Third Presbyterian Sunday Morning Bible Study - July 25, 2021

Below is the Bible Study written by Jim Rudiger for his Sunday School Class which meets at Third Presbyterian Church, Norfolk, Virginia. It's based on Mark 1:1 - 8.

Beginnings are wonderful things.  Beginning school.  Beginning work.  Beginning marriage.  Beginning a family.    When you hear "beginnings", what do you think about? Starting.  New.  Beginnings are appealing because there is a feeling of newness, a feeling of opportunity, the promise that something good can happen.  What were some good beginnings for you?  If guys have any sense, they’ll say their marriage.  One great beginning for me was when I left high school and went to college.  It meant a new start.  In high school it seemed that you were put into some kind of class system, and it was hard to move to another system.  In the fifties, Granby was very much like that.  Teachers picked certain students to do certain things whether they were the best at it or not.  If you played football, you automatically were on the baseball team. Going to college let me leave all of those class systems behind me.  I could develop my own person with new teachers and new class mates.  If you wanted to be recognized, you did it the old fashion way - you had to earn it.  It wasn’t given to you.  Some the guys who had been big deals at Granby were just one of the crowd in college and some of them couldn’t take not being top gun any more.  

But, beginnings have a down side, too.  We might have to begin to do an unpleasant task.  Ever have one of those bad beginnings?  Your child has to begin one of those thousands of middle school projects and doesn’t how to start.  All of the sudden you have to assume the role of a creative genius.  You suggest a topic, but, there is more to it than thinking up something for a project.  Your child asks the question that drags you into the project kicking and screaming.  “How do I do that?” Our granddaughter, Natalie, had to do a project for English.  I suggested that she make a scale model of Shakespeare’s theater, The Globe.  She thought it was a great idea.  Jackie thought it was a great idea.  It was a go.  But the “go” came to a screeching halt when my granddaughter asked, “How do I do that?”  It became painfully obvious that the “I” was going to end up “you.” So, I went up on the internet and got the dimensions and sketches of the Globe Theatre.  Natalie asked, “Now what?”  We would need some supplies, so, I went to Micheal’s and bought some Styrofoam sheets.  Then a very bad thing happened for parents who want to help on a project.  Suddenly, it became my project.  It ended with a 1/10 scale model of the Globe Theatre split so it could be opened up.  The final touch were two people constructed to scale standing on the stage.  I - sorry -  I mean, Natalie got an “A” and the teacher kept the scaled mock-up.  By the way, the best project award went to a little guy who filled a box with toy reindeer, bows, a Santa Claus figure and a dozen red and green cookies.  A sign on the side of the box named the project "Christmas Stuffing."  

In our lesson today, Mark starts out talking about beginnings.  Lets see if it was a good beginning or a bad beginning.

Mark 1 : 1 The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. 2 As it is written in the prophet Isaiah, "See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way; 3 the voice of one crying out in the wilderness: `Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight,"

Before going any further, let’s review what we know about Mark.  His mother had a house in Jerusalem which was the center of Christian church there.  Apostles like Peter, Matthew, John and James, the brother of Jesus, were always there talking about all that Jesus had said and done. As a teenager, Mark used to sit in the corner of the room absorbing everything that was said.  Then one day his uncle, Barnabas, asked the group if it would be all right to bring a new Christian to church.  When he told them it was a fellow named  Saul now called Paul, they vetoed the idea.  Saul was a hired hit man for the Sanhedrin who had gone all through the province causing Christians grief.  He was even there egging on the men who killed Steven.  Having Saul coming to their missionary  church was a trick so the Sanhedrin would know who the Christian leaders were and where they lived.  Barnabas staked his reputation on the validity of Paul’s conversion.  

Now Barnabas was an imposing guy, big with a voice that demanded your attention. He finally convinced them to let Paul come to a meeting and when he came, the leaders saw that Barnabas had been right.  This wasn't the Saul who took part in Steven's murder.  This was a new man not afraid of identifying Jesus as the son of God.  The church accepted Paul right then as a brother.  Not long after that, Barnabas started setting up a trip to let people outside of Jerusalem know about the Good News.  He lined up Paul as his associate and as a helper picked his nephew, Mark.  The trip took off, but, before they came to the first mission stop, Mark wanted to go home. Why?  

