I mentioned yesterday the question of why God allowed John the Baptist to go to prison. We don’t know for sure, but perhaps one reason was to get people’s eyes off of John and solely on to Jesus.
For right after John went into prison, it says that Jesus returned to Galilee to begin his formal ministry. In doing so, Matthew tells us he fulfilled the words of Isaiah who wrote,
Land of Zebulun and land of Naphtali, the way to the sea, along the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles– the people living in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned. (Matthew 4:15-16)
It’s amazing that the Pharisees totally missed this passage as they disparaged Jesus’ background. (John 7:52)
But here we see one of the reasons Jesus came. We were living in darkness, separated from God by our sin, condemned to death. But in Jesus, a light dawned.
Hope sprang anew as he showed the way to the Father. He declared to the people,
“The time has come…The kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news!” (Mark 1:15)
That is our message to this day. The King has come. His kingdom is near. Both in the fact that it is working in the hearts of all who believe in him, and in the fact that Jesus will come again to establish his kingdom here on earth forever.
And so we are called to repent. To repent is to turn around. To change our way of thinking. To stop living for ourselves and start living for God. To put aside our distrust of God and to follow him wholeheartedly.
A big part of that, of course, is to believe in the good news of Jesus Christ.
That God became man, becoming one of us. That he died on a cross to take the punishment for our sins, and that he rose again. And that if we will only put our faith in him, trusting in him as our Lord and Savior, we will be saved from eternal hell.
That’s the message Jesus came to bring.
Now there are two questions we all must ask.
First, have you put your faith in Christ? And if you have, are you continuing to pass on the message Jesus came to give?
How about you? Can you say yes to both questions?
Moment to Moment (Bible blog) 