I welcome you today to the final installment in our study of the
Gospel of Mark. It's been a wonderful two years
journey through this book together.
And so now I call you and I invite you to come with me to
Mark chapter 16, beginning in verse 9.
Mark 16, beginning in verse 9. Today's message is going to be
quite different than other sermons that we have heard from
this series in Mark. And I hope you're convinced of
this already, that this ministry is committed to preaching the
whole counsel of God. And that pursuit looks like us
looking at every verse in the Scriptures and seeking to
explain and expound on what it has to convey.
But this afternoon, we're not going to so much expound on the
final verses of the gospel Mark, as much as we are going to
discuss a commentary about these verses.
And the reason for this is because there is a marginal note
that is found in most English translations of the New
Testament, usually located immediately after verse 8.
And I want you to see it with me because there's a disclaimer
similar to what we find in the ESV, and we can turn there now
to read it together. You see it in brackets there in
your Bibles. Some of the earliest manuscripts
do not include 16 verses, 9 to 20.
Now, it's very likely that you have encountered this in your
personal reading, and it's equally likely that it troubled
you when you did. And my desire is to help ease
any troubles through this sermon.
And I'm also aware that this message, though that is the
goal, can be a little bit overwhelming.
It might be overwhelming to hear some of these names and the
research and the history and the quotations, but there's so many
things I can say about a sermon like this.
One of them is it's necessary, right?
Could have easily come to this point in our gospel study of
Mark and skipped over it to avoid dealing with the scholarly
aspect of the Bible. And it's necessarily,
necessarily also because when it comes to attack on your faith,
it boils down to the Bible. Because this is where we get
everything from. This is where we understand our
salvation, where we understand our practice, where we
understand the nature of God and Our Calling and our mission as
the church. And so we have to, we have to be
serious students of the Bible and be willing to explore
certain elements of the behind the scenes aspect of our Bibles.
And that's what we're going to do today.
We're going to do an overview of it.
And my desire in planning and praying for this was to make it
as simple as possible so that you don't feel overwhelmed in
the process, but at the same time to not make it so simple
where it lacks genuine substance.
I wanted to be true substance so that you can arrive to clear and
concrete conclusions about the veracity of the Bible, about the
reliability of the Bible. And so understand that this is
probably going to be less than an hour unless the Holy Spirit
desires to do something else. And beyond that.
But know that in preparation for this, there have been hours upon
hours upon hours of comparison examination, fact checking to
bring it to this point, to make it digestible.
And so this is more than just a message for one particular
Sunday. My desire and my plan really was
that because of the technology that we have in our age that
this would be recorded, which I pray that it would be in
preserved and that you can revisit this whenever you need
to see. You might be sitting here now
hearing what I'm about this to teach and think, OK, that might
be nice, but I don't know how this is helpful to me.
But if you engage with people who are skeptics or who might
challenge your faith, I assure you that what you're going to
hear today is going to be extremely helpful, extremely
beneficial. And so the real goal of this is
that you would be emboldened in your faith and that you would be
more confident that what you're holding in your hands is in fact
God's infallible inherent word, that this is his revelation from
heaven for you and I and for all creation.
But before we try to make sense of this alarming insertion, I
want to begin by laying the groundwork for the truthfulness
of the Bible. As I said, the Bible that you
and I have, your copy of God's Word, as long as it's a faithful
translation, is in fact God's Word.
And we have both internal and external evidence that make that
emphatically clear that how these ancient writings were
passed down throughout the centuries, and they in fact are
God's truth. And the transmission of these
truths have been gloriously preserved.
And they were penned, yes, by human authors, but human authors
who were inspired by the Holy Spirit to communicate these
things as a permanent witness for all generations.
And the safeguarding of God's truth throughout time is a
testimony and is a declaration that God himself makes in His
word. So I know I told you to turn to
Mark 69. It's because I want you to see
that disclaimer. But now I ask you to turn to
Psalm chapter 12, beginning in verse 6.
The psalmist says by the Holy Spirit, the words of the Lord
are pure words, like silver refined in a furnace on the
ground, purified 7 times. You, O Lord, will keep them.
You will guard us from this generation forever.
You see what the Holy Spirit is saying through David.
David is not only acknowledging that God's word is reliable, you
have that #7 there, right? The number of perfection.
God's word has been purified. In other words, it is undeniably
reliable. He also, though at the same time
celebrates God's ability to preserve that purified word.
Isn't that what He says here at the end?
He says, yes, it's purified 7 times.
But in verse 7, you, O Lord, will keep them.
You will keep them. So not only have you granted
revelation to mankind that can be relied on, but You've also
kept them for mankind for every age and every generation.
So we have the purity of God's Word, but also the preservation
of God's Word. And history testifies of God's
providential hand that has indeed preserved his word until
2024, and it will be preserved until the return of Jesus
Christ. Despite unfavorable
circumstances and natural conditions, despite fierce
persecution, literary criticism, archaeological discoveries,
philosophical assaults, and scientific claims, the Bible has
endured and risen above all scrutiny, all scrutiny.
And I would like to offer a few points on the history of how
your Bible came about, how my Bible came about in a very short
frame of time. This subject deserves weeks and
weeks of study, but I'm going to try to cram it in and and one
Sunday service for you to at least leave satisfied and
curious enough to explore this further, only to make your
confidence that much more concrete.
