October 2nd, 2011 Book of Mark Wk2-Be Disciples

How do we grab hold of more of heaven?  Continuing our series in the book of Mark, we follow up Jesus’s good news that more of heaven is within reach by digging in to what Jesus teaches on how we respond to his invitation and experience heaven breaking into our lives.

If you want a study tool to go along with the podcast, see Lift Notes here:

The Gospel of Mark: How do we take hold of the gospel?

October 2, 2011  by Kasey Crawford

Today’s Passage: Mark 1:15-20

Jesus came into Galilee, proclaiming the gospel of God, ¹⁵ and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.”                     Mark 1:14-15

So, the gospel in Mark 1 is: there is a life-changing opportunity to take hold of more of heaven in your life.

The gospel is not that Jesus died so you could go to heaven after you die; but that Jesus lived, died and rose again to bring heaven to earth now, in part, and welling up to its fullness in eternity.

Passing alongside the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and Andrew the brother of Simon casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. ¹⁷ And Jesus said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you become fishers of people.” ¹⁸ And immediately they left their nets and followed him. ¹⁹ And going on a little farther, he saw James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, who were in their boat mending the nets. ²⁰ And immediately he called them, and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired servants and followed him.   

        Mark 1:16–20

How do we grab hold of more of heaven in our life?  Jesus says…

____________  and _____________

Repent means a __________ or _________.

That makes a lot of sense when we understand that the gospel is God wanting to breakthrough the status quo of our life and bring some heaven.  On our own without God we are lost and wandering, we take life in the wrong direction and end up places we never wanted to go. So to come into ____________ with God’s heart will bring about a change of our thinking or a turning of directions.

The process of heaven coming to earth in our lives is when we turn little by little away from doing things our way and into alignment more and more with God’s way.

To put Repent into your life is to ask: “What is God _________ to me?”

Believe is a _________ that produces __________.

Here’s the kicker with what Jesus means by believe: If you say you believe but it doesn’t _________ action then you don’t really believe it.

To put Believe into our life is to ask:“What am I going to ___ about it?”

So, the gospel is that a life-changing opportunity is here, more of heaven is with reach, so reach out and grab it by asking “What is God saying to me?” and “What am I going to do about it?”

Those are the questions that a disciple carries with them at every _________of every ______ so that little by little we turn away from our old life and grab hold of more and more heaven on earth now.

Next in the book Mark gives us an example of what that it looks like in real life to repent and believe:

Invitation from Jesus: “Come Follow Me” This is an invitation to be a disciple of a Master, in order to learn a whole new way of life.  The way of the kingdom.  The way of life in which Heavens comes to earth.

Response: They immediately gave up everything.

If the gospel is that Jesus died so you could go to heaven after you die; then this response makes no ________.  But if the gospel is that Jesus lived, died and rose again to bring heaven to earth now, as we come more and more into alignment with his will and act upon it, then surrendering everything to follow him is the only __________ response.

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