“Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the entrance. So she came running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, and said, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him!” (John 20:1-3)
Mary Magdalene had intended to finish preparing Jesus’ body for internment, arriving before dawn on Sunday, perhaps for lack of sleep. What she found at the tomb seemed to just add one more cruel blow to her hopes and dreams that had been dashed by Jesus’ death.
The tomb had been broken into, and she immediately assumed that Jesus’ body had been moved to a pauper’s grave by Joseph of Arimathea’s hired hands. So she ran to Peter and John and told them that Jesus’ body was missing.
This made the disciples quite upset, and her even more distraught, and she assumed that this was just one more sign that her new life with Jesus had been too good to be true. Yet, she just wanted to know where Jesus’ body was, because his body was all that was left of her dream, and she wanted to express her love for him by making sure he had a decent burial.
Peter and John ran to the tomb and looked in and saw that the grave clothes were still there, and the cloth that had been around Jesus’ head had been meticulously folded and laid where the body had been. The interior of the tomb had a calmness to it, in contrast to the chaos going on outside where confusion resided.
Again, we see the difference between God’s perspective and our perspective. Victorious peace instead of uncertainty. Calm versus the storm.
So the guys left and Mary stayed behind crying her heart out. “As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb and saw two angels in white, seated where Jesus’ body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot.” Her tears prevented her from seeing that these were not mere men sitting in the tomb.
They asked her, “Woman, why are you crying?”
“They have taken my Lord away,” she said, “and I don’t know where they have put him.”
“At this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was him. ‘Woman,’ he said, ‘why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?’”
“Thinking he was (Joseph of Arimathea’s) gardener, she said, ‘Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.’”
“Jesus said to her, ‘Mary.’
She turned toward him and cried out in Aramaic, ‘Rabboni!’ (which means [dear] Teacher).”
“Jesus said, ‘Do not (keep) hold(ing) on to me, for I have not yet returned to the Father. (Or, ‘don’t keep touching me to see if I’m real–I’m still here in the flesh.’) Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am returning to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’ “
Jesus’ followers had started out as his disciples, then his friends and now his brothers. Our relationship with him is intended to grow. Our salvation is based on a person, not just an arrangement he has made that we mentally believe in. And it’s never Jesus’ intention to keep us at a distance. That’s our doing.