The Bible didn't start with the You Version app on your phone,
and you know that. I hope.
I hope we all know that. No, it was originally written on
papyri and parchment, scrolls and codices.
Codices. Another word for books.
So when you hear me reference in this next 45 minutes the word
codex, all that means is book. So papyrus, parchment, scrolls,
codexes, codices, and they were all manually, manually copied by
scribes. So when you hear the word
manuscript, all that means is something that has been written
down by hand, man. That's all it means, manuscript,
something that's been penned down by hand, specifically by a
scribe. And so we have that
understanding of the origination of the Bible.
The New Testament was primarily written in Greek, though some of
it is Aramaic, and we've studied those Aramaic verses in the
Gospel, Mark itself. And the Old Testament is
primarily in Hebrew, though there are some parts of the book
of Daniel and the book of Ezra that are Aramaic as well.
Now the original manuscripts, the autographs, meaning the
things that these actual authors wrote down, we don't have any of
it. That being said, and there's
there's reasons why we don't have them, good reasons to, but
I can't get into that at this moment.
What we do have though, are very early manuscript copies of the
originals. And when you look into that, you
realize that the biblical evidence with manuscripts is
unparalleled, unparalleled in comparison to any other ancient
document, both in terms of the number of manuscripts that we
have and also the time gap between the original writings
and those copies of the original writings.
And so I want to consider some of the highlights by way of
comparison of how the Bible stands out.
It's this race of evidence and reliability in terms of
historical documents. The Bible is in first place,
always has been, always will be, and everybody else is far
behind. So I want you to 1st consider
the number of manuscripts that we have concerning the Bible,
namely the New Testament. So in the New Testament we have
in the Greek language alone around 5800 manuscripts.
Now when you consider the Latin, the Syriac, the Coptic, the
Ethiopic, and the Armenian manuscripts, it brings the total
of New Testament manuscripts to around 25,000.
Now this makes a New Testament the most attested ancient
document in terms of manuscript evidence available the most.
And that is again confirmed when you compare with other
historical pieces that you've probably studied in high school
and college that nobody seems to debate about that nobody seems
to push up against. These things that I'm about to
bring up as way of example pale in comparison to the mountain of
evidence that we have in the Bible.
Have you read Homer's Iliad, one of the most well preserved works
of ancient literature? It's an epic Greek poem.
We have around 1800 surviving manuscripts of Homer's Iliad,
which is impressive, but when you compare it to 25,800
manuscripts, what about Caesar's Gallic Wars?
Manuscript evidence for Caesar's work is much more limited, with
only about 10 surviving manuscripts.
There are recent discoveries that might add to that number,
but for the longest time, 10 surviving manuscripts.
The earliest manuscript dating to around 900 years after its
original composition. Pastor this is Histories and
Annals. It's considered some of the most
reliable sources to Roman history, and we have only two
manuscripts, one from the 9th century, one from the 11th
century. And that we can go on and on and
on about these things that people study, that scholars
praise. But what we can conclude based
on the Bible in comparison, the fact that it was so widespread
in terms of the languages in the regions means that the early
Christian community really believed in their message and
they really wanted the world to know about it.
And when you compare these manuscripts, there are numerous
variations, none of them discrediting the doctrines of
our faith. And if you read any of those
main scripts, if you if you compiled the Bible based on any
of those, you're going to come to the same core messages that
you have in your Bible today. And so that says something about
not just the attitude of the church concerning the Bible, but
also God's miraculous preservation of protection of
those manuscripts. It speaks about it.
You can't deny it. But that's just the amount.
Consider the dating of these New Testament manuscripts.
The earliest fragment, I say fragment piece of a New
Testament manuscript is the John Ryland's Papyrus, otherwise
known as P52, and this fragment dates to 125 AD.
Listen only 30 to 40 years after the original Gospel of John was
penned. And what you find there in P52
is that on the front you have some verses of John 18, and on
the back you have verses of John 18.
In the latter part, verses 37 to 38, whereas the front is 31 to
33. Now, when it comes to the
complete New Testament, talking about the whole library of the
New Testament, you have two manuscripts.
There are codexes. The first is called Codex
Sinocatis and the other is Codex Vaticanus, and they are dated to
the 4th century, meaning around 300 to 350 AD, just a few
centuries after the New Testament was originally
written. You have entire complete
libraries of it. That's fascinating, and we're
going to come back to those two specific manuscripts shortly.
When it comes to Mark 16, trying to understand it, let's compare
it to other historical documents.
I reference Homer's Iliad, right?
The surviving manuscripts date from 9:00 to 10th century AD,
and they're from the Byzantine family, and they represent a
significant gap. You know what the gap is for
Homer's Iliad? 1200 years from its original
writing. 1200 years. The earliest manuscript of
Plato's Timius dates around 900 AD, about again, 1200 years
after he wrote it, which was in the 4th century BC.
You've heard of Plato. I'm sure you've heard of
Aristotle's works. Like Plato.
The discoveries of his manuscripts were around the 9th
century AD, but his original writings were in the 4th century
BC. So you're talking about leaps of
centuries over 1000 years. And yet we honor these things,
we praise these things being preserved.
Yet the Bible gets more criticism than anything else.
But any honest scholar or student can see that this is
staggering. This is overwhelming.
So we talked briefly about the amount of manuscripts.
We talked briefly about the dating.
