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Apr 17, 2022

Following the True Christ

Following the True Christ

Passage: Mark 16:1-8

Speaker: Patrick Lafferty

Series: Follow: Learning from Mark about Jesus’ Most Misunderstood Command

We conclude where we began, asking what it means to follow, not a “comfortable” or merely “admirable” Christ, but the true one. Here at the first discovery of His resurrection we find clear hints of what following that true Christ means, and it has everything to do with the most basic and unavoidable parts of life: our suffering, our failures, our dying…and our living.

Readings & Scripture

REPARATION: Psalm 5:11-12
LEADER: But let all who take refuge in you rejoice;
let them ever sing for joy,
and spread your protection over them,
that those who love your name may exult in you.

ALL: For you bless the righteous, O LORD;
you cover him with favor as with a shield.

CENTRAL TEXT: Mark 16:1-8
1When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salom bought aromatic spices so that they might go and anoint him. 2 And very early on the first day of the week, at sunrise, they went to the tomb. 3 They had been asking each other, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?” 4 But when they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had been rolled back. 5 Then as they went into the tomb, they saw a young man dressed in a white robe sitting on the right side; and they were alarmed. 6 But he said to them, “Do not be alarmed. You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. He has been raised! He is not here. Look, there is the place where they laid him. 7 But go, tell his disciples, even Peter, that he is going ahead of you into Galilee. You will see him there, just as he told you.” 8 Then they went out and ran from the tomb, for terror and bewilderment had seized them. And they said nothing to anyone, because they were afraid.

BENEDICTION: 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18
LEADER: Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.
ALL: Amen

RELATED SCRIPTURES:

  • Matthew 5:12
  • Luke 1:14
  • Romans 12:12
  • Philippians 1:18
  • Philippians 4:4
  • Colossians 3:1-4
  • 1 Thessalonians 4:13-17; 5:16-18
  • Hebrews 12:2

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS:

  1. How is the command to rejoice (e.g. 1 Thess 5:16) different from saying “c’mon, get happy?”
  2. What one thing might be different this very day if the hope of the resurrection became more vivid to you?

QUOTES:

  • I don't know what to say except that the worst misfortune isn't only misfortune. - Rev. Ames in Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead
  • [The resurrection] promises, bizarrely enough, that love is stronger than death. But it does not promise that death is imaginary, that death is avoidable, that death is temporary. To have death, this once, be reversed is to let us feel the depth of our ordinary loss in it, not to pretend it away. Some people ask nowadays what kind of a religion it is that chooses an instrument of torture for its symbol, as if the cross on churches must represent some kind of endorsement. The answer is: one that takes the existence of suffering seriously. - Francis Spufford
  • The growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs. - George Eliot
  • This is the resurrection! It is the announcement that life cannot ultimately be conquered by death, that there is no road that is at last swallowed up in an ultimate darkness, that there is strength added when the labors increase, that multiplied peace matches multiplied trials, that life is bottomed by the glad surprise. Take courage, therefore:
    When we have exhausted our store of endurance,
    When our strength has failed ere the day is half done,
    When we reach the end of our hoarded resources,
    Our Father’s full giving is only begun.
    -     Howard Thurman

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