Introduction

 

Well Bible study groups kicked off for the year this past week.  And we kicked off with dinner together.  Smoked pulled pork burgers.  And ‘yes’ … they were as delicious as they sound.  We followed that with an ice-breaker game … which was tell us (i) your family background, (ii) your favourite book or movie and (iii) one expectation you have for our group.  And MY favourite book is Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.  I’m not much of a fiction reader myself.  I’ve only read about 30 fictional books in my life.  THREE of those 30 books is Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.  I LOVE that book.

And the thing that makes it such a phenomenal book … is that it lives up to the hype.  Like if a book sells 1 million copies … they print that on the front cover.  1 million copies is incredible.  J. K. Rolling has sold more than 600 million copies of Harry Potter books … not to mention the movies, merchandise and theme parks.  And the reason Harry Potter is so popular is because it is a truly epic tale.  Yet when you have a tale that epic … it’s very hard to write an ending that does it justice.  Take the Matrix trilogy for example … The Dark Knight trilogy … The Aliens series … The Godfather … and don’t even get me started on Star Wars Episode IX.  None of those endings lived up to the HYPE of their stories.  Yet the Deathly Hallows is a truly epic ending to an epic tale.  And if you’ve only seen the movie … you’re missing out.  This is one of the only times you’ll hear these words come out of my mouth … but the book is better.

Well I mention this because last week we kicked off our term 1 sermon series on Mark’s gospel.  And in the first 8 verses of the book … Mark sets Jesus up for us … as an epic figure.  He is (i) THE Messiah, (ii) the Son of God, (iii) the one prophesied about centuries earlier, (iv) who has a special forerunner … to prepare the way for him, (v) Jesus is SO special that John the Baptist … the greatest human being ever born up until that point … Matthew chapter 11 … isn’t worthy to even untie the straps of his sandals, AND (vi) he will baptise people with the Holy Spirit.  Talk about great expectations.  In our passage today … Mark tells us WHO this epic figure is:

Mark 1:9 (NIV) At that time Jesus came from Nazareth in Galilee

Now modern readers MISS the impact of this … because we’ve heard of Jesus of Nazareth.  But in the first century … Nazareth was a backwater little town in the middle of nowhere.  Truth be told … it was in the middle of the dodgy part of town.  Now I might get into trouble for saying this … but it’s like saying Jesus of Laylor Park … or Jesus of Blacktown.  My apologies if you grew up there … but my point is Nazareth is NOT the kind of place you’d expect someone epic to come from.  It’s not even mentioned in the OT.  Yet everything we’re told about Jesus in these 5 short verses … shows that Jesus lives up to the hype.

And I’ve got FOUR points again … I don’t know what’s come over me this year … to help us see this.  So we’re going to begin our journey by looking at (i) Why Jesus gets baptised? … v. 9.  What’s even MORE impressive is (ii) WHO is present at Jesus’ baptism? … v. 10-11.  We’ll then take a step back … and look at (iii) What Jesus’ baptism is teaching us about life … before concluding with our application … which is (iv) How we respond to Jesus’ baptism?  So please come with me as we look at how Jesus lives up to the hype with the WHY, the WHO, the WHAT and the HOW of Jesus’ anointing by John the Baptist.

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Why did Jesus get baptised? (v. 9)

 

And our passage begins with these words:

Mark 1:9 (NIV) At that time Jesus came from Nazareth in Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan.

Now as we saw last week … John’s baptism is NOT Christian baptism.  It’s NOT a symbol that you belong to Jesus.  In Acts chapter 19 … the Apostle Paul comes across some believers who ONLY had John’s baptism.  And Paul said to them ‘John’s baptism was a baptism of repentance’.  To be a follower of Jesus … you need Christian baptism.  So Paul rebaptises them.  The only rebaptism … or anabaptism in the whole Bible.  But my point is … John’s baptism was an OC … or OT baptism.  It symbolised turning from one’s sin and returning to the Lord.

