SermonStudio
Passion Sunday
Preaching
Preaching Mark's Gospel
A Narrative Approach
The Sunday of the Passion confronts us with a different kind of challenge. The appointed text is two chapters of Mark's Gospel. Mark's "passion narrative" is filled with narrative connections to the earlier chapters of his Gospel. Time after time throughout this work we have moved from Markan texts to sections of Mark 14 and 15 which stand in narrative analogy to them. The woman in Mark 14:3-9 who breaks open an alabaster jar of ointment is elsewhere in these chapters spoken of in analogy to the "tearing open of the heavens" (1:10) and the "tearing open" of the temple curtain (15:38).
