June 6, 1944―that’s a date we all are familiar with, right? That’s the day, of course, of the invasion of the Normandy beaches, tens of thousands of soldiers from―American soldiers, British soldiers, Canadian soldiers stormed the beaches. We all know of the story of Operation Overlord, and how all those allied nations pulled together and stormed those beaches to begin the liberation of Europe. But what we might not be as familiar with is that among those American and Canadian and British soldiers were also one battalion of French soldiers. They were known as the First French Marine Rifles, and those are words that you probably have never heard put together before―French and Marine―but there truly were a battalion of French Marines that stormed the beaches. They stormed the beach called Sword Beach. It was a battalion of 177 soldiers―which is really more like a company―but they call themselves a battalion. And like a lot of combatants in World War Two that were combatants from countries that were now occupied by the Axis, they had escaped and been formulated into the British army there. The British Army and World War Two had regiments and battalions of Yugoslavia, Polish, soldiers from the Netherlands, France, Denmark―all these different countries that were occupied. But then when some, the combatants were able to escape, they were formed into their own fighting units within the British Army. And so it was also true for this French regiment known as the First French Marines. So, on that day, on June 6, they stormed the beach, they actually crossed the English Channel in a two-masted sailboat, and they stormed Sword Beach, and took part in the invasion to free Europe. But that story there―I say all that just to kind of set up this question here. And the question is; Imagine what was going through their minds as they did this. Of course, their thoughts were a lot like all of their comrades’, thoughts. The Americans and the British soldiers, the Canadian soldiers are all filled with fear and anxiety and concern, and of course, all these other emotions that they're feeling as they are entering into combat. But in addition to that, can you not imagine that there was just some other element of thought and feeling that was present among these French Marines? The feeling of invading not another country, but their own invading their own country―not for the purpose of occupying it or defeating it, but for the purpose of freeing it from the Occupation Forces. Just imagine what was going through their hearts as they stormed those beaches with the other soldiers. Now, there has to be some kind of a commonality, some sort of coordination, I think, between what they felt and what was going through their mind, and what was going through our Lord's mind as we turn to our passage today. Our passage today is verses 14 and 15. And so in a way that's similar, at least to how these French combatants invaded their own home, their own territory in order to free it from the violent, oppressive Occupational Forces of the Axis, in a similar way, verses 14 and 15 are going to begin narrating to us the story of how the rightful King invaded His own territory, to free His own people who were suffering and struggling under the oppressive reign of the false ruler of the false king. We talked about this last week, this theme that Mark is going to carry throughout his gospel, the theme of the Stronger Man who comes to defeat the strong man, the legitimate Ruler and the legitimate King, who comes to free His people from the oppressive rule of the false ruler, the false King, the strong man who's not the strongest, but he has bound the people with sickness, and with disease, and blindness, and leprosy and possession of demons. And now the rightful King is entering into His rightful kingdom, to free His people from the oppressive rule from under which they have suffered for so many centuries. So, let's all now just read together from verse 14. We'll read down through verse 20. And then we'll begin. Now after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee proclaiming the gospel of God and saying, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand, repent and believe in the gospel. 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. And Jesus said to them, follow Me. And I will make you become fishers of men. And immediately they left their nets and followed Him 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. And immediately called them. And they left their father's Zebedee in the boat with the hired servants and followed Him. So, as we begin in verse 14, here, we see that Mark begins this way―Now, after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee proclaiming the gospel of God. So, what we need to do is we need to set aside a few minutes here, and we'll talk about just some chronology. And we'll talk about what Mark has done here. And the reason would be so that we can more correctly―or more fully, I should say―understand Marks theme and how Mark is setting up the story for us. So, what Mark has done here is he has not only changed the context, because we can tell that right away because there―Mark’s two favorite words aren't there. His two favorite words are ‘immediately’ and ‘and.’ And both of those words tell us that Mark is telling a story in rapid-fire manner, and rapid-fire pace. He doesn't use either those words here, which tells us that the setting has changed. The scene has changed. And in fact, not only the scene has changed, but also the time has changed. Because you can't see it in your Bible, and I can't see it in my Bible. But between verses 13 and 14, about a year of time has passed, maybe as much as a year and half has passed. So, some time has passed from the end of verse 13, to verse 14. That's one thing that's happened. The other thing that Mark does is he now takes the story out of chronological order, because verses 16 through verse 20 happen before verses 14 and 15. IN just a minute, we'll see exactly how we know that and what that means for us―But Mark is taking the story out of chronological order, which is nothing that should concern us because we know that all four gospel writers do that on a regular basis. None of the gospel writers ever purport to us, to be telling us a story that is strictly chronological, that's strictly in chronological order. All the gospel writers will take events and put them in different order in order to tell the story of Jesus, as they want to tell it, emphasizing what they want to emphasize and bringing out the points that they want to bring out. Now that's something that bothers 21st century western readers, because―and here's why―because we want to do without even knowing we're doing it is we want to imply onto a first century eastern document 21st century western writing standards. And that's something that we just must guard yourself against doing. But we do it all the time. We read these New Testament documents, and unknowingly we apply 21st century western reading habits and expectations on to first century eastern documents. So, two big differences―there is one, we obviously are living in the 21st century, and we're reading things that were written in the first century. And that's a big difference in time. So, historians, biblical scholars, in fact, even non-biblical scholars tell us that in these times, this period of history, everyone tended to write like this. The way of writing chronologically telling a story strictly chronologically, was not something that is prevalent, like it is today. When we tell a story, or when we write a story, we have the impression that unless we're intentionally doing something different, we will tell the story in chronological order. Not so with first century writings, and especially not so with gospels. So, it's a very commonplace thing to do for people that are writing in this period of history to write events are not necessarily in chronological order. The second thing is that we are western readers, with western minds. Western people tend to think of history as strictly linear, as strictly going in a line. And so therefore, we like to read history that happens chronologically. Eastern people have a different manner of thinking. Even today, eastern people will often tell stories, and write stories that are not strictly in chronological order. That's just something that we as students of the Bible must get used to. We must be comfortable and get used to the fact that the gospel writers in particular made no attempt to give us a strict chronological telling of the stories of Jesus. Instead, all four gospel writers―we kno―will take events out of order, and they'll do it intentionally. If you if we doubt that then I can, I can show that to you real easily. Because here in verse 14, we're told that all this happened after John was arrested. It's not until chapter six, that Mark is going to narrate to us the story of when and how John was actually arrested. So, right there we see, Mark clearly has a little concern with telling the story in an exactly a strict chronological fashion. So, what he's done here is he's taken the events of verses 16 through 20. And he's taken them out of order, and put them after something that happened before them, which is verses 14 and 15. So, now, just real quickly, let's take a look at our notes. And let's just see how it is that we know this and how we can kind of know what this the stricter, so to speak, chronological order of these events was. So, if we take a look in your notes at John chapter three, we'll notice here that John is going to tell the story of similar events, a similar timeframe, but he's going to tell it in a more chronological fashion than what Mark just told us. So, if we look at John chapter three, and we look beginning for verse 22. John begins this way―After this―now John, chapter three, verse 22. Does anybody recognize what the ‘this’ is? The after, you might recognize just off top your head what after this is what he's talking about? It's immediately after the encounter with Nicodemus. Remember that happens the first part of chapter three, and then that continues on through―of course, remember, John 3:16―and then right after that, John 3:22, is where John says after this. So, after the encounter with Nicodemus, after the meeting with Nicodemus, John is going to narrate the following things. So, the encounter with Nicodemus takes place were? In Jerusalem. So, Jesus is in Jerusalem, and he has the encounter with Nicodemus, the Pharisee. After this, Jesus and His disciples went into the Judean countryside, and He (Jesus) remained there with them and was baptizing. So, Jesus has now been baptized, He's had His wilderness temptation. He's left the wilderness temptation, and now He comes back south into Jerusalem. And