Let the Mystery Be
“Let the mystery be…”
Mark 16:1-8
The 24/7 news cycle distorts our world. How many times a day does this ticker land on the bottom of the screen: “Breaking news!” I remember days when that ticker was justified: the explosion of the Challenger space shuttle; planes crashing into the World Trade Centers; the events of January 6th. However, that ticker is up all the time, every day. The truth is that earth-shattering news doesn’t happen constantly. However, if the networks keep telling us it is then, for a while, it feels like it might. You’ve got our attention, which of course is the goal for the network. Eventually, though, after stressing every time we see that ticker—“Oh no! What now?”—we end up jaded: “Ya, right…”
The other weird feature of the news is that long before anyone could possibly know what has happened, there will be panels of paid “experts” either speculating on what they think might have happened or simply telling us that they don’t know what happened but they will tell us when they do. The truth is that most of what happens in this world is pretty complex. Even when we do finally understand what happened, it will take even longer to understand the consequences of what’s happened. However, the news networks don’t tell long complicated stories. Instead, they send a reporter out to stand in the rubble of a tornado to ask people how it felt when their home blew away. That thirty seconds is all we’ll ever hear of them. Rather than being able to tell a story that is true and helps us make sense of ourselves and our world, we are bombarded with disturbing images and tragic moments that keep us watching but leave us with our hands on our knees, gasping for air.
It takes time to discern the truth. It takes real care to present the truth in a way that engages your audience. It takes discipline to only tell the story that we know and not just tell the story that the audience wants to hear: “If we tell them what they want to hear, our ratings will go through the roof!” On our best days, we pick friends who are honest and challenging. We almost never pick our news sources that way. Thinking is such hard work, right?
The other thing that is true about news in our world is that the networks will search the planet to find footage that holds our attention, footage that tends to be introduced with these words: “What your about to see will be disturbing for some people. Viewer discretion is advised.” It is a billion dollar industry to find footage of the worst things and bring it into our living room. In one sense, this makes us more aware than any human beings in history of what’s awful in our world. The problem, though, is that we have no more power to do anything about it than our ancestors, who were blissfully unaware. In the end, our power to act is almost always local, within a community, neighbor-to-neighbor.
It’s important to be honest about the world we live in because this is definitely not the world of our ancestors in faith. Our ancestors in faith waited a long time to write the Gospels. Mark, the first Gospel written, is generally thought to have been written in 70 A.D. Jesus died in 33 A.D. That means it took 37 years for the first Gospel to appear. That is definitely not a 24/7 news cycle pace! Why did it take so long? Well, in the ancient world, literacy was rare. Paper was hard to come by. Mostly, legal documents were written and not much else. Also, even if you were literate and you had paper and ink, you didn’t tend to write much when you were struggling to survive. Remember, for the first 300 years, our ancestors would be arrested and persecuted for their faith. Finally, in that ancient world, you conveyed the truth to others by talking to them. The “news” was shared on street corners and around dinner tables and in casual gatherings and that news, almost exclusively, would have been local.
The most specific thing that shaped the writing of the Gospel of Mark, as I’ve said before, was the failed rebellion against the Roman occupation. Jesus was accused of wanting to lead such a rebellion by the authorities. He was despised in the end by many of his former followers because he had no interest in leading that rebellion. 35 years later, someone else stepped up. That rebellion was almost immediately stopped. In 70 A.D., a young Roman leader was sent to teach Jerusalem a lesson. He blockaded the city until everyone was starving and weak. Then, he slaughtered the people and tore the city and the temple apart, stone by stone.
Mark is writing in the wake of that horrific tragedy. One instinct that we have in catastrophic times is to try to preserve what’s essential. That’s what he’s doing. He’s getting things down on paper (or papyrus) in the hopes that the truth will survive this onslaught. When you’re writing under those circumstances, you use less words rather than more words because neither you nor your audience have time to waste. If you actually read the Gospel of Mark like a regular book, it is an easy “one sitting” read. However, for those of us used to the longer versions of the other Gospels, the economy of words is really quite shocking.
Given all this about the Gospel of Mark, what does Mark have to say about Easter? Like everything else in this Gospel, the account is bare bones. Three women go to the tomb: Mary Magdeline; Mary, the mother of James; and Salome. Let’s stop there for a moment. Mary Magdeline is one of the more controversial women in church history. She was close to Jesus, a leader in the early church, and was later, in my opinion, slandered as “having been a prostitute” by a hierarchy that had to do away with women as leaders. Mary, the mother of James, is Mary, the mother of Jesus. James was Jesus’ brother. The thinking is that she was listed as the mother of James because she wasn’t there simply as Jesus’ mother. She was a woman of faith, standing on her own. Finally, who was Salome? Salome was a princess, the step-daughter of Herod Antipas. If you’re really dialed in, then you know that Salome was the royal daughter who asked for John the Baptist’s head on a platter.
