Sunday Sermon | The Gospel of Mark: Prepare the Way

The Gospel of Mark reveals Jesus as the long-awaited King who enters history with authority, power, and compassion. As we walk verse by verse through this fast-moving Gospel, we will see who Jesus truly is and what it means to follow Him as His disciples.

The world waited centuries for the promised Messiah. When He finally arrived, the message that prepared the way wasn’t power, politics, or prosperity—it was repentance.

In Pastor Jason Smith's sermon from Mark 1, we see how John the Baptist prepared hearts for the arrival of Jesus and why repentance is not condemnation but the doorway to restoration.

Key Takeaways

• The gospel is not advice—it is breaking news about a King.
• Repentance involves the mind, the heart, and the will.
• Sin is personal rebellion against God, but the gospel offers restoration.
• Repentance is not just the beginning of the Christian life—it is a lifelong pattern.
• God restores people who turn back to Him.

Scripture

Mark 1:1–8, 14–15

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Transcript

The King Who Changes Everything

SPEAKER_00 0:00

This story moves fast. No delay. No hesitation. The king has come. And everything changes. The sick are healed. The storms are silenced. And the crowds ask, Who is this? He is the king who serves. The one who suffers. The one who gives his life.

Prayer For Nation And Leaders

A Decade Of Waiting For Lily

Mark’s Opening And The Big Claim

Gospel Means World Changing News

Why Mark Writes Under Pressure

Prophets Foretold A Forerunner

John’s Message: Repent And Confess

What Repentance Really Requires

Sin, Shame, And The Path To Healing

Repentance As A Christian Pattern

Integrity That Matches The Message

Mark’s Second Chance And Restoration

Prepare Your Heart And Respond

Final Invitation And Next Steps

SPEAKER_01 0:37

Alright, good morning, church family. Turn with me in your Bibles to the Gospel of Mark. The Gospel of Mark. If you're a guest with us this morning, let me introduce myself. My name is Jason Smith. I'm the pastor here at First Baptist. And it is a tremendous honor and privilege to have us with you. If you do not have a Bible, there is a Bible in the Purec in front of you. You can take that Bible and you can keep it as a gift from us to you. We really want you to have a copy of God's Word, and so we want you to hold on to that. Alright, church family, before we jump into the sermon, I want to open our service this morning in a time of prayer for our nation, for who we are as a nation. I want us to pray specifically for our servicemen and women who are putting their lives on the line to serve and to liberate in Iran. And to I want you to think of the first responders that are here in the United States that are simultaneously putting themselves in harm's way. I want us to pray for our president and those making leadership decisions. And I want us to pray that our nation would have a heart of repentance. A heart of repentance. So let's go before the Lord in prayer. Heavenly Father, what a privilege it is to come before your throne in the name of Jesus. It is in his name we come as your sons and daughters. Father, we remember the servicemen and women who are serving us, protecting us, going to the ends of the earth, putting themselves in harm's way. Father, we pray that you would protect. We pray that you would give them strength and courage and even favor as they carry out their mission. Father, we know that the world is full of confusion, that kingdoms rise and fall, that there is evil, there is so much that is against your kingdom and your will. And so, Father, we pray that your will be done. Father, we pray that you would give our president and leaders wisdom that comes from you as they make decisions that affect millions of lives. Father, we pray always for the gospel to flourish and for the hope of your kingdom to be found, that your will would be done here on earth as it is in heaven. Father, we thank you for not only the servicemen and women who go to the ends of the earth, but also the first responders here in our country. As it seems like daily, there is situation after situation that rises up, that calls for immediate attention. And while everyone else is running out, we have brave men and women who are running in responding to these situations. Father, keep them safe and protect them. Give them a peace and a courage. And Father, we pray for our nation. We pray for the heart of our nation to see and to realize our desperate need for you. And for us to repent, to fall upon our knees and to cry out, asking for your mercy and your forgiveness because we have turned from you, because we have trusted in our own understanding, because we have we have called what you call evil, we have called it good. Father, forgive us and allow us to see our desperate need for you. We pray all of this in the name of Jesus. Amen. I remember it like it was yesterday. Lily's gender reveal party. So after seven years of infertility, one adoption, and one biological birth, we had our two boys. But now, ten years into marriage, we still didn't have a little girl. I can flash back to all the nights of waiting, the years of questioning God's plans, God's timing. Had we been forgotten? Lane, for more than a decade now, dreamed of putting bows in the hair of her little brown-eyed little girl. And well, you know how these things go. The family gathers together, everyone is holding their breath as they wait, and then it's finally revealed that we are having a baby girl. I literally did not believe the news until Lily was actually born. There were too many mistakes. My brother was supposed to be a girl. My parents only had a girl's name for him and then had to come up with something. So you know how those go, and you hear those stories, and I did not