Mark 1:1-8

1The beginning of the good news about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God, 2as it is written in Isaiah the prophet: "I will send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way"- 3"a voice of one calling in the wilderness, 'Prepare the way for the LORD, make straight paths for him.'" 4And so John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. 5The whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem went out to him. Confessing their sins, they were baptized by him in the Jordan River. 6John wore clothing made of camel's hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. 7And this was his message: "After me comes the one more powerful than I, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie. 8I baptize you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit."

Listening guide

Mark 1:1-8

Forgiveness is hard when it _____________.

Do you find it easier to say ….

One of the greatest gifts I can give you is a world with forgiveness.  

“I will send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way” — 3 “a voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him.’ ”  4 And so John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.”  

the Lord = 

baptism

don’t forgive because ….

I’ve got one of the greatest gifts: _________________

Discussion Questions

Sermon

Is there anything for which I need to ask forgiveness? (RM) “No, just differences.” 

Yet his critical remarks were still running around in my head. He had practically stomped away. He didn’t answer calls.  

I had a hard imagining that there was nothing that needed to be forgiven. Everything I saw said we need forgiveness.  

Forgiveness is great, it’s wonderful right up to the moment we actually have to forgive someone. The moment we actually have to say, I’m going to absorb the cost or let someone else absorb the cost of what you’ve done. I’m going to accept you without any hard feelings. That moment, it gets hard. Forgiveness is hard when it costs. If you come to my house and break a lamp, someone has to pay for that lamp. Either I say to you,  

  • Look, I can’t really afford to replace this lamp. Will you please replace it? Then you pay the physical cost of the lamp, plus you accept the responsibility or blame. You take the guilt. Or I say 

  • I’ll take care of it. I pay the cost. And then if I forgive you. I don't hold it against you. And I invite you over for dinner again.  

At some point I will say, look, you’ve broken four lamps at my house. I think we better eat someplace else. But there are so a couple of things that are much easier to say. 

 

It’s much easier to say, everyone is bad. Everyone does wrong stuff all the time. It’s not big deal. It’s much easier to say everyone is at least a little bad or guilty. It’s a fault without guilt attitude. Even I get this. Let’s say you don’t like something I do. One thing people say then to explain what I do is to say, “nobody’s perfect.”  What you’re doing, you’re excusing wrongdoing by saying, “everyone is wrong.” That might be true, but that doesn’t mean what I did is any less wrong. It’s much easier to excuse me than it is to confront a pastor.  

 

It’s also easier to say, nothing is really wrong. There is a view that says, “the only thing that is wrong is to tell me I’m wrong.” That’s another whole issue. Again, if someone does something and we say, “nope, you didn’t do anything wrong.” That is much easier to say than, “I forgive you.”  

I think we completely underestimate just how amazing forgiveness actually is. Loren Toussaint, a psychologist, might say that “people over 45 years of age who had forgiven others reported greater satisfaction with their lives and were less likely to report symptoms of psychological distress, such as feelings of nervousness, restlessness, and sadness” (The New Science of Forgiveness | Greater Good (berkeley.edu), accessed 12/05/2020)  

 

We could go through all kinds of data. In the end, I would say, there are a lot of things easier than forgiveness. You could create peer relationships without forgiveness. You could create a family without forgiveness. We’re on the way to creating a society without forgiveness.  

 

The data shows, and today God says, 

 

Promise/Adventure  

God says, one of the greatest gifts I can give you is a world with forgiveness.  

Development 

Mark chapter 1. This is a great section. Each week before Christmas we are going to take one of the backgrounds to the life of Jesus. Each section tells something God wants to give in sending Jesus. In Mark 1 it says, ““I will send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way” — 3 “a voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him.’ ”   

4 And so John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.”  

Whether we get it right away or not, he isn’t so much saying, “Get ready. Repent more or repent the rest of the way. Prepare your heart.” He isn’t really saying that.  

He is saying, the king is here. He is saying God has become part of this physical, material world and he forgives. Let me show you.  

Mark writes, “prepare the way for the Lord”. Sometimes in the Bible the word “Lord” means respected person or revered person. Your “lord” is your master or your ruler. That’s not what Mark says.  

The word “Lord” in the Hebrew is the name for God himself. It’s the name God gave when he introduced himself to Moses. He said, “The Lord, The Lord”. Now Mark is saying, God is not just coming at some far off time at the end of the world. We’ve talked about that. God will come again. Every eye will see him.  

He is saying, God has come now. As a human being. You have to realize this rocked the Jewish world. The Greeks said all the time, the gods have become men. Mark says, “That man, this man Jesus, is God himself.”  

And what he brings, or the only way to have him, is forgiveness. What does it mean it mean to prepare the way? It is a baptism of repentance for forgiveness. One thing you got to know here... 

Why did John all the sudden start baptizing people?  

