+++++ The Women of Easter (C) Brooke Thomas +++++

Friday

Mark 15

The mother watching her son be tortured and killed – Jill

(prop – “blood stained” shred of cloth)

The women staying to watch the crucifixion when the male disciples were nowhere to be seen - Alison

(prop – stones)

Friday

Reading: Mark 15: 1-20

The mother watching her son be tortured and killed

How can I begin to describe what I have seen and what I feel? No mother can see her child in pain and not feel it like a knife but how can I even imagine what he has been through and what is to come?

Powerless to stop it, my heart pounds, I can hardly breathe, I want to scream, I want to die. Can I die in his place? Would I be brave enough to take his place? He is meant for so much more. He is part of a great plan. How can they not see this, these men who watch but do not see as my son is beaten and bloodied in the name of laws which are not just or compassionate? His message has been of peace and justice and healing and he is met with such bitter condemnation, such terrible punishment.

I can hardly bear to look and yet I must, for how else can I even try to share his torment? Oh that I could deliver him from it, to be the mother who can scoop up her child when he has fallen down and hurt himself and tell him it will be alright. But it’s not going to be alright. I feel such panic, such terror. I can only cry and cry until it feels like there are no more tears that can be shed. And when I run out of tears, there is still this terrible, terrible pain in my heart that feels too much to bear. And yet he must bear worse so I will stay here and stay strong. If the glimpse of a loved one is all he can ask in these horrific hours, then I will be that for him.

I want to hate the men who deliver the blows, bear the whip, shout insults, but what I hate is their inhumanity, their blind adherence to an unjust system, the unquestioning obedience to immoral orders. How impossible it seems to hold to my beautiful son’s message of love and compassion when faced with such cruelty and injustice? And yet I see this love in the faces of those who have stayed here at my side, those who love Jesus and believe in his message. We will remain here and we will follow where he goes, even in these last hours until death. No matter the anguish, we will be here for him, and when he is gone, we must be here for each other.

Reading: Mark 15: 21-47

The women staying to watch the crucifixion when the male disciples were nowhere to be seen

This day has been an eternity – of impossible sadness and unimaginable pain. I have watched a friend die horribly and sat beside his mother while it happened, seen her unfathomable grief close up and felt my heart break that a man we all so desperately loved has been taken from us. Keeping our vigil in sight of the place of crucifixion, we have held each other tightly while our emotions ran from disbelief, to anger, to despair and now, in the stillness of twilight, the silence of what seems like the end of the world, to deepest sadness.

As I see him still upon the cross in the silhouette of night falling, it is impossible to imagine the sun ever shining again. Impossible to imagine even getting up from this place, pulling ourselves back together and taking steps back down the hillside without him.

It seems there should be more of us here. Where are the masses who cried Hosanna less than a week ago? Where are their declarations of devotion now? Where are the twelve who previously followed him through the region, through the good times? How can they run so quickly? There is danger but there is still reason. Even Joseph of Arimathea, a member of the Sanhedrin, has been bold enough to stand forward and say he will be responsible for Jesus’ burial, despite the risks of being associated with such a radical. We wait here numbly while he seeks permission from the governor. What value has discipleship if the followers can not also stand by him in the bad times? – and this is the worst of the bad times.

As we cling to each other against the growing cold, the gnawing fear and the crippling sadness, I wonder, where will we go from here? Can we follow a man who is no longer among us? I’m not sure but I feel that we must so that his death will have meaning and his message stay alive for future generations.

We must leave soon. It is almost dark. How long until daybreak?