Mark 1.1–28
The third of a series of talks on The Man they Crucified given at Kalbarri Anglican Church 22nd October 2023
I suggested Jesus fasted forty days in the wilderness pleading with God for mercy for Israel. He came from John’s mission and his baptism experience understanding he was the promised king, part of whose task was to carry out the great judgement. He knew if he did this now there would be much chaff to burn i and very little wheat. God heard his cry.
Mark gives the briefest account, and mentions four things subsequent to his baptism and temptation: first, he gathered followers. This is something you would expect of someone seeking to establish a kingdom. Second, he taught around the Galilean communities. Third, he healed demon-possessed people and did surprising miracles. This was significant and marked him out. The fourth thing is often overlooked—or confused with his teaching—but is actually more important than the other three. He made a special announcement, which Mark calls “the gospel of God.”
Now after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee, announcing the gospel of God, and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.”
Mark 1.14–15
You have probably heard a hundred times that “gospel” means good news. This is not wrong, but it only tells a fraction of the story. When the hospital told me my tests were OK, that was good news, but it was not “gospel.” In the ancient world gospels were a special kind of good news, mostly political. When a battle was won a messenger was despatched to carry the news back home. These messengers were called “evangelizers”, or gospellers. For example, five hundred years before the time of Jesus (490 BC), Pheidippides ran 240 kilometres to request help from Sparta when Greece was about to be invaded by the Persians. The Spartans wouldn’t help, so he ran back with the bad news. The Greeks fought alone at Marathon and were victorious. Pheidippides then ran to Athens 42 kilometres away to gospel the Athenians: “Rejoice, we’ve won!” he cried. There is some uncertainty about how much of this story is fact and how much legend, but it illustrates what was a vital occupation before radio made long-distance communications easier. The “day-runner,” or courier, who brought a message of victory was called an “evangelizer.” In Greek there is no word for the message—not until Jesus. A gospel—euaggelion—was the reward you gave the messenger. There were big payouts for the first to get through with an important message. Sadly, Pheidippides never collected; he delivered his news and dropped dead.
Jesus gave this word “gospel” (euaggelion) a new meaning, since in Hebrew there was a word for the gospel-message. Most of the New Testament writers don’t use it; it was bad Greek. It sounded as silly to Greek ears as it does to ours to hear someone say he heard an important “new” last night on the television. However, Mark uses it in the title of his Gospel, and so does Paul. Most of the New Testament writers use the verb, euaggelizomai; it was what Jesus came to do, and indicated a seismic change in the political realm, like you would have at the end of a victorious war, or at the outset of a new political regime.
Jesus came into Galilee, proclaiming the gospel of God, and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.”
Some Bible translations say Jesus came “preaching” the gospel of God. That is a serious mistake. Preaching is a church word. Jesus was not preaching sermons. He did, of course, when he was teaching. But that is different to gospelling. The word used there—the word Mark uses—is “heralding”; it is what the town crier did when he came into the market place to make an important announcement. “Announcing the gospel of God” is how I think it should be translated.
The gospel of God, then, is the announcement of the arrival of the kingdom of God. There is a big difference between gospelling and teaching. Gospelling means something is happening now, or has just happened, something which changes things on a large scale. Jesus wasn’t talking about what God was going to do in the future, like the prophets did. He was about to take over the government. “The time is fulfilled”: for more than a thousand years prophets have been saying God would one day send a king to put things right. That time has arrived, Jesus said: “The kingdom of God is at hand—and you had better make your peace with God now—repent and believe the gospel.” You don’t want to be found on the wrong side when Messiah comes to destroy God’s enemies.
I have taken some time over this, because it is important and not well-understood. Also, gospels can be powerful. Sometimes they actually bring about what they announce. I can illustrate this from recent South African history.
In 1994 in Cape Town there was a public announcement. The old South Africa was finished; the new non-racial South Africa had begun; Nelson Mandela was the new President, and his ANC party would form the new government. In the ancient world this change would have been gospelled. And it is important to see that the announcement actually made the new order a reality. Some gospels do this. When Jesus announced the arrival of the kingdom of God, his announcement made the kingdom of God a reality. Of course, not everyone believed the South African gospel; there were those who fought against it. But there were jets flying over as the announcement was made to show there was power behind the new order. The people who drove around shooting people, trying to resist the change finished up dead.
Today, when a person hears the gospel for the first time, the kingdom of God becomes present for them, with its invitation to enter. If they believe and begin to trust the king, they receive amnesty for all their sins under the old regime, and become part of the kingdom of God. The gospel is the instrument God uses to save people into his kingdom. This is why later, Paul can say the gospel is powerful.
I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for salvation of all who believe.
