Remain standing for the reading of the Word of God. Open your Bibles in the Gospel of Mark, chapter one, verses one through eight. Gospel of Mark, chapter one, verses one through eight. Give heed now to the reading of the holy and inerrant Word of God. The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, As it is written in the prophets, Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee. The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. John did baptize in the wilderness and preach the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins. And there went out unto him all the land of Judea and day of Jerusalem, and were all baptized of him in the river of Jordan, confessing their sins. And John was clothed with camel's hair, and with a girdle of a skin about his loins, and he did eat locusts and wild honey, and preached, saying, There comes one mightier than I after me, that leech of whose shoes I am not worthy to step down and lose. I indeed have baptized you with water, but he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost. Let us pray together. Almighty God and our almighty savior, our great king, the one that that lives above, that is seated in your throne of glory, that is worshiped by caribbeans and seraphins continually. We approach you now, great God and our father, praying that you would bless us. That we bless us now, Lord, when we come to to listen to you through your word, father, remove the blindfold of our eyes so that we can see the preciousness. Of your law, made a prisoner of your word, father, bring sinners to repentance, may bring encouragement to sinners heart made point us to Christ, our savior and our redeemer. In His name, Father, we pray. Amen. Please be seated. How good are you in keeping your promises? I bet that as the semester began, you have made up a schedule. and you set up specific hours to study, and you made sure that every single day you were going to read four chapters a day from your systematic theology, and you're gonna read two chapters a day from your New Testament introduction book, and you set up so perfectly your schedule, are you keeping up with it? Maybe you're already behind. Sometimes we're really not good on keeping our promises, are we? Or maybe you have just moved into town and you said, you promised your wife, said, honey, I will not get so involved with studies to the point that I'm gonna, that I'm not gonna pay attention to you. On the contrary, every Saturday, I will put my books aside and every morning we'll go to a nice park, a different park in Michigan, in Grand Rapids. And this is probably your second, third month here and your wife didn't see a single park yet. Or maybe you promised something to your kid. You that are fathers, parents, maybe you have a little child or a little girl, and you promise, no, no, look, honey, I promise I'll take you for some ice cream by the end of the week. And the end of the week came, and you were so full of things to do, have papers to write, and have jobs to do, and here comes your little kid, your little child says, Dad, come on, let's have that ice cream. Oh, honey, I'm sorry, but I can't do it. And then you listen. But you promised. Promises are really part of our lives. But our experiences with promises are not very positive sometimes. But when we come to the Gospel of Mark, Mark introduces this great gospel, this great narrative of the love of our Lord Jesus Christ, beginning with a promise and beginning with one that fulfill and is always faithful to his promises. In fact, as we approach this text, this is what we learn from it. We learn that God is faithful to his promises, no matter how long it takes to fulfill them. Christian, God is faithful to his promises. He's faithful to his promises in history, and he's faithful to his promises personally to you, no matter how long he takes to fulfill them. We are going to consider this text under three headings. The first one is remembering an old promise. The second one is fulfilling an old promise. The third one is expecting a better future. Remembering an old promise, fulfilling an old promise, expecting a better promise. As we began and we read the first three verses of Mark, we see that He quickly sets out what is his purpose with this text. He tells us clearly what is his goal. And he says in verse 1, The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. This is why I'm writing this text, says Mark. I'm writing this text to tell you about the gospel of Jesus Christ. This is my purpose. The good news is the purpose why I'm writing this. And look at this, this is extremely important. As we refer to the gospel, we frequently tend to narrow down the gospel to the cross, don't we? We talk about the gospel and it says, well, the gospel is the good news of Jesus Christ who died to save sinners. But here, Mark is saying, well, this is the beginning of the gospel. The gospel starts here. The gospel is not only restricted to the death of our Lord Jesus Christ or to his resurrection. It involves old promises. It involves the fulfillment of promises. It involves the birth of the Messiah, the incarnation of the Son of God. It involves as well his life, his suffered life among sinners. It involves all the persecution that he suffered, the opposition that he suffered. It involves his miracles. It involves His love and