But let's talk about the accuracy of these manuscripts.
Now, I touched a lot about the New Testament manuscript.
Let me make a brief comment about the Old Testament.
One of the most significant discoveries of our Old Testament
were the dead ski scrolls discovered in 1947 in The Cave
some caves of Qumran near the Dead Sea.
What you have with these Dead Sea Scrolls is marvelous.
You have almost every book of the Old Testament that date from
2:50 BC to 100 AD, and what they showed is the remarkable, almost
fanatical work of the scribes who wrote down these copies.
You've probably heard this before, that there were some
scribes who are believed to have so treated the transmission of
Old Testament Hebrew scriptures with a sacredness that they
would write one letter in the Hebrew and then we go take a
bath, come back and write the next letter.
They would go back and take a bath, write the next letter.
That's how much some of these crimes scribes esteem the
writings of these Old Testament books.
And the pristine work is seen in the Dead Sea Scrolls.
One of the most significant discoveries is what is known as
the Isaiah scroll. The code for that is one QISA or
ESA, short for Isaiah. And with these codes like P52,
1QA, like what's that all about? Usually those codes, all they're
doing is they're giving an abbreviation of maybe where it
was found or the the timing of it.
And SO1Q speaks of one of the caves in Qumran, and it
contained the Isaiah Scrolls, the book of Isaiah, and it's
captivated scholars and serious students of the Bible.
Why? Because it is a nearly complete
manuscript of the book of Isaiah that you have in your Bible
today. Can you imagine that?
So something that is dated centuries before the time of
Christ has been discovered. And when they compared it to
modern English translations, it's almost word for word.
This is an incredibly important discovery because it closely
lines what we have, and it demonstrates the accuracy with
which the Hebrew Bible was copied over the centuries.
So let me summarize this briefly.
We possess 10s of thousands of manuscript copies of the Bible,
ranging from the 1st to the 15th century AD for the New Testament
and from the 4th century BC to the 15th century AD for the Old
Testament. So for New Testament, we have
manuscripts from the 1st century to the 15th century Old
Testament. We have manuscripts from the 4th
century BC to the 15th century AD.
And these manuscripts, yes, if we're honest, they do contain
some variations, but they're all minor.
They don't compromise the validity, the the accuracy, the
essence of the Christian message.
It's untouched. And if you didn't know, there is
an entire academic field dedicated to discovering these
things and to assessing the most accurate version of the original
text. This academic discipline is
called textual criticism. Textual criticism is a science,
and as a science that seeks to establish the correct text of an
ancient document and listen, it's a it's applied both to
secular works and to sacred works.
So the same rules and the same methodologies apply.
And generally what happens with a textual critic, those who are
a part of that kind of discipline, is that they they
study the transmission of these copies and they compare them and
examine them in their variations.
And there are different methodologies, different schools
of thought that try to assess which one is most reliable,
which one can be rejected or questioned, and what other ones
can be more trusted. And it's important to
acknowledge that there are different methods.
I can't get into the different methods now, although we could.
But I want to bring it up to you because it helps us when we come
to our Bibles. Just knowing that there are
different methods helps us come to our Bibles and understand why
there are certain passages that are handled differently by
certain scholars. And that's where we are now led
to when it comes to Mark 16, verse 9, when you read in
brackets that some of the earliest manuscripts do not
contain chapter 16, verses 9 to 20.
And that's why I want to explain to you how the longer ending of
Mark is put into question by some of these scholars.
And, and this again, is a subject that requires hours upon
hours to just really scratch the surface.
My goal again today. It's not to make you drink out
of a fire hose. It's to have enough for you to
understand the general grasp of this conversation, for you to
feel satisfied, but also for you to be encouraged to potentially
consider it further for yourself.
So when it comes to those questioning the latter portion
of the Gospel of Mark, there are two main arguments that people
make that scholars make. And the first one is is obvious
because it's in the Bible that some of the earliest manuscripts
don't contain it. Now remember how I referenced
you to complete New Testament manuscripts that are highly
prized and praised? That is what these scholars are
referring to when it comes to this disclaimer at the end here
of Mark chapter 16. The argument is simple.
Those are some of the earliest there.
In fact, they are the earliest manuscripts that we have to the
New Testament. And both of those omit verses 9
to verses 20. And there is another smaller
manuscript that also doesn't contain the longer ending a
mark, but it's not as significant as the other two.
Nevertheless, we will include that in the count of manuscripts
that don't include those final verses.
So that that's really the argument is, well, look, if we
have these manuscripts and they date the closest to the original
time when they were written, then we have every reason to
question it. And that's where you have one
school of thought among scholars that's saying the older the
better, the older, the more confident we can be about what
was there and then in the original time in the original
writings. But here's what's so interesting
of all our Greek manuscripts, You have to listen very
carefully to this. We have close to 1650 that do
contain what I will call the longer ending of Mark.
So you have just over 1500 Greek manuscripts that do have verses
9 to 20, whereas in comparison you have three that omit it.
So what do we do with that? Well, if you do it in terms of
percentage, it means that 99.8% of the existing Greek
manuscripts that we have contain the longer ending of Mark.
Now, for some scholars, that doesn't matter because remember,
they have that kind of conviction, the older the
better. It's not about about the
majority of the text. It's more about the age of the
text. But at the same time, those
scholars who advocate the earlier manuscripts, you can
tell that they're reluctant. They're reluctant to completely
exclude the longer ending of Mark.
