204. Unbelievable News – Mark 16:10-11
The risen Jesus has just appeared to Mary Magdalene. She is the first to see him, and she returns and tells the disciples.
She went and told those who had been with him and who were mourning and weeping. 11 When they heard that Jesus was alive and that she had seen him, they did not believe it. – Mark 16:10-11
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When Mary runs back to the upper room, it’s significant that Mark tells us that the disciples there are not only mourning but weeping. The loss of Jesus was a loss they can’t comprehend, let alone overcome. Now they don’t even have his body! So, who is it that Jesus has just sent to them to announce that he has risen? Christian tradition tells us that this Mary Magdalene was the same woman whom the Jews had wanted to stone for adultery, and who had been a prostitute. Mark tells us that Christ had driven out seven demons from her.
Mary’s life of degradation would have ended quite recently: within the last few years, during which time she had met Jesus. Why would anyone believe someone like her? On this day, on which the Christian church was founded, Mary presented the disciples with her eyewitness testimony, but they didn’t believe it. This tells us a very important thing. The Christian message is based on evidence, but people choose not to believe it.
There’s no problem with the evidence. From the very beginning of Christianity, the problem for people is with unbelief. People choose not to believe because the facts don’t fit their worldview. And people choose not to believe because they can’t look past their fear. Both of these were true for the disciples that Sunday morning. But the resurrection of Jesus has changed everything.
We often act like the disciples in the upper room. We’ve been told that Jesus is risen and alive, but you can tell from our attitudes that we really don’t believe it. Like the disciples, we are mourning and weeping. Ask yourself, “Am I really living as if Jesus is alive?”
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