The importance of the desert in our lives
Preaching Outline on Mark 1:3 – The voice of one crying in the wilderness: Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.
Additional texts: Deuteronomy 8 / Jeremiah 29:13; 33:3
Introduction to Mark 1:3
The greatest of all prophets, John the Baptist, chose to carry out his ministry in the desert. Why? I believe that the choice was based on divine direction, the aim of which was to ensure that both John the Baptist and the people themselves had meaningful experiences with God. We want to talk about the blessings of the desert on this occasion.
1) Desert – A place to listen to God
For John the Baptist, the desert represented a special place where he would be able to get away from the distractions of this life in order to listen to God’s commands. We all live in a hectic world, where we are often forced to run up and down, trying to meet our daily schedules; but we don’t always realize that such agitation can distance us from that place of communion, where we can hear God’s gentle voice. It’s at these times that we realize how much we need to make the decision to seek out “our daily desert”, so that there He can speak in a way that we can hear Him, without the interference that naturally surrounds us every day.
Our desert can mean a closed room for prayer, a time alone with God, or just a place and time when being in His presence is the most important thing for us. If we fail to listen to God in our daily walk, we run the risk of losing direction, vision and the greater purpose for our existence. That’s why we need to listen to him.
2) Desert – A place of renunciation
The biblical text shows that the crowds set out into the desert to meet John the Baptist and hear his message. In doing so, everyone was leaving their home, their commitments, their comfort and their work behind. Such an attitude represented renunciation and stripping away of the old structure of routine life, in search of something that they considered to be important for their lives. Each one was demonstrating, with this behavior, a willingness to give up something of value in order to obtain what was still precious.
This experience teaches us not to expect the blessing “at home”, but to value it to the point of pursuing it. Those who were not willing to leave everything and go into the desert would also not have been willing to give up wrong positions in order to make a commitment to God. This is not to say that we need to “buy” God’s blessing, thereby nullifying the grace that is in Christ Jesus. Of course, all blessings are given to us by grace, not by human effort. However, our external attitudes demonstrate the intensity of our heart’s desire.
3) Desert – A place devoid of religiosity
We believe that by preaching the Gospel of God in the desert, John the Baptist was breaking with the hypocrisy of the religious leaders of his time, who valued their priestly garments and sacred objects more than truly doing God’s will. Many wanted to impress the people with an appearance of piety, but their hearts were empty of God and His anointing.
John the Baptist shocked the crowd because his clothes were not those of a religious man. His food and housing were totally different from the conventional. But his life expressed tremendous power and anointing from on high.
With all this, we believe that God was trying to instill in people’s minds that they should be prepared to receive something different from the usual. The aim was to help the people break away from that fruitless religiosity, so that they could receive from God the true message, totally devoid of religiosity, and which would make all the difference to their lives.
Conclusion of Mark 1:3
The desert in John the Baptist’s ministry was a special place where he and the people could separate to hear God’s voice more clearly. In order to receive the message of the Most High, people had to leave the comfort of home, showing an interest in giving up important things for something of greater value: the Word of God. John the Baptist dressed differently from the religious of the time, always passing on the message that true transformation proceeds from the inside out, and not the other way around, through a true attitude of repentance.
Application
Take a moment to listen to God’s voice in your heart. Even during the week, choose places with less traffic so that you can discern in your heart what he has for your life.
Preaching Outline on Mark 1:3 – The voice of one crying in the wilderness: Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.
More Preaching Outlines
- What did you go out to see in the desert? – Matthew 11:7
- The Importance of Forgiveness – Matthew 6:14
- ELIASIBE’S rejection – Nehemiah 13:29
