The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
As it is written in the prophet Isaiah,
“See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you,
who will prepare your way;
the voice of one crying out in the wilderness:
‘Prepare the way of the Lord,
make his paths straight,'”
John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. 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. Now John was clothed with camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. 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. I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.” (Mark 1:1-8)
As a lit major in college, I was taught to pay careful attention to how a book begins. It was not uncommon to be assigned a 438-page tomb and have 3, 50-minute class periods dedicated to discussing it, only to discover the entire first day’s class was dedicated to the opening pages. Introductions matter that much.
And, of course they do. I’ve never been hanging out with a new couple and asked them, “So, tell me about the 94th day you knew each other” or “What was your 19th date like?” That would be weird. But one of the quickest ways that couples grow familiar with one another is to ask, “So, how did you meet?” Heck, the entire rom-com genre is built around the “meet-cute” – the moment when the paramours encounter one another, and we just know they’ll fall in love. Again, introductions matter.
So, since the lectionary feeds us up Mark’s introductory verses, we had better pay attention. But before that, here’s a funny meme that pretty much sums up the four gospels’ introductions nicely.
And get down to business, Mark does. For these opening verses declare – unequivocally and clearly – the thesis of his entire gospel. The Good News of Jesus is the baptism of repentance and the forgiveness of sins. Hard stop. Everything John the Baptist will do points to this. Everything Jesus will do enacts this. Simply put, the Lord is coming – on paths now made straight, which means He’s going to make really good time – and everything is about to change.
Significantly, this opening passage concludes with a promise of power (power, we should be clear, that is only available in repentance and forgiveness) unlike any power we’ve witnessed before. As John poetically says, “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. I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”
We, Presbyterians, probably don’t talk about the Holy Spirit enough. And that’s not good. It’s not good to neglect one Person in the Trinity. The broad brush view of the Trinity is this:
God the Father – righteously angry
God the Son – lovingly forgiving
God the Spirit – um……
But the Spirit of God (or Holy Spirit) is essential to the story Mark wants to tell when he wants to tell us about Good News. I mean, it’s right there in the beginning – and introductions are important. Or, in terms of a rom-com, we have no “meet-cute” with our Savior that isn’t also a meet-cute with the Spirit.
It’s too much for one devotional to talk about the Holy Spirit fully. (That’s too much for one dissertation!). But it is important to understand that the power of God that raises Jesus from the dead is the Holy Spirit. Paul explains this well in Ephesians 1 when he writes about “the immeasurable greatness of his [God’s] power for us who believe, according to the working of his great power. God put this power [the Holy Spirit] to work in Christ when he raised him from the dead” (Ephesians 1:19b-20a). This line comes in the midst of Paul’s prayer for the church in Ephesus. He’s praying they have this immeasurable power – the same power that raises Jesus from the dead.
Friends, that’s our power too. Every holy thing we yearn, as a community, to achieve is available when gained through the power of the Holy Spirit. And since Jesus makes it clear that the Holy Spirit dwells in us as if we were the tabernacle of the Lord, wherever we go, we carry with us this power to do good.
This has been a truly disempowering season for us. No one could be blamed for feeling as if COVID has one up on Christ over the last 9 months. But that’s simply not the case. Christ conquers COVID by the power of the Holy Spirit, the same power that lives in us. So let us be bold and hope-filled. Let us not quiver with fear or shiver in shame. Let us grab hold of the blessings that Mark tells us about right from the very beginning. Introductions, after all, are important. Amen.
