As you read, consider: What might God be saying to me? Summarize your thoughts in a sentence or two.

My thoughts (Keith Phillips):

As you may know, these verses are not in the oldest existing manuscripts that we have of Mark’s Gospel, which was, most likely, the earliest of the four New Testament gospels. It seems that some ancient Christian(s) added pieces of the post-resurrection story from each of the other three gospels and maybe even from Acts, to help it have a more cogent ending. But, just because they were added later doesn’t make these verses less authoritative or less true.

The one thing that is included here and is not anywhere else in the gospels is that part about snake handling and drinking poison, which is taken quite literally by some of our more ecstatic (and occasionally sickened-unto-death) brothers and sisters in the faith. I sometimes think this ending to Mark is proclaimed as inauthentic so that we don’t have to think about handling snakes and drinking poison.

In my judgment, that’s a cop out. As I said above, just because they were added later doesn’t make these verses less authoritative or less true. In the Contemporary English Version Jesus says at the beginning of verse 17, “Everyone who believes me will be able to do wonderful things.” I’ll be honest — I’ve never handled snakes, I’ve never knowingly drunk poison, I’ve never performed an instantaneous healing, I’ve never exorcised demons.

But. . . wonderful, grand, glorious things (even better things, in my humble opinion, than those just listed) have happened in my life, in the lives of people I know and love, and in the lives of those I don’t even know, simply because I trust Jesus to provide the very best for all of us. I don’t think we should get distracted by the concept of “miracles;” there are far more of them in our daily lives than we acknowledge. Our faith and faithfulness are confirmed by the extraordinary turn of events throughout life which can only be attributed to God.

And, quite frankly, a deeper, even more wonderful thing than these signs and wonders, indications of God’s loving power, is that God has entrusted the message of God’s unconditional love for all humanity to me, and to you, to us who are dense, hard-hearted, and stubborn, yet do love the Lord.

Mark ends his story of Jesus with a statement of what’s happening among us in the 21st century: “And the disciples went everywhere preaching [that is, sharing the Good News], the Master working right with them, validating the Message with indisputable evidence” (Mark 16:20; The Message).

Thought for the day: As I share the Good News of God’s love today, what signs do I see that affirm the validity of that message?

We encourage you to include a time of prayer with this reading. If you need a place to get started, consider the guidelines on the How to Pray page.

As you read, consider: What might God be saying to me? Summarize your thoughts in a sentence or two.

My thoughts (David Zier):

Most of the disciples reacted with skepticism when Mary told them that Jesus had appeared to her. Was this because their spirits were devastated at the loss of their friend and teacher? Was it because they were not ready to hear any news of Jesus return — as he had spoken of before his death — because they were so focused on their grief? Or was it because Jesus had not appeared to them?

Every day we’re bombarded with infomercials and ads for products, wonder foods and supplements that are supposed to make us stronger, look younger, live longer, lose weight, get smarter, look like movie stars, and get richer. So, where are all these smarter, thinner, good looking people we see in these ads? But people keep buying it, even though we know the ads, pictures and testimonials are misleading us to get us to spend our money!

Perhaps we can be like the disciples and lack faith and not believe anything we are told. But Jesus had changed their lives. They had witnessed lives changed, the miracles, and his teachings. It wasn’t just some infomercial that was “staged”, this was real life to them! Why were the women able to believe it was the same Jesus they knew all along? If I were there, would I have believed like Mary or doubted like the Disciples?

We have the blessing of the entire Bible and our Christian ancestors to help us know and understand the presence of Christ and the work of the Holy Spirit. When we take the time to be quiet with God and listen to what God has to say to us, we can also experience the presence of Christ today, moving our hearts and minds in the direction that Christ taught. As we pray, and as we seek Christ’s presence and guidance, our hearts are shaped and transformed into being more like Christ.

So let’s evaluate ourselves. Am I doubting what Jesus can do in my life, or am I actively seeking Christ, asking for my heart to be transformed in his love and grace? Then ask yourself this question: How am I doing with Jesus’ great commandments? Do I love God with everything that I am? Do I love my neighbor, and others, as myself? How does this transformation show itself? Is it real, or is it an infomercial?

