Our Gospel story today leaves us wondering and wanting for more because Mark’s account of the resurrection, well, has no resurrection and no alleluias. It leaves us standing at an empty tomb, with no one around, with no ending.
Mark 16:1-8
When the sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint him.2And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb.3They had been saying to one another, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?”4When they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had already been rolled back.5As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man, dressed in a white robe, sitting on the right side; and they were alarmed.6But he said to them, “Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here. Look, there is the place they laid him.7But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you.”8So they went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.
Really?
Easter B April 8 2012
On Saturday Night Live (a comedy show on, yes, late Saturday nights) there is a segment where they parody “world news”. Recently, Kermit the Frog hosted the news with the regular host, Seth Meyers, in a segment called, “REALLY?”
Imagine that I am Seth Meyers, the host, sitting at a news desk with Kermit the Frog-Earl, will you help me.
Seth: On Thursday Congress rejected new USDA guidelines in school lunches that would increase fresh fruits and vegetables in school cafeterias. In fact, they declared that the tomato paste in school cafeteria pizza counts makes pizza count as a vegetable. This brings us to our next segment that we call “Really?!!”
Really congress, now pizza is a vegetable?
Please, Cafeteria pizza barely classifies as real pizza. It’s as nutritional as the plate it’s served on! I mean really?
And if pizza is a vegetable now? , does that make broccoli penicillin?
Kermit: REALLY? And if pizza is a vegetable, what is a fruit salad? Twizzlers and Grape Soda? Really. Really?
S: Pretty soon eating french fries will classify as taking French Class!
K: Really.
S: For what it’s worth, the tomato paste is only 31% tomatoes. The other ingredients are potassium sorbate citric acid, tricalcium phosphate
K: That’s not a vegetable, that’s a chemistry Quiz! I mean REALLY??
S: ReallY?
K: It’s your job, congress to look out for children! I mean, really!
S: In fact, food corporations spend millions each year lobbying against tighter nutritional guidelines so in this case, you are a PUPPET of the food industry! (no offense, Kermit)
K: Oh, no that’s o.k., none taken. Besides I am not a puppet, I am a muppet.
S: Huh, what’s the difference?
K: Well, a puppet is actually controlled by person, where I am an actual talking frog!
S: Oh! Really?
K: Really.
S: Really??
K: Really!
Really? Re ally??? Really--a word with many sentiments, wouldn’t you say?
And when I read this account of the resurrection in Mark, it’s exactly how I respond. Really Mark? Couldn’t you have thrown in a glimpse of the risen Christ somewhere? Why did you just leave us hanging, like a dangling participle? Really.
In fact, dear church, if you look in your pew bibles on page , you will see that we aren’t the only ones uncomfortable with the silence. Later, people added endings to this gospel--you can see it starting at “verse 9” there in the italics. My bible says, “Endings added later.” Really, Mark, you must have known the ending--how did you know the tomb was empty? Maybe Mark actually wrote the end, but the papryrus he was writing burned up in the cooking fire. Who knows? Or, maybe....maybe Mark wanted to end this story just the way he did--with no ending.
Really?
Think about it. The way Mark’s gospel ends invites us to stare at the empty tomb, just like Mary Magdalene, Salome, and Mary, the mother of Jesus. They didn’t see Jesus, and neither have we. They didn’t touch Jesus’ hands, or the hem of his garment, and neither have we. We are in the same place these women were that very first Easter--with an empty tomb, and a choice on how to respond. They are our “silent sisters” (Beyond Fear and Faith, Barbara Lundblad at Odyssey Networkshttp://odysseynetworks.org/news/onscripture-the-bible-mark-16-1-8-page-2), one with us in deciding how to finish the story.
And, really, Mary Magdalene, Salome, and Mother Mary can be our guides in how we do tell the story, in the context of our own lives (Lundblad). They flee from the tomb, seized in terror and amazement. Literally, in quaking and ecstasy. We know they told their story, because we wouldn’t know it without their telling. However, how they gave testimony was framed by their experience at the empty tomb--quaking, trembling (was that because of hope beyond hope? fear? ) and ecstasy (joy beyond joy that Love abides?)
Really--to me, it sounds like they were scared witless at the impossible possibility that Love and justice and hope won over domination, death, and injustice.
Sisters and brothers, when was the last time you were ecstatic about the possibility of Love overcoming all?
Really--I am serious.
Sometimes, I think, as God’s people, we stand at the empty tomb with question marks, or boredom, or literalness. We pay our respects to in this fantastical story of a Risen Christ, walking through walls to visit with the disciples...and we forget the sheer power of what it all means. We walk away from the empty tomb, unchanged, and get on with with. Christ has risen. Hallelujah. So what?
Let’s pause. Isn’t this sanctuary beautiful? Don’t you love singing “Christ the Lord has risen again?” Do you have a sense of the joy of this day?
The joy is present because the tomb is empty. The empty tomb proclaims that Love will always live, will rise above, again and again and again. It makes me tremble when I really think about it. I understand why Salome and Mary and Mary ran away from the empty tomb--because there was nothing there, so they ran back to their lives with the hope that change was possible. Really!
Sisters and brothers, we die a million deaths everyday. We crucify others--intentionally, and by mistake. We experience the suffering of the cross.
I die at the fact that still, in this society, that black children are murdered, “walking black”, and that parents have to have the “talk” with their black sons. I despair when I watch the news. I die when I hear that one day, just a month ago, on February 8, a colleagues sister was a 32 year old healthy pregnant woman, and the next day, on February 9, because of an errant driver and a car accident, became a parapalegic, whose baby was saved, but faces financial ruin and places her family at risk because our system does not have affordable health care. I die because God is nowhere to be found, and I die because I am tired of the suffering, the loss, the pain. It’s all futile ad hopeless.
Really, don’t you know what I mean?
But then, as many deaths as there are, there are twice that many resurrections, possibilities wrought by empty tombs.
We could be ecstatic with the profoundness of resurrection.
Really!
Flowers bloom.
My spouse accepts my apology.
People raise money to provide a state of the art wheel chair.
Someone says “I love You”
A stranger offers you a smile.
Your friend, who is dying, still wants birthday cake with candles.
In spite of white privilege and stupidity, people rally and protest.
Love is born. Love dies, because of fear and domination.
But then Love rallies.
And Love is resurrected.
That doesn’t mean that you are required to be happy and because everything is fixed and figured out.
The fact that Love wins means that even the most wounded of us can tremble at the possibility of hope, in spite of the struggles and sufferings of life. We don't know all of what that means; we don't have to. We can be afraid, confused, and even grieving. We don’t have to be stronger or happier or wise than we are to finish the unfinished story in Mark. (Janine Goodwin, read the whole sermon here http://feministheology.blogspot.com/2012/04/easter-its-more-than-happy.html)
Really.
You know this.
How do you know that love lives? That Love has risen? That Love will come again?
How will you bear witness? How will you tell the rest of the Story?
Really?
Then let me hear a Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
Again? Hallelelujah!
Yes. REALLY!!!
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