Our text this morning is going to be Mark 1:14-15. It’s another very short text. At this rate, we will finish the book of Mark sometime before Noah finishes high school, but I don’t want to rush through this book, especially this introductory stuff.

Let’s read those verses:

”Now after that John was put in prison, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God, and saying, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand: repent ye, and believe the gospel.”

Jesus was a preacher. In fact, He was the greatest preacher who ever lived. He was a greater preacher than John the Baptist, than Elijah, than Jeremiah, or Isaiah. He was a greater preacher than John Wesley, Charles Spurgeon, George Whitfield, Billy Sunday.

I remember my first sermon. I was 17. I had just answered the call to preach. My youth pastor had me preach in our youth group on a Wednesday night—about 30 of my peers. I guarantee you, if you could be a fly on the wall, it would have been the most pitiful thing you ever saw.

I remember standing behind that podium and having absolutely no idea what to say, stumbling and mumbling through some notes. It felt like it took FOREVER. It actually lasted 60 seconds.

Pastor Sexton down at Crown College and Temple Baptist Church is one of the greatest preachers I’ve ever known. God’s used him a lot. His first ever sermon was on the radio. He was 16. Someone made a tape. He was kind enough to send that tape to a bunch of us preachers. It was unbelievably pitiful. He mumbled and repeated himself and said the most obvious things over and over. To me, that’s encouraging. You can always improve.

Golfers have this joke where they will say, “Good news! There is only two things wrong with your golf game: distance and accuracy.” Sometimes I think, “Good news! There are only two things wrong with my preaching: content and delivery.” I think, “If I could just get those two things down.”

Most preachers have to work at it. We have to work on improvement. It takes a while to “get it.”

Jesus “got it” right away. Jesus’ first sermons weren’t pitiful. They were awesome. There was no YouTube when Jesus was alive, so we can’t analyze His delivery, but we know that people were awed. Look at verse 22:

”And they were astonished at his doctrine: for he taught them as one that had authority, and not as the scribes.”

There are very few preachers who I’ve listened to who have left me “astonished.” I can think of only a few, but I guarantee that if you were to put them up against Jesus, they would look like stammering and bumbling idiots.

But I don’t want to talk about Jesus’ delivery this morning, I want to talk about His content, because our text does something awesome for us: It summarizes the message of Jesus.

Look at the text again. It’s only two verses. It won’t hurt us to read it again.

”Now after that John was put in prison, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God, and saying, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand: repent ye, and believe the gospel.”

Based on verse 15, I think Jesus’ message could be summarized as three things, and I think those three things are three things that still need to be preached today.

Let’s pray and we’ll jump right into this passage.

Like I said, I think Jesus’ message had three parts, and they are three parts we all need today.

The first part is...

1. Listen

Look at the text again, notice some of these phrases:

• ”the gospel of the kingdom of God”
• ”the time is fulfilled”
• ”the kingdom of God is at hand.”

The word “gospel” means “good news.” It’s something to be proclaimed. If you can imagine living before the age of television or the internet, and even before the age of the printing press, then imagine your country is at war. How would you know if they won? How would you know who won an election? How would you know when the king died? Someone would have to stand in the streets and proclaim the news.

That’s what the word “gospel” means. It’s good news. When that crier was shouting the good news, everyone would stop what they were doing to listen. “Hush, I want to hear this. This is important.”

Jesus wanted them to know that his message was an important message, and that it was urgent. Jesus was saying, “Something big is coming. The time is now. You had better listen up, and you had better get ready.”

Specifically, what Jesus told them was that “the kingdom of God” was coming.

So let’s stop here and ask an important question: what was the Kingdom of God?

I’ve been reading the prophets in my devotions lately, and there were a lot of prophecies about God restoring Israel. Remember that during Jesus’ day, the Jews were living in the land here, but they are a fractured, conquered people. They are under the heavy hand of the Romans.

But I don’t think the primary thing Jesus was talking about here was a restoration of Jewish government. I don’t think that’s what most of the Old Testament prophecies were about anyways. I think there was a spiritual emphasis to this that they completely missed.

Let’s look at a couple of passages this morning. Turn to Ezekiel 36:24-27.

”Ezekiel 36:24-27 (KJV) 24 For I will take you from among the heathen, and gather you out of all countries, and will bring you into your own land. 25 Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean: from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse you. 26 A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do [them].”

Notice the spiritual emphasis there. It has a lot more to do with the heart of the people and their relationship with God than it does with kings, kingdoms, and land.

