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Mark 16:9-20 - The Disputed Ending

If you've got your Bibles and want to turn, even if you don't have a Bible and don't want to turn, we're still going to be in Mark chapter 16. Mark chapter 16, I'm going to read verses 9 through 20, the end of the book.

Now when he rose early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, from whom he had cast out seven demons. She went and told those who had been with him as they mourned and wept. But when they heard that he was alive and had been seen by her, they would not believe it.

After these things, he appeared in another form to two of them as they were walking into the country. And they went back and told the rest, but they did not believe them.

Afterward, he appeared to the eleven themselves as they were reclining at table, and he rebuked them for their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they had not believed those who saw him after he had risen.

And he said to them, Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.

And these signs will accompany those who believe. In my name they will cast out demons, they will speak in new tongues, they will pick up serpents with their hands, and if they drink any deadly poison it will not hurt them. They will lay their hands on the sick and they will recover.

So then the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken to them, was taken up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God. And they went out and preached everywhere while the Lord worked with them and confirmed the message by accompanying signs.

Textual Issues with Mark's Ending

Well, if you do have your Bible in front of you, your text there that we just read is probably set off in brackets. And you might ask, why are there brackets? And we talked about that a couple of weeks ago, but if you weren't here or if you were here and your eyes glazed over as we spent 15 minutes talking about textual criticism, I would understand that. So I'm just gonna give you the short version this morning.

The end of Mark's gospel is disputed. Most biblical scholars do not believe that Mark, the author of this gospel, wrote verses 9 through 20. Some folks suggest that he wrote a different ending, which was lost at some point. Others, that he simply ended abruptly with verse 8, which is the position that I take. I think Mark intentionally ended with verse 8. And then this later ending, verses 9 through 20, were attached sometime in the first two centuries of the church.

The earliest manuscripts that we have don't include these verses. And early church testimony suggests that these verses weren't there in the earliest copies of Mark's gospel. Nonetheless, early on they were attached. But I think Mark intentionally left us with verse 8. The women are running away from the tomb in fear. They haven't seen Jesus yet. They've just heard the angels who have given the message that Jesus is alive. And I think Mark does that to leave us with this question of what are you going to do with the good news that Jesus is alive? Are you going to believe or are you going to doubt. There's no more important question for you to answer is what are you going to do with the good news of the resurrection of Jesus?

But then we still do have these verses, verses 9 through 20, and they have been around for a long time. Again, second century probably is the first time we see these start getting attached to Mark's gospel, and you can understand how that would happen. Now, if you were in the early church and you're reading copies of the gospel and then you're making copies by hand, right? This is before the printing press, before typing. So you're writing these out by hand to send to your friends that live in different parts of the world or who are in new churches that don't have copies of the gospel yet.

You might get to the end of Mark and think, I would like them to have some more information than just, oh, there's news that Jesus is alive. The other gospels have things like, you know, Jesus actually visibly appearing to people or giving more instructions to the disciples, ascending to heaven, the church starting to go out and obey what Jesus told them. These are important details that Mark didn't include. And you could see if you were sending a copy of this gospel out to a friend or to someone else who needs this news, you might go, I'm just going to add some details here to fill in the blanks for them. And then God in his providence for 1,800 years has preserved this as attached to the gospel of Mark.

So the caveating there, done. We're still going to walk through these verses because with one exception, which we'll get to, all of the things that are mentioned here do come up elsewhere in scripture. And so I think they're still important. These events are attested to elsewhere in scripture, and they point to us over and over again.

Post-Resurrection Appearances (Verses 9-14)

So verses 9 through 14 give us the immediate post-resurrection appearances of Jesus. First to Mary Magdalene, then to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, and then to the 11. And the reference to Jesus here, appearing to Mary Magdalene includes the fact that he had cast seven demons out from her. That's, again, if this had been written by Mark, this seems like a weird place for him to bring that up. He would have brought it up earlier. He's talked about Mary several times over. But it's backed up by Luke chapter 8 and verse 2, where it says that Mary Magdalene is someone from whom Jesus had cast out seven demons.

We do see him appearing to Mary in John chapter 20 and verses 11 through 18. I'm going to read those for you real quickly. John chapter 20 beginning in verse 11 says,

Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. And as she wept, she stooped to look into the tomb. And she saw two angels in white sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet. And they said to her, woman, why are you weeping? She said to them, they have taken away my Lord and I do not know where they have laid him.

Having said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking? Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him and I will take him away. And Jesus said to her, Mary. Mary. She turned and said to him in Aramaic, Rabboni, which means teacher. And Jesus said to her, do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God. Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, I have seen the Lord, and that he had said these things to her.

Now, if you go back a little further in John's gospel, in John chapter 20, it would seem that putting this together with what we read earlier in Mark, the women... the group of four women, at least, who came to the tomb. They had met one angel there, and he had told them to go back and tell the disciples. So they go back and tell the disciples, who don't believe them. But then John and Peter sprint out to the tomb, and they don't see Jesus. They just see an empty tomb. And it seems like Mary has followed them back out here, and she's standing at the tomb weeping.

And you can kind of see where she goes, Did I miss something before? I've got to look. And so she looks back down into the tomb and where one angel had been before, now there are two angels. And I said, what are you looking for? Why are you weeping? And she gives an answer that's number one, obvious. And number two tells us that she didn't listen to the first angel very carefully. She says, they have taken away my Lord. And I do not know where they have laid him. Well, obviously she doesn't know where he is. She's standing here weeping. But the first angel had already told her that he was alive. But she still sees no body and just assumes somebody has taken this body away.

And then she turns around and there's this man standing here. And she assumes this man is the gardener. And he asks her the same question. Why are you weeping? And then he adds this second question. Whom? Are you seeking? And she says, you know, if you're the one who moved the body, if you've taken away my Lord, please tell me. I'll move him. I'll put him where he can stay. And Jesus replies to her with one word. He simply says her name. And when Jesus says her name, his voice is recognized by her. He is now recognized by her. And she clings to him and says, Rabboni, teacher, And then she does the only reasonable thing that she can do after he says, don't cling to me now. He sends her back to the disciples and she goes. Verse 18 tells us she goes back to tell the others.

And then here in Mark, it tells us that Jesus afterwards appeared to two of them in the countryside. And that story is recorded for us in the gospel of Luke chapter 24. There are the two disciples walking on the road to Emmaus. They've left Jerusalem and they're heading to this little town that's about seven miles away from Jerusalem. And they're walking along the road and this man appears beside them and starts to ask them, what are you guys talking about?

And the