Do you know how I know they are reluctant?
Because they include as a footnote in your Bible.
So they're hesitant because you can't deny the fact that there
is so much in terms of historicity and copies of
manuscript that do contain it. What are you going to do with
that? So there's a struggling there.
There's a wrestling there. Now there are some who are bold
enough to say it's not inspired Scripture, like you should not
treat it as you would mark 16, one to seven or any other part
of the Bible. You should treat it as maybe
like an apocryphal book or some kind of history book that might
shed some light on the Bible. But you shouldn't treat verses 9
to 20 as Scripture. Others more hesitant and they'll
say, OK, look, it's undeniable. It's there.
It's there in terms of the majority manuscript.
So let's let's put it in in our English transition.
Let people know that it's not part of the earliest ones
though, and they're satisfied in that.
And that's why if you have like a new King James Version, if
you're a person who reads the new King James and you come to
that same place in Mark 16 verse 9, they're a little bit more
transparent and a little bit more accurate in their
disclaimer of those verses. Let me quote it to you from the
New King James marginal note, verses 9 to 20 are bracketed in
NU as not in the original text. And this is what the new King
James says they are lacking in Codex Sinochatis and Codis
Vaticanus, although nearly all other manuscripts of Mark
contain them. So they're being a little bit
more transparent, the new King James, whereas other ones,
including the ESC will say some of the earliest manuscripts
don't include them. And people kind of they get
intimidated by that or even concerned.
So then for those scholars who who don't think that the longer
ending in Mark belongs there or it's not autographed by Mark or
is not part of the original text, what's their theory about
the longer ending then? Because again, you can't deny
all the manuscripts that do have them.
Those manuscripts, the 1650 that do have them, they date later
than the CODIS Vaticanus and CODIS Sinaticus, right?
So here's the theory of those who think that that's not those
verses are not part of the original.
They were added by scribes. They were added by scribes.
And why would scribes add verses 90, verse 20?
Because if you don't add them, the gospel mark ends in Mark 16,
verse 8. So let's read verse 8.
Let's read it from verse 6 to get context.
And he said to them, do not be alarmed, you seek Jesus of
Nazareth, who was crucified. He is risen, He is not here.
See the place where they laid him.
But go tell his disciples and Peter that He is going before
you to Galilee. There you will see him, just as
he told you. And they went out and fled from
the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had seized them.
And they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.
The book closes. So the theory is this, the
Gospel can't end this way. There's no way that the last
thought that Mark wants to convey in his Gospel account is
that the women were terrified. And so the idea is scribe saw
this and they go, I think we need to add to this.
And they borrowed from Luke and they borrowed from Matthew and
they borrowed from John. And so some claim that the
addition here, the insertion, are just a kind of a compilation
of concluding thoughts from the other Gospel accounts.
So that's the theory for those who believe that those verses
are omitted. But external manuscript evidence
is not the only argument proponents of the shorter ending
make. There's a second major one.
It's internal saying. What do you mean?
Well, again, when you go back to Mark 16/9 to 20, what you'll
discover here, not so much in the English as much as in the
Greek, is that this is the claim.
It reads differently than Mark's previous writings in the
previous chapters and verses. So they'll make arguments like
there are words in verses 9 to 20 that Mark never uses in the
Gospel account. And and you can imagine how this
is highly debated and contested among scholars.
And the reason why is because there are other long portions of
Mark where Mark uses Greek words for the first time too.
But we don't discount them either, do we?
So there's back and forth here, but the main points is this from
verse 8 to verse 9, it's kind of a clunky transition.
So this is what they'll say, right?
So look at verse 8 again, they were afraid and they look at
verse 9. Now when he arose early on the
first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary
Magdalene, from whom he had cast out seven demons.
So they say that's kind of an awkward transition.
You're almost like reintroducing the resurrection and you're
reintroducing Mary Magdalene, though she's already been
introduced to us. So this is the claims of people
are I'm just, I'm just relaying it.
And so though, again, nitpick on certain things and bring out
certain words and ideas and flow of thought, and the argument is
it seems to be different. It seems to be added.
It seems to be maybe somebody who worked in it and try to
complete it. Now, I don't want to get into
every single debate about why some believe this and why some
believe that. I just want to give you the two
main arguments. Like if you talk to scholars,
they're going to tell you those are the two main arguments.
There's an external point terms of the early manuscripts not
having it and internal that you know.
Let me show you here how I think Mark's words at the end don't
match his his consistent tone of voice throughout.
You might be wondering where I stand on this issue, and that's
why I want to provide an overview of why I personally
believe that the longer ending of Mark should be included,
should be included in our Bibles and recognized as authentic.
I have three points, Three points to why I believe verses 9
to 20 is something that we should honor and recognize as
Holy Scripture. The first one is the manuscript
evidence. Now, I already told you about
how the majority, 99.8% of Greek manuscripts contain it, but I'm
not going to make that simple argument that there's more.
So it's better scholars, some scholars who also believe in the
longer ending have done a wonderful job examining CODIS
Vaticanus and CODIS Sign Atticus, and they've made pretty
convincing cases that those who penned those manuscripts were
aware of the longer ending, but they didn't include it for
speculative reasons. So I mean, this isn't, this is a
sermon, this isn't a presentation, this isn't a
class. But if you, if you want to go
home, Google Codex Vaticanus specifically, and what you'll
discover is at the ending of Mark in that parchment, that
page of his book, they're empty columns.
