Now on the first day of the week Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early, while it was still dark, and saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb.
2 So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.”
3 So Peter went out with the other disciple, and they were going toward the tomb.
4 Both of them were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first.
5 And stooping to look in, he saw the linen cloths lying there, but he did not go in.
6 Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen cloths lying there,
7 and the face cloth, which had been on Jesus’[a] head,
not lying with the linen cloths but folded up in a place by itself. 8
Then the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed;
9 for as yet they did not understand the Scripture, that he must rise from the dead.
10 Then the disciples went back to their homes.11
But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb, and as she wept she stooped to look into the tomb.
12 And she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet.
13 They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have
laid him.”
John’s work is a literary masterpiece with every word and line dripping with significance and because of that we will spend a few weeks looking at this chapter moving
slowly through it. You remember how John will hearken back to the beginning of time, to the beginning of history and does so purposefully, even beginning the gospel in the same way that Genesis begins, “In the beginning…”
Thinking about our biblical worldview, we can understand why John makes much of light and darkness and draw parallels from creation to redemption, how it is that light
and darkness take on ethical connotations, not just creative ones…darkness referring to that which is morally bad in John’s writing, while light refers to the overcoming of the darkness, the overcoming of evil.
Listen again to how John begins:
“In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the Word was God…In Him was life and the life was the light of men, and the light shines in the darkness
and the darkness did not comprehend it…”
The reference to Genesis is unmistakable, but the point of light and darkness at creation is only to mirror, to picture and to point us to what God is doing in redemption.
And then we read and only in John, “Now on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early while it was still dark…”
Why does John tell this to us? Why does he think it is important that it was the first day and that it was still dark when Mary arrived? Of course, the simple answer
is that it WAS the first day of the week and she went to the tomb early in the morning. We could stop there and just appreciate the information that tells us the day and the conditions. But after reading John like we have, we know there is more to it than
that.
John wants us to think back to the first day of creation. He wants you to remember that on that day the darkness covered the earth, the darkness enveloped everything,
there was no light yet. He wants you to think of that scene and then to think of this one…as now the disciples, those who were the most devoted to Christ are themselves covered over by darkness and what was to them the impossibility of ever overcoming that
darkness…after all, Christ has died, Jesus is dead.
Think about this: On the first day of the week, in the beginning, in Genesis, God is at work. But the work He does is a hidden work. At creation there is no one there
but the holy angels to see what God is doing, to hear the almighty say, “Let there be light…”
Here at the tomb we again are called to view, to participate in a hidden work, not in creation but of redemption, as God alone brings to pass the greatest work ever,
where death and hell are defeated and darkness gives way again, to the light of God.
As creation was powerless in itself to penetrate the darkness, so the disciples, faced with the death of the One they had followed and hoped in, were powerless to
lift the veil of darkness that now surrounded them. It is why Nicodemus three times mentioned coming to Jesus when it was dark, for the light had not yet come to Him. It is why Jesus tells the Pharisees in chapter 9 when he heals a blind man, that they, the
Pharisees are in darkness still and why at the crucifixion of Jesus the earth shook and became dark.
John is not wasting words when he tells us that Judas goes to betray Christ, and it was dark. Judas goes to serve darkness, and John’s comment that, “it was night”
powerfully preaches the central message of the power of the darkness and how it is about to be stripped and left impotent. John wants you to see that just as God brought light to the darkness of creation, so now the Lord brings light to this world’s darkness
because of sin.
Now, I am not sure what you think of all of this so far and for some perhaps literary analysis isn’t your thing. But I hope you see the lengths that God has gone to,
so that the glory of what He is doing to save sinners…to save you…would be revealed as His chief purpose.
Does it mean anything to you, that God has had the church in mind all this time? He literally made everything that He has made to serve His work of redemption. He
would make everything that He would make, with the purpose of pointing sinful, blind, men and women to Jesus, so that He could save them. What kind of God does this?
It is all pointing to what we are going to see next in our text. We move from a broad redemptive historical theme of light and darkness to a more intimate personal
one. I want you to notice in John’s gospel the prominence of Mary Magdalene. In Matthew, Mark and Luke, Mary is mentioned and is accompanied by other women. But in John, although not denying other women being there the emphasis of John is undoubtedly
placed upon this one woman.
John and only John mentions a number of times that this was taking place in a garden, the garden is important to John as there are connections between the garden of
Eden and the garden of Gethsemane. There was a woman in that first garden, in Eden, a woman with whom Satan the enemy of God and the enemy of the souls of men would be entangled.
In the first garden the woman found no one, not even her husband that could stand in her place, no one to die for her in order that she might be reconciled to the
light of the knowledge of the Lord God. In this garden we find a woman, a woman who had also had an encounter with the Devil, had herself been lost and given over to the Devil’s plan.
