Mark 1:9-15 is the Gospel text in the lectionary for February 21.
There is a new sheriff in town. Jesus came, baptized by John and identified by God as the Beloved. The yoke had been passed. Elijah had ushered in Messiah. It was a new beginning that provided new hope for a people who had struggled under, sat in the deep darkness of oppression under empire for generations.
Jesus was prepared for the mission ahead by going through His spiritual boot camp in the wilderness, tempted to make it about Himself instead of the mission and God's people. He emerged from that wilderness experience and went to work, even as John was taken out of the picture. There is no one else. It is Jesus.
And the first words of this one sent by God were Good News. In the first Gospel written, in the first chapter, the first words of the Messiah are, "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news."
Not "believe in me." He had emptied Himself of his glory in the wilderness through His trial by Satan. He was now all about the mission to save God's people from their oppression under empire, sin and death.
Believe in the Good News. Period.
And what is the Good News?
Glad you asked.
It is Agape Love and Grace. It is resistance to the evil values of empire. It is justice and the Shalom that comes when there is justice. It is therefore PEACE, not as the world gives, but Jesus' Peace - Shalom built on justice, equity and community.
At the center of EVERYTHING Jesus taught, commanded and modeled for His followers is the living of Agape Love (active commitment on behalf of the other, even stranger and enemy and especially the most vulnerable among us) and Grace (undeserved loving mercy) toward the Shalom (completeness, wholeness and well-being) of ALL PEOPLE.
This IS the Good News! God commands us to live this with one another. It is a different way, a better way, this Jesus' Way. It brings peace within and among. It is not solely about personal salvation, but about saving lives here and now, in THIS PART of God's Kingdom, which has come near. God's Kingdom come and God's Will being done on earth as in heaven. It is Good News of liberation from the oppression of systems built on greed, hatred, lust for power and desire for personal status above others, which are at the core of empire.
Believe in the Good News that you are about to read or hear read to you.
Believe in the Good News of what it means to be people of God, together in loving, Shalom community.
Believe in the Good News that turns the worldly systems of oppression on their head.
Repent (change your thinking and direction).
Believe instead in the Good News of Jesus' Agape Love and Grace.
This was Jesus' mission, built on Agape and Grace, embodied in selfless sacrifice for others and fulfilled in the ultimate act of Agape and Grace on the Cross.
Jesus' Way is to be OUR Way.
Believe in the Good News. Apply what Jesus taught, commanded and modeled for us to your life. Live it.
Do you want to be faithful to God? Here's how, folks... (see the Words and Actions of Jesus, as we have witness in the Gospels).
THAT is God's Way for us.
Pastor Jamie
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