Chapter # 1 Paragraph # 5 Study # 2
December 18, 2018
Moss Bluff, Louisiana
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Thesis: When Jesus came on the scene, He was preaching "the Gospel" and calling for "repentance" and "faith".
Introduction: In our last study we considered the larger issues involved in the word "Gospel" and then narrowed those issues down to what the text identifies as "the good news". We saw that there were two issues of "good news" specifically identified
- I. Mark's Focus Upon "Jesus".
- A. He used the name "Jesus" in ninety verses of his 16 chapters (roughly 10% of the total number of times this name is used in the New Testament).
- B. By way of contrast, He used the title "Christ" in only seven verses.
- C. This signifies that his focus was on Jesus as the Deliverer.
- 1. We have already seen what he considered to be the major "issue" of man's need for deliverance.
- 2. That this "Jesus" was presented by Mark through John's message as "the Mightier One" Who would "baptize" people in the Holy Spirit and fire means that he wanted his readers to think of Jesus as a "Mighty Deliverer" in the face of the massive nature of the problem and that His "might" would be shared by those whom He baptized with the Holy Spirit.
- II. Mark's Reference to John's Imprisonment by Herod.
- A. We know from other sources that Jesus actually was "making and baptizing disciples" in Judea before John was arrested (John 3:22-23).
- B. Thus, we conclude that Mark wished to focus upon Jesus' "Galilean" ministry as the One Who came from Nazareth without "reputation" in the eyes of the leaders of Israel.
- C. This reference to John's imprisonment is a carefully laid pre-reference to the major issue of Mark's Gospel: men driven by the pride of life are moved to do great evil.
- III. Mark's Major Focus: the Preaching of Jesus in Galilee.
- A. He calls the content of the preaching "the Gospel" twice in these two verses.
- B. The initial issue: Good News (as opposed to Bad News, as in John 3:17).
- C. The greater explanation.
- 1. The "Good News" of the "Nearness" of the Kingdom of The God.
- a. The reference to "the time is fulfilled".
- 1) The term "time" is used in the New Testament to refer to a "season" which involves the ripeness of fruit (Mark 11:13) and, thereby, indicates "a period of time within time" that is marked out for a specific "event".
- 2) This "season" was laid out in prophecy in Daniel 9 and marked the "time" when God's Messianic King would destroy the kingdoms of mankind and set up a kingdom for the saints without end.
- 3) This "season" was a major focus of desire among God's people as seen by the fact that this issue was the last issue raised by the disciples before the Ascension of Jesus into Heaven and about which Jesus simply refused to answer directly (Acts 1:6-8).
- 4) In the prophecy of Daniel, this "time" was marked out in terms of a certain number of years and a certain number of "events" that were to take place.
- a) As to the "time" issue, Jesus began His ministry at the beginning of the sixty-ninth set of seven years.
- b) This meant that there were only fourteen years of prophesied events that were to precede the coming of the Kingdom (with a small matter of a couple of intervening "events").
- c) Thus, in harmony with the prophecies, the Kingdom was potentially only 14+ years away.
- b. There were some "negative" events involved.
- 1) Messiah would be "cut off".
- 2) The city and the sanctuary would be destroyed by the "people of the coming prince".
- c. There was no "time" declared by the prophecies that would indicate how much "time" was going to be taken up by these "negative" events, and that's where the "rub" comes in.
- d. There are indications of another concept of "nearness" involved beyond that of a "season" of months/years.
- 1) Matthew 12:28 argues for the presence of the kingdom in the person of its King as an "already present" fact.
- 2) Matthew 16:28 and following argues that the presence of the kingdom involves the presentation of the "glorified King" so that the "Kingdom is present whenever the King is present in His "glorified" condition.
- e. Jesus' meaning involved the "good news" that God's Kingdom was "at hand" in, potentially, a matter of a few years as well as in, actually, the presence of the King.
- 2. The "Good News" of a workable "way" of being qualified to enter into that "near" reality.
- a. "Repent" is a repetition of John's message and the essence of the theology of Jesus, to which He revealed Himself as committed by submitting to the baptism of John: the "Good News" is this: Repent and God will forgive you.
- b. "Believe" is an extension of John's message of "the Mighty One Who is coming": "faith" in the mighty works of Jesus as the explanation for how forgiveness has been made available by God.
- c. The "order" of the text is crucial.
- 1) John's "grace" message, which the 'establishment' in Legal Theology viciously rejected, was unobscured and easily understood: repentance brings about the "good" relationship with God that results in eternal life.
- 2) "Faith in the Gospel" is the secondary, follow-up that explains how God can "forgive sins" upon repentance.
- 3) If repentance is in place, "the Gospel" can be/will be "believed" because "faith" arises out of a joyful, harmonious relationship with God.
- 4) Thus, if repentance is not in place, "faith" in the Gospel will be "fraudulent unbelief" worn as a mask to allow tares to coexist with the wheat until the harvest unmasks the impenitent. To make an analogy, Paul said that "circumcision" was "uncircumcision" if it did not result in righteous behavior (Romans 2:25-29); likewise, if "faith in the Gospel" is not preceded by "repentance", "faith" has become "unbelief's mask" to hide the reality of no justification. [Note carefully what these texts declare is to be "preached": Luke 17:3; 24:47; Acts 2:38; 3:19; 5:31; 8:22; 11:18; 17:30; 20:21; 26:20; Romans 2:4; 2 Corinthians 7:10; 2 Timothy 2:25; Hebrews 6:1, 6; 12:17; 2 Peter 3:9; Revelation 9:20, 21; 16:9, and 11. Do not be "deceived" by the nonsense that all "repentance" is is a "change of mind about who Jesus is" because that statement is a delusion rooted in the error of defining a term based upon its etymology instead of the way it is used by the Holy Spirit in the words of men.]