But this begs the question; why does Jesus need to get baptised?  Why would a sinless person need the sign that he’s turned from his sins?  In Matthew’s account of this episode … John the Baptist objects to baptising Jesus.  He says ‘I need to be baptised by YOU’.  Now according to the gospel of John … that’s John the apostle … too many Johns.  But according to John the apostle … John the Baptist didn’t even KNOW Jesus was the Messiah until AFTER his baptism … until v. 10-11.  Yet John the Baptist still recognised that Jesus was more righteous than he was … and therefore Jesus should have been baptising John.  And John’s humility in this … is an object lesson in how we come to Christ.  Unless we can admit that we need Jesus to wash us clean from our sin … we can have no part in him.

So … John is doing the right thing here.  He’s saying ‘I’m the sinful one.  I’m the one who needs to be washed clean from my sins by you Jesus’.  Yet Jesus objects.  And the reason Jesus objects … is because he’s come to swap places with his people.  He’s COME … to be a substitute:  He’s in effect saying:

• Even though I don’t NEED to get baptised … I’m going to get baptised … in your place

• Even though I don’t NEED to repent of my sins … I’m going to repent of Sin … in your place

• And even though I don’t NEED to die … to pay the penalty for my Sin … I’m going to die … in your place

And that’s WHY Jesus got baptised.  He was identifying himself with his people.  Now in Matthew’s gospel this is a LITTLE more complicated.  So AFTER John the Baptist says ‘you’re supposed to baptise ME Jesus’ … Jesus then says:

Matthew 3:15 (NIV) … “Let it be so now; it is proper for us to do this to fulfill all righteousness.”

Thanks for that Jesus.  Clear as mud.  So … follow-up question; ‘what does it mean to fulfil all righteousness?’  Well the word ‘righteous’ means to be right with God.  And to be right with God means to OBEY God.  And at THAT particular point in history … God was telling his people to get baptised by John.

So it’s the same thing.  Jesus came to earth to be a substitute for his people.  Now his people TODAY are Christians around the world.  But the people of God in the first century was the nation of Israel.  And the nation of Israel at that time was being baptised by John.  And so Jesus identifies with those people … he says THESE are the people I’ve come as a substitute for … by doing what they were doing at that time … which was being baptised by John.  Jesus got baptised … to identify with those he’s come to save.

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Who is present at Jesus’ baptism? (v. 10-11)

 

Well … as epic as that is … what happens next is even MORE amazing.  We read:

Mark 1:10-11 (NIV) Just as Jesus was coming up out of the water, he saw heaven being torn open and the Spirit descending on him like a dove. 11 And a voice came from heaven: “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.”

Now there are 3 things worth noting about WHAT happened when Jesus was baptised.  The first is … this is supernatural.  Like the way Mark talked Jesus up in v. 1-8 … ‘I’m not even worthy to untie his shoelaces’ … we’re expecting something out of this world.  And that’s what we get.  The heavens are TORN open … and God speaks … and the Spirit descends on Him like a dove.  Not in the FORM of a dove … sorry to all those expensive paintings out there … but LIKE a dove.

The SECOND thing worth mentioning is what is said:

Mark 1:11 (NIV) “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.”

Now this is a combination of 2 OT passages.  The first is Psalm 2 … which is about God’s special king … God’s Messiah … who would rule the nations.  The fascinating thing is … King David never ruled the nations.  Nor did any of his successors.  So the Israelites had been wondering for centuries … ‘who will be this ‘special king’ … this Messiah … who will rule the nations?’  In Mark chapter 1 … God says it’s Jesus.

The SECOND half of v. 11 is a quote from Isaiah 42.  And in Isaiah 42 … the person God is well pleased with … is NOT the Messiah?  It’s the suffering servant.  Now never in a million years would the Jews have equated the suffering servant in Isaiah with the Messiah.  But that’s what God does here in Mark 1:11.  He says my king … will rule through serving.  My king … will be victorious through defeat.  My king … will save through suffering.

