She (Mary Magdalene) went and reported to those who had been with Him, while they were mourning and weeping. When they heard that He was alive and had been seen by her, they refused to believe it. After that, He appeared in a different form to two of them while they were walking along on their way to the country. They went away and reported it to the others, but they did not believe them either (Mark 16:10–13).

Who were these that "refused to believe" that Jesus was risen and even after further testimony by those in their own number "did not believe"? They were none other than Jesus' very own disciples. I am reminded of Jesus' words to Philip,

Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? (John 14:9)

And when the disciples finally saw with their own eyes that Jesus was risen, we are told that "He reproached them for their unbelief and hardness of heart" (Mark 16:14).

The disciples lived with Jesus during the three years of His ministry. They saw Him give sight to the blind, raise the dead, feed five thousand men with only a few pieces of bread and fish, walk on the water, and instantly calm a raging storm with a word. They were amazed by His wisdom and authority to interpret and apply the Scriptures. They understood that He was the Messiah, the Son of God. Everything He predicted had thus far come true.

Yet, they refused to believe that He rose from the dead, even though before He died He repeatedly told them that this would happen.

Now, don't miss this. If Jesus' closest followers, who saw Him, heard Him, and knew Him better than anyone, did not believe, what makes you and me think that we are so much better? Those that think that Jesus' disciples believed in Jesus of their own free will, apart from God's supernatural enablement, are badly mistaken and stubbornly proud. Jesus had to open the minds of the disciples, so that they could understand and believe:

Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures (Luke 24:45).

Likewise, you and I did not believe on our own. God opened our minds to believe. He enlightened our hearts so that we might believe and be saved (cf. Ephesians 1:18; John 3:3). Therefore, there is no place for boasting, not even in our faith, for it too, as with all of salvation, was given to us by grace (cf. Ephesians 2:8–9). As the Scriptures also teach,

It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. Therefore, as it is written: “Let the one who boasts boast in the Lord” (1 Corinthians 1:30–31).

AI-Expanded Reflection

The disciples’ struggle to believe the resurrection is striking precisely because they already knew Jesus. Familiarity with his teaching and memories of his miracles did not make them emotionally or intellectually prepared for the crucifixion and its reversal. Luke 24 portrays grief, disappointed expectations, and difficulty understanding Scripture alongside their unbelief. Their story challenges the assumption that faith is simply the predictable result of possessing enough religious information. A person may know many correct statements about Jesus while still resisting what those statements mean for suffering, hope, and personal allegiance.

The original quotation comes from Mark’s longer ending, which is absent from some early manuscripts and is identified as disputed in many modern Bibles. That textual issue should be acknowledged without implying that the broader observation rests on this passage alone. Luke independently describes the apostles’ initial rejection of the women’s report, the confusion of the travelers to Emmaus, and Jesus’ opening of the disciples’ minds (Luke 24:11, 25–27, 36–45). The reflection can therefore proceed from a well-attested Lukan theme while remaining honest about the textual status of Mark 16:9–20.

In Luke 24:45, Jesus opens understanding in relation to the Scriptures and his own suffering and resurrection. Divine illumination does not replace the message with an unexplained private sensation. Jesus teaches, recalls what was written, appears to his followers, and commissions them to bear witness. Grace works through this encounter with truth. This provides a useful pattern for Christian teaching: pray for understanding, explain the text carefully, listen to actual questions, and resist the assumption that pressure or cleverness can manufacture faith.

The comment rightly directs gratitude away from spiritual boasting. Nevertheless, its polemical contrast needs qualification. Christians disagree about how divine initiative and human response relate, but many who affirm a real human response explicitly understand that response to be enabled by grace. Calling every such position proud risks deciding the discussion by accusation. Ephesians 2:8–10 grounds salvation wholly in grace and immediately connects it with a life of good works; it does not authorize contempt for believers who describe the workings of grace differently. Ephesians 1:18 likewise asks for the continuing enlightenment of people already addressed as believers.