compassion for sinners. And then it does involve His passion, His death, His resurrection, and His ever-abiding presence with His church. So the gospel of Christ, Christian, is the whole gospel. It's the whole gospel according to Mark. This is just the beginning. But the whole book is the gospel. And where does it begin? It begins at the Old Testament. It begins back in the Prophets. That's what it says. As it is written, as you read in verse 2, as it is written in the Prophets, the gospel begins there. Hey, you want to know about the good news of salvation? Go to the Old Testament. You want to know about this great Messiah, this great Christ that is God incarnate, that is Yahweh promised in the midst of His people, that is the great Emmanuel? Look at the Prophets. Look at the Old Testament. What do they say? And he starts pointing back to the Old Testament, remembering first of the promise written in the book of Malachi. Malachi 3.1 is the passage that he first cites here in verse 2, when we read, And then he quotes Isaiah. In verse 3, the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. You see, the promise of Malachi tells about one that would come to prepare the way of the Lord. And it's interesting when you read Malachi 3.1, this one that is preparing is a messenger that is preparing the way of the Lord. He's preparing the way of Yahweh, who is the covenantal Lord. And when we go to Isaiah, the pathway that is being opened and is being prepared is for Yahweh Himself. You see, when we look back, especially in Isaiah, it is not a general Lord, a mighty ruler that is coming. But it's the tetragram, it's the Hebrew tetragram that is present in the prophecy of Isaiah. It is the covenantal God that is coming, Himself is coming to the midst of His people to deliver them from His enemies, to abide with them completely and forever. This is who is coming. And then there is this messenger, the prophecy says, that is preparing the way of Yahweh, removing all obstacles, removing all hindrances, all barriers, everything that would stand in the way of the one that would come, this messenger is doing this work. And, Mr. Christian, as we look at these three very first verses, and we realize that the beginning of the gospel is in the Old Testament, Seminary students who are preparing yourselves to be teachers and pastors of future congregations. Oh may this text Elevate your love for the Old Testament scriptures You see it's very common in our days to regard the Old Testament as well. This is just for the Jews This is just for Israel There is nothing relevant in the Old Testament for us That's not Mark's position That's not what the Holy Spirit is telling us here. On the contrary, it is telling us you want to know about the good news, go back to the Old Testament. And therefore, you Christians, you as those who are preparing for the ministry, may you as well look for Christ in the Old Testament. May you prepare sermons that would point your congregations to Christ in the Old Testament, that would elevate their love for the Old Testament scriptures. But not only that, as you consider, this old promise that is being remembered, may you be motivated to look at the great sovereignty of God in controlling history, in governing all things according to His will. You see, Mark says, you want to know about the gospel, you want to know about the good news, go back and look to the prophets. But what is the promise in the prophets? That in some point in history, God will intervene. God will do something. God will send a messenger according to His will, controlling history, sovereign ruling over all things. He is the one who makes promises and fulfill promises. He's the one that controls time, that control histories, that set up governments and take them down. He's the one that can make promises and fulfill them because he sovereignly rule over all things. I remember as soon as I moved here from South Carolina, we spent, me and my wife, we spent just 12 or 14 days here. We organized our apartment and then we flew back to Brazil. And the morning that we flew back, we were supposed to drive two hours to Detroit. we're supposed to wake up at 5 a.m. and we woke up at 6 p.m. 6 a.m. sorry no 6 p.m. that would be that would be a lost cause but we woke up one hour late so we were very busy we're very we're trying to speed up and and then we caught our car and we drove and it was a rented car and as we arrived there if you have been already to the Detroit Airport are there are two terminals there's one that that Certain airlines go there, and they work there, and there are other ones where other airlines go there. And they're very far from each other. You need to take a shuttle to go from one to the other. And therefore, so we arrived and said, honey, are you sure that this is the terminal? Yes, yes, yes, I'm absolutely sure. Say, OK, great, great. So we arrived there, and I parked the car. I removed the luggage. I left her in the line. And then I took the rental car back to the rental store. And I took the shuttle from the rental store, went back. Everything very rushed. And as I arrived there, I said, OK, now we're all settled. We're great, huh? I said, no, we're not. I said, what's going on? We're in the wrong terminal. I can't really remember. many times that I have been unkind to my wife, but that was