In the United States an election year is upon us. As we move toward political conventions and nominations of Presidential Candidates, there are a lot of questions circulating as to who the best leader will be: a man, a woman, a Southern, an experienced politician, a Democrat, a Republican, an Independent?—who knows? We know we need leadership but it isn’t easy to find. In fact, many would say that there is a lack of leadership in our world today.
If you go on the Internet and Google the phrase "lack of leadership" you will find countless newspaper articles, web pages, blogs, and even pictures, which portray and bemoan this lack of leadership. Everything from politics to religion, from business to home life, from East to the West, and from the North to the South—everything is blamed on a lack of leadership. When I read about all of this lack of leadership I find myself simply shaking my head "yes" in agreement. In my experience there truly is a lack of leadership in the world today.
But when I read the Bible, I find that there has always been a lack of human leadership. Certainly a lack of leadership is endemic in the whole story of Christ’s arrest, trial and crucifixion in the 14th and 15th chapters of Mark’s Gospel. Perhaps most striking is the lack of leadership among Jesus’ own disciples. They fail; they all fail miserably—except perhaps for one notable group: the women. It’s the women who consistently are faithful.
Mark introduces us to these faithful women even before the Easter morning story begins. In the 15th chapter Mark tells about the women. He says in verse 40 and 41 that there were faithful women watching from a distance as Jesus dies. Verse 41 tells us that these women had been long time disciples of Jesus. They had been financially supporting the ministry of Jesus, caring for him and the 12 disciples. Given this faithfulness, perhaps it is here among the women that we can find some true leadership. It certainly appears that following the women might be a good idea. They look pretty faithful, like pretty good leaders in our text … especially when compared to other examples of failed leadership.
In contrast to the faithful women are the 12 disciples of Jesus. These people are supposed to be leaders, but it is a lack of leadership that has typified the 12 disciples in the entire story of his suffering and death. Do you remember their failures …? The three disciples who are closest to Jesus, that is, James, Peter and John, all fall asleep when they are suppose to be praying. Judas, one of the twelve, betrays Jesus. Like a bunch of cowards all the disciples desert Jesus when he is arrested and flee, one man even fleeing naked into the dark night. Peter, the rock, forgot all his boastful promises and denied his Lord three times. All of the 12 disciples let Jesus down, but the women appear to remain faithful. In Mark 15:47 we read that it is the women, two of them, who see Jesus laid in the tomb. Where are the men? No where to be found.
So we are not surprised on Easter morning to find the women as the faithful ones on the way to the tomb. The men might just as well be sleeping in, but the women are fulfilling their leadership role of caring for the body of Jesus. As they are on the way to the tomb they begin to worry about who will roll away the large stone covering the entrance to the above ground, cave—like tomb. But like all good leaders they do not let their worry stop them. They keep right on going, focused on their mission. The simple fact is that in the midst of the other disciples’ failures, the women stand out as super stars. Everything looks positive and good.
So what happens when the women get to the tomb? A young man, who we know as an angel from other Gospels, meets the women at the tomb and tells them that Jesus has risen just as he said he would. The women are told to go tell all the disciples and Peter that Jesus is alive. Surely the women, the leaders we have staked our hope in, will believe and go tell the disciples, right?! Well, no, no they don’t act like leaders at all.
In fact, when we look a little closer at the text we find that from the moment the women see the empty tomb with the angel sitting there, they are alarmed. Maybe they are just alarmed because of the angel. Angels always alarm people. But then verse 8 of our text hits like a bomb shell. We read that the women are trembling and bewildered. Even after they hear the good news of Jesus’ resurrection they are bewildered. They went out of the tomb and fled—fled not to tell the disciples in obedience to the angel’s instruction—but fled to say nothing. We read that they said, "nothing to anyone." In fact in the original Greek language that Mark uses to write his Gospel, he uses a double negative to convey the depth of the women’s silence. A literal translation would be, "They said nothing to no one." Nothing to no one. Why? Because they were afraid.
So where does this lack of leadership leave us? If the 12 disciples have failed and now the women have failed too, where do we turn? Well, what we should do is turn back to the Biblical text and see what it tells us. But that’s part of the problem. The oddest part of this entire Easter story is that all the oldest and most reliable manuscripts of Mark’s gospel, show the Gospel coming to an end right here. As far as our best scholarship can determine, the original Gospel of Mark ended at the eighth verse with trembling and bewildered women. What a surprising and distressing ending!