The THIRD thing worth mentioning … and this is going to be the focus for the rest of our time together … is that ALL 3 members of the Trinity are present here.  Now why is this important?  Well in PART … because it reminds us of creation.  Mark chapter 1 is actually a big neon sign … pointing back to creation.  So take the opening words of Mark’s gospel: ‘The beginning’.  Where have we heard that before?  Genesis 1.  What we ALSO have in Genesis 1 is God … the creator, God’s WORD … speaking, and the Spirit … hovering over the waters.  That’s WHY the Spirit is said to descend LIKE a dove here.  It’s a reference to the Spirit ‘hovering’ in Genesis 1.

Then in Mark chapter 1 we have God the Father … speaking, we have Jesus … who is elsewhere identified as THE Word of God, and we have the Spirit.  The reason this is important is because just like the Trinity was present and active in the CREATION of the world … so too in the Trinity present and active in the REDEMPTION of our world.  Jesus really IS living up to the hype.

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What Jesus’ baptism teaches us?

 

But is that ALL this is showing us?  Like is this just a divine ‘Avengers Assemble’ scene … like at the end of Endgame?  Is this JUST for entertainment purposes?  Well ‘no’ … because the presence of the Trinity points us to the basis of reality itself.  You see the world around us is NOT the basis of ultimate reality.  The reason being … the world around us didn’t always exist.  In having ALL 3 members of the Trinity present at Jesus’ baptism … Mark is reminding us that ultimate reality isn’t our WORLD … it’s our God.  GOD is the only thing that has existed for all eternity.

The thing that makes the Christian God different to the gods of every other world religion … is that the Christian God is Trinitarian.  He is 3 persons in 1 Godhead.  What this means is … love and relationships are the essence of ultimate reality.  Let me explain.

Take Islam for example.  Islam is a monotheistic religion … just like Christianity.  But the ESSENCE of Allah is NOT relationships.  Why?  Because the God of Islam had no one to relate TO … until he created someone to relate to.  So for Islam … power and greatness are the essence of ultimate reality.  OK … most monotheistic religions produce individualism … where you seek power and greatness for yourself or your religion.  Why?  Because your god is an individual.

At the other end of the spectrum is polytheistic religions.  THESE religions tend to make FAMILY the essence of ultimate reality.  Now whether that’s a religion like Hinduism … with a FAMILY of gods … like Ganesh and Vishnu and Shiva … or a religion in which you venerate your dead ancestors … these religions promote family.  Now that SOUNDS nice … until you realise they promote family at the expense of everyone else.

But if God has existed for all of eternity in a loving relationship with himself … then love and relationships are the essence of ultimate reality.  Why?  Because love and relationships have existed for all of eternity.  And we see the NATURE of those relationships in this episode.  OK:

• The Father is showering the Son with words of love and admiration.

• The Spirit is enveloping the Son with power.

Each person of the Trinity pours out all their love and glorification and power onto the others.  And C. S. Lewis describes this as a kind of dance.  What he means is this.  If you’re really selfish and self-centred … you tend to make yourself the centre of the universe … and demand that everyone else orbits YOU … revolves around YOU.  So you MIGHT give to the poor.  But ONLY if it makes you feel good about yourself … and ONLY if it doesn’t cut into your way of life very much.  You might fall in love.  But only if it makes YOU happy … and only if it doesn’t compromise your individual interests too much.

Yet each person of the Trinity … Father, Son and Spirit … is other-person-centred.  They revolve around the OTHERS.  And so when all 3 of them are revolving around the others … it reminds us of one of those Victorian era ballrooms.  It looks like a dance.

And WHAT this teaches us … is if we don’t get into this dance ourselves … then we’re on the sidelines of ultimate reality.  OK … if we are standing still … and demanding that everyone else revolve around us … then we are going against the very fabric of how we’ve been made.  OK … we’ve been made in God’s image.  And this means we’ll NEVER be happy in life … NEVER be satisfied in life … if we are living at odds with the essence of reality.