The pastoral force remains substantial. We should not despise another person’s questions as though our own understanding arose from superior intelligence or moral sensitivity. Nor should someone struggling with belief conclude that honest questions place them beyond Christ’s patience. The risen Jesus corrects his disciples and gives them grounds for witness. Humility therefore moves in two directions: we confess our dependence upon God, and we take seriously the means he gives for understanding. Reading Scripture in context, examining the resurrection testimony, praying, and learning in community can express that dependence. The final aim is not satisfaction with our capacity to believe but confidence in the crucified and risen Lord who meets confused disciples and sends them to proclaim forgiveness.

Mark 16:17–18 says these signs will accompany those who believe: in Jesus's name they will drive out demons, speak in new tongues, pick up snakes with their hands, and when they drink deadly poison it will not hurt them; they will place their hands on sick people and they will get well.

Today, snake handlers and poison drinkers have largely been marginalized and rejected by the evangelical community, and rightly so, because they have misapplied verses like this one to mean that first-century signs have continued unchanged to this day.

These signs were prevalent in the early church, as Acts attests, and were given to authenticate the ministry of the apostles. Mark 16:20 says the disciples went out and preached everywhere, and the Lord confirmed His word by the signs that accompanied it. Hebrews says this salvation was announced by the Lord and confirmed by those who heard Him, and that God testified to it by signs, wonders, and various miracles, and by gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to His will (a reference to Hebrews 2:3–4). Paul cites these very signs as authenticating his apostleship — the marks of a true apostle, including signs, wonders, and miracles (a reference to 2 Corinthians 12:12).

The church is described as built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus Himself as the chief cornerstone (a reference to Ephesians 2:19–20).

AI-Expanded Reflection

One textual matter belongs in front of this discussion, and it strengthens rather than weakens the comment's conclusion about snake handling. Mark 16:9–20 is absent from the earliest and most reliable Greek manuscripts, including Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, and virtually every modern translation marks it with a note to that effect. Several other endings circulated in antiquity. Scholars across the theological spectrum, including many conservative ones, regard the longer ending as a later addition. Whatever one concludes, building a doctrine or a practice on verses whose place in the text is this uncertain is not sound — which is the clearest argument against handling snakes on their authority.

On the larger question, this is the cessationist and continuationist debate noted earlier in this project. The comment argues the strong cessationist position: that apostles and prophets belonged to the foundation and that authenticating signs ceased with them. That position is seriously held and has substantial arguments, including the ones cited here.

Continuationists read the same texts differently. They point out that Ephesians 2:20 concerns the foundation without stating that the gifts themselves ended, that 1 Corinthians 12–14 gives ongoing instructions for the use and regulation of gifts in a local congregation, and that Paul tells the Thessalonians not to despise prophecy but to test everything. They also distinguish between the unique office of apostle, which they generally agree has ceased, and the gifts, which they hold continue.

Both sides agree on what this comment is most concerned about: that claims made in God's name require testing, and that practices which endanger people cannot be justified by appeal to a disputed text.

Friends, we read in Mark 15:38, "Then the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom." What is this veil? What does it mean that it was torn in two? What significance is it that it was torn starting from the top?

This is where a knowledge of the Old Testament becomes critical. There you will learn that when God delivered His people out of Egyptian bondage to make them a nation after His own Name, He promised to dwell with them forever. And until they came into the Land of Promise, He commanded that they build for Him a tabernacle (i.e. a large tent), where individuals could come to worship the LORD. It was in the form of a tabernacle because they were constantly on the move. When they were established in the Land of Promise, this tabernacle would be replaced by a more permanent temple. The superstructure of both the tabernacle and temple was the same. There were three primary sections: (1) the outer court, (2) the holy place, (3) the holiest place ("holy of holies"). While every Jew was permitted in the outer court, only the priests could enter the holy place, and only the High Priest could enter the holiest place, and that just once a year on the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur). As one proceeded from the outer court to the holiest place, one was coming nearer to the presence of God.

