Mark’s Easter story is missing something.

I never noticed it before because the tomb was there… the women followers of Jesus were there, ready to honor his body. After Jesus’ death, they followed the body to see where it was buried. They waited, anxiously, until the sabbath was over, and then hurried to honor Jesus in death, and to grieve for him. We heard them fret about huge the stone in front of the grave and wonder if they can find someone to help them roll it away. The mysterious figure was there to give the news.

Then before this version — in Mark’s version of the story — there’s no Jesus.

In fact, the messenger says: “He is not here.”

Um, this is Easter — if he’s not here, where is he?

The women didn’t wait around to ask too many questions. They rushed off, as the story says, seized by “terror and amazement.” In the original Greek, the words are even sharper — trauma, and ecstasy.

The story ends in silence.

This ending is so unsettling that at last three different attempts have been made to fix it. It doesn’t seem quite right to leave the story there, and later writes have added to the end.

Mark wrote this gospel down about forty years after the death of Jesus, in a time of upheaval for the Jewish people. The great temple was reduced to rubble. The people of Israel had rebelled against the Romans and sustained terrible losses. The followers of Jesus were separating from other Jews who didn’t believe he was the Messiah. There’s more and more distance between Jews who follow Jesus and Jews who are still waiting for the Messiah. These two groups with the same roots, sometimes even members of the same family, were dividing. Mark wrote his gospel into a world of terror. The bleakness of the ending matched the harshness of the times.

The women’s reaction made perfect sense. They were seeing something they had never seen before. The first day of college, being the new kid at school, first day in the military, first date, the first time they let you take a baby home from the hospital and seem to think you can take care of it — we’ve all known the terror of something completely brand new.

We take the resurrection for granted because we know the story, but it’s a huge surprise on that first day. I don’t know that I would have been any different. In fact, I admire their courage. If you were expecting a body and you got a message that Jesus who was missing, being afraid makes perfect sense.

Still, we want more.

Like the women at the tomb, we want to know where Jesus is, and what he’s up to.

Glennon Doyle wrote on her blog about teaching Sunday school at her church. The kids came into the sanctuary and sat down, listening to the teacher. After a bit, one little boy got restless and whispered to her: “Excuse me. Is God coming?” As she said, he looked around “like he was expecting God to show up here like Ronald shows up occasionally at McDonalds.” (Momastery.com)

“Excuse me. Is God coming?”

That’s the question, isn’t it - when we look into the tomb and find it empty but we don’t know what’s coming next.

When the job ends.

When the divorce papers come in the mail. When you’re about to lose your house.

When the doctor comes in, and she isn’t smiling. When your child is lost to drugs.

When violence comes into your life and shakes your sense of safety. Is God coming?

Mark wrote his gospel for people who were already believers.

They already knew the rest of the story.

They knew that God was coming, that God has come and is still coming.

The story is not so much about the empty tomb and the missing Jesus, but the reality that he’s already at work again. He’s already in Galilee, where they’re all from, where it all began. He’s not in any place that can contain him, seal him up, or keep him in place. He’s in Galilee, where there’s work to be done. The very first thing Mark ever says about Jesus is, “In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan.” (Mark 1:9)

He went back to where the work was.

He went to Galilee, and Chicago, and Syria.

He has gone to refugee camps, where parents are burying children today.

He has gone to the seat on the bus where someone is being bullied, and to the dark walkway where a woman is being harassed.

He’s gone to the park bench where someone will try to sleep tonight, and to the empty dining room where a family is sitting without food.

He’s gone ahead to the person standing on the edge of a bridge, planning to end their own life.

He’s gone because he’s busy, coming to us.

We can stand, peering into the tomb, wanting more.

We can get lost in our fear, or our surprise at something new.

Or, we can get up and go to Galilee, wherever we find it in our world, right now, and try to find the Jesus who can’t be limited, can’t be contained, and can’t be held down by death.

We can go and find him, for he carries the good news with him. God is coming — to you and me and every place of terror and need, every place of pain and suffering, and every place of joy too.

He has good news for us and work for us to do alongside him.

He is not here — he has been raised.

Let’s hurry and catch up with him.

In the name of the risen Christ, Amen.