Now, what's unique about those empty columns is they're foreign
to every other book in the New Testament.
So the argument is, why does CODIS Vaticanus leave empty
columns right after verse 8? And some scholars believe, look,
you can actually fit if you if you pen Mark's writings based on
that copy of the manuscript, the same way you can fit Mark 16/9
to 20 perfectly in those empty columns.
So we don't really know why some, again, speculate, but
there is sufficient evidence that's just one argument to make
that even within those early manuscripts there, they were at
least aware that there was a longer version out there.
And so I would say manuscript evidence beyond that point #2
and this to me is one of the most convincing points, is that
it was widely referenced, recognized, and circulated in
the early church. I'm talking about the last part,
verses 9 to 20 and Mark 16. So the oldest manuscripts date
from the what, 4th century Codis, Vaticanus, the Codican
Atticus? I don't know how many times I'd
be able to say that without tripping over my words, so bear
with me. So the the earliest Newton
complete New Testament mainstream, those two, which are
fascinating discoveries, they omit them, but they are not the
oldest historical pieces of evidence that reference the
ending of Mark. So you have what is called
patristic evidence, Patristic fathers, Church fathers.
Those church fathers are recognized as the disciples of
the disciples that we read of in the New Testament, right?
And their disciples. When you read some of these
church fathers, what you will discover is that they reference
Mark 16/9 to 20. You're talking about 2nd
century, so at least a century before those two codexes.
You have church fathers that reference and make allusions to
the longer ending of Mark. One of them is Iranians.
Let me quote them to you, who wrote in his third book called
Against Heresies between year one 74189, at least a century
before Vaticanus was produced. And he wrote this quote also
towards the conclusion of his gospel.
Mark says so then after the Lord Jesus had spoken to them, he was
received up into heaven and sits on the right hand of God.
This is an illusion and a reference to Mark 6920,
specifically Mark 16 verse 19. We're told that he ascended and
he was seated at the right hand of God.
You have another 2nd century writer by the name of Justin
Martyr who wrote in his writings called the First Apology using
Mark 1620. You have Tation, another 2nd
century writer who was a pupil a student of Justin Martyr who
includes the longer ending a Mark in his work Dietassaron.
Dietassaron was an ancient writing where Tation sought to
bring all four gospel accounts and merge them into a
chronological text, and when he brought that together, he
actually included Mark 16/9 to 20.
Another known text, and excuse me if I butchered these, is
called Apustula Apostolorum, which was written before the
year 150, providing yet another a fourth witness by making an
allusion to the longer ending of Mark.
So right there I'm providing you 4 witnesses to the longer ending
of Mark in the 2nd century. This is important because that
means that the longer ending of Mark was being circulated in the
church and recognized as authoritative.
OK, it's not found in the earliest complete New Testament
manuscripts, but it's found among these early Christians.
And I can go on and on to mention the support of patristic
works in the two hundreds and three hundreds and four
hundreds. But one of the most interesting
ones that I want to bring up to you is actually from a non
Christian. You actually had a Roman
philosopher by the name of hierarchies who quoted the
longer ending of Mark chapter 16, verses 9 to 20 as a part of
his critique of Christianity in the early 4th century.
And the conclusion there is that he actually made a comment about
where we're going to read in a moment how Christians can drink
poison and nothing will happen. And the case that he makes in
his critique as well, then OK, let's have Christians drink
their let's have their leaders drink poison and see if what
their Bible says is true. You know what's funny is that
even in modern day debate among Muslims, Muslims make that same
argument. Oh, if your Bible is true, your
Bible says that on the Mark 16 to drink poison and you'll
survive. So here's some poison, drink it.
That's nothing new. That came back from the 4th
century. So you have a listen.
There's the point I'm trying to make though.
You have a non Christian who critiqued Christianity who made
a reference to the ending of Mark that scholars today believe
should be omitted, but in fact was recognized apparently by the
early church for him to make that reference.
Does that make sense? I hope so.
Now if you want more of this, if you want more meat, if you want
to sink your teeth even deeper, you come see me after the
service and I could provide some resources.
But here's my final reason, brief reason.
Again, this is just overview. This is just overview I'm giving
you. I talked to you about manuscript
evidence, not just the amount, but even within the earliest
ones that omit it, you can make a case that they were at least
aware of the ending of Mark. We have early Church Falk even
before those earliest complete New Testament manuscripts.
And lastly, this is this is a pretty practical, it's
theological, but it's practical. The final reason why I believe
it should be included is because what it teaches is completely
consistent with the New Testament.
There's nothing out of place there.
There's nothing that shatters our faith.
There's nothing there that contradicts the tenants of our
belief system. So why don't we read it?
Let's begin in verse 9 down to verse 20.
Mark 16/9 went. Now when he rose early on the
first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary
Magdalene, from whom he had cast out seven demons.
She went and told those who had been with him as they mourn and
wept. But when they heard that he was
alive and had been seen by her, they would not believe it.
After these things he appeared in another form to two of them
as they were walking into the country, and they went back and
told the rest, but they did not believe them.