Prayer for the day: God, I pray that I can have faith that will allow me to experience the risen Christ, so that my life can be in a transformed state to be more like Jesus. Amen.

We encourage you to include a time of prayer with this reading. If you need a place to get started, consider the guidelines on the How to Pray page.

As you read, consider: What might God be saying to me? Summarize your thoughts in a sentence or two.

My thoughts (Jeff Miner):

Jesus had died.

His closest followers, including Mary Magdalene, had removed his lifeless body from the cross and taken it to a cave-like tomb. They had handled this dead body. They had seen Jesus’ arm thump to the ground when unsupported. They had watched his head all toppled about, unsupported by active neck muscles.

It was finished. He was finished.

Death is so final — like hitting a brick wall. Have you ever stood beside the open casket of a dead person and tried to imagine what would happen if he/she were to suddenly revive? Looking down at the face of a corpse, it’s just too hard to imagine. A dead face looks so utterly finished — bloodless, pasty, immobile, lifeless, beyond hope.

Once when my spouse David and I were touring an historic home in Wheeling, West Virginia, the tour guide told a chilling, but true story of a teenage girl who had died in that home in the early 1800s. They laid her in a pine casket in the living room for viewing, and the next day family and friends gathered there for the funeral. Right in the middle of her funeral, she awakened. She had apparently just been in a deep comma, so deep she had no detectable breath or pulse.

Can you imagine!

What feelings must have rushed through that family! She who was dead was alive again!

This is precisely the situation Mary Magdalene faced on Easter morning — except Jesus had been gone three days (not one) and his death was from gaping wounds, not subtle disease. Yet the tomb was empty and an angel was saying, “He’s alive.”

Just try to imagine that first moment when Mary allowed herself to entertain the idea that maybe, just maybe, Jesus wasn’t gone forever.

Thought for the day: This is the power of God. Live in that power; live in that hope.

We encourage you to include a time of prayer with this reading. If you need a place to get started, consider the guidelines on the How to Pray page.

As you read, consider: What might God be saying to me? Summarize your thoughts in a sentence or two.

My thoughts (E’sha Cooper):

The death of Jesus was so sorrowful and frightening that they who were most intimately connected to the Savior could not bear to do customary burial preparations.  So Joseph of Arimathea, with no regard for the naysayers, did that which was appropriate for His burial. I believe if Joseph were a poet, he might have written something like this about the death of Christ:

Master oh Master release Thy grip
In to the arms of death gracefully slip

I, Joseph of Arimathea, will be there in haste
Delicately preparing your body, adorning your frozen face.

Now that you have passed over I am filled with joy
This is anticipation to the hilt
Although I was among the many sorrowful
at the ground whereupon Your blood was spilt.

I didn’t want to see you go but I knew that it had to be
For without this death and burial, sinners would never experience God’s victory.

Thus I am so filled with joy no words can describe
It is through death that I too shall rise.

I do not mean to seem annoyed for that is far from my reason for this obsession
For if I don’t quickly get you buried, then I will delay the resurrection.

Thought for the day: How have I benefited from Christ’s death?

We encourage you to include a time of prayer with this reading. If you need a place to get started, consider the guidelines on the How to Pray page.

As you read, consider: What might God be saying to me? Summarize your thoughts in a sentence or two.

My thoughts (Kristin Lee):

Today’s scripture names some of the women who were present at Jesus’ death and alludes to the presence of many unnamed others. Does it matter that the unidentified women are a nameless and faceless gathering of supporters, not featured as Mary, Mary Magdalene, and Salome? Is their presence any less important? I don’t think so.

When I was in college, my friends and I bought some groceries for a single mom with two small children. It was our way of spreading the Christmas spirit with strangers. We didn’t even know the family’s name. I had simply gotten the address of a needy family from my internship supervisor at the local child services office.

My friends loaded up the car with pasta noodles, sauce, fruit juice, cereal and canned vegetables and drove to the recipient’s apartment. Under the cloak of night, we left the food outside the door with a card “From Santa and his elves.” We knocked loudly to get the family’s attention and ran. The mother followed us outside, and we hid in the parking lot until she left to gather her food.