one day. That was very unkind to her. I know Brazilians can be really quick to point out, but this is your fault. And then, very upset, we have to move the luggage, get the shuttle, go to the other thing, go to the other place, terminal, and as we arrived there, we lost our flight. And here I am, complaining again, and just being unkind to my wife. No, this is your fault. We lost the plane. We lost the flight. Now we're not going to Brazil. Oh, it's going to cost tons of dollars to buy different tickets. And just making a long story short, everything was sorted out. We caught a different flight, and we arrived to New York in time. We caught the flight from New York to Brazil, and everything sorted out. And as my wife was patiently bearing with my complaints, I just couldn't help to start sobbing when everything was sorted out. I just remembered how little Calvinistic I was being in my behavior. How little I was trusting God's sovereignty. Even if you have lost a plane, that's God's sovereignty. That's God's rule and control over all things. And you see, Christian, as we come to this passage and we see Mark remembering all the promises, we are also glad to remember that God made all the promises and fulfilled them because he's the one that sovereignly rules over history. He sovereignly rules over your life. Even when things go wrong, even when things do not go when you have planned them to do, God is controlling all things for his glory and for the good of those who love him and who treasure him. As we go back here to the narrative, verses four and five tells us about the fulfillment of the old promise. We saw about the remembering of Old Promises in verses 1-3, and in verses 4-5, we see the fulfillment of Old Promises. There was this promise of the great messenger that would come. In verse 4, Mark quickly goes and says, John came. John did baptize in the wilderness and preached the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins. Basically, what Mark is saying is, the messenger came. The master that Malachi was prophesying, the master that Isaiah was prophesying, he came. The promise that I just remembered you about has been fulfilled. Mark identifies this prophecy as being fulfilled with John the Baptist. Not only that, remember, if there is no message, there is a message to be proclaimed. And here again, we see in verse four that he came proclaiming a message. John baptized in the wilderness and preached, this is the Greek verb keruso, He was proclaiming out loud the baptism of repentance for the remissions of sins. He's preaching a message of complete transformation. He's preaching a message of radical change. This is what the word repentance, metanoia, means. It's a complete reversal of life. But you see, as we see this discontinuity between the Old Testament and the New Testament, there is a little bit of discontinuity as well. As Mark is going out and preaching, he's calling all Jews. You see, there's people from Judea in verse 5. You see, Judea and Jerusalem, which is the bigger region and the smaller region, they're all coming to be baptized. But you see, the message of repentance into Jewish culture Everybody knew they had to repent. Everybody was very acquainted with the sacrificial system. And right after the Babylonian captivity, without the temple, Jews, rabbis already started making different ways for you to be forgiven. Not offering sacrifices, but giving alms and praying to God. But that a Jew should be washed by water, that's new. That's discontinuity. You see, actually, this is what a Gentile needs to do to become a Jew. Yes, to become a Jew, a Gentile, someone that is born outside of the tree of Israel, that has no genetical relationship with Israel, they would come, and they would confess their sins, and then they would be washed in water. But see, John the Baptist is calling everyone You Jew, you Gentile, all of you need repentance. All of you need to be baptized. There is a disruption. There is a discontinuity. The old covenant is gone. All of you need to be baptized and repent of your sins. That's the message. All needs to be watched. Both Jews and Gentiles. And as we come to the end of verse 5, we see that the message is efficacious. You have your We have here an unlikely preacher, preaching in an unlikely environment in the desert, preaching to an unlikely crowd, the Jews who never believed they should be baptized for remission of sins. They are all drooling. They're all listening. They're all coming. And you see, all were coming to Him. Those who dwell in Judea and Jerusalem, they were coming to Him, and they were truly being baptized. And as we read, at the end of verse 5, they were confessing their sins. The message of John, the ministry of John the Baptist, was efficacious. The message was proclaimed, and the message was efficacious. And you see, brethren, as you study here, especially It's a blessing, isn't it? When I was in Granville, I was to pass down eight different churches until I get to my church. And they're all good churches, all faithful churches, Baptist Reformed, different Presbyterians. And sometimes we feel, well, I'm not sure if I want to go back to my country. I feel sometimes this way. I know what I'm going to face there. I know I'm going to go back there and I'll be ostracized. I'll be ridiculized. I'll face opposition. I don't