Several reasons may have influenced Mark:  (1) Some feel that he was extremely young and missed the security of his home and his mother.   (2) The missionary route went through some of the most dangerous lands filled with robbers and murderers.  There could have been a concern for safety. (3) As preparations were made, Mark might have seen Paul assume more leadership.  Perhaps Mark's loyalty to Barnabas caused Mark resent Barnabas' diminishing role. Mark went home but it left a bad taste in Paul’s mouth.  When it came time to launch another missionary journey, Paul didn’t want any part of Mark.  So, Paul and Barnabas split up and Barnabas took Mark with him on a missionary trip to the east.

Later on when Mark had grown up, he became Peter’s secretary.  I imagine the many lonely nights Mark spent listening to Peter talk about what Jesus had told him or how he had seen Jesus heal the sick or the sermons Jesus gave.  Add to that his duty of writing down Peter’s sermons and letters.  From all if these things, Mark got a pretty good picture of the ministry of Jesus. 

Tradition has it that Mark did extensive missionary work and founded the church at Alexandria in Egypt.  Mark re-emerges late in Paul's life.  When Paul writes from imprisonment in Rome to the Colossians, Mark is with him.  In Philemon, Paul includes Mark as a fellow laborer.  When Paul's ministry was near the end and with death waiting, he asked Timothy to bring Mark to him so that Mark can help with Paul's ministry.

In about 65 AD Christians, particularly in Rome, were facing severe persecution.  In 64 AD that royal nut case, Nero, had set Rome on fire.  It was meant to clear some land for new buildings, but, it ended with burning down a large part of Rome.  The people living in Rome were pretty ticked off and wanted to know who we responsible.  The first thing Nero did was to hide his fiddle.  The second thing he did was to blame the fire on the Christians. A blood bath followed.  The Christians were frightened and were losing faith as the reality of persecution set in.  Peter, Paul, John and the others preached and encouraged them as best they could, but they could only reach a small number of Christians.  There were only so many meetings that these men could physically attend.  Some means had to be developed to bring the words of the Christ to the brothers and sisters under the gun and unable to hear the Good News from the apostles.  

Mark recognized the need and started writing down Peter's sermons dealing with the life and words of Christ and the stories Mark had heard in his Mother’s house as a boy.  There was an urgency to get this message out particularly to the Roman Christians.  It had to be short and it had to be relevant to the Roman Christians.  These Roman Christians wouldn't be interested in Christ's Jewish heritage or lineage, so it wasn't included.  A lot of references to Old Testament writings would not mean anything to Romans not exposed to the teachings of the prophets, so these references would be limited too.

Now as we study his book we see that this isn’t about the beginning of the earthly life of Jesus - when or where he was born.  This book is about the beginning of the Good News, the gospel.  It’s about Jesus coming to earth, dying on the cross and rising from the dead.  And, that is the gospel.  In scripture there are three great beginnings:

(1) "In the beginning was the Word" (John 1:1).  This goes back to before there was anything such as time.  Before there was any world, stars, sun or moon.  Before the Big Bang.  Before Face Book and ESPN.  You and I can't imagine what existed then in any physical sense.  We are here and so are all the things that our senses bear witness to, but we have no real appreciation how they all came to be.  And we are not alone.  Scientist have all kinds of theories but few facts.  Scripture assures us that in all that vastness of the unknown there is one known and that is that the Word was there.  It is our contact with the infinity of the universe's origins.

(2) "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth" (Gen. 1:1).  Here scripture bridges that vast void of eternity to the real world we know and can relate to.  We still don't know how it all happened in a scientific sense, but everybody has to agree that at some point in time there was a creation and from that material creation everything that exists today followed.  As believers, another mile stone in God's dealings with man was set.

(3) Mark gives us the last beginning.  How does Mark start? "In the beginning the good news..." (Mark 1:1).  This time the beginning is dated.  It is at that time when Jesus Christ took upon himself human flesh and proclaimed to man that there is a sure fire way to re-establish a right relationship with God.  A new beginning with God!

In one of the rare incidences in his book, who does Mark quote?  Isaiah.  The Romans knew little of Jewish prophesy but Jesus’ credentials have to be established.  So, Mark tells them that a great learned man hundreds of years before had predicted the coming of Jesus.  Mark is giving Jesus' resume to the Romans. 

