Mark 16:9-14
Nobody Believed Them
9Early on the first day of the week, after Jesus had risen, He appeared first to Mary Magdalene, from whom He had driven out seven demons.
10She went and told those who had been with Him, who were mourning and weeping.
11And when they heard that Jesus was alive and she had seen Him, they did not believe it.
12After this, Jesus appeared in a different form to two of them as they walked along in the country.
13And they went back and reported it to the rest, but they did not believe them either.
14Later, as they were eating, Jesus appeared to the Eleven and rebuked them for their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they did not believe those who had seen Him after He had risen.
Berean Standard Bible
Something about these verses first, because a family is better hearing it from us than from a stranger later. The earliest surviving complete manuscripts of Mark end at 16:8. Verses 9 to 20 were known very early, by the second century, and they stand in most later manuscripts, which is why they are printed in the Bible on this table. Most scholars do not think they belonged to Mark's own ending. We are not skipping them. They get read next to the rest of scripture, and no belief and no practice in this house rests on them alone. Christians can say a thing like that out loud and the floor does not give way. Now the verses themselves.
Early on the first day of the week, after Jesus had risen, He appeared first to Mary Magdalene, from whom He had driven out seven demons.
The sentence stops to say who she was before it says anything else about her. Not the council that convicted him, not Pilate, not Peter. The risen Jesus goes first to a woman who had been in a state nobody in her town would have wanted to describe out loud.
She goes and tells the others, who are mourning and weeping, and they do not believe her. Then two of them are walking out into the country, and he appears to them in a different form, and they go back and tell the rest, and the rest do not believe them either. This is not a movement carried along on excitement. It is a group of grieving people refusing, twice, to accept good news brought to them by their own friends.
Later, as they were eating, Jesus appeared to the Eleven and rebuked them for their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they did not believe those who had seen Him after He had risen.
Hard hearts. The phrase has been following these men through the whole book: after the loaves, again in the boat, and Jesus used the same words of his opponents in a synagogue back in chapter three. So he arrives at the table, and the first thing he does is tell them off.
And at 16:15 he sends them into the whole world with the gospel. He does not put them on probation and he does not wait until they look ready. The rebuke and the commission happen in one conversation, at one table, with nothing in between them.
How We Know
The events summarised in these verses are told at length elsewhere. Verse 9 identifies Mary Magdalene as the woman from whom seven demons had been driven, which Luke 8:2 also records. The two walking in the country in verse 12 correspond to the road to Emmaus in Luke 24:13-35. The rebuke at the table in verse 14 sits alongside the appearances in Luke 24:36-43 and John 20:19-29.
So the content is consistent with accounts that stand on their own elsewhere in the New Testament, whatever is concluded about where these verses came from.
The manuscript question is set out in the previous devotion and is not repeated here.
Questions
1 What should a family know about where these verses come from?
AnswerThe earliest complete copies of Mark stop at verse 8. These verses were known very early and stand in most later manuscripts, which is why they are in our Bibles. We read them, and we build no belief and no practice on them by themselves.
2 Who does the risen Jesus appear to first, and what does the text remind us about her?
AnswerMary Magdalene, and that he had driven seven demons out of her. Not the authorities, not the men who led the disciples. A woman with a past nobody would have chosen to advertise.
3 What happens when the news gets brought to the others?
AnswerThey will not have it. Not from Mary, and not the second time from two of their own friends who had met him on the road. Twice they are told by people they know, and twice they refuse.
4 When somebody tells you something surprising, what makes you believe them? What did it take for these men?
AnswerAnswers will differ, and that is the point of asking. For the Eleven it took Jesus standing in the room while they were eating, and even then he had to rebuke them for not believing the friends who had already seen him.
What This Means for Us
They did not believe, and he used them anyway.
Mary tells them and they refuse her. Two more tell them and they refuse again. He turns up and tells them off for it, and then he hands them the whole world, with no gap in there for them to improve in first.
That matters at a table where somebody is quietly waiting to feel more certain before they act. These men had the evidence from people they trusted and still could not manage it, and the work came anyway. If faith feels thin here, the answer is not to wait for it to thicken. It is the next ordinary act of obedience, done by somebody who is not sure.
Prayer
Father, your Son's closest friends did not believe the people who told them, and you sent them out anyway. Thank you that you do not wait for us to be impressive. When we are slow, be patient with us, and give us something to do while we catch up. Amen.