We have to remind ourselves that none of the Gospel writers were telling the story of Jesus to people who had not already heard his story. The Gospel writers aren’t introducing anything new. Rather, they are emphasizing things to their audiences and responding to the controversies and conversations of the day. So, as he’s telling the story of the most pivotal morning in Christianity, Mark puts three incredibly important women front and center. In doing so, Mark challenges his readers to understand the place of women in the faith and in the community.
Early in the morning, these three women head to the tomb, at great risk to themselves, carrying burial spices to give Jesus a decent burial. On top of the horror of dying on a cross, the bodies of crucified people were left hanging on the cross for weeks as food for the buzzards. Because someone powerful intervened, Jesus’ body was placed instead in a tomb. That tomb had been sealed with a large stone. The women want to pay their respects to Jesus after his death, but there is a giant barrier: that stone. The women ask each other, “Who will roll that stone away?”
That’s the most memorable phrase for me from Mark: “Who will roll this stone away?” They’re on the way to do the right thing but they know the barrier that awaits them. We’ve all been there, right? I know what I have to do, what I need to do, even what I’m being called to do, but I also can come up with a terrific list of all the reasons why I’m just not going to be able to get the job done. (This, for me, is the struggle, at some point, of every work trip that I’ve ever been on!) What we have to do is refuse to let barriers stop us, especially the barriers that we are worried will be there in the future. What if we get there and the “stone has been rolled away?”
For the women, when they arrive at the tomb, the stone has already been rolled away. How many times has this been the case in your life? It happens all the time in mine. I’m sure that I know what the problem is going to be. When I finally arrive, the problem is already resolved (or sometimes there’s a whole new, unanticipated barrier to replace it—but that’s a sermon for another day!) For the women, though, the physical challenge that they knew they couldn’t handle is no longer an issue at all.
Who moved the stone is a giant question. Matthew tells us that there was an earthquake and a dazzling angel with all sorts of powers. The authorities in Matthew tell everyone that the disciples came and, among other things, rolled the stone away—a part of their “big lie.” Mark simply tells us that the stone is out of the way and offers no explanation. Honestly, that’s usually my experience when the barrier that I anticipated has been removed: “I don’t know how that happened but thank God it did. Really…thank you, God.”
When the women enter the tomb, they see a young man in a white robe. Notice, this young man is not identified as an angel. His clothes aren’t dazzling. He isn’t plopped on top of the stone. Those are features of Matthew’s story. Instead, this is just a young man. The women see him and they’re frightened. The young man tells them not be scared. He has a message to deliver that is a lot like the message that the dazzling angel in Matthew relates: “Jesus isn’t here. He has been raised. Look—his body was laid right here. Now, you need to go and tell the disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you and will meet you in Galilee. You’ll see him there.”
Let me share a few thoughts. First, why is this a young man not a dazzing angel. I think Mark doesn’t want to distract us from the message. Try this experment with your dog. Point something out to them. Does the dog look in that direction or does the stare at the finger? People “stare at the finger” all the time. Angels aren’t the point. Angels point to your calling.
Second, did you notice how the young man refers to “the disciples and Peter?” I wonder, is Mark telling us, “There are the regular, run-of-the-mill disciples and then there is Peter, the great leader?” Or, is Mark separating Peter out because of his denial of ever having known Christ in Jesus’ last days? Peter was a controversial and powerful leader in the early church. Mark’s saying something. I’m just not sure what…
Finally, knowing that this Gospel was written after the destruction of Jerusalem, it is fascinating that Jesus is going to meet the disciples and other followers as far away from Jerusalem as possible in the backwoods of Galilee. In 70 A.D., Galilee was a safe place. Mark seems to be hinting that the Christian faith never needed Jerusalem to thrive. From the start, the faith bloomed far from the city.
In the end, what I love about Mark’s Gospel is that he doesn’t reduce the mystery of the moment by giving us easy answers. The stone is out of the way but we don’t know how. A young man explains what’s happened to the women but we don’t know who he is. The women are told to go tell the disciples that Jesus will meet them in Galilee. Instead, the women, overwhelmed with fear and amazement, run away.
Mark looks us in the eye and tells us, “Something happened here. Something mysterious. You need to live with that mystery and refuse to explain it away. You need to let the mystery be.”