Sermon Tone Analysis

Too good to be true?

I’m old enough to remember getting those envelopes in the mail.

“You’ve just won $100,000.00”.

How many of you have opened an envelope like that?

You open the letter only to read the words.. “This could be you.”

These days we get emails from Ace Hardware and Kohl’s.

You’ve won a new gas grill.

All we need from you is a $100 dollar deposit guaranteeing the mailing.

The BBC is currently running a series on its podcasts about a female celebrity who sends guys her picture and after developing a relationship with them and promising of all things marriage, begins asking for money.

Thousands of guys have been taken in, and hundreds of thousands of dollars have been scammed.

And it’s not the celebrity it is just her picture and she doesn’t live in florida she lives somewhere in Africa or Europe.

If it sounds too good to be true, it’s ________________.

We’ve all been taken in by someone at some point.

How do you feel?

You feel foolish.

And you promise yourself this will never happen to me again.

It does.

But over time, we do tend to look at unbelievable news as news to be ignored or not to be believed.

That happens in today’s story.

I dont’ know if you noticed when we were reading the text, but that’s a running theme after Jesus rose from the dead.

With his best friends.

We looked last week at the witnesses, the women that were told that Jesus was alive.

Here in another biography of Jesus, we are told about the reaction to the women’s message and it’s not pretty.

But first things first… here’s what’s happening in this story.

Again, this is the day that begins with women making their way to the tomb.

These women are going to the tomb of their best friend and they are planning on putting burial perfume on the body.

And when they get there there is no body.

Instead, an angel tells them that Jesus has risen and they are told to go and tell the rest of his friends.

And that’s when it gets interesting.

Jesus appeared.

Three times in this story, it says Jesus appeared.

What the angel said is true.

Jesus is alive and he’s making appearances.

To his friends.

This resurrection is real.

These aren’t visions.

When it says “Jesus appeared”, the writer’s are telling us that Jesus showed up and was seen.

There are witnesses to the bodily resurrection of Jesus.

But here’s what happens when Jesus shows up and shows himself to his friends.

Here’s the rhythm of this story.

Jesus appears.

Mary goes.

Mary reports.

They don’t believe her.

And again.

The same thing.

Jesus appears.

The 2 friends go.

The 2 friends report.

They don’t believe them.

And then there’s a third appearance.

Jesus appears.

Jesus rebukes.

They hadn’t believed the reports.

There’s no missing this pattern here.

Jesus appears.

The friends go.

The friends report.

The rest of them don’t believe the reports.

We don’t know who the two friends are.

But Mary Magdalene was a known friend.

One of Jesus’ closest friends.

They all knew her.

But it was too good to be true.

Multiple accounts of Jesus being seen and Jesus being alive.

And still there is this persistent unbelief.

Mark, who is writing this doesn’t want us to miss this.

They don’t believe.

They don’t believe.

They don’t believe.

This has been a running theme throughout Mark’s biography.

Jesus is to be believed and yet people have a hard time believing that He is the Messiah, the Promised One of the Old Testament, the Son of God, God himself.

People, including those closest to Jesus just don’t believe.

If Jesus is God, then God has a problem because people aren’t inclined to put their belief in God or at least the kind of God who comes in humility and suffering and finally gets himself killed.

What kind of a God is that?

We want a God who is going to come in power, but we want that power to be used against those who aren’t with our program.

We want His power to fulfill our expectations.

And Jesus is coming and not fulfilling anybody’s expectations.

He’s hanging with sinners.

He has no where to sleep at night.

He spends his time talking about carrying crosses.

and then he carries a cross himself and he dies.

What kind of a God does that?

He isn’t to be believed.

And then this Jesus rises from the dead and his best friends continue this story of fear and unbelief.

It’s too good to be true.

You know if I’m those friends, I’m listening to Mary and the 2 disciples who say they saw Jesus alive, and I’m sitting there thinking… if he can rise from the dead, why did he get himself killed to begin with?

He wouldn’t do that, would he?

And then there’s Jesus himself and he shows up and he’s not explaining how he died, he isn’t giving details as to how he rose from the dead.. I’m sure they had questions, but this is Mark’s summary of the conversation between Jesus and his friends:

Mark 16:14 “Later he appeared to the Eleven themselves as they were reclining at the table.

He rebuked their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they did not believe those who saw him after he had risen.”

He rebukes them because they didn’t believe the gospel.

They didn’t believe he rose from the dead, even though they had reports from credible witnesses, including Mary Magdalene, one of Jesus’ best friends.

As Mark is telling this story, Mark wants us to see this close connection between Jesus rising from the dead and the necessity of faith.

Faith in Jesus and His resurrection.

And among those who think it’s too good to be true and have written the resurrection off are those who are his best friends.

Go and preach

The conversation doesn’t end there between Jesus and his friends.

Jesus himself is giving them some instructions, based on the same pattern.

Mark 16:15-16 “Then he said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation.