From Mark Chapter 1:
1. A beginning of the good news, which is Jesus Christ, God's Son (or: [The] beginning of the message of ease and wellness which pertains to and has its source in Jesus Christ - Son of God).
2. In accord with what has been written in Isaiah the prophet [other MSS: in the prophets]:
"Look and consider! I, Myself, am periodically sending forth My agent (messenger) on a mission - before Your face - who will construct (build; furnish; equip; put in readiness) Your road (Way; path). [Mal. 3:1]
3. "A voice! One repeatedly crying out (shouting; exulting; exclaiming; imploring): 'Within the midst of the wilderness (desert; desolate place; abandoned and uninhabited region) you folks prepare and make ready the road of [the] Lord (the path whose source is [Yahweh]; the Way whose character is that of, and which pertains to, [the] Owner [= Yahweh])! Be progressively constructing (making) His highway (thoroughfare) well-placed and straight.'"
(or: "A sound! One is continuously crying out within the midst of the desert: ... ")
[Isa. 40:3]
4. John - the one habitually baptizing (immersing; dipping) - came into the scene (came to be) within the wilderness (in the uninhabited area of the desert), repeatedly heralding the proclamation of a baptism (an immersion) which [signifies] a change of thinking
(a change of perception, frame of mind and
mode of thought; a change of understanding;
= a new attitude involving trust and obedience)
and a turning back [to Yahweh, which leads] into an abandoning and divorcing of failures
(a sending-away of errors; a letting-go of sins;
a release or dismissal of mistakes;
a letting-flow-away of situations where the
target was missed).
5. And all the Judean territory (province; region; country) - even all the people of Jerusalem - kept on traveling out to him in a steady stream, and were one by one being immersed (baptized) by him within the midst of the Jordan River, while they were openly confessing-out their failures (mistakes; errors; sins).
6. Now John was by habit being one who had dressed himself in a garment woven of camel's hair with a leather belt (or: a girdle made of an animal skin) around his waist and loins, and was habitually eating locusts (or: grasshoppers) and wild honey [as his food].
7. And he had kept on making a loud public proclamation, as a herald, repeatedly saying, "Behind me the One (or: the Man) stronger than me is progressively approaching (steadily coming) - of Whom I am not (do not exist being) of adequate size or sufficient strength to be competent to, stooping down, loose and unfasten the strap (thong; lace) of His sandals.
8. "I myself, indeed, immerse (or: baptized) you folks within water, yet He, Himself, will immerse and saturate (or: be baptizing) you in a set-apart spirit (or: within [the] Holy Spirit; within a Holy Wind; in a set-apart Breath-effect; in union with a holy attitude)."
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