Unfinished Business

I'm now in Falls Church, VA, but with the church office closed for Easter Monday, I'll actually begin work tomorrow.  Most adults know about beginning a new job, about the process of learning the ropes and figuring out what the work really entails.  This process now begins for me, but there is another piece to figuring out my work.  And this involves knowing what the overall work of the Church is.  What is it we are called to do as Christians?

Today's gospel is Mark's Easter morning account.  Mark's version has provoked much debate over the years.  Most Bibles note that the best manuscripts of the gospel end at 16:8.  Then follow shorter and longer endings which seem to have been affixed later.  There is little debate regarding these additions.  The questions are about the original ending.

From a grammatical standpoint, the Greek text of 16:8 ends very awkwardly, leading many to insist that the original ending has been lost.  Others insist Mark does this intentionally to leave the gospel with an unfinished feel that calls the reader forward to continue the command first given to the women.  There is no way to totally resolve this debate, but regardless, we are left with this strange conclusion to Easter, where three witnesses to the empty tomb say nothing because they are afraid.

Very few of us don't have some experience in this area.  We have heard all sorts of commands from Jesus, commands to love our enemies, to turn the other cheek, to love God over wealth, but we don't do as we are told.  Like the women on that Easter morning, we aren't convinced it is in our best interest to act as we've been commanded.  And so we don't.

Of course we know that the women did not remain silent.  The command to tell must have overwhelmed their fear eventually.  But we present day Christians have had nearly 2000 years to develop a long list of excuses for not doing as Jesus says.  At times we've perverted Jesus' call to follow him into a trite formula where believing a few things is all that matters.

And so the Church needs to remember what Jesus said to us, hear him call us once more and then overcome the fears that keep us from following.  And I think the Spirit is spurring the Church to do just that.  As anxious as it makes many of us, some of the change and the turmoil in the Church of late is calling us back to our work, to our unfinished business of showing the world God's new day, the Kingdom Jesus insists has drawn near.

And so as I begin learning the ropes of a new job, I pray that I never lose sight of my true job: helping the people of this congregation hear what Jesus is calling us to do.

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