Now it is true that in many of your Bibles you will find a longer ending tacked on, but you will also probably find a footnote or parenthetic comment explaining that this ending probably was not part of the original text. In fact, the Revised Standard Version ends with verse 8 and merely puts the longer ending in a footnote. The New International Version puts a line after verse 8 and indicates that "the two most reliable manuscripts do not have Mark 16: 9—20." What are we to make of this?
Well, what is most clear is that the first eight verses of Mark are the inspired Word of God given by the Spirit to Mark. What is also clear, and what our Bibles try to communicate with various footnotes, is that we simply can’t be sure that any verses after verse 8 are authentic. So where does this leave us? It leaves us with verse 8. All the best evidence suggests that Mark intended for his Gospel to end at verse 8. What a strange ending.
We don’t like that ending. It doesn’t seem like an Easter ending does it? But that is where Mark leaves us. Of course, if we have been reading the whole story of Jesus’ passion and persecution, his death and burial, and all of the disciples who have failed, we shouldn’t be surprised to see more failure here. But still it is surprising, isn’t it. We want Easter to be all about angels and hallelujahs, about tulips and lilies, about fancy Easter dresses and Easter bonnets. We want pastel eggs, green Easter grass, and jelly beans. What we don’t want is a bunch of failed disciples, women who flee, a complete lack of leadership, and the silence of fear. What kind of Easter story is this?
Quite honestly, it is an Easter story that isn’t pretty, and doesn’t have a nice, clean ending, but is brutally honest about our broken human reality. Last year, on the day before Easter, the local press in my town printed a so—called resurrection story on the front page of one of the interior sections of the paper. The story was about how the bodily resurrection of Jesus most likely is not true. The article went on to quote many religious experts who claimed that the actual resurrection of Jesus was both highly unlikely and wasn’t really necessary to the Christian Faith. It really isn’t all that surprising that a secular press would run such a story, but what really struck me was my fellow pastors who were quoted in the article. One claimed that the bodily resurrection of Jesus didn’t matter. Instead, he claimed that Easter simply calls us to be in touch with the resurrection of the "divinity within." My question for my colleague would be, "what resurrection of divinity within!?" In light of the disciples’ repeated failure and the women’s fleeing, what divinity within could this pastor possibility be talking about?
Another pastor was quoted in the article as saying that Easter is just about "living out the example of Jesus." But again, in frustration I say, "How can we live out the example of the perfect Son of God?" The Gospel of Mark shows us men and women like ourselves who are simply not good enough, strong enough and faithful enough to follow the example of Christ. If scripture teaches us anything about ourselves, it is that we are more apt to betray, flee, lie and deny than to follow any divine example or to have any sort of resurrection within. We don’t need a pseudo resurrection of our spirits, of our efforts, of our hopes. We need a real resurrection of a real Savior.
It is that real need for a Savior that can leave us so frustrated with Mark’s strange ending to the Easter story. We need leadership. We can’t get to the nice Easter story and ending that we are looking for without leadership, but everywhere we turn on this first Easter morning, we simply find more failed leadership and brokenness. Again, hear verse 8: "Trembling and bewildered, the women went out and fled from the tomb. They said nothing to anyone, because they were afraid." I say again, what a strange ending.
Yet, upon further review we find that Mark’s ending, although very abrupt, is not quite as unique and surprising as one might think. In the last scene of Matthew’s gospel, just before the resurrected Jesus ascends into heaven, Matthew tells us that some of the disciples doubted. Matthew ends with disciples who still doubt. The Gospel of Luke tells us that on the first Easter evening, even after the resurrected Jesus has appeared to the disciples, some doubted. In fact, Jesus rebuked them saying, "Stop doubting." Likewise in John’s Gospel Mary Magdalene does not believe the news of the resurrection until Jesus calls her by name and Thomas doesn’t believe until Jesus makes a special appearance to show Thomas the nail holes in his hands. The hard truth is that in all the Gospels, Easter morning does not start with a bang of belief and a church full of people singing the Halleluiah Chorus, but with a whimper of doubt, fear, fleeing, and failure.
On this Easter morning take just a moment to be honest with your own brokenness. Do you think you would have been more faithful than the doubting disciples and silent fleeing women? Perhaps you do and perhaps you would have been more faithful, but examine yourself—honestly examine yourself. Would you have been the leader that others could follow in faith? Would you have been the one leading others to the tomb on that first Easter, boldly proclaiming that Christ had risen? Well, I don’t know your answer but I know mine. I’m afraid I would be among those who were silent, bewildered, fearful and doubting.