Mark 1: 4 John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. 5 And people from the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him, and were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. 6 Now John was clothed with camel's hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. 7 He proclaimed, "The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals. 8 I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit."

Who was God’s messenger in these prophesies?  John the baptizer.  What is John preaching?  The baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.  Jews were familiar with baptism.  They were the ritual washing required before worship.  But what John was doing went beyond ritualistic washing.  John was saying in effect, "It doesn't matter how many ritualistic washings you have had in the past, you are still unclean in the sight of God."  There had to be a confession that you had sinned against man and God and a sincere turning away from that sin.  And that act of turning away was repentance.

There had been four hundred years since the last prophet.  The people were eager to hear the words of this new prophet.  They flocked to hear and see John.  And what a sight he was!  He lived in the wilderness.  Actually it was a limestone desert located near the Dead Sea.  It was so desolate that the Jewish name for it was The Devastation.  He wore rough fabric clothes woven from camel hair and a leather belt around his waist.  Don’t you think a camel hair shirt would be kind of itchy?  And the ends of the camel hair must have stuck into his back like thousands of little needles.  John came from a good family who could have afforded clothes from the Men’s Warehouse. Why did he dress this way?    

Remember Elijah.  Ahaziah, the king who had shut down temples faster than the coronavirus, had fallen from his palace roof and was pretty bad off, so he sent some messengers to the temple of a pagan god to find out if he would recover.  When they got there Elijah met them at the door and told them to tell the king that because he had gotten rid of all of the temples to the true God, he was going to croak.  When the messengers reported back to the king, he asked them what Elijah looked like.  He was described as a hairy man with a leather belt around his waist.  Sounds a lot like John, doesn’t it?  

Well, later Malachi would identify God’s messenger who would announce the coming of the Messiah as Elijah.  Maybe John dressed like Elijah to call attention to his credentials as the prophet who will usher in the Messiah.  So, there John stands complete with matted hair and beard.  He appeared a ghostly white caused by the fine white limestone powder that billowed up with every step he took.  Gaunt, tanned and hardened from the sun and wind, this guy really looked like a prophet but hardly the type of a man you would want to meet in a remote parking place at Military Circle at ten o'clock at night.  

And what about his dietary habits?  What was his favorite meal?  Locusts and wild honey. Considering my lack of cooking skills, this doesn’t sound half bad to me.  But, I recognize that It would be bad enough to sit in the Red Lobster with John looking like a wild man, but to have him order a plate insects and a jar of honey would tax even the  most tolerant  waiter.  The evening would abruptly end when John started stuffing those bugs into his mouth and dipped his fingers into the jar and sucked the honey off of them.  Believe it or not, locusts were considered kosher food.  Leviticus 11:22-23 allows the eating of locust, crickets and grasshoppers.  So the next time a cricket comes bounding across your room, don’t step on him, eat him.  Actually locusts are high in protein and would probably be a healthy alternative to a steak, but, I’m not sure they are good with A1 sauce.  The word used for locust may also mean a kind of bean or nut called the carob which was the food eaten by the poorest of the poor.  Does the word carob sound familiar?  Well, for a while, carob was used here as a substitute for chocolate. 

Is John impressed with his own importance?  No.  What is John’s only job?  To direct the people’s attention to the really important person coming after him.  John's message is that he isn't important.  He doesn’t deserve the pop star treatment.  He is only preparing them for the promised one.  

In those days open sandals were worn.  During dry times the roads were dusty and your feet became coated with this dust.  During the wet season the roads became muddy bogs and your feet were caked with mud.  It was the duty of the most lowly servant in the house to remove the sandals of a guest and clean his feet.  John says that he isn't even good enough to perform this lowly service on the feet of Jesus.  

John recognizes what his mission is.  He tells them that the baptism he performs is symbolic.  It is good for those who receive it but it has limitations.  John baptized with what?  Water.  The completeness of the baptism will come only when Jesus baptizes us with what? The Holy Spirit.  

Beginnings can come with joy and expectation or come with dread and foreboding.  A lot of time it depends on the attitude we have when that beginning appears.  But for all of the good beginnings and all of the bad beginnings, where we spend our eternity is going to depend more on our endings than our beginnings.  If our ending is with our Savior, then the beginning really doesn’t matter.

Prayer: May our beginning be with acknowledgment of Christ as our Lord and Savior and the rest of our life spent testifying to that fact.  Amen