Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature

 

 Now when the Sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, that they might come and anoint Him.  Very early in the morning, on the first day of the week, they came to the tomb when the sun had risen.  And they said among themselves, "Who will roll away the stone from the door of the tomb for us?"  But when they looked up, they saw that the stone had been rolled away -- for it was very large.  And entering the tomb, they saw a young man clothed in a long white robe sitting on the right side; and they were alarmed.  But he said to them, "Do not be alarmed.  You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified.  He is risen!  He is not here.  See the place where they laid Him.  But go, tell His disciples -- and Peter -- that He is going before you into Galilee;  there you will see Him, as He said to you."  So they went out quickly and fled from the tomb, for they trembled and were amazed.  And they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.  

Now when He rose early on the first day of the week, He appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom He had cast seven demons.  She went and told those who had been with Him, as they mourned and wept.  And when they heard that He was alive and had been seen by her, they did not believe. After that, He appeared in another form to two of them as they walked and went into the country.  And they went and told it to the rest, but they did not believe them either.  

Later He appeared to the eleven as they sat at the table; and He rebuked their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they did not believe those who had seen Him after He had risen.  And He said to them, "Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.  He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned.  And these signs will follow those who believe:  In My name they will cast out demons; they will speak with new tongues; they will take up serpents; and if they drink anything deadly, it will by no means hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover."

So then, after the Lord had spoken to them, He was received up into heaven, and sat down at the right hand of God.  And they went out and preached everywhere, the Lord working with them and confirming the word through the accompanying signs.  Amen.

 

- Mark 16:1–8 (9–20) 

 

Yesterday we read that, at Christ's crucifixion, there were also women looking on from afar, among whom were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James the Less and of Joses, and Salome, who also followed Him and ministered to Him when He was in Galilee, and many other women who came up with Him to Jerusalem.  Now when evening had come, because it was the Preparation Day, that is, the day before the Sabbath, Joseph of Arimathea, a prominent council member, who was himself waiting for the kingdom of God, coming and taking courage, went in to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus.  Pilate marveled that He was already dead; and summoning the centurion, he asked him if He had been dead for some time.  So when he found out from the centurion, he granted the body to Joseph.  Then he bought fine linen, took Him down, and wrapped Him in the linen.  And he laid Him in a tomb which had been hewn out of the rock, and rolled a stone against the door of the tomb.  And Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses observed where He was laid.

 

 Now when the Sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, that they might come and anoint Him.  Very early in the morning, on the first day of the week, they came to the tomb when the sun had risen.   My study Bible explains that because Christ died so close in time to the Sabbath, the burial customs of the Jews could not be completed.  Therefore, these faithful women go as early as possible to complete the rites of burial.   Some patristic writers teach that Mary the mother of James was the wife of Alphaeus, and this James was one of the Twelve (Luke 6:15).  But most hold that this is the Virgin Mary, as she is in fact the stepmother of another James, called "the Lord's brother" (see Matthew 13:55, compare to Mark 15:40, 47 from yesterday's reading).  Many teach that Salome was the wife of Zebedee and the mother of James and John.

And they said among themselves, "Who will roll away the stone from the door of the tomb for us?"  But when they looked up, they saw that the stone had been rolled away -- for it was very large.  We understand that the stone had been rolled away not to accommodate Christ's exit from the tomb, for as in His resurrected body, He needed no such accommodation (John 20:19).  Instead, this was specifically to allow the witnesses -- and us readers -- to look in and see that the tomb was empty.

And entering the tomb, they saw a young man clothed in a long white robe sitting on the right side; and they were alarmed.  But he said to them, "Do not be alarmed.  You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified.  He is risen!  He is not here.  See the place where they laid Him.  But go, tell His disciples -- and Peter -- that He is going before you into Galilee;  there you will see Him, as He said to you."  So they went out quickly and fled from the tomb, for they trembled and were amazed.  And they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.  My study Bible comments that the specific mention of Peter reveals a special care for the one who had denied Christ.  Theophylact comments that Peter would have said of himself, "I denied the Lord, and therefore am no longer His disciple."  This command given by the angel is a promise that Peter is forgiven.  That they said nothing to anyone doesn't mean they never spoke of this, but that they kept silent until Christ's appearance to them (see subsequent verses).

Now when He rose early on the first day of the week, He appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom He had cast seven demons.  She went and told those who had been with Him, as they mourned and wept.  And when they heard that He was alive and had been seen by her, they did not believe. After that, He appeared in another form to two of them as they walked and went into the country.  And they went and told it to the rest, but they did not believe them either.   My study Bible notes that verses 9-20 (that is, these verses and the rest of today's reading) do not appear in two early manuscripts of Mark's Gospel.  But nearly all other manuscripts ever discovered have them.  They are thus canonized Scripture and are considered by the Church to be inspired, authoritative, and genuine.  Note that Jesus appeared in another form to two disciples:  the specific emphasis is on the Lord's resurrected body, which transcends not only physical space and time, but also appearance.  My study Bible points out that He was sometimes recognizable to His disciples and at other times He was not.  It's interesting to note that the rest of the disciples did not believe these early reports from Mary Magdalene and the two disciples (see Luke 24:13-35).

Later He appeared to the eleven as they sat at the table; and He rebuked their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they did not believe those who had seen Him after He had risen.  And He said to them, "Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned."  This is called the Great Commission; it is the Lord's final commandment given on earth.  My study Bible says that it is to be lived out in the Church until He returns again.  To make disciples cannot be done in the strength of human beings, but only in the power of God.  It notes that the power of the Resurrection is not only for Christ Himself, but that it is given to all believers for Christian life and mission.

