Mark 16:1-7
Dear Friends, Among all the Resurrection stories, today’s passage from Mark is especially challenging and different. All the stories carry the fundamental message of victory over death, the restoration from the consequences of the first sin of Adam and Eve. It is clear that God had spoken and the ultimate word is not death but life, not hatred but love, not injustice and violence, but wholeness, integrity, peace and reconciliation.
In today’s passage we are given a powerful insight about discipleship: God never gives up on us!
In the three passages in Mark (8:31, 9:31, & 10:34) where Jesus foretell His journey to Jerusalem and His death, He also foretells His resurrection. “And three days after His death He will rise.” (Mk 9:31)
Each time in Mark the failure of the disciples to grasp this reality is highlighted by an event that shows their total misunderstanding of Jesus’ message.
At the Tomb, the messenger of God, dressed in white, tells the women to have the disciples go to Galilee where they will encounter the Risen Christ. This means they will be given another opportunity to enter deeply and openly into the teachings of Jesus which so evaded then in the first go round.
Jesus has not given up on the disciples. Their failure to grasp his message, their desertion at the time of the Passion and Death does not call forth the wrath of a vengeful God. On the contrary, we are presented with a faithful and forgiving and ever so patient God. Indeed, the reality is God did not give up on the disciple and especially Peter. Nor will God ever give up on us.
This invitation to return to Galilee is to enter into the Gospel message with new eyes of faith. It is a call for us to truly understand the words of Jesus to take up our cross and follow Him to Jerusalem. It is an invitation to face up to death in all its manifestations, great and small, and realize that God has spoken with the ultimate authority in our human reality. The last word is not death but life, not defeat and hopelessness but victory that unveils a graciousness and a sense of hope in all our darkest moments. God has not given up on us!
We need to return to Galilee and encounter God’s word in Jesus with new eyes opened by the reality of the Resurrection. It is, indeed, a long journey to learn that there is victory in defeat and it is better to serve than to be served and that the first shall be last and the last first and to save our life we need to lose it! Alleluia!
