Sermon preached at Evensong, St George’s Cathedral Cape Town. Second Sunday of Easter 12 April 2026
I’m sure many of you have heard a preacher end a sermon with a question or a controversial statement and instead of answering the question or explaining the statement, the preacher has left things just hanging there and gone back to their pew.
Recently I tried that at my home parish of St Stephen’s in Pinelands. Afterwards while shaking hands at the door, a lady said to me. ‘Are you okay? You just stop your sermon so suddenly!’ Realising that giving a dissertation on hermeneutics and homiletics while shaking hands at the door was inappropriate, I merely said: ‘I did that on purpose so that you could finish the sermon in your own mind during the silence that followed.’ She looked at me strangely but moved on.
I was reminded of this after reading through our second lesson this evening. My sermon ending was a bit like the ending of Mark’s Gospel. The final chapter is quite famous for ending so abruptly. Following the young man’s statement of Jesus’ resurrection, the women flee the empty tomb in fear and tell no one. As Mark says: ‘they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.’
Later manuscripts of Mark’s Gospel have added a longer ending (16:9-20) This contains resurrection appearances and the Great Commission, but the earliest manuscripts end at verse 8, where our reading ended. Scholars are divided on whether the abrupt ending had an ending which is now lost or whether this an intentional literary device by Mark to challenge readers’ responses to the resurrection news. The same device I tried in my sermon.
‘… they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.’ At some point they must have said something to somebody, or this Cathedral would not be standing here tonight, nor would composers and poets have written the words and music of what we have said & sung thus far.
Since last Sunday and for a total of 50 days we start our Eucharist Services with the words Alleluia! Christ is risen and you have responded He has risen indeed. Alleluia! Our hymns have been loud and filled with praise and expressions of thanksgiving to God for the resurrection. But all too often this praise and thanksgiving have remained here in this building and have not gone out into the rest of your life.
Our first lesson this evening has a heading in the NRSV of A Psalm of Thanksgiving. In this psalm Jonah expresses his thanks to God for deliverance from the rough seas and the belly of the fish often called the whale. Here in Cape Town the Iziko Museum has a Whale Well and it needs this vast open space to display all the whale skeletons. 
This Cathedral has a vast open space, and these columns rising up and arched at the top could be seen as whale ribs. So, my question is: do we perhaps feel too comfortable in this ‘whale’ – this cathedral – and unlike Jonah, we do not wish to be spewed out into the world to carry out the tasks God has given us.
For Jonah the task meant going to Ninevah and telling them to change their ways or be destroyed. Do go and read the whole of the story of Jonah, it is only three pagers long. Jonah being swallowed by a fish, is used as a metaphor. It is a didactic story (a parable) to teach us about God’s mercy and obedience.
And those women, they, at first, hid. This was their equivalent of Jonah’s big fish and they ‘said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.’ Have you spoken to anyone about Jesus’ resurrection or are you afraid? Just as Mark challenged his readers to respond to the resurrection news by ending his Gospel abruptly, I’m challenging you tonight make your response.
