Unfinished Business

Mark 16:1-8

Mark’s version of Easter is my favorite because he didn’t finish it. In Greek, it ends mid-sentence—a hanging “because” there at the end—Afraid and terror-struck, the women ran away, telling no one because… It’s a perfect cliffhanger. It grabs all of us, wondering what happened next.

But we know what happened next. We know what it means. We know the women got themselves together and told the disciples. 2000 years went by, and here we are singing praises, handing out Easter eggs, and maybe sitting down to a big brunch with family and friends. That domesticates the miracle. It becomes something we can understand. It becomes something familiar. 

That domestication, though, is a mistake. We should not think we can control resurrection, making it part of human experience, assuming it something we can manipulate, as we do with so many other things that used to be mystery that are now part and parcel of human wisdom.

This year, we here in California are dealing with El Nino, a weather pattern that was once mysterious enough that folks personalized it. It was a wayward child in the heavens, playing with rain and wind and sun, disrupting the patterns of human planting, growing, and reaping. This petulant child could send horrific floods to one place, dry another out beyond parched, and warm the winter chill to an eternal spring. The ancient farmers did not know why it happened, just that it did, and they had to deal with the consequences. Now, of course, we know what it is—warm water pools off the coast in the Pacific, altering humidity patterns, riding winds with drying in one place, and deluge in another. We can predict its arrival, anticipate its consequences, and act accordingly. 

But can we?

Yes, El Nino is weather, but it is weather that still has a child’s tempestuousness. We may know why it is here, but we still reel to cope with its effect. Large sections of Africa are dealing with drought that brings starvation. Parts of Central America are literally drowning in unwanted water. We’re glad for the rain, but we still do not really know how quenched our own parched farmland will be. Casually, most of us ignore it, but we cannot escape it. 

That is the truth Mark poses by ending his gospel unfinished. He leaves a gaping blank space at the end. He does so because in his mind, the story is anything but finished. It was still unfolding as he penned his gospel. It was still unfolding long after he was dead and gone. It is still unfolding this very morning. That is what Mark wants us to see and understand. Easter—the Risen Christ—is a mighty act of God, beyond all comprehension, beyond all reason, and beyond all rational hope. It is a surprise—total and complete surprise.

That is true of so much within our lives. We close one chapter, but wake up the next morning to begin the next, not entirely sure what awaits us. 

We grow from childhood into adulthood, leaving behind the things of children to take on the things of grown ups. We move from study into work, ending college to begin a career, or an exploration of the world. A lot of us meet someone who completes us, and we move from singleness into marriage. Children come, ending one phase of life to being another. Those phases continue to come and go until one day we pass from this world to the next. But the truth of every single one of those transitions is that the story is never really done—it keeps going, we keeping adding things to it, and we continue to extend the narrative, even after someone dies, continuing the story of family, friendship, and life as it was. The surprising twists and turns keep coming. The constant change continues.

Mark wants us to see and understand that the same is true in the life of faith. Christ’s story did not end with any of the gospel narratives. We believe that, for we do not simply hold to a “once upon a time” idea that is long, long ago, and very, very far away. No, we believe in the Living God, a living faith, and the certainty that the resurrection continues to manifest and find expression here and now.

Mark does us a great favor by reminding us that the women were not ready-made saints of God. They are going to have to grow into faith. At first, it overwhelms them. Find no fault with them—to experience a dead man walking is a terrifying prospect (hence, it never goes out of style in horror movies). Don’t we all feel overwhelmed by God from time to time? Don’t we ever struggle with whether or not we are up to the work of being disciples? Of course we do. Heck, all a preacher need do is to look over a congregation, fix his or her eyes on someone, and intone those dreadful words, So and so will now lead us in prayer…Terror may well send the chosen into glory before their time! No, an inescapable piece of discipleship is confronting our own unreadiness for it. What Mark assures us of is that nothing could be more normal in the life of faith. God is God, and we are not. That’s all right. In fact, that is the sure and certain way of being the best disciples we can be. We accept our own limitations, but then invite God to transform and transcend who and what we are. 

Have we grown too jaded to really experience Easter? We know the story all too well. It rolls off like the Christmas stories of shepherds, wise men, and a baby in a manger—we see the stone rolled back, the angel quietly intoning the good news, and the women stumbling away to find the others. But does it still shock us with the total reordering of the world as it is?

Mark’s story is unfinished, incomplete, and jarring in its open ending. Afraid and terror-struck, the women ran away, telling no one because… 

See that opening for what it is. It is our call. The angel commissioned the women to go and tell what they saw. The angel tells us the same thing—Go and tell what you see and hear…He is not here; he is risen!

What holds us back? What keeps us from going? Are we afraid? Are we worried we are not up to the task? Are we afraid no one will take us seriously? The world is a mess—city after city blows up literally in human madness. Our own country lurches through a ludicrous presidential election. The flow of human misery continues up Folsom Boulevard with folks pushing their entire world in a grocery cart beside the road. What can we do in the face of all of that?

Fear not, God is with us. Today, the world changed; the New Creation bloomed into being; and we are the messengers. The world changed. Even with news of terror sweeping the world; even with seemingly insurmountable problems before us; and even with an election cycle bordering on the insane; we have good news to tell. He is not here; he is risen! Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness cannot overcome it.

We can look a child in the eye and assure her she is a child of God, beloved and kept. We can look at our time and place and intone words of hope, comfort, and compassion without a hint of irony. We can do so because Christ lives! There is always another chance. There is always another day. There is no lost cause. Resurrection tells us that God is not done with us. We’ve a story to tell the nations.

Mark left us room to write it. Fill in the rest of the sentence. Better yet, be the rest of the sentence. Show someone what resurrection means by loving them with Christ’s love. Show them hope by lifting them up. Show them healing by walking with them until they are well. 

He is not here; he is risen!

Glory be to God!