I really enjoyed looking at Mark’s Gospel with a group of pastors in Kisumu recently (Preaching from Mark handout). I find myself getting more and more excited about the shortest Gospel. Such an exciting story. Such a carefully told story. Such a lot of Jesus. There were loads of things that struck me afresh reading it through again but I’ll just mention one:
The importance of the baptism
It comes earlier than in any of the other three Gospels. Just nine verses in, the first appearance of Jesus in Mark, the very first thing he does – going under the water. It’s a massive surprise. We’ve just been told to expect Jesus Christ the Son of God (Mark 1:1), the LORD God himself (cf. Mark 1:3; Isaiah 40:3; Mark 1:7) and here is a man from Nazareth being baptised – BAPTISED!?! – the dunking of repentance, for forgiveness of sins, with confession of sins (Mark 1:4-5). What sin does he need to repent of, be forgiven of, confess? And yet he wades into the muddy waters of the Jordan as a sinner. He is ‘numbered with the transgressors’ (Mark 15:28). His baptism is a graphic picture of the Cross – just as he drinks the Cup of God’s wrath instead of us so he plunges under the waters of death and judgment we deserve (Mark 10:38).
And then we get that wonderful glimpse of the Trinity: ‘the Spirit descending on him like a dove and a voice came from heaven, “You are my beloved Son, with you I am well pleased”’ (Mark 1:10-11). What an awesome glimpse of the heart of the universe – three persons united in love. And when do we get this Spirit-Father-Son theophany? At the exact moment (“immediately”) when Jesus’ hair is wet and his face streaked with mud and his soaking shoulders covered in weed – then. It’s like the Father and the Spirit are turning up and saying, “This is what we’re all about. We are the Trinitarian God who is all about coming down, all about saving, all about being numbered with the transgressors, all about humbling to death on a Cross.”
So the whole of Mark’s Gospel, from verse 9 onwards, is about the Cross. Or to put it another way, the whole Gospel is about the baptism of Jesus; about the Beloved Son becoming what we are, suffering the death and judgment we deserve, that we might become what he is, beloved sons of the Father.
fidelnyikuri
iServe Africa Webmaster
Utumishi Blog 
Thanks Andy for posting this. We are currently looking at ‘interpreting the gospels’ and it’s striking how we tend to generalize the interpretations of the four gospels e.g. reading a portion from Mark & interpreting it as it is in Matthew’s gospel yet it’s clear that each of the four writers has his own reason for writing the way he does & putting the story at a particular place. It’s amazing how in Mark’s case, the theme about Jesus being the Christ or Him being the Son of God & what He’s come to do runs through right from verse one of chapter one! Thanks again.
Thanks Fidel – really good point. I’d never noticed before how something like the feeding of the 5000 has a different form, setting, function and thrust in each Gospel. It’s really exciting to start to get a sense of each Gospel’s distinctive flavour and feel and flow. I’m trying to ‘get’ Matthew and feel a bit more at home in that Gospel at the moment. I guess it’s a lifetime work…