April 12, 2015
Mark 16:1-8
“It’s a Hard Stop”
Rev. Dr. David A. Davis
It’s a hard place to stop. “They said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.” Mark’s account of the empty tomb at the end of his gospel. “They said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.” No greeting from the Risen Jesus. No Risen Jesus for that matter. Yes, the stone is rolled back. There is a young man dressed in white who tells the women that Jesus has been raised. He is not here. The women, according to Mark, they fled from the tomb in terror and amazement. No “fear and great joy”. Just fear. “They said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.” It’s a hard place to stop.
When you read the 16th chapter of Mark, if you were following along as I read the first 8 verse to you, you will see all kinds of brackets and footnotes and margin notes and paragraph headings. Bible editors and bible translators try to make the reader aware of the critical work that has been done related to the ending of Mark’s gospel. Ancient manuscripts lack consensus and so ones finds a shorter ending and a longer ending and an ending-ending. Beyond what the scholars write about in terms of historic sources and style of the Greek language, parts of the second half of chapter 16th, they sort of don’t pass the sniff test (a highly technical term in biblical scholarship). Snake handling and drinking deadly things but not getting hurt and the Risen Jesus “upbraiding” the disciples for their lack of faith and stubbornness and Jesus sending out through them “the sacred and imperishable proclamation of eternal salvation”. That phrase sounds less “gospelly” and much more like a sentence from a final paper over at the seminary. The consensus among New Testament scholars is that the ending ending is here at v.8. “They said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.” Yes, it’s a hard place to stop but it’s a hard stop. Mark ends here.
I had read the novel Gone Girl a while back. When the movie came out, I kept reading and hearing from folks who saw it but complained that they didn’t like the ending. When I finally did see the movie, the ending of the movie was pretty much exactly like the ending of the book. Some people didn’t like it, but the ending was the ending. When it comes to the Gospel of Mark, it would seem that folks didn’t like the ending. The earliest scribes, church fathers in the first centuries, establishers of the canon; they didn’t like the ending and after all, who wants to stop at “They said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.”? So we’re left with a shorter ending and a longer ending and an ending ending. On a morning like last Sunday, it’s not easy to stick with Mark and a hard stop at v.8 when the sanctuary is full and the brass are playing and everyone is waiting to sing “Thine is the Glory”. And the preacher announces that the first proclaimers of the Easter message, they fled in “silence and fear.” Cue the trumpets!
Don Juel was a professor of New Testament at Princeton Seminary and a worshipping member of Nassau Church, along with his wife Linda. Don died in 2003. Others can describe his legacy more fully than I can, but I can’t imagine anyone wrote about the ending of Mark’s gospel in a more compelling, more provocative, more faithful way than Don Juel. The hard stop at v.8, . “They said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid”, for him, it was no longer up for discussion. What’s most captivating about Juel’s work is how he sees Good News in THIS ending. How he sees in THIS ending to Mark, the very promise of God.
With what must have been a bit of devilish humor, Don once preached a sermon on the longer ending of Mark and after reading Mark 16:9-19 he said to the gathered community “I will confess that I have never heard those words….read in church. And I hope I never will again.” Juel went on in that sermon, which was of course on the ending ending not the longer ending, he went on to say this: “People can’t leave the ending alone: it’s too unsettling. What terrified the women who went to the tomb, loaded down with spices to do their duty to the corpse, was that Jesus wasn’t there…As the Gospel ends, Jesus isn’t there. He is nowhere to be seen. There’s not even a garment to touch.”
“When you reach the end of the story” Professor Juel preached, “Jesus isn’t there….It’s a good thing. If we could get our hands on Jesus, we would surely throttle the life out of him as did his contemporaries. But we can’t. Jesus is free, out of the tomb, beyond our control, and beyond death. That’s why the story is good news. He’s free so that he can make his way into our lives and actually liberate as God had planned since before the foundation of the world.” Here’s the provocative trajectory of Juel’s thought: if you are going try to keep the Risen Jesus under your thumb, if you’re going to forever link resurrection hope to a pious effort to cling to his feet or to hear him call your name, holding on to a conception of Jesus that simply confirms all your expectations and assumptions, if you’re going to limit God’s liberating promise to the requirements of your intellect, your imagination, or your satisfaction, if God’s entire Easter enterprise results in little more than (in Juel’s own words) “believing in a Jesus who has saved everyone in principle but never gets close enough to unsettle anyone in particular”, well, you may as well leave him in the tomb.
