Week Two of Advent
Mark 1:1–8
The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
As it is written in Isaiah the prophet,
"Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way, the voice of one crying in the wilderness: 'Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight,'"
John appeared, baptizing in the wilderness and proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. And all the country of Judea and all Jerusalem were going out to him and were being baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. Now John was clothed with camel's hair and wore a leather belt around his waist and ate locusts and wild honey. And he preached, saying, "After me comes he who is mightier than I, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie. I have baptized you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit."
The Gospel always begins with John the Baptist. Whether it is Matthew, Mark, Luke or John, John the Baptist stands prominently at the beginning of the story about Jesus. Why is that?
One big reason is to hook the story of Jesus into the long twisting wandering story of Israel. The story about Jesus is a fresh revelation and it's a flash of light breaking into the darkness, but the revelation has been foretold and the flash of light has been hinted at and expected for a long time. All the way back in Genesis, God promised to bless the world through Abraham. Somehow Abraham's family was going to be the way that God worked to undo the evil that had been introduced in the Garden. The long and meandering story of the Old Testament is full of many side plots and problems but the main story of how God is going to fix the world through Abraham's offspring is never abandoned. It seemed like the answer almost came with the rule of David and Solomon. The kingdom Israel was as large and prosperous as ever and pagans were coming to listen to the wisdom of Solomon, but tragically right at this point Israel's own king succumbs to idolatry. Immediately after his kingdom is ripped in two and never again attains its past glory. Despite the growing list of misfortunes that befall the people of Israel from here on out, the prophets, even as they condemn the nation, keep hope alive that God will one day act, that the promises to Abraham haven't been abandoned, and that in some mysterious way He himself would come to do what needed to be done.
Into this story steps John the Baptist, a bizarre desert monk-like figure, proclaiming that the time had come, the mighty one was on his way. John straddles the ages standing with the prophets of the past but pointing to the new thing God was about to do. He is the perfect prophet for Advent because he tells us to remember the story that has already been told and to get ready for its fulfillment. In Advent, we are always looking back to what God has done in sending Jesus to save us, but we are also always looking forward to what God will do when He sends Jesus again to judge the world. We want Jesus to judge the world. We need him to, because judging means he'll fix things. He'll weed out evil, root out sin, and put an end to death. John tells us to get ready for the One Who is to Come, to prepare for his coming and be eager for it. Our waiting doesn't have to be like people sitting in the waiting room of a dentist office, bored and a little apprehensive about what is to come. Instead we can wait like a child who's been told that when his dad comes home he's bringing him a present. I want to wait for Jesus with that kind of joy and that kind of excitement, because I can't wait to see him and what he is bringing.