Today's gospel is the first entry in the gospel of Mark which opens "The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God." Mark was the friend and companion of St. Peter and wrote what Peter had seen and experienced. He was a contemporary of Peter and Christ. As to Christ's nature, Mark has no ambivalence at all.
In today's readings several ideas are juxtaposed. Most prominent is the mind-bending concept that God's eye sees a day in a thousand years, a thousand years in a day. But then we see the image of building roads to smooth the way for the coming of God. And John the Baptist is seen as a path-maker for Christ. Both are images of man in a world of sequence, man as a creature of time.
But there is another sequence, the key one. The Baptist is described as one bring baptism to those with penance, for those with sorrow for their sins. That is the prerequisite, the first of the sequence. The human step. The next step, the step in the sequence that John can not supply, will follow with the appearance of Christ. That part of the sequence is forgiveness.
So God, a Being outside time, enters the the sequence and confines of time to offer forgiveness for those who repent their sins.
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