The Devotional - 119 - The Baptizer's Messge

Thought for the Day – 119 – The Baptizer's Message

Proverbs 22:3 – We may believe that prude and prudence have something in common, but it is not so; a prude is overly cautious and stands out like a fraud. Prudence on the other hand is like the military man, who sees the enemy and isolates himself until the right moment. So stop being a prude with the Word of God, the punishment can be deadly.

 

Comments and challenges

I think that John Mark was a hyper, a sort of over the top individual; in our medical minded world of Post Hole Diggers (PHD’s) we would brand Mark as A.D.D., or A.D.H.D. and write him off as “challenged” or someone who should ride the “short bus” to school. This cataloging or classifying of our young people today is a shame and most cases a sham simply because many secular parents have no clue about raising children and many doctors who have no children claim they have the “inside straight” on how too. Now don’t take that wrong, I was once a young secular parent; I had no clue who made larger than life mistakes too.

Mark wrote nearly twenty years after Matthew’s gospel, no doubt as he grew up that he had plenty of opportunity to read Matthew’s gospel as a commentary on the life of His Savior and as he compared the life of Jesus with the Scriptures of the Old Testament he begins seeing the connection that the prophets spoke of in the coming of Messiah. For me as I have studied in the truth of Jesus Christ the Son of the Living God; knowledge of Jesus did not come chronologically, I understand the chronological events, but I seldom write in any order.

Also, if you have a reference Bible, you might note the number of times Mark references the gospel of Matthew, but I will take this no further since I believe you get the point in that we sometimes swallow the camel without a “burp” and gag to the point of “up-chucking” over the gnat.

Mark says that John the baptizer came baptizing with a message of repentance; in the NKJV, the KJV and even the NIV state that the baptism is for the remission of sin. Now this is important so take a closer look. The rendering of these words are better translated “because of the remission of sin” not “for”. With God who lives in eternity where time does not exist, all things are completed actions; from Genesis to Revelation God has provided what “was” what “is” and what “is to come” only as the “fullness of time is experienced” do we in time see what God has already done.

How else could John the apostle who wrote his gospel just before his writing of Revelation; circa 85 A.D. say in his opening words. “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the SIN of the world” of course at this time John is at least 45 years beyond the death and resurrection of the LORD, but in a few years future he will be a witness and a writer of the these words of Jesus. “I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, says the LORD, which IS, and which WAS, and which is TO COME, the ALMIGHTY. Revelation 1:8

Mark is convinced, just as we should be CONVINCED that the baptism of John the baptizer was sufficient in the remission of sin. How else can it be said? “God hates sin in mankind and He dealt with it by removing IT. The only obstacle that stands between God and mankind is the evil condition of mankind’s heart which is UNBELIEF. Hebrews 3:7-19. Also we should note in the Book of Acts the testimony of the apostle Paul concerning a man named Apollos who only knew the baptism of John the baptizer. Acts 18:24-28.