believe it until she was born. Now, from that point forward, from the gender reveal, waiting was much faster with hopeful expectation. Now imagine waiting not years but centuries. Israel had been waiting for the promised Messiah. Without word from a prophet, for 400 years. Empires came and went, generations lived and died. And it seemed like heaven was silent. And then Mark opens his gospel by saying, the wait is over, the Messiah is here. Listen as I read, Mark chapter 1, 1 through 8. But I'm also going to skip down and read verses 14 and 15. And the reason is because Mark's introduction to his gospel is 1 through 15, with 15 kind of being the climactic summary. But I can't preach all of that in one sermon, so I've divided it in half. And so you get the first half this week, the second half next week. Okay. The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. As it is written in the in Isaiah the prophet, behold, I send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way, the voice of one crying in the wilderness, make ready the way of the Lord, make his path straight. John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. And all the country of Judea was going out to him, and all the people of Jerusalem, and they were being baptized by him in the Jordan River, confessing their sins. John was clothed with camel's hair and wore a leather belt around his waist, and his diet was locusts and wild honey. He was preaching and saying, After me one is coming who is mightier than I, and I am not fit to stoop down and untie the throng of his sandals. I baptize you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit. Now skip down to verse 14. Now after John had been taken into custody, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of God and saying, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe in the gospel. Every once in a while, your regular TV programming or possibly your phone gets an interruption. Because breaking news, something has happened in the world that is so important that everything else must stop and it must have your attention. Now, in the first century, the word that Mark uses here, gospel, meant something like that. A world-changing announcement had come. But the good news of the gospel, right, as it was commonly used, it almost always announced the king's birth or even victory from war. In the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, or Jesus the Messiah, okay, that is a title. The Hebrew word Messiah means anointed or promised one. The Greek word is Christ. That's not Jesus' last name, okay? It's a title. The beginning of the gospel of Jesus the Christ, the Son of God. See, at the outset, in the most dramatic fashion, breaking news, Mark announces that God's King, God's Son has come. See, Christianity is not news of political power or military victory. It's not helpful advice or religious activity. The breaking good news is a person. Jesus, God's King, God's Son has entered in. Now, after Mark has grabbed our attention with these titles, we will have to learn throughout the duration of his book exactly what he means by these titles. But the invitation is there. Come and see what God has done. The most important news that you will ever hear, because he is here. He is finally here. Historically, known as John Mark, our author has a story in context of his own. Mark eventually became an indispensable leader in the early church, overcoming the embarrassment of abandoning Paul and Barnabas on their first missionary journey. He would prove that he was worthy of a second chance, and Mark would eventually become Peter's right-hand man, his trusted accomplice. Now, as Mark writes, that strength will be needed. Mark writes from Rome, where Peter has just been executed. And Nero has unleashed hell on earth upon the early church. You see, Nero is persecuting Christians, scapegoating them for his burning of Rome. And believers flee and they cower in fear. Mark's gospel is action-packed, showing his readers that Jesus is the one who speaks, he is the one who acts, and he is the one who identifies with those who are suffering. A hundred and fifty times Mark uses the historical present tense. Jesus comes, Jesus says, Jesus heals. Because Jesus is the God who breaks into history, and he is our ever-present help in time of need. Mark begins by quoting Isaiah chapter 40, verse 3, and Malachi 3:1. As it is written in Isaiah the prophet, Behold, I will send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way, the voice of one crying in the wilderness, make ready the way of the Lord, make his path straight. In the ancient world, announcements would be made that a king was going to come visit your village. And in anticipation of that coming, everyone would put on their best, right? You would prepare the road, especially, clear any obstacles, fix potholes, level the path, do your best for presentation of the king. Now, if your wife is anything like mine, there is a frantic running around the house once it is announced that anyone is coming over. Okay? We have to look our best. Now, the odd thing for me is that also occurs when there's an occasional cleaning lady that comes. Okay? We have to clean the house. We have to make this place look immaculate before the cleaning lady gets there. I'm probably in trouble for that. My apologies. Friend Isaiah is seven hundred years before Christ. And Malachi four hundred years before Christ. You see, this very moment has been planned and orchestrated by God from eternity past. And the moment in time has come. God keeps his word. His plan of redemption is ready to unfold. Mark tells us that John the Baptist is the long-awaited forerunner to the Messiah, the voice of one crying in the wilderness, the one who will spiritually prepare the hearts for the coming of the Lord. Read the account. Because the way is