Look at Jeremiah 24:7.

”And I will give them an heart to know me, that I [am] the LORD: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God: for they shall return unto me with their whole heart.”

Look at chapter 31:33.

”But this [shall be] the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people.”

God promised a restoration of the kingdom to the Jews, but He promised much, much more than that. He promised a new heart; He promised a new spirit; He promised a restoration of their relationship; He promised that they would finally be His people indeed and not just in name.

There were lots of preachers in Jesus’ day who were talking about politics and kingdoms, but I don’t think that was ever the thrust of Jesus message. I do think if the Jews hadn’t rejected Jesus, He may have setup his kingdom then, but I don’t think that was the thrust of Jesus’ message. I think Jesus was telling people that they could be right with God, and that they could see these spiritual promises fulfilled in Him.

What was the good news?

• The good news was they could have a relationship with God.
• The good news was they didn’t have to keep living in sin.
• The good news is that God wanted to help them and to make them a part of His people. God wasn’t just going to slap a band-aid on them. He was going to give them new hearts.

Listen, folks. Today, 2000 years later, Jesus is still saying the same thing to us: “Listen up. Hear this. I’m offering you a new heart. I’m offering you a new way of living. I’m offering to be your God. You don’t have to live separated from me anymore. There doesn’t have to be this rift in our relationship. I’ve got good news: I’ve made a way for us to be reconciled. I can be your God, and you can be a part of my people.”

God can give you a new start and a new heart through Jesus. That’s good news, but you have to hear it. You have to put down your Facebook, turn off your Fox News or CNN, and stop worrying about the baseball game next weekend or the test next week. You have to turn the noise off and listen.

So the first part of Jesus’ message was, “Listen.” Listen: the kingdom of God is at hand. I’ve got good news. Hear it. Listen.

The second part of Jesus message was:

2. Think

Look at what Jesus says in verse 15 again:

”The time is fulfilled, the kingdom of God is at hand: repent ye.”

Jesus said, “Listen,” and then He said, “Repent.”

Now, there is a lot of confusion about this word “repent.” The Catholic Church took this word over the years and they made it mean “to be sorry for.” They added an emotional element to the word, but that’s not what Jesus was saying here. The word “repent” just means “change your mind” or “think again.”

In Greek, the word “repent” here is “metanoāō.” “Meta” means “change” like “metamorphosis.” And “noāō” means “think” or “your thinking.” So what this is literally saying is, “Change your thinking,” “Change your mind,” or “Rethink some things.”

When Jesus says, “Repent ye,” He isn’t telling you to have some emotional experience where you blabber and cry and feel really, really bad about yourself. He’s telling you to rethink some things. He’s telling you to take a long, hard look at your life and how you are living, and rethink some things.

Here are some things you need to rethink:

You need to rethink your relationship with God.

A lot of people assume that they are right with God. They assume that “it’s all good with the man upstairs,” or they assume that they are Christians just because of their culture or because of their heritage.

But that’s not what the Bible teaches us at all. The Bible teaches us that we are all sinners. The Bible teaches us that we are all God’s enemies, and that there is this rift in our relationship with God.

The Bible says in Romans 8:7, ”The carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can it be.”

Not only are you not “alright with the man upstairs,” but you can’t possibly be “alright with the man upstairs” unless you trust Christ as your Savior, because God requires perfection, and you can’t possibly do it.

You need to rethink your relationship with sin.

The reason why no one is right with God is because God demands perfection. God is 100% holy. God cannot have sin in his presence, and every one of us is, by nature, a sinner.

Sin is anything we say, do or think that displeases God. We can start with the Ten Commandments. The one everyone goes to first is murder. Okay, I’ll give you that one, but can you honestly say you’ve never lied? Can you honestly say you’ve never taken anything that doesn’t belong to you?

You know one of the Ten Commandments is coveting what belongs to someone else. Can you honestly say you’ve never driven by the country club or seen some nice car and thought, “Why do they get that and not me?”

And those are the easy ones. The first of the Ten Commandments says, “Thou shalt have no other gods before me.”

We are all sinners. We all—if we are honest with ourselves—fail at God’s standards all the time. We are sinners.

The Bible says, ”For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.”

You are a sinner. Your sin must be punished by a Holy God.

The third thing you must re-think is...

You need to rethink your relationship with your own works.

Most people will admit that there is a God, and they will say they believe in heaven and hell, but if you ask most people if they are going to heaven, almost all of them will say, “Yes.” Then if you ask them why, almost all of them will say the same thing again: “I’m a pretty good person.”