Afterward he appeared to the 11 themselves as they were
reclining a table, and he rebuked them for their unbelief
and hardness of heart, because they had not believed those who
saw him after he had risen. And he said to them, Go into all
the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation.
Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does
not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany
those who believe in my name. They will cast out demons, they
will speak in new tongues, they will pick up serpents with their
hands, and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt
them. They will lay their hands on the
sick, and they will recover. So then the Lord Jesus, after he
had spoken to them, was taken up into heaven and sat down at the
right hand of God. And they went out and preached
everywhere, while the Lord worked with them and confirmed
the message by accompanying science.
Now, if you've read the Gospels before the entirety of the
Gospel accounts, then a lot of what Mark says in those verses
echoes, right? I mean, if you review it, then
you'll know that, for example, when you come here to verse 10,
she went and told those who had been with him as they mourn and
wept. You'll find that in Matthew and
John, right? And we also see the skepticism
in verse 11 of the disciples. They would not believe it.
Look at verse 12. And after these things, he
appeared in another form to two of them, and they were walking
into the country. Where's that?
Found the end of Luke with those two who are walking to Emmaus.
And at first when the disciples heard their report, they also
were skeptical. We read here that the Lord
appeared to the 11 themselves and He rebuked them for the
unbelief and hardness of heart. We see Him do that in other
gospels as well, where He gently rebukes them, verse 15, where He
tells to go unto all the world. Do we not see that in Matthew?
Now where things get interesting is about these signs, these
signs, and what Jesus says immediately preceding these
signs. So that's where I wanted to
spend some time. Look at verse 16.
Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does
not believe will be condemned. So how do we make sense of this?
Because it's a verse like this and a verse 1718 where we read
these signs that has caused some people to be skeptical even
before these manuscript debates. In other words, some people that
believe these verses shall be omitted, they don't say it
outright, but when you read their arguments, they show that
they actually have a preconceived bias already.
They already have this difficulty grasping and applying
these truths. And so when it came to this
debate, it just made a way for them to put into question.
It was almost like, OK, I'm more willing to question these verses
because I already think that this is problematic and this is
strange for Christian Christianity to begin with.
But what seems to be problematic and uncomfortable is in fact
consistent. It's a very dangerous practice
to look at parts of the Bible that may disturb you, make you
uncomfortable and put into question because of your bias.
Very dangerous, right? It doesn't matter if you're if
you're a scholar and if you have the whole alphabet beside your
name, that doesn't matter. But it's amazing how some of
these guys reveal themselves. But I want to make the case
again that this is something that we see in our bibles #1
whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does
not believe will be condemned. So you have some people who
advocate that this promotes baptismal regeneration.
In other words, if you're going to be saved, you need to get
baptized. Why?
Because he says here, whoever believes and is baptized will be
saved. But here's what's interesting.
And remember this whenever you study the Bible, when you and I
ever come to a verse that seems to vary or challenge a biblical
doctrine that is consistent throughout the Bible, you never
make a doctrine from an isolated text.
Never. And this is not just something
that we see in Mark 16, is it not?
There are other places in the Bible where when you read it
alone, it seems to is that saying what I think it says.
So what's our discipline? That you take a verse and you
compare it to the rest of Scripture that you you bring
into account the entirety of the Bible to bring you to a
conclusion, not from one verse or two verses, but the whole
library of divine revelation before you come to a conclusion.
What holds more weight? This is lined up with other very
clear passages. Does does this verse support
baptismal regeneration based on what others have to say about it
in the Bible? So we we can't just take one
verse and make a whole theological dogma out of it.
You have to make the practice of looking at the entirety of the
Bible. That's not just true for Mark
1616, that's true for any verse in the Bible.
So that's the first thing, right?
And let me mention even some clues within Mark 1616.
Notice it says whoever believes that is baptized will be saved,
but whoever does not believe will be condemned.
So in the positive believe and be baptized, you will be saved.
But in the negative, if you don't believe, you will not be
saved. Why didn't you say if you don't
believe and don't get baptized? So all this really takes is
context and careful reading of our Bibles.
So this is that's just one internal clue.
We haven't even explored the neighboring text.
So First things first, whenever you see something that seems to
be challenging, it seems to even be contradictory or paradoxal,
always take into account the entirety of the Bible before you
come to any conclusions. And that's certainly the case
here from Mark 1616. But it's the next verse, the
exciting, juicy stuff that people really want to talk
about. And these signs will accompany
those who believe in my name. They will cast out demons.
They will speak in new tongues, they will pick up serpents with
their hands, and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not
hurt them. They will lay their hands on the
sick and they will recover. Can I ask you a simple question?
Do you see these signs following the disciples after Jesus
ascended to heaven? Simple question.
You don't have to be a scholar. Yes, we do see them casting out
demons. Do we speak see them speaking in
new tongues? Yes, you do see them speaking in
new tongues. Do you even see them interacting
with snakes? Not like the crazy people on
YouTube, the snake handling services, I'm not talking about
that. But there is one account in Acts
28 when Paul was in the island called Malta, and as he was
feeding the fire with dry sticks, a snake came out and bit
his hand. And what happened?
Did he collapse? No, he survived and it opened a
way for the people in Malta to hear the gospel.
It was a sign. Now the thing that stands out of
all these signs is what? The drinking of any deadly
poison, right? We don't see that necessarily
and a specific account or narrative in the New Testament.