Years later, after we were out of college, one of the friends began working in the social services field and ran across the mother we had helped. She was able to identify the mother, who still didn’t know who we were, by the card from Santa we had left. The mother said she’d been praying for a way to feed her family and then heard a loud knock — our knock — on the door.

The chance of becoming famous and being featured by name in books or magazines is small. I’ll go so far as to suggest that we’ve all had moments, some longer than we’d like, where we’ve identified more with an extra than the featured star, even in our own lives. But our level of notoriety does not define the importance of our actions or our souls. We are more than a job evaluation, a performance review, or a health assessment. We may be part of a nameless and faceless gathering of supporters on this Earth, but we have showed up and made a difference, and we are in great company.

Thought for the day: What can I do to be present for someone else who needs the support I either wish I had or am grateful for?

We encourage you to include a time of prayer with this reading. If you need a place to get started, consider the guidelines on the How to Pray page.

As you read, consider: What might God be saying to me? Summarize your thoughts in a sentence or two.

My thoughts (Tommy Chittenden):

It all comes down to this moment.

Have you ever wondered if legions of angels filled the heavens, desperately wanting to intervene in the escalating drama of Golgotha — some intensely aware of every history making moment, some covering their eyes so as to not gaze upon the Son of God anguishing in such pain? I have pictured these hours like this many times. Add to Heaven’s grandstand all of the great leaders who gave prophecy about this day — Moses, Abraham, Elijah and David. Everyone is standing in reverent silence. Waiting.

I dare say there has never been anything like this day in all of history. Just when it looked as if the curtain was about to come down signifying the “end of the story”, the curtain, instead, was torn apart, from the top to the bottom.

This cry in the darkness of the cross, the release of the spirit of Jesus, and the rending of the veil (curtain) in the temple — Mark brings them all together in order that we might understand what these events mean. As Jesus’ cry rang out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”, many in the crowd recognized these words as the opening of Psalm 22. I’m not sure there is an adequate explanation for the question that Jesus asked except that which Scripture itself provides, “God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.” (II Corinthians 5:21).

Then there comes the loud cry of release and the rending of the veil. Such an amazing dramatic way for God to say for all time and for all people that the way home, the way into His heart is now freely accessible. No revenge planned! All those who gathered at the cross on that day and since are welcome to come into His presence. The way is wide open and He is waiting to restore the hopeless, the helpless, and the fearful. This curtain (veil) said to be 60 feet tall, 30 feet wide and as thick as the palm of a man’s hand, symbolically reminded the Israelites that their access to God depended on another human being (priests in general and the high priest specifically). The very moment Jesus breathed His last breath everything changed.

Before Calvary (Old Covenant) God made a temple for God’s people. After Calvary (New Covenant) God began making a people for God’s temple. “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God?” (I Corinthians 6:19)

My brothers and sisters, through Jesus, we can now come into the very presence of the Creator of the Universe. “Therefore, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place, by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, His body, let us draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith.” (Hebrews 10: 19-22)

Thought for the day: “Almighty God, with all of the angels, and all those in Heaven’s grandstand on that day of unconditional love, we join in to say Holy, Holy, Holy! There can be no greater wonder than the realization that I am loved with such an amazing love!

We encourage you to include a time of prayer with this reading. If you need a place to get started, consider the guidelines on the How to Pray page.

Dear Be Still readers,
In the very near future, Found Pearl Press (Jesus MCC’s publishing ministry) will be publishing our first volume of devotionals as a printed book. The book will be entitled, Quench! refreshing devotionals by gay, trans, and affirming Christians.

We’re looking for a few testimonials from users of Be Still and Know to use for the back cover. Would you be willing to let us know what Be Still and Know means to you? If we use your testimonial, we’ll send you a free copy of Quench! as a token of our thanks.

Please email your testimonial to bestill@jesusmcc.org, along with your name and the best way to contact you. Submission of a testimonial constitutes permission for Found Pearl Press to use the testimonial at its discretion.

All we need is two or three sentences — but we need these ASAP! Could you email a few lines right now?