Easter

What a sight to see, huh?

It’s pretty clear which festival we are celebrating today. The visuals alone of these beautiful flowers — really a garden — tell their own stories about new life and Easter blessings.

It’s been a week of images. I’m a visual person, so I can tell you that I’ve taken a whole visual trip before getting to Easter Sunday.

It began last Sunday with the palms. [p1] The cries of Hosana, both of joy and fear. It continued with the image of a servant’s towel on Maundy Thursday. [p2] The kind of love that Jesus calls us to is at the same time menial and miraculous. And then the cross of Good Friday. [p3] That symbol of struggle, pain, and fear. And the final symbol, the tomb. [p4] Death. A bare altar. A stone. The end.

These images serve to tell part of a story that comes to a conclusion in this last chapter of the Gospel story as told by Mark — the Gospel we’ve been focusing on this year. To all appearances it would look to be the end of Jesus. Certainly the Roman and Jewish authorities considered the tomb to be the end of the story. You can almost hear their sighs of relief that this uncomfortable conflict stirred up by a weird son of a carpenter has come to end: might is still right, and every who was in charge is still in charge.

[CLOSELY] But we know that this is not quite the end. We know that there’s more to this story. The Gospel changes everything. After the palms were laid down, the towel removed, the cross lifted up, and the tomb sealed, now hear the Easter Good News this morning from the Gospel of Mark:

(Mark 16.1–8 NRSV modified)

“When the sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint Jesus. And very early, on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb. They had been saying to one another, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?” When they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had already been rolled back. As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man, dressed in a white robe, sitting on the right side; and they were alarmed. But 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. But go, tell his disciples even Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you.” So 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.”

How’s that for an ending? Although most Bibles include a longer ending to the Gospel of Mark, the really smart Bible people, and the earliest manuscripts of Mark end the Gospel right here.

And they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.

This is how it ends? After everything that has happened? After all the miracles? After all the healings? And teachings? After all the people Jesus sent away saying “Tell no one” who then went out proclaiming the Good News themselves we come to this end, the final vindication of Jesus, raised by God. And we end with terror. Saying nothing. To anyone.

What an unsettling ending. It’s like a piece of music that ends without resolution…

Isn’t it annoying? We want that ending. That resolution. Have you ever left a movie theater totally uncomfortable…because the film refused to give you a resolution? I have. Recently.

Not too long ago I went to see a movie called “The Hunger Games.” Has anyone heard of it?

[Hunger Games]

Besides being one of the biggest blockbuster premieres of all time, it’s also a pretty good movie. How often does that happen? This thing is, it brings up all these important issues about

• violence and society
• the treatment of children
• entertainment and politics

but does not resolve them by any stretch of the imagination. I won’t spoil the story for you if you plan to see it soon, but a brief synopsis might be a story set in a world similar to ours where children aged 12-18 are selected to literally fight each other to the death in a tournament held as a kind of ritual each year. And this tournament is produced and manipulated and televised by the government and watched by millions of people who cheer on their local child warrior — at least while they are still alive.

It’s a brutal story that left me pretty uncomfortable, but it’s not too hard to see what the author might be trying to show us about our own world. And what violence can do to us. After all, it’s not just in the world of Hunger Games where kids are neglected, abused, and even killed. This is our world, too. This is the same as the world that Jesus came into: a world that turned against the one that came to save it. A world in which mothers still lose their sons and daughters. (If anyone wants to keep talking about the story of the Hunger Games, let me know and we can continue that later.

For now, it’s enough to say that the movie shows us the forces of evil at work in the world — even if it takes place in different reality. The movie brings up real issues for me. And I want resolution to these issues. But the movie does not provide them all.

Now, I know the answer for Hunger Games is that I’m supposed to wait for the sequels or read the rest of the series to get my resolution. But what about the Gospel story? There are real issues there, too. About life and death, hope and violence, love and sin. Where do we find resolution to a story that ends with silence, amazement, and fear?

Well, I imagine we have two options: we can go back into what has already happened and look for clues there. Or we go forward. Actually, I think the Resurrection calls us to do both.

First, the Resurrection of Jesus, and the abrupt end at the empty tomb sends us back into the Gospel to look for our resolution. What does this all mean, now that Jesus has been raised? When Jesus taught the people not to fear death — maybe he was right? When Jesus said that all who lose their lives for the Gospel will save them — maybe he was serious? When he said pick up your cross, he meant it. When he said that all things are possible for God, that was true.

The Resurrection means that light and life and love can show up anywhere — even in death — for all things are possible for God. And here is my hope, found in the second to last verse of the Gospel of Mark:

But go, tell his disciples, even Peter, that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you.

Even Peter.

Most translations say Go tell his disciples and Peter, but it’s equally valid to translate this as even Peter. And it makes more sense. Peter, our star disciple. Who confessed Jesus as the Messiah. Who pledged never to abandon his Teacher and Lord. Who could not even stay awake in Jesus’ greatest struggle, as he prayed in Gethsemane. And — when it came down to it — who denied even knowing Jesus. Three times before the rooster crowed.

Go tell his disciples. Even Peter. I don’t know about you, but these words give me hope. Even Peter. Even me. Even you.

Even those of us who profess our faith, but struggle with doubt. Even those of us that love the commandments, but find them hard to keep. Even those of us who claim to be leaders, but stumble along the way. Even those of us who hear this story but are left in silence. And fear.

But for us, even us, the resolution is not found in the final words written in ink on a piece of paper. The resolution is your encounter and my encounter with this same Jesus.

The same Jesus who has been resurrected in our lives. Where forgiveness has been given even when we don’t deserve it. Where love has been shared despite our flaws. Where God’s will has been done even as we thought we failed.

The ending to the Gospel of Mark is unresolved by Christ is still being resurrected in our lives. God still walks with us. Christ still invites us together, and feeds us with his own body and blood. Not once, at the end of the story, but every time we gather.

How’s that for an ending?

The final image, then? In a week that began with palms, moved to towels, to the cross, to the tomb…This is the final image of the story: I’m looking at it. It is a group of people — yes even you and even me — who have heard the Good News. Who have found life in Jesus. Who have found hope in the story. Who have strength in love. You look like the next part of the story. Even you.

Amen and Alleluia.