"And these signs will follow those who believe:  In My name they will cast out demons; they will speak with new tongues . . . "  My study Bible says that new tongues refers to the capacity to speak in languages that one has not learned in order to edify others in worship (1 Corinthians 14) and to preach the gospel (Acts 2:1-11).

". . . they will take up serpents; and if they drink anything deadly, it will by no means hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover."  To take up serpents, my study Bible writes, refers primarily to spiritual battle against demons (Luke 10:19).  Therefore, Christ is promising to deliver believers from the power of sin.  Moreover, this includes certain physical protection as well.  St. Paul was bitten by a serpent and suffered no harm (Acts 28:3-6), and according to tradition, Barsabas Justus (Acts 1:23) was forced by unbelievers to drink poison and survived.  Nonetheless, while God's grace can protect believers from both physical and spiritual harm, to test God by deliberately committing harmful acts against oneself is a grave sin (Deuteronomy 6:16, Matthew 4:7).

So then, after the Lord had spoken to them, He was received up into heaven, and sat down at the right hand of God.  And they went out and preached everywhere, the Lord working with them and confirming the word through the accompanying signs.  Amen.   The Ascension of Christ (He was received up into heaven) is celebrated forty days after the Resurrection (Acts 1:3).  This event fulfills the type which was given when Elijah ascended in a fiery chariot (2 Kings 2:11) and it marks the completion of Christ's glorification and lordship over all creation.  My study Bible teaches that at the Incarnation, Christ brought His divine nature to human nature.  But in the mystery of the Ascension, Christ brings human nature to the divine Kingdom.  He reigns with the Father and the Holy Spirit in His glorified body, revealing His glorified human nature -- indeed, human flesh -- to be worshiped by the whole angelic realm.  In some icons and paintings of the Ascension, we may observe that Christ's white robes are tinted red to indicate the shedding of His blood for the redemption of the world and the ascent of that life-giving blood into heaven (Isaiah 63:1-3; see also Psalm 23:7-10).

How do you carry out Christ's Great Commission?  He commands the disciples, "Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature," adding that "he who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned."   In order to properly take in this second statement, it is necessary to read John 3:18, and understand that a lack of faith in Christ sets up a personal barrier against the salvation Christ offers.  But how do we go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature?  In the Greek, this command literally reads that the disciples should go into all the world and preach the gospel to "all the creation" (πάσῃ τῇ κτίσει).  This is affirmed in the statements in John's Gospel, in which we're taught that Christ came into the world "for the life of the world" (John 6:33, 51).  There is, in effect, nothing left out of this salvation plan.  In fact, in the Greek for "all the world" (in Mark 16:15 as well as the two verses from John 6) the word used for world is κόσμος/kosmos, which effectively embraces the whole created order, as while it is a word used to indicate "the world" as we understand it, it is also the word for literally all of creation -- that is everything created by God, an entire universe of all things visible and invisible, as the Creed states.  What that seems to indicate regarding this Great Commission is that God's redeeming mission, and the power of the Resurrection, will leave absolutely nothing out of this redemption.  Only human beings have the power to reject this for themselves, but the nature of this healing, transforming, redeeming gospel mission is to be complete in every respect imaginable.  The Creator has come into the world as a human being in order to restore all of creation to communion with God, to heal what is broken -- and that brokenness, apparently, goes way beyond only the minds and hearts of human beings.  It is something we need to understand in its fullness, both the effects of sin reaching into all levels of life, and the power of redemption which will not stop until it is fully complete for the entire creation.  And so, this gospel message of redemption is truly for all the world, all the cosmos, everything understood to be created by God, and not simply for individual human beings.  It is individual human beings who have the power through their will to reject it; but its fullness is intended for much more than we can possibly imagine.  Jesus also mentions baptism in this Commission, and if we think about baptism, it is about much more than the power of God coming to faithful human beings.  It is also about the transformation of the elements of this world into carriers of salvation.  Water is blessed in order to bring us to participation in Christ's death and Resurrection.  Oil becomes the oil of chrismation, a vehicle for the Holy Spirit.  The very elements of creation, through the Incarnation of Christ, have become those things through which the good news of the Gospel, and the power of God, carry God's power in sacrament and mystery.  This is why, in our churches, the tradition is to bless everything, from houses to objects we make use of, to gardens, to new endeavors, in order to be effective means of salvation in our use of them.  Christ's mission into the world, and His death and Resurrection -- which are necessary in order to send the Holy Spirit -- is for every single element of creation, without exception.  The ultimate sign of salvation and redemption is the Cross itself -- through Christ's Passion, death, and Resurrection it became the symbol of salvation, transformed from the horrific instrument of the worst kind of punishing death.  So it can be in our lives through God's work in us and among us:  the things that were once used to harm or bring pain can be transformed into something entirely different.  Forgiveness works in the same way:  we give up to God our pain and hurt and harm, so that God may work through our circumstances and set us on a right path, Christ's good road, instead.  Everything about Christ's mission, in short, is redemptive, healing, salvific, and nothing is left out of this plan nor out of the Great Commission with which He left this world in order to send the Holy Spirit.  Let us use the tools and instruments we're given, the sacraments and mysteries, the helpful vehicles which convey faith such as icons or holy water, the blessings which belong everywhere, and most especially the power of prayer, for Christ reaches out all the time (Revelation 3:20-22), and the Lord is still working with us and confirming the word through all kinds of accompanying signs.