Romans 1.16
Jesus began his ministry by announcing the arrival of the kingdom of God. When his disciples tried to keep him in Capernaum, he refused be tied down to one town:
I must announce the gospel of the kingdom of God in the other towns as well; for I was sent for this purpose.
Luke 4.43
This is why he sent his twelve apostles two by two into every town and village in Galilee. Later he sent a further band of seventy-two into Judaea. Israel’s destiny hung in the balance.
As we know, Israel rejected the gospel, and continues to do so. Although they responded eagerly at first, and clamoured for his healing and miracle working, they lost interest when it became obvious that going to war against Rome was not in his mind. Jesus saw no real turning to God. When he said goodbye to Galilee and moved towards Jerusalem, he looked back on the first part of his ministry as a failure.
Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty works done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes. But it will be more bearable in the judgment for Tyre and Sidon than for you. And you, Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? You shall be brought down to Hades.
Luke 10.13–15
The seventy-two went ahead of him into all the towns and villages on the way to Jerusalem. When he came to Jerusalem the story was the same. He saw what its response to the kingdom-message would be.
And when he drew near and saw the city, he wept over it, saying, “Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. And they will not leave one stone upon another in you, because you did not know the time of your visitation.”
Luke 19.41–44
Once more we come up against the judgement. Messiah’s mission is to bring in the new world. This would begin with the great separation, the Day of Judgement, when the good and the evil would be separated. He pleaded with God for time to prepare the people. He announced the kingdom was open to all, and proclaimed forgiveness to all who would repent and believe. But he also warned of catastrophe if the nation refused. Its answer was to crucify him. And then? Within forty years Jerusalem was a heap of rubble, and the glorious temple, the wonder of the world, was levelled to the ground, and has never been rebuilt.
But God is a God of surprises. What looked like failure was never complete failure. At the same time as Jesus turned his back on unrepentant Galilee, he rejoiced that God’s plan was working itself out.
In that same hour he rejoiced in the Holy Spirit and said, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will.
Luke 10.21
Some Jews were responding. Tax collectors and broken women, and all sorts of little people, and even a few of the leaders; that was the first surprise. The second surprise was the cross. It looked on all accounts to be the ultimate failure of Jesus’ mission: the high court judged him to be a blasphemer, the people cried for him to be crucified, Rome carried out a sentence of death, his followers scattered. It all looked like defeat upon defeat. But something unforeseen was happening in the spirit-world. Satan was pushing Jesus to save his life—but he would not, not even at the brink of death. He saw dying as part of his mission. And what looked like final defeat became victory. Unlike his father, Adam, this man ran the Devil’s gauntlet and overcame. Jesus was established as king through his victory over the Evil One. His resurrection proved that Satan’s ultimate weapon, death, was powerless. The hope of a new world was alive again–even a world without death.
I am jumping forward, but we need to see that the gospel–the announcement of the kingdom’s arrival—now changes its form. The identity of the king, which was formerly a mystery—Jesus announced the kingdom, but who and where is the king—is now seen to be Jesus himself. His kingship, which they thought was to be over Israel, was now seen to include the spirit-world and death itself. The third surprise is that Jesus welcomed men, women, and children from all nations into his kingdom. Through his death he achieved forgiveness for all believers. It is Paul who explains that though a hardness has come on Israel, mercy has come to the nations, until the time of the Gentiles comes to a close, and God’s mercy returns to Israel. Ultimately there will be a complete transformation of the environment in a new and deathless world. This was and is all part of God’s plan.
Jesus is Lord! That is our gospel. When a person hears it and believes, they become part of the community of the future, which as Jesus said, will inherit the earth.
Much of this will be strange to most people—it certainly wasn’t how I understood Christianity when I first believed in Jesus. Most of us respond to the promise of eternal life though his death on the cross for our sins. It is a very personal thing. The gospel addresses our fear of death and judgement; we enter into a personal relationship with God. All this is real and true and precious. What I have been saying takes nothing away from it, but shows how it happened, and that it is part of something much bigger. What Jesus has done, and is doing, effects the whole cosmos: the world of humans, and the spirit-world, and ultimately the physical world. God is going to completely heal and renew his creation. There is not a person alive or dead whose destiny is not in the hands of the Lord Jesus Christ.
We lament the decline of the church. We wonder what is wrong with us that no one comes anymore. We do not realize that the problem may be with them, that we should be lamenting the world. It is they who are missing out. When the seventy-two returned, out of their minds with excitement over the miracles they had done, Jesus said:
Do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.
Luke 10.20
We need to keep our nerve. Our king—our Saviour—is alive, and driving history to its conclusion. Everything is happening according to God’s plan, though it may look terrible to us. The outcome will be a healed, eternal world, and we are promised a share in it, if we will only hold onto the king.