want to go back there. But you see, this morning the Holy Spirit reminds us through the holy and inerrant Word of God that the message of the Gospel is efficacious to save sinners. We don't need to appeal to PowerPoint presentations, to theaters, or to choirs. We don't need to appeal to anything. The message of the Gospel is powerful in itself. We don't need any other artifice. We don't need any other tools except the power of the Gospel. As John the Baptist was preaching, the more unlikely the crowd was. The gospel was like a hammer in the hands of the Holy Spirit, and He was shattering all doubt and all ostracism. Therefore be encouraged, be encouraged to return to wherever you come from, to preach this gospel, to be the John the Baptist among your people, among your country, to preach precisely the gospel of Jesus Christ, to preach baptism for the remission of sins. This message is powerful. This message is efficacious. Just as it was for John the Baptist, it is still efficacious today. But not only that. As we see in verses 4 and 5, God fulfilling His promise. We can also be assured that He continues to fulfill His promise. We can trust and rely on the faithfulness of our great God. If He Himself kept a promise alive for 400 years, the promise of the return of our Lord Jesus Christ would certainly be fulfilled, no matter how long it takes. God is faithful to keep His promises, no matter how long it takes to fulfill them, but He will fulfill them. Amen. And therefore, we can take courage in that. We can take great courage in that as we face the problems of our day, as we face the difficult situations in our soul, the sin that so darkly tries to destroy us. We can trust in the promise of God to sanctify us in His Holy Spirit. As we feel alone, and really all alone amongst multitudes, we can trust in the promise of Emmanuel, of the eternal presence of Christ among His people. as we are saddened, and as we cry on different situations that really oppress our soul, we can trust on the promise of redemption that our Savior gives us. See, there are several promises in the Scripture, but most of all, we can be assured that Christ will fulfill the promise of His return. Judgment Day will come. The restoration of all things will come. Because God fulfilled His promise in Christ, we can be sure of His faithfulness, and that He will keep fulfilling His promises for healthy nations. As we come to the end of the passage, verses 6-8, we see that the original readers should be, based on this promise, expecting a better promise. Mark remembered them of an old promise, told them about the fulfillment of an old promise, and now it tells him about the expectation of a better promise. And as we read in verse six, it's really interesting that Mark spends a whole verse with a description of John the Baptist, isn't it? He describes him with quite detail. And we read, and John was clothed with camel's hair, and with a girdle of a skin above his loins. And he did eat locusts and wild honey. As we look again back to Malachi, initially Malachi chapter 3 verse 1 was this promise is cited here, a recite, a remembering. But as we come to the end of Malachi, Malachi 4 verse 5, Malachi ends with expectation of the return of Elijah. Mark is saying here with this description, John the Baptist, is that Elijah? He's trying to make that bridge. That's why he spends so much time, in verse 6, he dedicates a verse to describe John the Baptist. Now, why can we be sure that this is Elijah? First one, first thing, in 2 Kings 1, verse 8, we see that John the Baptist is clothed in the same way as Elijah was. In 2 Kings 1-8, we see that these are exactly the clothing of Elijah. He was clothing with camel's hair and a girdle. Not only that, John the Baptist also eats very similarly to Elijah. Not the same diet, but both of them depend on God's provision. In 1 Kings 17, verse 4, we read that Elijah should trust on God to provide for him. And he was not supposed to go outside and go into the cities to buy groceries and go to the local Walmart and do whatever groceries he needed to. He was to trust in God's providence. God would feed him through ravens and through his goodness to Elijah. And in the same way, here, John the Baptist is not being fed by ravens, but he is eating from the providence of God. He's eating from whatever he finds. He's eating lotus and wild honey. John the Baptist is the New Testament Elijah. He's the fulfillment of Malachi's prophecy. But you see, no matter how Elijah was regarded as a great prophet in the Old Testament, and no matter how important is this bridge of Elijah now coming in the New Testament context, we are to expect a higher one, a one person that is even higher than Elijah. This is a powerful illustration. As we come to the New Testament context, you see, Mark just described, or John the Baptist with his statement, just described the service of a slave. Yes, a slave was the one in New Testament historical context that would stoop down and untie the sandals of his master. And if you do remember a little bit of New Testament history and the New Testament context, streets in those days were not very clean. They were very dirty. And as the master would arrive in the house with his shoes and his sandals, all messed up with dirt and mud and whatever you can imagine that was in the street, it