The Jews practiced ceremonial washing. They did that regularly. It was a physical practice. One of the things it did, the people got to make a physical expression of what was going on in their lives. But no one got baptized to be a believer. That wasn’t how it worked.  

You went to synagogue school. You were instructed. You professed the shema. And eventually, you were accepted.  

Then God comes along and says, I would be glad to take you, I want you, and every one of you needs to be baptized as an act of repentance. You are much worse than you imagine and you cannot stay as you are. If I am here and I am at work, you will change. You do not get life your way.  

Let me make a little clearer what I’m saying.  

Everyone has a ruler, a master, a Lord in their lives. I think far and away the best one is the Lord, the God of heaven and earth. His kingdom is a kingdom of forgiveness. That is the only way he operates. You either take it or leave him.  

If you say, forgiveness isn’t part of my life. I don’t believe in forgiveness. I don’t practice forgiveness. No one ever sins against me. I don’t see any sin in my life. If you say that, you are part of a different kingdom and world. You won’t ever have to forgive me. You won’t ask me to forgive you.  

That might be a great world very often. You might have a lot of strength, a lot of power. I could imagine no one will ever mess with you or cross you. Why would they? It’s not safe at all. On other hand, you might have a lot of kindness, pity, and even excessive generosity. I could imagine no one would ever hate you or leave you. Why would they? You’ll never turn on them.  

But that isn’t God’s world. God both confronts and comforts. We pray it every week. “Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.” Do you realize what that is saying?  

That’s saying, you will not be forgiven if you do not forgive. Heinrich Heine, German nonbelieving poet in the 800s. “God will forgive me. It’s his job.”  

That is the thing of God. And if God is not forgiving you, and if you aren’t taking that forgiveness and being moved. If you haven’t moved by it and absorbed by it, if it doesn’t fill up the low places in your life and knock down the high places in your life, then you don’t get God yet.  

Not only are you not part of his kingdom. You’re saying, look God, I know how the world works better than you.  

  • Evolutionary thinking, common thinking tells us to eliminate our enemies.  

What we need to do is ask, on a practical basis or an evolutionary basis, why forgive at all? Going back to the light example, it doesn’t benefit me at all to forgive you for breaking my light. I have to pay the money for a new light. Plus, I lose any power I gained over you.   

The world of forgiveness is a frightening, terrifying and thrilling place. It’s a world where anything goes. 

  • Where relationships can be wrecked, and wrecked relationships can be restored 

  • where lives can be destroyed once and for all, (if you don’t want to be rebuilt) and destroyed lives can be rebuilt, and 

 

This is truly one of the greatest gifts: forgiveness.  

Action 

So take this gift this Christmas, and if you really enjoy it, give it.  

(Don’t forgive because …. 

You’ll notice, I’m not saying forgive because we are all feeling guilty. I do believe guilt is a real thing. I know I feel guilty. What I call a feeling of guilt is an intense feeling that I messed up. I didn’t just make some else feel awkward but I actually did something wrong, even if I don’t know what it is. I think feeling guilty is a real thing. We would all be a lot healthier and happier if we deal with our guilt. Smart psychology says the same thing.  

Still, that’s not what I’m saying today. That’s not what God is saying.  

I’m not saying forgive because we need to keep the peace. I do think forgiveness is good for reconciliation. We’ve got too many relationships that are characterized by unforgiveness. Let me five you three characteristics of relationships that are missing forgiveness: avoidance, coldness, irritability. We would have a lot stronger and more meaningful relationships if we practiced forgiveness. Again, psychology says the same.  

I’m saying more than that. God is saying more than that. We’re saying that you are not you and God is not God if you don’t forgive.  

I’ve told you before this example of the woman and her husband who felt guilty for the abortion they had. She said she had confessed her sins thousands of times and couldn’t get rid of it all.  

Some people would say to her, accept that you’re forgiven. You feel guilty because you just don’t accept that you really are forgiven. Jesus died for that sin too. Believe it. And that would be right.  

Other people would say, look, Jesus died to give you peace with God. Stop pushing that peace away. Trust it. That’s not what someone told her.  

This woman sat down with another woman named Rebecca and confessed her sin. Rebecca looked at her and said, “The sin that led to you taking that life was pride. And the sin that led to Jesus losing his life 2,000 years ago on the cross was also pride. And if you know enough to know that Jesus already paid for that sin 2,000 years ago, then you’ll know he can cover any sin.”   

In that moment, she realized she had been saying, my way is better. God couldn’t work this way. But if you accept that Jesus died to pay for you saying, “God can’t do it this way. My way is better”, then God can die for every other sin too and forgive every other sin.  

If you get that, that’s not a simple thing. You can’t just say, “Nice sermon” or “That’s inspiring”. You have to stop beating yourself up over the mistakes that you have made. And you have to take all of that energy and say, I’ve got one of the greatest gifts: forgiveness.” You have to praise him, just like that.