The Message is simple

The message, the good news is simple. It is three simple words “He is risen”. And by making that statement, you might think that I have gotten my date mixed up thinking that it is Easter or Holy Cross Day; or that I have lost all my marbles and taken and leave of my senses. The fact that Jesus is risen. And we should consider that when we come to the Gospel lesson this week (Mark 1.1-8) that is what is meant by the good news – He is risen. It is why he came and it is why he is coming again in a second advent.

And in this vain we need to start at the beginning to understand what it is that Mark proclaims in his gospel. It is not a nicely wrapped up whodunit like “NCIS” or “Diagnosis Murder” Episode. There are no birth narratives with angels or shepherds to look at. There is no manger scene with mother child and distant father to peruse.  Not even a lamb or a cow to consider.

What this beginning is, is uncomplicated. It is not a well thought out dissertation on the finer points of eschatology. It is not meant to be a creedal statement in the same way that the creeds are. It is a pointed and simple recognition that God is coming to his people to bring them back. He is coming to bring them home. He is coming to restore the order of creation as it was before things fell apart through our fault and wanting it all our own ways. So through the prophets, we are told that God and his kingdom are coming. In the midst of the wreckage and ruin of our lives, in the middle of the refuse and rubble of our kingdom building, at the heart of the destruction and desolation of our communities, Viola! Ta-da! Here is God. God is building a way home for us to follow and it is through his Son. Here is God ever present to his people, still victorious over the things that enslave us and God still reigns.

And to make sure that we are aware of this God sends a prophet. God sent someone who was willing and able to speak things out of his heart into the hearts of men and women so that they could respond and so that they might find joy in the message of their own salvation. Someone who is willing make God’s message and plan plain and known. John was such a man. With John there was a change and a new beginning. He was indifferent from the teachers of his day. He did dress like them. He didn’t eat what they ate. He did not live in the comfort of a city. He made his home in the wilderness. And people came to John, to hear him preach. Those same people who crowded the riverbanks found themselves responding to that teaching in their lives through baptism. Through John and his active proclaiming of the good news of God people were aware of the presence of God amongst them and began to make themselves ready for a mightier gift, a greater guest: the Messiah.

This change of mind, this repentance leads each and all of us into a new identity. We in effect die to one life and begin to live another – represented in the waters of baptism. We go in one person and come out another. And we gain this new life not just because we have the right creeds, know all the right doctrines or go to the right church, we have this life this new way of living and of being because God has made this way our way and this life our life in Jesus. God is being faithful to honour the promises he has made over the centuries to men and women of faith that three be redemption and there will be salvation and heaven and earth will be one, as they were meant and created to be.

So where does this leave us? We are the sentinels of this kingdom. Like John, we are called to draw others to the water’s edge and to declare clearly and forthrightly the good news that “he is risen”. We are the beginning of God’s work in this city, appealing to all who listen to come and be comforted by God and to be drawn into friendship with God and into his eternity.