We are creatures. This is the reality of being human, and our actions are based on the forces acting upon us. We are all products of some form of discipleship, for there are a thousand forces discipling us and telling us what the overriding direction of your life should be. But God has exactly one will for our lives. Of all the possible scenarios of how we can live our lives and be discipled, God has one possible set of terms and circumstances, and it is in this Book that that we learn the will of God and the direction we are to take. Read on to see what Mark has to say about discipleship and God’s plan for disciples!
(A) Disciples are prepared to listen (Mark 1:1-3)
Mark opens his book by telling us that it is “the beginning” of some good news about a Person called Jesus Christ (Mark 1:1). It is also His “gospel” - a term that we now understand as a body of soteriological content. But at this juncture in the book, it is just a good news declared. We also learn that Jesus is the Son of God - another term that we’ve become extremely used to this. But what does it mean?
Mark tells us that this gospel begins in Isaiah the prophet. Why does Mark want us to know this? Was he merely grabbing onto the anticipation of his day? Raising credibility and relevance for his audience in light of the crazy claim about Christ? Consider another reason: Isaiah was Mark’s Bible. Mark’s God is a speaking God, and because He speaks, there’s text. And God’s people - the people who are shaped by the character of their God - always reach for His text. What Mark does by quoting Isaiah is what we do when we quote Mark. This is merely what God’s people have always done! They look to His Word. Whenever God’s people feel tempted to reach beyond the Bible for extra-biblical revelation, they must remember to reach for the Scriptures.
But who is this Mark, and why is he qualified to write about Jesus? Acts 12:12-14 tells us that Peter goes to Mark’s house when he is released from prison. Peter’s base of operations is in Mark’s house! 1 Pet 5:13 also tells us that Mark’s close association is with Peter, as Peter refers to him as “Mark, my son”. This is internal Biblical evidence for Mark’s warrant, which shows us that the Bible confirms what church tradition tells us. Here are some examples:
Bishop Papias of Hierapolis (60-130AD) repeated the testimony of the old presbyters (disciples of the Apostles) who claimed Mark wrote his Gospel in Rome as he scribed the preaching of Peter. Papias wrote a five volume work entitled, “Interpretation of the Oracles of the Lord”. In this treatise (which no longer exists), he quoted someone he identified as ‘the elder’, (most likely John the elder), a man who held considerable authority in Asia:
“And the elder used to say this, Mark became Peter’s interpreter and wrote accurately all that he remembered, not, indeed, in order, of the things said and done by the Lord. For he had not heard the Lord, nor had followed him, but later on, followed Peter, who used to give teaching as necessity demanded but not making, as it were, an arrangement of the Lord’s oracles, so that Mark did nothing wrong in thus writing down single points as he remembered them. For to one thing he gave attention, to leave out nothing of what he had heard and to make no false statements in them.”
Irenaeus (130-200AD) “Against Heresies” (Book 3 Chapter 1):
“Matthew composed his gospel among the Hebrews in their own language, while Peter and Paul proclaimed the gospel in Rome and founded the community. After their departure, Mark, the disciple and interpreter of Peter, handed on his preaching to us in written form.”
Clement of Alexandria’s (150-215AD) “Hypotyposeis” (Ecclesiastical History Book 2 Chapter 15):
“And so great a joy of light shone upon the minds of the hearers of Peter that they were not satisfied with merely a single hearing or with the unwritten teaching of the divine gospel, but with all sorts of entreaties they besought Mark, who was a follower of Peter and whose gospel is extant, to leave behind with them in writing a record of the teaching passed on to them orally; and they did not cease until they had prevailed upon the man and so became responsible for the Scripture for reading in the churches.”
There are other sources by Eusebius, Tertullian, the Muratorian Fragment and Origen. What do these sources show? Peter channeled all of his memories to Mark, and Mark wrote Mark, channelling Peter. We can trust Mark's gospel.
Mark’s “beginning of the gospel of Jesus” talks about three groups of people and three actions:
3 groups of people: The speaker, the messenger, and the one being spoken to.
3 actions: The speaker sends the Messenger, the Messenger “cries out in the wilderness" and prepares the way, and the one being spoken to has his way prepared.
