Focus

Prepare yourself to discern what is and what is not of God today. Still yourself so you can hear how God is calling you.

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Read

Mark 16:1-8 (NRSV)

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. 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 and 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.

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Reflect

Mark gives us great detail about Jesus’ life, but he does not have all the preliminaries of the other three Gospels. It is the same when he tells us about the Resurrection in a very brief scene. The “young man, dressed in a white robe” makes a simple declaration: “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.” The women were terrified. They ran away. This is not the end of the story. Mark’s earliest readers had evidence because others shared this good news with them. It was handed down through the Apostles. It has been handed down to us.

Just as the women were terrified, sometimes we are also terrified. Just as the disciples hid in fear, sometimes we want to hide out of fear. We are the carriers of the good news in Christ Jesus. It is through us that the message will continue to spread, just as it spread through the followers of Jesus in the earliest days after his resurrection.

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Pray

Dear Lord, do not let us be silenced by our own fears. Help us to remember that you are always with us to guide us so we, too, may be witnesses to Jesus’ resurrection from the dead. Strengthen and guide us so we can indeed be true to the Lord who was true to the end, even to death on a cross for our sake. Amen.

Go with God.