So – this Sunday we’ll be coming to our last study in the Gospel of Mark – we’ll be reading chapter 16. For the last year in doing this study I’ve done digital paintings to accompany the teachings – and I thought I’d share my process with you for these. This is sped up by 650% – so don’t get any ideas that I can actually paint this fast. It was fun to do – but I don’t think I’ll bite off anything that ambitious again – it really commandeered my time.
Most scholars, including very conservative ones, don’t believe the last 12 verses of ch 16 were part of the original text, but were added sometime after the 3rd Century. With that in mind, we’ll be keeping our focus of this study on the first 8 verses…which makes for a really open-ended finale.
In the text we return to the women we were reading about at the end of chapter 15. They are going to the tomb to finish the job of preparing Jesus’ corpse, something left undone because they ran out of time before the Sabbath. How does the theme of unfinished work get revealed in the first 8 verses?
Why do you think it was important that the angel singled out Peter as one to whom this message was given? What can that tell us about our own times of falling short? What significance can you discern in the fact that Jesus had gone before them and would meet them when they got there?
If you were to narrow the text down to the first 8 verses, what do you feel at the end of v8? Is there anything you feel prompted to do when concluding with v8? Ad infinitum is Latin for “to infinity”, connoting that something is ongoing. Mark probably intended for his readers to be called to an ongoing action in the wake of Jesus’ resurrection. What is your response to the news that Jesus his risen, and what does it call you to do?
This has been a really enjoyable study to undertake! Hope you got as much out of it as I did, and I certainly hope you return to Mark again and again to read the Good News about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God!