But here's the point that I want to make primarily is that this
is this is a overall message that the Lord is trying to
convey. Yes, he's being specific.
You can't deny that, but there's a context that we have to honor
here. So let me give you a personal
experience. Many, many, many, many years
ago, right? I mentioned the debates with
Muslims and how they bring up this particular versus a
challenge to Christians. I remember the first time I came
across a debate on this issue. It was just a general debate
about the reliability of the Bible, the historicity of the
Bible. Again, it was just something
that was in passing. I didn't even watch the whole
thing. I just came to the end in the
closing remarks, and I remember seeing one of these Muslim
imams. And the crowd was filled with
other Muslims looking at this kind of sheepish, I believe,
scholarly man who was a Christian.
And he literally pulled out a bottle of poison.
And he looked at this man and he says, your Bible says this.
And he quoted Mark 1617 to 18. So why don't you prove to us
right here, right now that your Bible is true and drink this
poison. And the crowd began to cheer.
And this man just gently received the bottle.
And he stood up quietly. And you know what he did?
I remember so vividly. He began to explain the case of
how verses 9 to 20 are omitted from the earliest manuscripts
and it was just really being drowned out by the crowd.
You, you don't have to make that argument if you just properly
interpret what Mark is saying here.
So I remember I freshly saved, didn't know a thing about what I
just presented to you in the past half an hour, 45 minutes,
didn't know one thing. I just came back to my Bible,
maybe look at different versions.
And here's what I read. And this is, this is even more
clear if you have the new King James and the King James.
Look again at verse 17 and these signs and I'll quoted to you in
the new King James and King James.
And these signs will follow those who believe.
And remember this, this specific thought raced through my mind.
It says that these signs will follow those who believe, not
that these believers will follow such signs.
Right there, there, just right there.
And then it dawned on me to challenge a promise of God.
It's called testing God. And that same kind of logic and
argumentation and challenge is no different than Satan himself
who told Jesus what in the wilderness.
He quoted Psalm 91 concerning angelic protection.
He says, why don't you jump off the temple and see if this is
true? Do not test the Lord your God.
So to take a verse like this and to entertain the idea that we
should try to see if God will come through in a miraculous way
because the Bible presents the possibility of his promise of
coming through for us is Antichrist. 1-2 Look at the
context. Is the context here for us in a
service to come together and pull out snakes out of a box and
share some Kool-aid and see if we're all going to be OK?
No. The context is world
evangelization. The context is world missions.
The context is you disciples who invade foreign areas that have
never heard the truth, never seen the light.
When you go, you can know that I will empower you in a special
way and I will protect you in a special way.
That's exactly what Mark is saying here.
I'm with you and I'm going to tell you some of the ways I'm
going to be with you, that I'm going to see you working for my
namesake and I will work with you.
Look at verse 20. And they went out and preached
everywhere while the Lord worked with them and confirmed the
message by accompanying science. So this is not about us chasing
snakes and chasing poison and going to debates or coming to
services and saying the Lord said we can do this, let's do
this. This is about a group of people
who are going into very dangerous and hostile territory.
And as they go preaching the message, the Lord promised, I'm
going to be with you, I'm going to empower you, and I'm going to
protect you. And now that doesn't mean that
this is going to be signs that can be performed on demand or
going to be consistent without any other option because these
same disciples would be martyred and they would be subject to the
elements. This is something that we teach
in this church, that as long as you are walking in the will of
God and as long as you are living for His name's sake, you
are in essence immortal until he calls you home.
As long as you're not foolish and as long as you're not living
in sin, as long as you're abiding by the truth, the Lord
will empower you and the Lord will protect you until the end.
That's the essence of what Mark is saying here at the end.
And so I remember realizing that early in my walk.
This is say that we will follow these signs says that they will
follow us. And I don't determine when they
follow me. My job is simply to do what
these disciples were called to do and let's preach the word.
And if God wants to empower me in a special way so that he can
confirm that message, so be it. And if unknown to me, I'm in a
dangerous place and I'm serving the Lord and there's an attack,
whether through natural elements or through my persecutors, I'm
going to trust that God's going to protect me.
And if he doesn't protect, it means my mission is done on a
going home. So when you properly interpret
it, you see that there's a different understanding here.
Now this is not my habit to quote church fathers and talk
about manuscripts. It's it's my joy to preach what
the Bible has to say. But we have to continue with the
service. So let me just bring to you one
thought that blessed me from the ending of Mark, because I'm
going to share it to you because I believe it is God's
authoritative word. Notice verse 20.
And they went out and preached everywhere while the Lord worked
with them and confirmed the message by accompanying signs.
You've been with us since the beginning of Mark.
And you heard throughout the Gospel of Mark that Mark seeks
to portray the Lord Jesus Christ in a certain way in comparison
to the other gospel accounts. Mark seeks to portray Jesus
Christ of Nazareth as the perfect servant of God.
Remember. And what I find so fitting and
so appropriate is that when you come to the last verse of the
Gospel of Mark, what do you find the Lord Jesus Christ doing?
Working. He's working, He's still
serving, but this time he's serving with the servants of God
to advance his Kingdom. So if you want to talk about
thematic consistency, if you want to talk about whether this
last part coincides and works with the rest of it, I argue
that's just one example of how it does.
Because throughout Mark, we're seeing Jesus working, serving,
using his hands, less parables, more miracles.
