To those few among you who still write old-fashioned paper letters, how do you begin? Will you begin with a salutation or greeting? Will you ask about their health? Will you follow with a little chit-chat, or small talk? Will you complain about the economy or the Mariners? Well, the Gospel of Mark doesn’t do any of those things (I know, I know, it is not really a letter). The writer of Mark offers no pleasantries. He wastes no time. There is no room for chit-chat. Mark begins his gospel by saying, “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” He gets right to the point. After generations and generations of waiting, he is here. The Christ is here. God’s Son is here. And this is his story. Is there anything more important to say than this?
The gospels are accounts of the life of Christ written by men from different backgrounds with different personalities to different audiences, so we would naturally expect them to be slightly different from each other. But there is one thing in common – they all tell the same story. In God’s sovereignty, however, God had decided there would be four gospels in our Bibles, not two, not five. In addition, he had decided the four gospels were Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. And here we are, living in the 21st century, and because we have the Bible in our hands, we must read all four gospels. That is what God expects and asks you and me to do. The four gospels, nothing more, nothing less, are exactly everything we need to have a full understanding of God’s gospel.
In the new academic year that begins this fall, Billy will teach us the Gospel of Mark. But before he does that, the message this Sunday is an introduction to the second gospel. We will talk about how Mark recorded down the stories of the life of Jesus, rapid fire, and what this does to us. We will then talk about how he surprised us and slowed down only when he began to talk about Christ’s passion. Mark devoted a noticeably greater proportion of his gospel to Christ’s last week on earth than Matthew, Luke, or John. In anticipation of this study, I have begun to read Mark in the mornings this summer. I encourage all of you to read Mark as well, and if Billy were here, he would say read it, “slowly”. See you Sunday.
Your Friend
Alvin