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How do we respond to Jesus’ baptism? (v. 12-13)

 

So what does this mean for us?  HOW do we respond to Jesus’ baptism?  Well here’s our application for today.  Get into the dance.  Stop demanding that others revolve around me.  Stop crying out ‘what about me’.  Stop obsessing about how others are treating me badly.  And start dancing around others.

Now first and foremost … this means revolving around God.  And that means giving Him our unconditional allegiance … even if it looks dumb or dangerous to do so.  You know WHEN God told Adam and Eve not to eat the forbidden fruit … he didn’t explain to them why?  Like WHY is ‘Knowing’ good and evil a bad thing?  The REASON he didn’t tell them why is because if we know the WHY … then we’re not orbiting around God.  We’re just doing what is best for us.  To orbit our lives around God means to obey him unconditionally … even if we don’t understand the WHY of his commands.

SECOND … it means revolving our lives around other people.  And THAT means … looking after their needs and wants … EVEN if it costs us.  Now that doesn’t sound pleasant … I know.  But it’s the only path to ultimate reality.  And we have the ultimate example of this in v. 12-13.  Let me read it for us:

Mark 1:12-13 (NIV) At once the Spirit sent him out into the wilderness, 13 and he was in the wilderness forty days, being tempted by Satan.

Just as an aside … this is yet another allusion to creation.  Straight after the Father, Son and Spirit create the world … what the FIRST thing that happens?  The serpent shows up to tempt Adam and Eve.  And what’s the first thing that happens after the Father, Son and Spirit appear at Jesus baptism?  The serpent shows up to temp Jesus.

The difference with Jesus though … is he wasn’t in the Garden of Eden.  He was in the desert.  Jesus didn’t have abundant food and drink at his disposal.  Mathew and Luke said he went without those for 40 days.  And Jesus didn’t have the protection and comfort of Eden.  He was surrounded by wild animals.  The question is … WHY would Jesus put himself through such a horrible ordeal?  The answer is … BEFORE Jesus could die the death of a sinner … he had to live the life of a righteous person.  Let me explain.

You see if Jesus had sinned while on earth … even once … then his death would ONLY have paid the penalty for HIS sin.  The only way Jesus’ death could pay the penalty for your and my sin … is if he didn’t have any sin to pay for himself.  Yet in order to do that properly … he had to live a representative life for us.  Put it this way.  If Jesus had died when King Herod tried to kill him as a baby in Matthew 2 … would Jesus’ death have been able to pay for our sins?  The answer is ‘no’.  Jesus had to live a perfect life for us … before he could die a sinless death for us.  We actually sing about this:

My hope is built on nothing less

Than Jesus’ blood … and righteousness.

And WHY did Jesus do this?  Because he was revolving around US.  You see Jesus got NOTHING he needed out of the cross:

• He didn’t NEED relationships.  He had perfect … other-person-centred relationships in the Trinity.

• He didn’t need love.  The Father, Son and Spirit have been loving each other infinitely for all eternity.

• And he didn’t need worshippers.  The Father, Son and Spirit have been worshipping each other … glorifying each other perfectly for all eternity.

The REASON Jesus walked into that desert was because that’s just how the Trinity rolls.  It is the essence of ultimate reality.

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Conclusion

 

And if you and I want a taste of that … a taste of the very heart of reality … then we need to enter the dance.  We need to orbit our lives around God and others … even if it costs us.

• God said to Adam … obey me about the tree and you’ll live … and he didn’t.

• God said to Jesus … obey me about the cross and you’ll die … and he did.

For that’s what the Father, Son and Spirit have been doing for eternity.  And until we are willing to do that ourselves … we’re out of touch with reality.  But … if we can see surrendering ourselves to the needs and wants of others as a beautiful thing … then we’ve begun to enter the dance of ultimate reality.