He's in Jerusalem when he encounters this man, Nicodemus So verse 23, John also was baptizing it a non near Salim, because water was plentiful there. So, at this point, I'll put a map up on the screen. The orange area is an area called Judea. In Judea that's in the south. And of course, Jerusalem is there and Judea, Bethlehem is there, and Judea. To the north of Judea is this sort of, I guess that's teal, the teal, blue, green sort of area, that's an area known as Samaria. And in Samaria, of course, a lot of things happen in Samaria area that we'll talk about in just a few minutes. But north of Samaria is another area called Galilee in the yellow. So, if you can see right here (I’ll put my finger right here), right here is Salim and Aenon, we were just told that John, the Baptizer is there baptizing in that area, near Aenon and Salim, because water was plentiful there. So, you can see that that's by the Jordan, and it's up north, kind of near the Sea of Galilee. It's in a place called the Decapolis, in an area called the Decapolis. We're familiar with the Decapolis. That's where the man known as, with had the demons known as Legion, he was in that area there. So, John is up in the north baptizing there, Jesus has been baptized, and He now has followers. And we'll see in just a minute how all the followers of Jesus, among those followers of Jesus were the twelve that will eventually become His apostles, Jesus's twelve apostles, were all of them were either followers of John prior to Jesus, or they were there when Jesus was baptized. We know this because in Acts chapter one, verse 22, you remember when Judas has now committed suicide, and the apostles are talking about replacing Judas, and they say, well, the replacement has to be like us, he has to be one taken from those who have been with Jesus since His what? Baptism. So, all twelve apostles were followers of Jesus since His baptism, since the dove, since the declaration of who He is. So, all of this, the central the inner twelve, those who would eventually become apostles, were either disciples of John prior to being disciples of Jesus, or they were there in the wilderness to be baptized themselves, when Jesus was baptized. So, now after being baptized Jesus and these followers, now they come back south into Jerusalem, they have this encounter Jesus has this encounter with Nicodemus, and then after this is when we're told that John's now still he's still baptizing up near Aenon and Salim, verse 24, for John had not yet been put in prison. So, right there we have our timeframe. Mark begins in verse 14 By saying after John was put in prison, John the Apostle now just told us this is happening before John was put in prison. So, prior to what we read about in Mark one, verse 14 and 15, prior to that, Jesus leaves His baptism. He has His period of temptation. And He comes south, into Jerusalem. And here in Jerusalem, he has been by baptizing but then he departs and goes into the Judean countryside back into the wilderness. Verse 26, and they came to John and they said to John, Rabbi, who was with you across the Jordan, to whom you bore witness, look, he's baptizing and all are going to Him. Hey, this other―you remember that? The dove guy, you remember the guy that dove came? He's bigger than you. He's more popular than you, more people are following Him than you. To which John answers, verse 27, you yourselves bear witness that I said, I'm not the Christ. I keep telling you people, I'm not the Messiah. Why aren't you listening? You're supposed to be my disciples. I'm telling you, I'm not the I'm not the Messiah. But I have been sent before Him, He must increase and I must decrease. So, that's what's now happened is John is up in this area towards the north, he's still baptizing in the wilderness, although his ministry is fading fast, intentionally so. And more and more people are now following Jesus. Jesus has gone into Jerusalem. But now hearing about all these things, Jesus now leaves the country, or leaves the city of Jerusalem, He goes back into the Judean wilderness, or the Judean countryside. And he we’re told a little bit later, that not Jesus but His disciples are now baptizing in the wilderness. So, now, take a look, now John, chapter four. And the story continues at John chapter four down at the bottom. So, now when Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making him baptizing more disciples than John, so now, just a few verses later, we're told that Jesus learns that the that the Pharisees now consider Him public enemy number one. They now considered Jesus more dangerous than John, the Pharisees were never fans of John the Baptizer. But now they have become bigger enemies of Jesus because Jesus is now more popular, and He's has more followers than John the Baptizer. So, Jesus hears of this, He hears that the Pharisees now consider Him to be public enemy number one. Verse three, He then left Judea and departed again for Galilee, and He had to pass through Samaria. Okay, so Jesus is down here in Judea, in the Judean wilderness, baptizing down here, He learns that the Pharisees now see Him as a bigger threat than John the Baptizer. He leaves Judea, and He goes to Galilee, but He has to pass through―guess what? Samaria and passing through Samaria, what's going to happen in Samaria? In John, chapter four? The Samaritan woman at the well, this is where Jesus has the encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well as He's passing through Samaria, on His way to Galilee. All of this has still, is still prior to John chapter one (I'm sorry), Mark, chapter one, verse 14. So, Mark, chapter one, verse 14 still hasn't happened yet, because Mark chapter one, verse 14, says―after John was put in prison, John, still not in prison. So, prior to verse 14, here, Jesus is in Jerusalem, He talks with Nicodemus, He hears about John the Baptizer, and how He's now considered a bigger threat than John. So, He leaves to go to, to Samaria, or to Galilee. He passes through Samaria, you probably have heard the stories of how Jews would often go all the way around to avoid Samaria. Jesus, of course, didn't. He passes through Samaria, He has the encounter with the Samaritan woman. And you remember after her conversion, and the conversion of the village, what does Jesus do? He stays there a few more days. So, He's there in the Samaritan Village for a few days, it's during this period of time that John the Baptizer, is now arrested. So, John the Baptizer was arrested, probably while Jesus was in Samaria. He then leaves Samaria, and then goes now into Galilee, because we're told that He was on His way to Galilee. Now, let's put this together with Matthew chapter four. Matthew, chapter four, verse 12. Now when He heard that John had been arrested―so now John's been arrested. Probably Jesus was in Samaria when that happened, but Jesus, hears that John has been arrested, He withdrew into Galilee. So, Jesus wasn't in Galilee, when John was arrested, but He was close. So, He then probably from that point, leaves Samaria and goes into Galilee. Now, Galilee, again, this yellow area right here. Nazareth is right there on the southern edge of Galilee. And Matthew is going to tell us that Jesus then goes to Nazareth. So, verse, (where were we?), verse 13, and leaving Nazareth, so Jesus enters Galilee, and it's just about as soon as you cross over into Galilee, you're in Nazareth. So, Jesus crosses over into Galilee, into His hometown of Nazareth. And you remember, that's the story from Luke four where Jesus is ministering there in Nazareth in His hometown. He goes into the synagogue, He opens the Isaiah scroll, He reads from the Isaiah scroll, He says in your presence, this has been fulfilled. And then He's eventually He's rejected in Nazareth, because it's His hometown. So, all that takes place. And then Matthew says, He then leaves Nazareth. So, after leaving Nazareth, He went and lived in Capernaum by the sea. So, Capernaum, I’ll point to it’s way up here. Capernaum is right here. This is a small fishing village on the very, very northern end of the entire kingdom of Israel. It's on the Sea of Galilee, it's one of probably two dozen or more fishing villages on the Sea of Galilee at this point. And so Jesus is going to go here to Capernaum. And He is going to set up base, set up home base, ground zero in Capernaum. And Capernaum, is going to basically be His field of operations for the next three years, Jesus is going to more or less live in Capernaum, He's going to traverse back and forth over the Sea of Galilee a number of times, and He's going to travel to some other areas. But Capernaum is basically where He's going to live throughout the majority of His three-year period of ministry, until the point at which He then, as we're told, sets His face for Jerusalem and then makes the trek back down to Jerusalem in order to be arrested and crucified. So, Matthew says He now leaves Nazareth and goes to Capernaum. And the reason He does this, Matthew tells us is so that prophecy will be fulfilled, because the prophecy is―that in the territory of Zebulon and Napthali, so that what was spoken by the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled, the land of Zebulun, and the land of Napthali, the way of the sea, beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles, the people dwelling in darkness have seen a great light. So, there's the prophecy. The people who are living there, in the regions of Napthali and Zebulon, the area there, Nazareth, Capernaum, they've seen this great light. So, that fulfills this prophecy. So, Matthew now places Jesus in Capernaum. Now, all that brings us to Mark chapter one, verse 14. So, you see how much has happened between verse 13, verse 14, quite a lot has happened, that Mark just sort of skips over all that, because why―actually doesn't skip over all of it―he skips over much of it. Because that doesn't fit into the story, as he wanting to tell it. He has a purpose. He has an agenda, he has a reason for saying all this. Now, we also know as we noted earlier, that all of Jesus's disciples are disciples at this point, because they were all disciples of Jesus from His baptism. Jesus gained many disciples or followers along the way, during those three years, but the twelve, who would start out as disciples and then become apostles, those twelve, all of them were with Jesus from His time of baptism. So, what verses 16, 17, 18, 19 and 20 are telling us is―the calling of Peter, Andrew, James and John, who were apostles. So, all of that has to take place before verses 14 and 15. So, you see how Marks taking it out of chronological order? Now, why would Mark do this? What's Mark's goal? Well, that's something we got to speculate on. Because he doesn't tell us then tell us why he took