was the work of the servant, of the slave, to go there, to untie those shoes, those sandals, and wash them and take care of them. But Joseph the Baptist says, I can't be this one's slave. You know, this is the worst work in all society right now in New Testament context, but even this lower position, I, before this one, this mightier one that has come, I cannot do this job. I am unworthy to do it. He, John the Baptist, traces this antithesis between him and the one that is supposed to be expected. This one has a most excellent character, says John the Baptist, that I am not worthy. to come even close to Him. Not only that, He has a most excellent work. He has a most excellent character, and He also has a most excellent work. And we read this in verse 8, I indeed have baptized you with water, but He shall baptize you with the Holy Spirit. And you see, John the Baptist here is not removing any honor or any authority from his ministry. He is the New Testament Elijah. He's the one prophesied by God. His ministry does have relevance, but it's just a shadow. The washing of water is just a shadow of the washing of the spirit that this mightier one was going to bring. Yes, I am the New Testament Elijah, says John the Baptist, but you are to expect a better the higher one that is to come. You see, Christian, as we come to the end of this pericope, apparently to love and has this high regard for Christ, just as John the Baptist did. Do you have a high regard for Christ? Do you have a high view of Christ? Do you consider that when you compare yourself to Him, when you look at Him, are you constrained? taken by His holiness, by His beauty, by His grace and mercy towards you? Is He the first thing in your life? Is He the one that controls your heart, your soul, your mind, your thoughts, your plans? Are your life and all your plans dedicated to this great and mighty Savior? Do you have this high view and high regard of Christ? Well, Jonah Baptist did. But you see, not only that, as this people that was listening to the preaching of John the Baptist, as they were expecting, expecting this better promise to come, we don't need to expect the better promise to come anymore, do we? As we are confronted with this text this morning, we are sure that this Christ has come, that He has already been baptized. then the Holy Spirit already came upon him in the presence of thousands of people. That he lived a suffered life. He suffered and he died and he resurrected on the third day and he's present in this church even now. That's what he said at the end of the Gospel of Matthew. And behold, I am with you always until the end of the ages. You see, we are in a higher position. We have this ready in our hearts and in our tongues and in our throats to cast this message upon the masses, to cast this message upon our neighbors, upon our unconverted parents and friends and relatives. This is the good news of the Gospel, the whole Gospel, as Mark said. And it has already been fulfilled. He encouraged that the promise has already been fulfilled in the same way it made great effect in the time when John the Baptist was preaching. It is the same way powerful to convert and transform souls today. God is faithful to his promise as a Christian, no matter how long it takes to fulfill it. As we consider the fulfillment of prophecy, There is probably no better place in the Bible to go back than to Samson. Samson was not really a good promise keeper, was he? As an Ezraite, he was not supposed to touch dead bodies. Not very successful in keeping that one. He was not supposed to drink strong drinks, drink wine or alcoholic beverages. Not very successful in doing that as well. promises that Samson was not faithful to keep. Nevertheless, in his very last day, in spite of all his unfaithfulness, God was faithful to him. In that very last day, when he was tied up, when he was changed as two great columns, as two great pillars, as Samson repented, as he cried out to the Lord, Lord be faithful with me even in my unfaithfulness. That's what He receives. He receives the faithfulness of God. And He still does His work for the glory of God. Because God is faithful to His promises. No matter how long it takes to fulfill it. May you be encouraged by it. May you desire to preach it every day of your life. Trusting in the faithfulness of this God to keep His promises. Always looking for the great promise that awaits us. the return of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. The glory be to Him forever and ever. Let us pray. Our great God, what a blessing it is to be reminded today that You are the One who fulfilled promises. That in spite of all our unfaithfulness, Lord, You are the One who controls history. You are the sovereign ruler. Not only that, Lord, You are the One that is faithful to fulfill Your promises. And you have given us a better and most excellent promise, our Lord Jesus Christ. O Lord, as we go and continue our studies, may us be encouraged by this reality, that you are faithful to His promises, that the power of the gospel is eternal, and that the same way you impact people in the past, you continue to impact and transform all generations, all those who come to you in true repentance, confessing their sins. Encourage Oswald to boldly preach this message, trusting in its power, wherever we go, wherever we are.