Here, Mark actually draws from two prophets whose messages are recorded in the Old Testament (Isa 40:4 and Mal 3:1).
In Isa 40:4, Isaiah is writing from the perspective of someone who says to someone else that a messenger has been sent before his face, who will prepare his way. The messenger will cry, “prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.” This is a complex conversation that gets even more complex when we consider its context.
Isa 40:4 tell us that all will be levelled and made flat to construct a highway for his God: it will become easy for the Lord to walk on. That’s the preparation! The preparation is done to the ground, and not the Lord.
Mal 3:1 speaks of the Lord of hosts, and we see a much clearer personality. God is saying that Lord is coming to His temple, and Isaiah 40 tells us how. The road for the Lord to come to His dwelling place will be made flat.
Mark combines these quotes (because Isaiah is more famous), and says, “this is where the gospel starts.” The Lord has expressed His intention to come to His dwelling place. And we are to make His way ready. But we gloss over these details because no one is impressed by highway-making. It doesn’t sound impressive or strategic, because some of us who are mountains will be laid flat, and all of us will be levelled - that doesn’t always sit well with us.
But discipleship begins with this preparation. Following Jesus always begins with our hearts being prepared to listen. It doesn’t sound impressive to us that God desires preparation, for we hunger for the big ideas and try our best to skip the process. But Isaiah says “prepare ye the way of the Lord.” Is this is core in your DNA, as people who are to be prepared for His coming? People weren’t prepared the first time Christ came. Will it be the same for you the second time He returns?
Being prepared means we put aside what we are searching for and we tune ourselves to what He desires. We make the road speedy so that when the Lord comes we can received Him in His dwelling place. Have you ever prayed for your heart to be a highway? That God would iron out the parts of you that are an obstruction to His dwelling place? Pray this today: Prepare in me the way of the Lord.
A follower is one who deliberately puts aside the course of his self-determined life to intentionally follow the course of another. That’s what the men and women who responded to John the Baptist, were trying to be!
(B) Disciples repent and are forgiven (Mark 1:4-6)
Mark proceeds to introduce us to John the Baptist. He’s the subject of this prologue, and three verbs are associated with him: He appeared! And did two things - baptised and proclaimed. To proclaim is to preach, declare, and announce publicly, and what he proclaimed was important and unusual. Mark 1:6 might seem odd to us, but for the reader of Mark’s day, it was Mark’s way of saying, “this is how you know John was the real deal.” John wore prophetic clothing and ate prophetic food, and we are to pay attention to his message. We know this through Zech 13:4, which shows us that Mark’s words would have resonated with certain associations in the Jewish mind about what it meant to be a true prophet of God.
John was baptising, and proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. These are very familiar words for church-goers, but let’s think carefully about its meaning. It’s a little bit like saying, “John had an everyday 9am-9pm shouting session of repentance and forgiveness of sins.” This baptism isn’t just an action. It’s an explained action with meaning and significance. It’s not membership or special position, but it is about forgiveness that is conditioned on repentance. John the Baptist wasn’t proclaiming a repentance-less forgiveness, because there’s no such thing.
Many ask, "Why doesn’t God just save everyone?” Here’s the answer: they haven’t repented! The sign of repentance isn’t just putting up your hand, filling in a card, or regular church attendance. It’s baptism. There is no other way to get right with God. You have to respond with repentance, and that means turning away from the way that you lived your life. It means that you willingly and intentionally put aside the way that you lived my old life, and subjugate yourself to God’s way.
This isn’t just for non-Christians. This is the Christian life, for a Christian life’s is a life of repentance. Consider how baptism doesn’t mean a single action of water. To baptise is to be fully immersed, and completely associated with. I go into the baptismal waters, and I never stop being what I was baptised into. We've been washed clean, but we’ve also been immersed into that which cleans us. If you have truly repented and turned, you will always cleave to the new way. When Martin Luther nailed the 95 Theses to the church door in Wittenburg, the first theses wrote, ”All of a believer’s life is repentance.” This was because Luther understood exactly what was being said here.
The people respond by confessing their sins, which means that they verbalised and acknowledged publicly the content of what they were doing: “I’m going into the water because of who I am and how I’ve lived my life, but I’m coming out of the water because forgiveness is possible.” What does confession look like for you?