these events out of order. But it's not too hard to speculate, what reasons he might have for wanting to tell us first of all, what Jesus does as He comes into Galilee, because that's what verse 14 is all about. As He came into Galilee, He was proclaiming and heralding. He was saying and proclaiming these things. So, Mark wants to start the story of the Strong Man from that point, of the Strong Man coming into Galilee, of the rightful King coming into Galilee proclaiming these things. So, I could just speculate that well, first of all, he probably since he's telling, of course, the story from verse one of the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, it makes sense to me that he wants to start from this place. He wants to start from the point of the rightful true King proclaiming, heralding, right? That's what kings did. There was these heralds that they would proclaim, this is what the king says, This is what the king declares. And so this is what He's heralding. So, this is the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ. So, he probably wants to begin on that note of the proclamation that He is the king. Perhaps Mark wants to accent John's quick exit off of the scene after his role is completed. So, you notice how Mark tells the story here? I mean, John just vanishes. And again, in chapter six, Mark's gonna come back and he's gonna spend about two thirds of a chapter telling us about the arrest of John and all that sort of thing. Here he wants to, I think, perhaps accent the fact―Jesus is anointed, He leaves the scene of combat victorious and boom, John's off the scene. John's arrested John's taken out of the way. John was heralded proclaimer as soon as that job of heralding is done, he's not taken out of the way. Although, chronologically speaking, he wasn't quite taken out of the way yet. Mark wants us to see it that way he wants us to see that once John's, John's role is complete, John's now off the scene. That also makes sense to me too. Also Mark is illustrating that there are some, some very distinct connections here, some connections between John the Baptizer, and Jesus, and the connections are this: John, the Baptizer is here heralding he's doing his role, what God has appointed for him to do, what God has anointed and raised him up to do. And then that all ends in his arrest, and eventually his execution. And then there's this distinct connection, of course, with Messiah, who now is also raised up and He's doing what God has raised Him up to do. And so there's this connection between the two, both are going to be arrested, both are going to be executed. In fact, in fact, I think Mark even makes the connection stronger than that. Because what Mark, or actually what our Bibles tell us here is that now after John was arrested, your translation probably says arrested. But that's not what you want what Mark wrote. Mark didn't write that John was arrested Mark literary wrote, after John was handed over. The word that Mark uses here is going to be one of his favorite words in the Gospel. It’s the word paroditomai. It just literally means handed over. Now, most of our Bibles translate that arrested. And perhaps the end result is the same―they're in custody. But can you see how handed over has a different connotation to it than just arrested? Handed over, carries with the sense of betrayal, doesn't it? If you're arrested, like we just saw earlier, if you're arrested, then that's one thing. If you were handed over, then you were betrayed, you were betrayed by one of your own. Now, we're not told anything about John's betrayal. But nevertheless, Mark wants to begin establishing something in our viewpoint here, and that is the idea of being handed over to one's enemies. So, here he used this word for Mark, (or I'm sorry for John)―that John was handed over. Look how many times he's going to use this word for Jesus. Chapter Nine, verse 31, for He was teaching his disciples saying to them, the Son of Man is going to be delivered over or handed over into the hands of men, they will kill Him. Chapter 10, verse 33, we are going to Jerusalem and the Son of Man will be delivered over, or handed over to the chief priests and the scribes and they will condemned Him to death and they will hand Him over or deliver Him over to the Gentiles. And this is not even to speak of chapter 14 and 15, in which it occurs eight more times. This is one of Mark's favorite words―handed over. And then is going to carry the connection from John the Baptizer, to Jesus, now to Jesus's followers―same word chapter 13: Be on your guard for they will hand you over to the council's you will be beaten in the synagogues, verse 11. And when they bring you to trial and hand you over, or deliver you over, don't be anxious beforehand, for what you are to say, but say whatever is given to you in that hour for what is not you who speak but the Holy Spirit and brother will hand over brother to death, and the father, his child, and so on and so forth. You see the theme? So, I think Mark's trying to establish a connection and by taking out of the story, all those events that we just talked about the Jerusalem incident, and Nicodemus, the Samaritan woman, traveling through Samaria, by taking all that out. Mark wants us to think he wants us to make a short direct line from John the Baptizer being handed over to Jesus being handed over to us being handed over.