Mark 1:1-8 “Voice Crying Out”
Imagine that it is the time of John the Baptist. This fellow who has traveled far had come to be baptized by John in the Jordan. He comes up to John the Baptist and seeing that he is in an emaciated state asks if he would like to go have dinner with him. So, they find a restaurant and sit down together. They order their food. Remember that John the Baptist had only been eating locusts and honey before, so he gets a nice steak and thoroughly enjoys it. However, during the course of the meal, John the Baptist asks his host if he likes to eat bugs. The fellow responds that he does not even want to talk about it during his meal. So, John the Baptist changes the subject.
After the meal as they were walking back to the Jordan River, the fellow asks John the Baptist about his question of eating bugs. “Oh yes,” John the Baptist responds, “Do you enjoy eating bugs?” The fellow remembers that John the Baptist ate locusts and honey. He considers how to answer, but finally decides that he must be honest and state that he does not like to eat bugs.
John the Baptist responds, “I wish you had answered me earlier!”
“Why is that?” asked the man.
“There was a fly in your soup at the restaurant.”
This is an outrageous way to start the story of salvation! The first verse of our Scripture this morning says: “This is the beginning of the good news (gospel) of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” This is a very raw statement. There is no introduction of the author of the text, Mark. There is no dedication to a particular audience. There is no opening joke like a good sermon should have. It is a basic notice to the reader that what follows is going to save souls. Period.
Right after that basic one-line opening comes a quote from the Prophet Isaiah that tells of the time when the Israelites were held in captivity in Babylon but were set free when Cyrus the Great conquered Babylon. The nation of Israel made a straight path back to Judah to rebuild the temple in Jerusalem that had been destroyed. However this prophecy is being used now in another way. Mark tells his readers that Isaiah was writing about Jesus and John the Baptist that is that voice crying out in the wilderness.
Today, we have no problem with this as Christians; however, in the time of this writing, those who heard this would be confused if not offended. We should remember back to that time when Jesus as a boy was in the synagogue and read from the Prophet Isaiah. Everyone was impressed with him until he stated that the prophecy was fulfilled in their hearing. In other words, it is not what they thought it was. They became very upset. Again, this is an outrageous way to start the story of salvation.
The next verse (4) we read that John came to preach a baptism of repentance and forgiveness of sins. That is also an “in your face” kind of statement. When we hear it, we ask ourselves, “Do I need to repent of my sins? Am I a sinner? What needs to be forgiven in my life?” And, the understanding is that I need to be baptized because of my sins. In essence what is being said is that I have sinned, but I cannot get rid of the sin myself—I need someone to cleanse the sin away from me.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, we have all done things wrong. And, I am sure that in our heart of hearts we wish that we could make them all better ourselves. We wish that we could make amends for every wrong we have ever done. But, that is not enough. We cannot save ourselves. No matter what we do, we could never make ourselves good enough to match in any way the greatness and glory of God in heaven. The only way we can be saved is if God is willing to save us unto himself.
When we ask ourselves, “What is baptism?” We might get quite a few different theological answers to that question. Yet, one thing should be clear: One cannot baptize one’s self. Somebody else has to do it. When that takes place, Christ is present in those there gathered. So, I am not going to get into the whole issue of infant or adult baptism, sprinkling or immersion, and all the rest. The important thing is that we understand that we cannot save ourselves just as much as we cannot baptize ourselves and think that this would lead to salvation! I hope you get what I am saying.
People came from Judea and Jerusalem to find this person who could help them to salvation. This also another outrageous idea! If you were to look at map of the area and see how everything is laid out. In order to get to where John was baptizing in the Jordan, those people in Judea would most likely have to walk through Samaria—their least favorite thing to do. They did not like the Samaritans one bit. So, why couldn’t they just stay in Jerusalem and repent? They could go to the Temple and make a sin offering, slaughtering a lamb or a bird or two. They understood that that kind of offering was not going to cleanse them of their sin. They needed to be baptized.
Today we have people who will not come into the church to be saved because they think that they can somehow save themselves without anybody else’s help. There is even a word that has been coined “idio-faiths.” This means that each person has his or her own particular faith that is separate from everybody else’s. The term “idio-faith” really sounds like what it is! Don’t you think?
Now, back to the text, we get a glimpse at the man of John the Baptist himself. We actually know more about the appearance of John the Baptist than we do about Jesus—interestingly enough. We know that he wore a camel hair garment with a leather belt. He also ate bugs, locusts, and honey. Consequently we have to assume that he was somewhat offensive! He must have smelled like wet camel. That did not matter to the people who were coming to him. They wanted to be cleansed of their sin.
John in all humility tells the people that he is only baptizing them in water, but the one who is coming is going to baptize with the Spirit. The one who is coming is so great that John would not even be worthy to touch the rope of his sandal. Talk about being outrageous and offensive! I know in our culture touching someone else’s feet is no big deal, but in Middle Eastern and Southern Asian customs this is just the worst thing one could think of.
You will recall when that Arab news reporter threw his shoes at President Bush, we all kind of chuckled. How funny it was that a man would take off his shoes and throw them. But, in that culture still today, one would be hard-pressed to come up with a more offensive act. In the news this last week, by the way, that same news reporter was being interviewed when he too received a shoe being thrown at him. Goes to show that what goes around comes around—even shoes.
Let us not get off-message here though, what John is saying is that that Son of God is going to baptize us with the Holy Spirit! This is something, again, that we cannot do for ourselves. God is going to do it!
Jesus comes up to John to be baptized himself. John does this. After this, Jesus starts his ministry that we know from the Gospel. I want us to think about this especially this time of year. We tend to go around trying to create the Christmas Spirit. . .not always successfully. But, the idea of Christ’s coming is one in which we let something happen to us. And, we bless other people with it. It is a spirit that is shared. It is not something that we really can create, but must simply welcome into us. Like water falling over us, cleansing and making us pure, so our hearts must be washed in the Spirit of Christ.
Yes, keep this as an idea for your holiday season that you will allow it to be bathed over you. Be immersed in the Christmas spirit. Let it happen to you. Christ is baptizing you in the Spirit so that all of your sins will be forgiven.
Amen.