Mark 1 Session 1

What we learnt from Jacob and how God changed him and led him all began with his willingness to accept that he needed to change, he didn't know how but he was willing to engage with almighty God. We, like Jacob, have to recognise that we need to change and that we need a saviour, someone who is able to travel with us through life's journey. Jacob allowed God to travel with him and learnt from Him, we can do the same.

Let's look at Mark's gospel and begin to discover who this person is that came to show us the way.

Mark introduces his story by focusing on John the Baptist.

He quotes from Malachi Chapter 3 v 1
"Behold, I am preparing the way before you, then the Lord, who you seek will suddenly come to His temple"

Paul reminds us in 1 Cor 6:19-20 that we are the temple of the Holy Spirit.

  19 Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit in you, whom you have of God? And you are not your own,
  20 for you are bought with a price. Therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's.

"The Lord who YOU seek will suddenly come to His temple"

Mark is declaring that God is preparing a way before us. Are we seeking the Lord? If we are then He will suddenly come to His temple, that is into you and me.

John was the last prophet before the coming of the Christ, God's only begotten Son. He came declaring that the time had come to repent, to be washed, immersed, baptised as a sign that the coming Christ was able to set us free from sinful, human nature. This was God's ultimate sacrifice, He knew that it was not enough just to have the old sacrificial system which never dealt with the cause, just covered the sin. Here, in Christ was a new way, a way that all mankind could relate to and enter into, but it needed repentance.

This teaching was completely new, in one powerful declaration, John had radically challenged a way of life that had gone on for centuries. Sometimes it takes a fresh, radical look at ourselves, our lives and situations, in order for us to be changed.

Let us hold on tightly to the verse that Mark quotes from Malachi "The Lord who YOU seek will suddenly come to His temple" And may we say "Yes Lord Jesus come quickly". Inhabit this unholy temple and may it be a place where Your light shines in a dark and lost world.