Ever since Easter day of last year I have kept a broken piece of a clay pot in my office. During the Sundays leading up to Easter last year my church had several broken clay pots up on the platform to remind us of our brokenness. Many members of the congregation took and kept some of those broken pieces to remind them of their own brokenness without Christ. I often look at my own broken piece. Even now, I have the piece in my pocket. Yes, it reminds me that I am broken, but that isn’t why I have the broken piece in my pocket today. I have it in my pocket because I have written some Easter words on the broken pottery—Easter words that we have not yet considered today—words of Christ that point us away from our brokenness toward His leadership.
Here’s what I am talking about: Look at verse 7 again. The angel tells the women that Jesus is "going ahead" of the disciples into Galilee. Now the disciples should have already known that Jesus was going ahead because Jesus had told them this just a few days before. In Mark 14, just hours before Jesus was crucified, he had said to the disciples, "…after I have risen I will go ahead of you into Galilee." Now the angel tells the women to remind the disciples of these words saying, "There you will see him just as he told you."
Can you hear and understand how important this message of the angel is? Jesus is going ahead. That’s what leaders do. They go ahead and their followers follow. Moreover, the women and the disciples are reminded that Jesus is faithful to his promises. He had told them that he would rise from the dead. Now he has. He told them that he would go ahead of them to Galilee. Now the Angel assures the women that it will be so. Moreover, the angel gives the women the great promise that the disciples will see Jesus there! Jesus the faithful leader comes through for his followers.
Yes, it is true that the women and all the disciples let us down with their doubting, with their trembling and bewildered fear, with their silence. Yes, it is true that we let ourselves down with our own doubt, fear, and imperfection. We are all like the piece of broken pottery that is in my pocket. BUT (and here’s the great truth of Easter) BUT the risen Lord has gone ahead of us! He is faithful even when we are not.
The strange ending of the Gospel of Mark pushes us to the faithful risen Savior, for where else would we turn? We know from all the other Gospels that the women do not stay in their silence and bewilderment for long. Jesus begins to appear to his doubting, wavering and fearful disciples. From Mary Magdalene to the whole group of gathered disciples on Easter evening, from Thomas to Peter, to as many as 500 according to the Apostle Paul, Jesus appears and shows himself as Lord of life after death. He rebukes, blesses with peace, eats and talks with his followers. In short, he leads them back from their broken doubt and fear.
I too, and you too, need to be led this Easter into the only faith that can conquer death. So, on my broken piece of pottery I have written the words, "He goes ahead of you." This reminds me that it isn’t about me and my strength, it is about the One who had gone ahead: My Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
The abrupt ending of Mark’s Gospel is all about grace. It leaves all the questions hanging: What will the women do, what will the disciples do, what will I do, what will you do? Well, we know that there is only one eternally faithful leader to turn to in answer to these questions. Turning to Jesus we find the only eternal life there is.
So here is what I suggest for you this Easter. Find something broken in your life. It shouldn’t be hard. It may be a broken spirit, a broken faith, or broken home life, or even as simple as a broken piece of a clay pot. But find something broken. Then pray. Pray a prayer of confession where you say to God, "This is all I’ve got, Lord. I am broken and I need you to lead me to life." If you pray that prayer I can’t guarantee exactly how God will respond, or what exactly God will do. But I can tell you this. In the name of the Risen Savior, he will go ahead of you. Follow your risen Lord. He’s the only true eternal leader that brings us life. Follow him.
Pray with me please.
Prayer
Dear Heavenly Father, we confess that we are broken. We are broken and failed in and of ourselves. We thank you, Father, for sending your Son to go ahead of us, for bringing him back to life that we might have a Savior. We pray, Lord, that we will follow that Savior now. Thank you for the resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. In Jesus name, Amen.
Paul DeVries
Rev. Paul DeVries, most commonly referred to as “Pastor Paul”, is the Sr. Pastor of Brookside Christian Reformed Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He is married to Diane (nee Vanden Akker) and the father of four children. He graduated from Calvin Theological Seminary in 1989 and served for 12 years as the pastor of Unity Christian Reformed Church in Prospect Park, New Jersey. As a pastor his first love and greatest joy comes in the honor of bringing God’‘s Word to his congregation on a weekly basis through his preaching. He enjoys reading, camping with his family, watching his children’‘s sporting events, and working on home improvement projects - inside and outside his home.
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