The entrance to the holiest place was covered with a thick veil, which separated it from the holy place. Only the high priest could enter the holiest place. And even as the high priest entered the Holy of Holies on the Day of Atonement, he had to make meticulous preparations: He had to wash himself, put on special clothing, bring burning incense to let the smoke cover the mercy seat, and bring blood with him to make atonement for sins. Anything amiss could mean the death of the high priest (Leviticus 16:2). In Numbers 4:15–20 we discover that touching, improperly approaching, or even looking at any of the holy things within the veil could mean instant death.

The veil separated the common from the holy, sinful man from a holy God. Only the blood sacrifice brought in by the high priest once a year could bridge that gap. And only temporarily. It had to be performed every year. However, when Christ Jesus died, we are told that the veil was torn, which means the separation between God and man was removed. The fact that it was torn from top to bottom may represent the activity of God (above) on behalf of people (below). We did not initiate this new-found communion with God. God initiated it Himself. And when Christ died, it was His own blood that was offered and not the blood of animals, which was what the high priests brought in the OT. Also, when Christ offered Himself as the sacrifice, it would be once for all and for always, unlike the yearly ritual of the high priest.

So we read in Hebrews 9:11–15

But Christ came as High Priest of the good things to come, with the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands, that is, not of this creation. Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood He entered the Most Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption. For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? And for this reason He is the Mediator of the new covenant, by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions under the first covenant, that those who are called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance.

And by this one sacrifice, all of us can now boldly come before God through Christ (Hebrews 4:16). Jesus has removed the veil that separates us from God. In a sense, He Himself has become that veil, and through Him, since He lives within us who believe, we have direct access to God the Father.

Therefore, brethren, having boldness to enter the Holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which He consecrated for us, through the veil, that is, His flesh, and having a High Priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching (Hebrews 10:19–25).

Friends, as this Scripture commands, (1) let us draw near to God with the confidence that we have through Christ Jesus, (2) let us hold fast our hope that God will accomplish our salvation for us in due time, and (3) let us consider how we might spur each other toward love and good deeds, even as we see the day of our gathering together to Christ approaching. This is not simply theological truth but also practical instruction. On the basis of what Christ has accomplished for us as our High Priest, we are called to boldly trust and diligently obey Him with our lives.

AI-Expanded Reflection

The temple veil belonged to a system in which access to holy space was carefully restricted. Leviticus 16 emphasizes that even the high priest could not approach casually: sacrifice, cleansing, and prescribed preparation accompanied the Day of Atonement. The incense cloud covered the mercy seat, not simply the priest's eyes. These details communicate both God's presence among his people and the seriousness of approaching him as a sinner.

Mark reports the curtain's tearing immediately after Jesus' death. Reading this with Hebrews gives a compelling theological connection: access to God is opened through Christ's definitive sacrifice. Mark itself does not explain every symbolic detail, so the direction from top to bottom can appropriately suggest divine initiative without becoming a separate doctrine. The curtain also belongs to a temple whose judgment Jesus has announced. Access and judgment are therefore related dimensions of the larger narrative. Read Mark 15:33–39 and Hebrews 10:19–25.

Hebrews does more than contrast old restrictions with new permission. Christ's blood cleanses the conscience for service, and his enduring priesthood grounds confidence that does not depend on repeating his sacrifice. The invitation is to approach with a true heart and full assurance of faith. Such confidence is neither familiarity that trivializes holiness nor anxiety that treats Christ's work as insufficient.

The three exhortations at the conclusion make access practical: draw near, hold fast, and consider one another. A doctrine of restored relationship with God should produce worship, perseverance, and active concern for the community's love and good works. The opened way is not merely a private privilege. Believers help one another use it, especially when suffering or discouragement makes retreat attractive. Christ's completed sacrifice thus becomes the basis for a continuing life of shared faithfulness.