And now when you come to the final thought, the last snapshot
of Christ that we get even in his resurrection as a in his
ascension, he's doing what working, working with his
servants to advance his message. A message that is believed on
today, a message that still saves, a message that is true
and will always be true. Do you believe the gospel of
Jesus Christ? Because what we're about to
partake in together is for those who have put their trust in this
message, it is reliable. It's undeniable.
Yes, there's historical proof behind it.
Yes, it eclipses any other history, historical document,
historical asserts, and historical event.
And God has done that in His Providence.
But not just Providence. This gospel has power.
It has power. It has power to save you from
the power of sin. It has the power to eliminate
the penalty of sin. And the way in which you
experience what is yes, historically recognized and and
found in documents, especially in our Bibles, is when you
believe it by faith. You see, no matter how much
evidence you're given, you're going to come to a place where
you have to take a leap of faith.
And if you think that's foreign or that's a cop out, you do it
with almost everything in life. When it comes to looking back at
the past, history, the books you love, the documentaries that you
watch, the with all those things, you were giving an
element of faith. You're taking a leap of trust.
I'm trusting those who have put this together to say this is
what happened before my lifetime.
But more than manuscripts, more than church fathers, anything
else, though, those are a poor man.
Those are paramount. We don't have blind faith.
The testimonies of lies that have been transformed by this
message, it's incredible. And I want you to have that
testimony. And again, the way you have that
testimony is when you repent and believe or you realize that
there is a man who whose name Jesus Christ, He was from
Nazareth, but he was unlike any other man.
He was perfect. You couldn't document his a sin
and his word and his action, his deeds and his reactions.
The Bible testifies that he was internally pure, incorruptible.
Even his accusers at his trial were fumbling and stumbling,
trying to find something to bring against him.
But he was not a martyr. He was not a victim at the hands
of cruel people. He voluntarily laid down his
life. He laid down his life because
understanding our humanity, our sinfulness, and our bankruptcy
before God, it would require a sacrifice.
A sacrifice that would please God and His justice, and that
would be able to be applicable to all men of all time.
And the only way that one person could cover the sins of all
humanity from past, present and future, if that person was
eternal, if he suspended and superseded time, if he was above
all of those things and yet became a man so that he can
mediate on behalf of humanity. This is the uniqueness of the
person of Jesus Christ. There is none like Him and what
the Bible demands is that you realize that He is unique, that
He is fully God, fully man, truly God, truly man.
But it wasn't just a stunt. It wasn't just a three-year
visit in the earth. It was a mission.
A mission to bring you out of the muck and mire and pull you
out of the place where you will receive the wrath of God, apart
from Christ. So let me just let me just speak
plain and clear. Have you at any point made a
conscious decision that you understood what Jesus Christ of
Nazareth did for you and that you accepted as a free gift?
Have you ever done that? If you've never done that, I say
this in love. You stand condemned before God.
You do. Every sin that you've ever
committed will be brought up on that final day, and you'll have
to pay with eternal punishment. But at the same time, if you
realize that God and His love for you, he will never
compromise His justice. He'll never, ever, ever diminish
His Holiness, but at the same time, His love is just as
fierce. And if you recognize, yes, His
Holiness, but also His love that he wants to rescue from his
wrath, rescue from eternal punishment, and he drank the
wrath of God himself, why would you deny it?
And why wouldn't you accept the forgiveness that Christ offers
you? And everything that you've ever
done, everything that you've ever committed, will be washed
clean, and you will not stand wondering if you will have
eternal life. You can stand confident that you
have been forgiven for all your sins and that God will keep you
and He will preserve you, and He will walk with you in this life
until He brings you home into His presence forever.
That is the gospel of Jesus Christ.
And why we do this is because we're about to line up now and
take these emblems, a piece of bread and a cup with the fruit
of the vine to remember. It's not because of what I've
done. It's not because what I perform,
It's not because of my righteousness that I'm safe.
It's because of what He's done in His body.
It's because he shed His blood that I am forgiven.
I have eternal life because of what He's done in his flesh and
what He's done in His sacrifice. We have come to celebrate our
redemption in Jesus Christ. But this table is reserved only
for those who believe in that message that I just preached.
And so if you're a person here visiting, we're so glad that
you're here. But I respectfully ask that you
observe and don't don't participate.
This is an ordinance that's only been given to the church and
believer. If you do believe in this
message, but your walk is not consistent with that message,
consciously you're living in a way where you're justifying sin.
You would please your master more if you pause today and you
reflected and repented than if you partook of this.
And so I'm going to ask us to just pause now.
And we're going to do this in a moment that praising can come
up. But when it comes to this table,
we're called to look in different places.
One, we're supposed to look at Christ, Remember what he's done.
Two, we're supposed to look at one another and remember that we
are one body like this bread symbolizes.
So if there's any friction, any unresolved issues, you please
more, you please God more by reconciling than of eating or at
least reconciling before you eat.
And lastly, you look within, possibly examine yourself,
right? And so look to the Lord, look to
one another. Now look within and take this
time to say, Lord, is my practice matching my profession.
Lord, help me live for you. Help me live the way you called
me to live and help me rest in your truth.
Help me please You also, knowing that you've finished this for me
and that I walk from grace, not for grace.
So just in silence. I encourage you to, if you need
to bow your head, examine your heart.
We're going to sing and then we're going to eat.