This woman, in the Garden, finds the resurrected Xp who has not only offered himself up for her but now claims her by
speaking her name. Darkness…a garden…and a woman entangled with Satan, in both Genesis and John, but with a profound difference.
There is much speculation about Mary but what we do know is that she was so given over to this world and to evil that she housed within her body 7 demons and Jesus
cast them out. There could not have been a person more in bondage, more lost than Mary.
Everything about Mary shouts of her uncleanness, her defilement, even her hometown of Magdala was a notorious unclean city where respectable Jewish teachers would
never go. She belonged body and soul to Satan and from this the Savior had come to her…cast out the demons and made her clean and called this woman to follow Him, which she had done, in love, from that very day.
The emphasis upon Mary preaches to us the absolute wonders of grace because when we look at Mary, we do not do so with self-righteous judgment. No, when looking into
the face of this woman, we see ourselves. We see our bondage, our sin and our inability to remedy our situation by ourselves…we see the darkness that once was and that Christ has broken! And it was to her, to this one in the clutches of Satan himself, that
the Savior came, and not because she wanted HIM, but because HE wanted her. It was to HER that redemption called, the power of heaven, a power greater, a love greater than all the devils of hell combined.
In a word, having received much she loved much, having been forgiven of such great sin, such great bondage, the greatness of her love for Xp was the fruit of His great
love for her. Jesus said elsewhere, that he who has been forgiven much, loves much, is it any wonder that we find this woman here? Is it any wonder, that John, who from the upper room forward was so taken with the love of Jesus that it consumed the rest of
his life, I say, is it any wonder that it is John who reminds us of just how great and powerful a love it is?
When we come to these accounts I cannot help but wonder how our love for Jesus can at times be so shallow and so lukewarm? What are we to think when so many profess
Christ but lack devotion to Him, and who are just as content to speak His name but live for their own?
If we only understood, what Mary understood, what Mary knew. If we only saw ourselves as we truly are. Have you not been forgiven much? Did not, and would not, the
power of hell and your own sins have their way with you, if not for a love greater and more powerful than they? Mary will be, flesh and bone of what Paul said and what we read in our liturgy this morning.
“…He died for all, so that those who live should live no longer for themselves but for Him who died for them and rose again.”
If Christ has died FOR YOU, and I would guess most of us would say that we believe this…If Christ has died for you it is so that you would no longer live for yourself,
but that you know would live for Him…Makes you think doesn’t it? This is where Jesus is taking Mary, and this is where He is taking us. That in the light that comes from the resurrection, you might with great joy, refuse to live for yourself, but for Him.
We are drawing the lines that the resurrection makes so clear: You say that Jesus died and was resurrected for you…you profess that, and you believe that? Here is
the proof: Do you live for Him or for yourself?
Oftentimes Christians talk about selfishness and we teach our children about it, and we say it is bad. We tell them not to be selfish. Why? Why do this? Is it because
people don’t like selfish children? That might be true, but that is not why. We are called to die to ourselves because the gospel teaches the abandonment of self…that for us as Christians to live with self on the throne is a denial of the resurrection. To
live in selfishness is to refuse the cross that Christ has called us to bear, and it is in essence to deny the meaning of the cross that HE bore.
Everything in the text hints at the special ties that bound Mary to the Lord. She, first to arrive at the tomb, not the disciples, not the men, but this woman, seems
to care so little for anything but to honor the One who brought the light of life to her, she arrives before them all.
She is alarmed that the stone is rolled away and Christ is gone. The disciples, Peter and the disciple that Jesus loved, came to the tomb, examined the situation and
then, according to verse 10, they were so excited, they went home. They went home, why? Were they afraid, confused? Verse 9 makes it clear that they were as yet still dull with regard to the necessity of Jesus resurrecting from the grave, but why just go home
as if nothing had happened.
Why not call a meeting of the disciples? Why not go to Pilate or try and find Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea after all they buried him and it was Joseph’s private
guard where he had been laid. I don’t know…the text doesn’t answer such questions. But the text does quickly bring us back in verse 11, as if to strike a contrast, to Mary, who did not return home as if she had a home where Jesus was not, she stood outside
the tomb, weeping. Finally, she bends over and sees the angels and they ask her why she is weeping and she tells them, “They have taken away my Lord and I
do not know where they have laid Him.” Even in the midst of apparent defeat, the death of Jesus and most who followed him abandoning him, the circumstances
could not be worse, yet what does Mary say?
They have taken away MY Lord.
Prayer: Father, may the spirit of my sister Mary be my spirit. May I set aside everything but to follow my Savior and to have no other chief affection but to please
Him and make Him known. I renounce my selfish ways and give myself fully this day to the cause of my Redeemer. Father, receive the offering of my praise and my life, through Jesus Christ my Lord, Amen.
Hymn: Were You There When They Crucified My Lord