Were we there when God raised him from the tomb? asks the song’s last verse. And we have to answer, no, we weren’t there – because no one was there – no one but the angels, and God, saw the Resurrection at the moment it happened, no human being saw Jesus throw off that shroud that was covering him and stand up. We only see what happened later, the next morning. Mark shows us the women slipping through dark and empty streets – Mary Magdalene, the other Mary and Salome – hearts bursting with grief, eyes red and swollen from weeping, going to the tomb to anoint the body. We see them arriving at the tomb, wondering how to roll back the stone from the tomb so they can slip inside and give honor to death. And they find that God has done something absolutely inexplicable, that the stone that was blocking their way is already gone, and that Jesus is alive and free and on the loose.
And you and I, all these centuries later, know the proper response to resurrection, don’t we? We know that in the face of resurrection, the only thing to do is shout Alleluia! Christ is risen! [The Lord is risen indeed, Alleluia!]
But somehow, the women, that Easter dawn, didn’t know to shout Alleluia. They didn’t know what to say at all. The angel tells them what has happened, tells them Jesus will meet them in Galilee, instructs them to go back to Peter and the other disciples and tell the good news. But they don’t – they are struck mute – they are silent – and more than silent – they are terrified.
The passage we read today is probably the original ending of Mark’s gospel, scholars believe. But it has a very sudden ending, an ending that leaves us dangling, this sentence that we translate as “And they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.” In Greek, it’s even stranger – the literal translation is something like “They didn’t say nothing to nobody” – a triple negative to emphasize just how silent they were. And then the last part of the sentence even ends with a dangling preposition, the word “for”: “they said nothing to anyone, they were afraid for…” As the preacher Thomas Long says, even in Greek this is an odd way to end a sentence, not to mention a book – it’s as if Mark had been dragged away from his desk in middle of a sentence. Is this any way to run a resurrection? The end just hangs there: they were afraid for … for … what?
It’s a good question, for on Easter morning what are we afraid for? Surrounded by Easter flowers, hearing glorious music, smiling with joy on this high holy day, surely we are not afraid for … for anything. But perhaps we will go home after this service, perhaps we will eat Easter dinner with our families and relax the rest of the day, perhaps tomorrow we will not be thinking of Jesus and his resurrection at all, and perhaps we will remember reasons to be afraid for … Perhaps there are troubles on our minds, a health crisis in our family, tax returns to finish, retirement accounts to obsess over, the security of our jobs to worry about; perhaps we are concerned about relationships with those we love, the conflicts in our world, the future of our children, the health of our parents, perhaps we are holding all this in and saying nothing to anyone, because we are afraid for …
And on Monday morning, perhaps it won’t occur to us that the resurrection of Jesus Christ has anything to say about those things that make us afraid for, perhaps we will think that Jesus Christ was only someone a long time ago and far away who has nothing to do with our world now, maybe we will think that the only reason to think about his resurrection will come in the long time future, when we begin to be afraid for our own death. Perhaps we are slipping through our own dark and empty streets, determined to take control of the next task ahead of us, and yet afraid for … what?
The terror and amazement of these women tells us something about ourselves. These are the brave ones. These are the ones who stayed with Jesus while all the male disciples ran away, the ones who followed him to the foot of the cross and who weren’t even willing to abandon him to the grave without caring for him first. Living with him dead, grieving his loss, mourning the end of his beautiful, hopeful, thrilling ministry – these things they understand how to do, bravely. And yet, confronted with Resurrection, their courage fails them.
And maybe we’re not so different from these silent, fearful women. Because the Resurrection shatters everything we’ve ever believed: the impermanence of life, the finality of death. Resurrection means we have to re-think our entire lives, re-orient our fears to something new. All our resignation to the evil of this world, our determination to live courageously in the face of heartbreak, our worries over the challenges of our lives, our stresses about how to roll away the stones that stand in our way – all these things are not enough to fend off death – but God is enough.
Into our human darkness comes God’s Resurrection light, and the fabric of our universe is torn in two. And we now have to learn to live in a new, amazing, terrifying world: a world in which the ultimate triumph belongs not to familiar, fearsome, inevitable death, but to thrilling, astonishing, resurrection life. We now have to adjust to living in a world where God loves us so much he will never, ever let us go. We have to learn to live as Easter people in a Good Friday world.
Fifteen years ago I had a small glimpse of what it means to live as Easter person. That year, on Maundy Thursday, I took my 5-year-old daughter Sarah to church. Maundy Thursday is the day we remember Jesus’ Last Supper with his disciples, his gift of bread and wine to them as a way to remember him, to bring his true, living, resurrected presence into our lives here and now, through the Eucharist. Maundy Thursday is the day also that we remember what that supper means, because in John’s gospel, Jesus demonstrates its meaning by washing feet, commanding us to wash each other’s feet as a sign that we love each other as he loved us.
At that Maundy Thursday service 15 years ago, we washed each other’s feet, so everyone had their own feet washed and everyone washed someone else’s feet. I sat down to have my feet washed and then realized that the person who was in line to wash my feet was my own 5-year-old daughter, Sarah.
And as she sweetly took my feet, one at a time, carefully poured water over them, tenderly rubbed them dry with a towel, I found myself unaccountably weeping – because I was remembering the countless times I had done these same things for her: tenderly caring for her infant body, washing, feeding, nurturing my child. And here, she had somehow learned to do these things for me.
And I realized that this is the natural order of things. First we are loved and cared for ourselves; then we learn to love and care for others. The love that we are given becomes the love we have to give away. Which surely is a very deep meaning of the cross and the resurrection – Jesus dies in an outpouring of love for us, so we can turn and pour out that same love for others. And as long as that love lives in us, we have nothing to be afraid for …
Why does Mark’s gospel and Mark’s Easter story end with a dangling preposition that leaves us dangling, this odd non-ending? I think it’s because the story hasn’t ended – the story continues with us. The women are silent because we are the ones who are given the story to tell. We are the ones who are given the love of Christ to share with others.
Go and tell the disciples that he is risen, and will meet you in Galilee, the angel says. Who are the disciples? We are.
Mark’s story doesn’t end because the story didn’t end with Mark. The story continues all through human history, the story continues with us. And that means that it’s to us that the angel is speaking.
Go into all the places of your lives, the angel tells us, all the Galilees we came here from, all the places where we make our everyday life, all the places we are afraid for… and we will find Jesus there ahead of us, waiting for us, waiting to lead us into new life and new hope. Go into the places of worry and fear, says the angel, and we will find him there. Go into the places of silence and amazement, and we will find him there. Go into the places God is leading us, places we never would have thought of on our own, places of surprise and discovery, and we will find him there. There, with us, to help us tell the story of his love.
Because, to all of us who are afraid for …, Mark’s gospel has good news today. The tomb is empty, the place of death can’t contain the living Lord. Resurrection has changed the rules of the game, and the world has been remade. We weren’t there when God raised him, but he is here with us now. The Resurrected One is truly present in our midst, teaching us to love and serve each other.
And although the women are silent, we know what to say: Alleluia! Christ is Risen! [The Lord is Risen Indeed! Alleluia!]
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