When you do the hard stop here in Mark. When you stop in the harder place,. “They said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.” When you stop right there, all you have to hold onto is the promise of God. The promise of God in the words of the young man in a white robe. “He has been raised; he is not here….he is going ahead of you to Galilee, there you will see him, just has he told you.” As Professor Juel concluded, “the gospel that ends with frightened women is far more real and holds considerably greater promise.” Holds more promise because the only one to finish the story, it’s not a scribe, or a bible editor, or the women or the disciples, or the first century church, or even you and me, the only one who can finish the story is God. Because it’s God’s promise.
“He is going ahead of you…there you will see him, just has he told you.” Or as the Risen Jesus puts it at the end of Matthew’s Gospel, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
Earlier when we were gathered at the font, I said to Charlotte what I try to say every time we celebrate a baptism for someone older than an infant, what I try to say to an older sibling standing there with us around the baptismal waters, “Charlotte, this water, it’s a sign that God loves you very, very much. And nothing, nothing, nothing will ever change that.” Truth is, I should have said it to Rich. “Rich, , this water, it’s a sign that God loves you very, very much. And nothing, nothing, nothing will ever change that.” I should have said it to him. We should say it to parents when they stand up here. We should say it to any witnesses. We should say it over and over again. It is the baptismal promise of God. The prior promise of God. The promise of God we claim in baptism. I am with you always. The baptismal resurrection promise of God. You will see him just as he told you. I am with you always, to the end of the age.
The prior promise of God. Not you will win the game, or you will make lots of money, or you will live a long and happy life, or you will be cancer free, or it will be all good all the time, or your most important relationships will always thrive, or your boss will always like you, or you will get in wherever you apply, or you will have no doubts, or you will always have a mountaintop believe, or that all of this (life, meaning, purpose, kingdom, servanthood, following Jesus), that it is all going to be that easy. No. How about “You will see him just as he told you.” and “I will be with you always”.
The baptismal promise of God. That Jesus of Nazareth, the One who brought the kingdom of heaven near, the One who embodied the unconditional love of God, the One who sowed visions of righteousness and snipped away at religiosity, the One who emptied himself and was obedient to the point of death on the cross all the while saying that he would rise again, the Son of God, the Messiah, the Savior, the Risen Christ, nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing will ever take his love away from you. He will be with you until the end of the age.
When the women got to the empty tomb he wasn’t there. And at that moment, all they had to go on was a promise. Of course they were scared and said nothing to anyone. But the story continues, the gospel continues with the promise of God. The baptismal resurrection promise of God. And those first women, and then disciples, and then the early church, and then our forbearers in faith, and then you and me…the Living God invites us to respond to that promise, to live that promise, to participate in that promise, to carry out that promise with our lives seeing the Risen Jesus there and knowing that with every step, with every day, with every breath and then some, he is with us and for us.
“They said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid”. It’s a hard stop. Last Sunday with the sanctuary overflowing and the brass playing and everyone waiting to sing “Thine is the Glory”, here’s how it should be proclaimed. Here’s how to do Easter morning and the end of Mark’s Gospel: the congregation is of course all revved up to hear about the Risen Jesus. They’re ready for “Christ is Risen!” Someone stand up to read the gospel lesson, and stops at v. 8 and sits down. “They said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid”. Then, nothing. No sermon. No singing. No organ. No brass. No timpani. Only silence and a church full of uncomfortable, shuffling folks wondering what on earth is coming next. What comes next, what breaks that awkward loud silence, the next thing to be spoken, heard…..
I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Responding to God’s promise and continuing God’s story with the discipleship of our lives.
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