In Ezra 9:5-10:1, Ezra paints a picture of true Biblical confession. Read it and think about what it means! Biblical confession of sin is not saying, “God I’ve done something wrong, can you just let me out?” Rather, it’s that we understand things from God’s perspective - true confession of sin always takes God’s perspective.
“If I looked at myself the way You saw me, I stand condemned before you. I have no hope. Because of who and what I am. You’ve seen my life, my heart, and the deceitfulness of my spirit. I am truly unable to be whole on myself. All of my confession is tainted and flawed. I am in great guilt before You. If then you should choose to destroy us you would be right, yet how gracious of you to leave a remnant. Save us O God.”
Disciples want to be baptised, that they might be God's. Disciples repent and are forgiven. What a wonderful truth that God makes it possible for us to turn and He forgives us! But John’s baptism isn’t a complete baptism - John doesn’t fully understand what’s going to happen with the One who comes after him.
(C) Disciples are baptised into Christ by the Spirit (Mark 1:7-8)
We learn many things about the One who comes after John. Firstly, He is mightier than John the Baptist. In terms of chronology, He is the point of John’s ministry, and He connects the dots between Isaiah and Malachi’s prophecy, and John’s teaching. The highway was someone, and He’s that someone!
This One is also greater and more worthy than John the Baptist. The language John employs speaks of His immense worth. John says that he’s not even worthy to do what a slave does for the One - he’s unworthy to dust the feet of the One who is to come! For us who know that the One is Jesus Christ, how do you think of yourself as a servant of Christ? When we don’t have our way or see fruit, we are prone to thinking that we are owed things. But John’s attitude here is in the right place. We must learn from Him, for we are not even worthy to touch our Master’s feet. Do you find yourself saying, “Lord Jesus, wash my feet”? Remember that the Lord whose feet we are not worthy to touch, condescended to wipe the feet of His disciples. This is the same Lord Jesus whose feet we are not worthy to touch.
The One after John will have a better baptism than John the Baptist. Baptism is also the word for dyeing. You take a colourless piece of cloth, take it to a vat of red dye, and baptise it into the vat of dye so that when it comes out it would be baptised red. John is conceding the limits of his baptism: it merely symbolises what has changed by saying, “the old way was dirty, this new way is clean.” But the baptism of Christ is so much better, and John doesn’t even know the full significance of this.
To get a fuller picture of what Christ’s baptism means we can look at Romans 6. The single action of going down symbolises what it means to go in-Christ to death, and coming out to a newness of life. To be baptised by the Holy Spirited is to be united to Jesus, and if you have been united to Christ, you cannot be un-united from Him -Our Union with Christ cannot be broken. The Bible tells us that you became a Christian not because of parental influence or social conditioning, but because you died in Jesus, and came out Jesus. The cloth goes into red, and comes out red. We go into Jesus, and come out Jesus.
We often read of baptism in the Great Commission in Matt 28:19-20, but we need to also see that making disciples is not just about a series of actions, it’s about being something. When you make disciples, you don’t just do something to them - You help them to be something. Young professional Singaporeans have developed the best (worst) way to follow Jesus: without discipleship. We try to do all the right things, but our lives remain unchanged. If this is a picture of your life right now, you have not been baptised into Christ. There is too much of you left in you.
The encounter between Phillip and the Ethiopian eunuch in Acts 8 is a great picture of becoming a disciple. The eunuch understood what all Judea and Jerusalem understood. If I am turning away and following this predicted Saviour to be my master and my discipler, then today is the day of my turning and salvation. I want to do it now, and I don’t want to be unbaptised from it. If you have not been baptised, and if you’ve not told anyone that you’ve been born again (spirit baptised), you need to get baptised.
Followers of Jesus Christ need to be clear about when they followed Jesus Christ. Are you water baptised but not born again? Understand that your old life was a horrible life - a life where you were God. But you have turned away and you follow a new Lord; His burden is light and His yoke easy. Following Jesus is so much better than following your old ways. There are only two types of people reading these words: those who have been born again, Spirit Baptised. And those who have not. Hear the words of John the Baptist, and go to Jesus!