being prepared for the Lord himself. Now the scene is nothing like what you would expect. Sure, the imagery of preparing the road for the king, I get that. But John is out in the wilderness. And verse 6 tells us that John's a wild dude. I mean, camel's hair clothing and a locust diet. Now, no doubt he is a picture of Elijah, the promised prophet. But the focus is not on his appearance. John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. And all the country of Judea was coming out to him, and all the people of Jerusalem, and they were being baptized by him in the Jordan River, confessing their sins. Now recall what was so shocking about Jesus' birth, small town in Bethlehem, to peasants in obscurity, not in Jerusalem, not with royalty, and so to hear. Prepare the pathway of the Lord. And it's with the common folk. Very few religious leaders, farmers and laborers and soldiers and tax collectors, traveling out east in the arid desert and camping in the wilderness. You see, they have the same fears and hopes that you do. And their hearts are hungry to hear from God. There is excitement. Redemption is finally here. And what are they coming to hear? John was preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. See, in the most common language, giving practical examples, John calls them to repent. This is what it probably sounded like. Friends, we are proud and arrogant. Yeah, we hold to all the ritual laws, but our hearts are far from God. And where we do skimp, it's with our money. We do not love the vulnerable. We do not care for our brothers as God calls us to. Humble yourselves. Cry out for mercy. Repent from your sins. And the end of verse five tells us that each one that would come out would confess their sins publicly and then be baptized. Church, picture the scene because it is profound. They are humbling themselves. Now it's important we understand that repentance involves three parts. First, the mind. That you see rightly and agree with God about your sin. That you call it what it is, that it is wrong, that it is evil, and that it is rebellion. Even if your flesh likes it, your mind says that is against God. Our culture greatly struggles with that currently. Because we we say, but if my flesh likes it, it must be right. Instead of submitting to God's word. Secondly, the heart. Repentance is from the heart because it is grieving your separation from God. You feel sorrow, not just for the consequences, but because sin separates you from God Himself. When God confronted David's sin of adultery with Bathsheba and then having Uriah killed, God didn't confront David and say to him, How could you lust? And then how could you try and cover it up? No, God through Nathan said to David, Why have you despised me? Why have you despised me? See, God wanted David to know that sin is always personal to God. And number three, repentance is your will. Turning from sin, changing direction, making an about face, and then pursuing obedience with your will. Now let's get honest. Our culture avoids the concepts of sin and repentance like the plague. Instead of highlighting, instead, we highlight trauma and brokenness and personality flaws. Because that shifts the responsibility. Now hear me clearly. All of those may be legitimate factors, but the Bible insists that something deeper is wrong with us. That amidst all your mess, you have a personal choice. That sin is a personal act of rebellion against God Himself. Now to that, our culture says, why would you shame me like that? Don't you know if I admit my sin, I lose my worth? But the gospel says, you are more sinful than you dare to believe, yet more loved than you could ever imagine. Friend, it is not loving to ignore that which destroys you. You wouldn't be mad at a firefighter who awoke you from your sleep to tell you that your house is burning. And sin at its core is God your creator, saying, I designed you, I love you, and that thing that you love is destroying you. You can keep lusting after images, but that's like putting water in your gas tank. It's destroying you. You can keep craving stuff. That's like microwaving a metal spoon. It is destroying you. Imagine a doctor who runs tests and finds out that you have a cancerous tumor. Doctor number one says, You seem like a wonderful person. I don't really want to focus on the negative or have you be insulted by this conversation. And so he does nothing but send the patient home with encouragement. Now that may sound compassionate, but that is actually medical malpractice. But now imagine a second doctor who says the scans show a tumor. It's serious. And we need to act now and cut it out in order to save your life. You see, the news hurts, but it's the only pathway to healing. Friends, send works the same way. Repentance is the moment that you say, Yes. The diagnosis is true. But something in me is deeply wrong. And then the gospel says Christ did not just come to diagnose the problem, but he came to deal with it on the cross. Look with me at verse 15. Because Jesus preaches the exact same repentance as John. Jesus says, the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe in the gospel. In other words, repentance is not a message of a strange wilderness preacher. Repentance is the message of the king himself. But friend, the bad news about sin is actually the doorway to hope. Look forward with me into John's message of verse 8. I baptize you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit. Friend, God is calling you to himself. He wants to give you a new heart. He wants to put his Holy Spirit inside of you. He's not to shame you. He's calling you to life. He wants to call you his own. He wants his spirit to seal you for eternity. You see, repentance does not crush us. It would be crushing if God said, You are a sinner, now go and fix yourself. But he doesn't. He doesn't