiah.  My study Bible comments that John's baptism did not grant remission of sins once and for all, but prefigured and prepared people for the baptism of Christ to come (see Romans 6:3-11).  John is a figure of the Law in that, like the Law, he denounced sin but could not remit ("put away") sin.  Both John and the Law point to the One who can remit sin.  We can see how revered and popular a figure he was in that all the land of Judea, and those from Jerusalem, went out to him and were all baptized by him in the Jordan River, confessing their sins.

 

 Now John was clothed with camel's hair and with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey.  And he preached, saying, "There comes One after me who is mightier than I, whose sandal strap I am not worthy to stoop down and loose.  I indeed baptized you with water, but He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit."  John is notably clothed in a manner which is similar to that of Elijah (2 Kings 1:8), and this distinction is a clue that he fulfills the prophecy of Elijah's return (Malachi 4:5-6).  This will be later affirmed by Jesus (Matthew 17:12-13, Mark 9:11-13).  Again, the significance of John as fulfillment of prophecy indicates his stature as a figure of great importance in the Church.  Here, John reveals his own capacity as a prophet, as he prophesies baptism with the Holy Spirit.

It came to pass in those days that Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee, and was baptized by John in the Jordan.  And immediately, coming up from the water, He saw the heavens parting and the Spirit descending upon Him like a dove.  Then a voice came from heaven, "You are My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased."  Mark's is the shortest of the Gospels, and here we read a brief exposition of Christ's baptism by John in the Jordan.  But this highly significant event, which in the earliest times of the Church was celebrated together with Christ's Nativity, is an Epiphany or Theophany.  My study Bible comments that Jesus does not need purification.  But by making the purification of humanity of His own, He accomplishes several things:  He would wash away humanity's sin, grant regeneration, and reveal the mystery of the Holy Trinity.  (Thus, the revelation here of the presence of Father, Son, and Spirit is a Theophany or manifestation of God.)  Therefore, my study Bible adds, Christ's baptism was necessary for the fulfillment of God's righteous plan of salvation.  It quotes St. Gregory of Nyssa:  "Jesus enters the filthy, sinful waters of the world and when He comes out, brings up and purifies the entire world with Him." 

 

 Immediately the Spirit drove Him into the wilderness.  And He was there in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan, and was with the wild beasts; and the angels ministered to Him.  Here we see the immediate action of the Holy Spirit, beginning Christ's public ministry.  The first thing necessary is this preparation of forty days in the wilderness, tempted by Satan, with the wild beasts, and the ministering  angels.  To be tempted is to be tested in fundamental areas of faith.  For the details of Christ's temptations by Satan, see Matthew 4:1-10, Luke 4:1-13.  Each temptation is regarding the use of His power, and especially Christ's loyalty to the Father.  The language here tells us of the powerful action of the Spirit; the word translated as drove (ἐκβάλλω/ekvallo) means to throw or cast out. 

If there is one thing we can gather from this beginning of Mark's Gospel, it is possibly an understanding of the need for preparation for an important event or undertaking.  Everything in the story of Christ's life and ministry unfolds with a certain level of preparation, a sense of proper steps to be taken in the accomplishment of something.  God does not just drop upon us, all at once, the most profound changes and mysteries.  Instead, we are prepared.  The prophets have come throughout the spiritual history of Israel, preparing the people for the Messiah, calling the people back to God.  Without the prophets, we would not have an understanding of the mission and ministry of John the Baptist.  The people would not have understood what he was about, what it meant that he was preparing the way of the Lord, that John is the messenger, the forerunner, the one sent in advance to prepare the people with baptism and preaching -- yet again, in the words of the earlier prophets -- repentance; that is, a call back to God and to the ways of God.  Ultimately, everything is a preparation for the Messiah, for the mission and ministry of Jesus Christ.  John comes in fulfillment of the prophets, crying in the wilderness, "Prepare the way of the LORD; Make His paths straight."  But then we observe, even in this briefest of the Gospels, the preparation of Jesus for His public ministry.  He first submits to be baptized in the Jordan by John, a way to "fulfill all righteousness" (Matthew 3:14-15).  This accomplishes all manner of things, because Christ Himself prepares the waters for Christian baptism through this process.  Moreover, the Holy Trinity is revealed in the voice of the Father, the identification of Christ as Son, and the presence of the Holy Spirit which rests upon Christ.  Powerfully, Christ's public ministry begins with a manifestation of the Trinity, the fullness of the Godhead.  And then, immediately the Holy Spirit acts to throw Christ out into the wilderness, where He is tempted and tested by Satan in preparation for His ministry, with the wild animals, and ministered to by the angels.  The temptations of Satan test Christ's loyalty to the Father and seek to break that loyalty, which will be the all-encompassing power to complete His saving mission for the world.  Without that loyalty, we would not have our Savior nor our faith.  It is the one thing that the evil one must break in order to prevent Christ from successfully completing His ministry and mission to the world.  It is the thing that will be severely tested through rejection, heartbreak, pain and suffering, even betrayal by one of His chosen Twelve.  It is the one thing that will make His mission complete.  It is the one thing He will teach us that remains for us above all, as He taught us to pray, "Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven" (Matthew 6:10), and to be like Him.  For all of the fullness of this mission, and for our own understanding of it, all of this preparation is necessary.  It is paving the way for the salvation mission of Christ.  God helps us to make Christ's paths straight, so that we are prepared to accept this giant, colossal gift we have been given, and to understand its fullness as it manifests as we are able to grasp it in our lives.  Jesus will go to the Cross, but we -- and the disciples -- will have been prepared along the way to understand the meaning and power of the Cross, and the mission of Christ to save, to redeem, to transform, and how we are also invited into that mission to follow Him as well.  Let us consider the power of preparation in our own lives:  how we are tested and prepared by circumstances for deeper challenges we might not understand in advance, how the power of prayer helps us prepare to be the people we need to be when we are challenged, how our own circumstances give us opportunities to make a deeper commitment to Christ and to living God's love in our own lives.  If we look upon life the right way, we might come to see everything we have received as preparation, including our mistakes and heartaches, the bad times and also the good.  The Gospel teaches us about the Old Testament Scriptures, and how they are preparation for the New, just as the Law and the Prophets were preparation for the gospel of Jesus Christ, the good news of our Lord.  John baptizes with water, but he knows the Lord will baptize with the Holy Spirit -- as we are taught to find and serve the things God asks of us.   Finally, let us look at a detail included by Mark, that Jesus goes into the wilderness to be tempted by Satan, and is with the wild beasts.  This hints to us deeply of preparation, for the first Adam in naivety and unknowing, and against the teaching of God, made a choice for wisdom beyond what humankind was ready to have (Genesis 2:16-17).  But Christ, who is the New Adam, is here to undo the effects of that choice, and to bring to us what it means to resist temptation and testing, to set aright and put us back in relationship not only with God, but even with the wild beasts of the wilderness, to set a world back together after it had been broken.  He gives us the way, and all that has gone before has been preparation.  Let us follow Him, for we may all become "beloved sons" by His preparation for us.