Week 2: Jesus Begins His Ministry
Matthew 4: 23-25, Mark 1:14-15, Luke 4: 14-15
Jesus did ministry on Earth for three years.
Why? Wasn’t His mission the cross and an empty grave?
Yes, and Jesus is explicit in the goal of His ministry in Mark 1. To establish the beginnings of His kingdom.
Jesus has come to teach us how to live in a kingdom and to show us that the kingdom is for the broken to be healed, redeemed, and cleansed.
The kingdom of God is a treasure for the broken people of this world. Jesus models this through the way He lives His life, the way and what He teaches, and the miracles He performs. He is establishing His kingdom here and now.
What is significant about the life of Jesus in the midst of His ministry is that He is an example of laboring for the Lord FROM His identity. Last week we read about the baptism of Jesus. A baptism that was the outward proclamation of an identity given to Him by His Father. And it was from that identity that we see Jesus work.
Is that not what He calls us to emulate, too? We work for the Kingdom AFTER we’ve been given our identity. After we’ve experienced resurrection life, redemption, healing, cleansing, and salvation. We are new, and from our newness we work. It is not our work that saves us, but the blood of Jesus. We first must become citizens of this new Kingdom by His blood before we ever work for it and for its expansion.
Jesus models the laborious life of the Christian person. The labor of showing people how to live in a Kingdom not of this world, but of one coming. We see the shadows of it growing, knowing Jesus the King is coming.
“Do you not perceive it?”
Jesus ministry is not busy work; it's not proving His worth, it's a life offered to what is coming.