say that. He's accomplished righteousness. He's inviting us into his finished work as a gift. Therefore, it's actually liberating to say, I am a sinner, and I fall short of the glory of God. But Jesus Christ died for sinners, and he gives me his glory. Now, Christian, while I am here, I need to point out one additional thing. Many Christians assume that repentance is something that only happens at conversion, but that is simply untrue. The mature Christian repents as a pattern of life because he keeps his heart soft towards God and sensitive to the Holy Spirit. When you repent at conversion, you are accepted into the family of God. That act of repentance is once and for all. Hebrews 10, 14. But sin, even as a Christian, still separates you from God your Father. Separates you relationally. So while the Christian need not repent to get back in the family, he does need to repent to stay relationally close and to not grieve the Holy Spirit. Therefore, the sign of a mature Christian is a pattern of repentance. Okay? One who sees more sin in himself and is continually humbling himself before God. Finally, I want us to notice the way that John the Baptist models integrity as a servant of God. Integrity is when what we believe and say and how we live all match up. Right? In other words, John's life matched his message. He lived what he preached. Engineers talk about the integrity of a bridge. It means that it is structurally sound all the way through. Okay? All the way through. Because if one area is compromised, the whole bridge is compromised. That's the picture of character. And like it or not, Christian, our credibility with the lost world around us rises and falls based on our character. John preached a repentance away from worldliness, and he lived a simple life. When his popularity grew and he gained notoriety such that he could have influence that could easily corrupt, John stayed faithful to God's message. Repent, prepare. The Messiah is coming. And he displayed stunning humility. After me comes one who is mightier than I. And I am not fit to stoop down and to untie the throng of his sandals. In the ancient culture, the absolute lowest servant was the one who took off his master's sandals. Think about what John is saying. The absolute lowest servant. And John is saying, I'm not even worthy of that. In other words, John is saying, I'm not the point. I am simply a sign who points to Jesus. Beloved, we have to ask ourselves, do we have integrity in our speech? Do you keep your word? Are you truthful in your conversations? Do you have integrity in your private life? Your thoughts? What you look at on the internet? Those unseen decisions. Do you have integrity at work? Are you honest and diligent and reliable even when the boss is not around? Now, church, we must not mistake John's example for John's power. He has already told us, do not look to him, but he's pointing to Jesus. I baptize with water, but he will baptize with the Holy Spirit. Only Jesus, through the power of the Holy Spirit, can transform you. Okay? But that doesn't mean that we do not live up to godly expectation. If the Spirit of God is inside of you, should we not walk with integrity? As we close, I want us to think again about our author, John Mark, the man who wrote this gospel, because he knows something about repentance. Early in his life, he joined Paul and Barnabas on their first missionary journey. But somewhere along the way, we don't know exactly what happened, but Mark quit. He abandoned them. He went home. Later, when Barnabas wanted to give Mark a second chance, Paul said, absolutely not. And there was such a sharp dissension that they would split and go separate ways. Now I want you to imagine Mark's embarrassment. Imagine his regret. Imagine the thoughts and feelings about has God done with using me forever? Have I missed my chance to be used by God? But somewhere along the way, Mark repented. In his mind, emotion, and will, he repented. And God restored him. He became a trusted companion of Peter. Near the end of Paul's life, Paul wrote from a Roman prison: get Mark and bring him with you, for he is useful to me for ministry. The man who once quit is now the author of this gospel. And that's the beauty of repentance. Repentance is not the end of your story, it's the beginning of your restoration. So John the Baptist said, prepare the way of the Lord. Jesus said, repent and believe in the gospel. And the man who wrote this book will tell you, God is still restoring people who turn back to Him. So today, prepare your heart. Turn from your sin. Believe in the good news. Because the king has come. We pray with you. Heavenly Father. We bow our hearts before you. We say to your Holy Spirit, search me and know me. And see if there is any wicked way in me. Father, we trust you. That your spirit searches us not to shame us. But to bring us life. So that we will know you and walk with you and have fellowship with you. Father, right now across this room, I pray that hearts are being exposed and are finding freedom. As we have the courage and boldness to confess our sins to you, it is only at the foot of the cross that we find forgiveness. But it is only when we start with repentance. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Church family, the praise team comes to lead us in a time of response. I say this every week. I can never tell you how to respond. I can tell you you've heard God's word. And so I stand upon the authority of God's word. Whatever God's Spirit has said to you, be obedient and respond. Stop playing games. He's given all for you. Now it's your chance to respond. We have ministers down here at the front who would love to pray with you. If you want to use these steps as an altar to pour out your heart before the Lord, have the freedom to respond to the Spirit of God. Would you stand?