Most people think that the way to get to heaven is to be a good person—To do more good works than bad works, and to try to keep the Ten Commandments. And most people, if you give them this test, think they are passing it.

The Bible has something else to say. The same verse that says, “For all have sinned” also says, “and come short.”

No matter who you are, you aren’t going to be good enough to satisfy God’s demands. You are going to come short.

I’ll use an illustration I’ve used many times before. Imagine that you, me, and the world champion long jumper are going to try to jump across the Grand Canyon. I go first. I set up and run my hardest. I’m ready to give my very best jump, but I stumble on a rock at the edge and just sort of trip right into the Grand Canyon. Then you go. You set up. You run hard. You do your best jump ever. You jump 40 feet. That’s like jumping from this platform to the back wall. That’s amazing. The world champion goes last, he sets up and runs and jumps. It’s an amazing jump. 80 feet. He shatters the world record.

But here is the thing: It doesn’t matter if you jump 1 foot, 40 feet, or 80 feet because the Grand Canyon is over a mile across, and all of us are dead. All of us failed.

You aren’t going to be able to save yourself by works. You might be an amazingly good person, but you aren’t sinlessly perfect. You might be above average or you might be a derelict. It doesn’t matter. God’s standard is sinless perfection. It’s a perfect 100 or it’s failure. You don’t get in with a B+.

The Bible is so crystal clear about this. Whole books of the Bible were written about this one point. Galatians 2:16 says:

”...by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.”

Romans 3:19-20 says this:

”19 Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. 20 Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law [is] the knowledge of sin.”

So to review, you need to understand some things, to rethink some things:

• You are not good in God’s eyes by default. There is a rift there, and that rift is caused because
• You are a sinner in the eyes of a Holy God.
• No matter how hard you try, you can’t save yourself. You can’t do enough good works to save yourself.

Listen - God wants to give you a new heart and a new start. Think - You are a sinner before God now who can’t save himself.

Look at the third part of Jesus’ message...

3. Believe

Jesus said in our text:

”The time is at hand: repent ye, and believe the gospel.”

Like I said, the word “gospel” means “good news.” Jesus was saying, “Believe the good news.”

I don’t think the people Jesus was preaching to totally understood the good news. They couldn’t see the whole picture yet, but we know what Jesus was ultimately referring to here. The Bible tells us exactly what the gospel or the good news is. Turn with me to 1 Corinthians 15.

Look at verse 1:

”For I delivered unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand: by which also ye are saved.”

So Paul is talking about the gospel; the gospel that you have to receive and believe; the gospel that saves you. What is it?

Look at verse 3:

”For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; and that the was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures.”

That is the gospel. Jesus died for your sins. Jesus was buried, and He rose again.

It’s very, very simple really. Mankind has rejected God and chosen sin. All of us are sinners. God’s standard for heaven and a relationship with Him is sinless perfection. No one can do that.

You need a 100, and no one gets a 100.

So Jesus did it for you. Jesus took your punishment on the cross. He lived the sinless and perfect life you couldn’t, and then was punished for your sins by a holy God on the cross. Then he was buried and rose again in victory.

That’s the gospel, and God’s one requirement is that you believe it—that you put your faith and trust in it.

You have to let Jesus take the test for you, and you have to trust in what Jesus has done. It’s so simple.

?
He paid a debt He did not owe 
I owed a debt I could not pay 
I needed someone to wash my sins away 
And now I sing a brand new song 
Amazing Grace 
Christ Jesus paid a debt that I could never pay
?

That’s the gospel. That’s the good news, and all God asks you to do to be saved is believe it. Trust in it. Rest in it.

• He’ll give you a new start.
• He’ll give you a new heart.
• He’ll give you purpose.
• He’ll give you a new spiritual family.
• He’ll wipe your slate clean.
• He’ll give you power over sin.

Listen. Think. Believe.

That’s what it’s all about folks.

Have you ever believed the gospel? Has there been a time in your life when you trusted Christ as your savior? For me it was when I was a fourteen-year-old boy. I knew all about church. I could quote every verse, but I knew in my heart that I was lost. I knew I was a sinner. I got down beside my bed one night, and I asked Jesus to save me and believed the gospel.

Bells didn’t ring. Lights didn’t flash. I didn’t tingle all over, but I believed the gospel and God started changing me.

How about you? When did you trust Christ?

Let’s all stand with every head bowed and every eye closed.