St. Mark

Mark's was the first Gospel and is the shortest.  Interestingly enough, the original version ended with Chapter 16: 8:  "Then they [the women]  went out and fled from the tomb, seized with trembling and bewiilsderment.  They said nothing to anyone, for they were aftraid."  A longer ending was added, it is estimated, about two hundred years later and is based on the post-resurrection accounts of Matthew and Luke. Mark, as always, is succinct but detailed enough to give a realistic picture of what it must have been like to come to an open and empty tomb.  Trembling, bewilderment and fear make sense when we stop and reflect that rising from the dead was not an everyday occurrence.  How would we have reacted?  Startled? Spooked?  Most likely, as if the corpse at a wake had sat up in the casket.  Ending the Gospel with this scenario gives the reader a jolt as well and poses the unstated question, "What next?"  A call to faith, trust and a hearkening back to what we've experienced of Jesus,  a call to the community to share its faith.  A firming up of our trust in what apparently seems "the impossible becoming possible".  Can we do it?
Bro. Rene