Mary and the Resurrection

“Our Lord has written the promise of the resurrection, not in books alone, but in every leaf in spring-time.” – Martin Luther

It should have been just a normal Sunday. As a child, Mary Magdalene had always loved this time of year – the rebirth of the earth at spring, the warmer days, but most of all the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread. She enjoyed helping her mother prepare the Passover meal, the family ceremonially cleaning out all of the leaven from the house, and especially sitting in her father’s lap as he told her how God had delivered the children of Israel from slavery in Egypt. She never tired of hearing that story.

And this Passover held so much promise. It seemed as though Jesus’ words had become more urgent, more intense, as if – like spring – something was about to be birthed. Jesus had shown Himself to be a prophet, but so much more than a prophet; a priest, and not just a priest, but a king; yes, a king. After all, a week earlier He had made a triumphant entry into Jerusalem on a donkey, just as the prophet Zechariah had foretold. Mary’s mind replayed the conversations with the others about that day. “He is the One,” they exclaimed, “who will restore Israel! The Messiah really has come!”

But that week leading up to the Passover had taken some strange turns. Jesus had been telling His closest friends that He had come to Jerusalem to die. That was certainly not the talk of a triumphant king. Yet Mary heard purpose in Jesus’ words. She would remain with this prophet regardless of the outcome. After all, the one who had delivered her from the torment of seven demons deserved her devotion.

And remain with Him she did. It still made her feel faint when she thought of Him on the cross, bloodied and gasping for air. “Tetelestai!” she heard Him shout. But what did He mean, “It has been fulfilled”?

Yes, it should have been just a normal Sunday. Instead she found herself walking in the cold of the predawn darkness to the tomb of the One who was supposed to restore Israel to the glory of King David’s reign. She was carrying the spices they had prepared on Friday, because they were commanded to rest on the Sabbath. Rest…yesterday was anything but rest. Her eyes still swollen from the tears, Mary made her way to the tomb, still unsure how she was going to remove the stone to get to the body. Consumed with grief, Mary had not noticed that the dawn had just begun to break.

When she arrived she saw that the stone had already 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!” So Peter and the other disciple started for the tomb.” When they arrived, they saw the stone removed just as Mary told them. And in the tomb lay only the strips of linen “as well as the cloth that had been wrapped around Jesus’ head. The cloth was still lying in its place, separate from the linen.” The disciples “still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.” So they “went back to where they were staying.” (John 20:1-10)

But Mary remained.

As she stood weeping outside the tomb, “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. They asked her, “Woman, why are you crying?” [At this point, nothing seemed to faze Mary, not even the presence of angels] “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 Jesus. He asked her, “Woman, why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?” Thinking he was the 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 “Teacher”). Jesus said, “Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news: “I have seen the Lord!” (John 20:11-18)

St. Augustine rightly calls Mary Magdalene “the apostle to the apostles.” (Greek: apostolos: a messenger, one sent on a mission) After all, she was the one chosen to be sent with the fullness of the good news to the “sent ones.” Jesus said, “My sheep recognize my voice, and they follow me.” (John 10:27) The redeeming love that Mary recognized in Jesus’ voice is a love that preceded that moment. It was a love that had resounded throughout redemptive history; a love that extends to you and to me.

When we take communion, we are proclaiming the Lord’s death until He returns. But Jesus’ death without His resurrection would be meaningless. As Paul writes, “if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain…your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins…If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most to be pitied. But now Christ has been raised from the dead.” (1 Cor 15:14, 17, 19-20)

On this depends the only hope of humanity. It is your only hope.

As we eat the bread that represents the body of the Lord Jesus that was broken for our wholeness, we eat in hope.

When we drink the cup that represents Jesus’ blood spilled for the cleansing of sins and the ushering in of a New Covenant, we drink in hope.

But our hope is not one of blind, wishful thinking. Instead, it is a resurrected Hope; a hope that is set resolutely on the only sovereign God of creation who’s Word has never and will never fail.

Jesus Christ has risen.

When I See the Blood

Recently, my Bible reading plan led me to the book of Exodus, which records the account of the Israelites being rescued from Egyptian bondage by the hand of God through ten incredible plagues as He executed judgments “against all the gods of Egypt.” (Exodus 12:12)

I don’t know how many times I have read through the story of the exodus, and yet this time a single phrase jumped off the page and pierced my heart.

The context is during the tenth and final plague when God instructs the Israelites to sacrifice an unblemished lamb at twilight. They were then to take some of the blood and put it on the two doorpost and lintel of their front door. This was to mark their homes so that those inside would be spared from God’s judgment He was executing throughout all of Egypt.

And the Lord said, “…when I see the blood I will pass over you.”

When I see the blood I will pass over you.

And then it hit me – everything that I am physically, emotionally, and spiritually, is riding on the truth of that one phrase: “when I see the blood I will pass over you.” If that is not true, then my life is completely worthless and all would be for nothing.

What’s important to note is that God who is the omniscient Creator of the universe who knows the heart and mind of every person did not actually need to see the blood on the lintels and doorposts in order to keep things straight in His mind as to who was His and who wasn’t. He knew the heart of every person with the blood smeared on the doorpost as well as the heart of every person who did not have it. So the blood served as a reminder, not for God but for those inside the house. It was to show them that it was out of their hands; their salvation depended wholly on God alone. The Lord told them, “I am about to release a judgment on the land of Egypt so fierce and terrifying that there will be a great cry throughout the land such as there has not been before and such as shall never be again. And this judgment will be so encompassing that it will strike every single household in Egypt. But I have made a way of escape for you. Just do what I tell you and trust Me.” This is the theme throughout redemptive history that would point not just to a symbol or a shadow of things to come, but the reality of Christ being the source of salvation for all who trust in God alone.

Picture in your mind an Israelite family by faith sacrificing the lamb, by faith preparing the unleavened bread, by faith spreading the blood on the doorposts, and by faith eating the Passover meal. Their hope was beyond themselves; it rested in the One who said “when I see the blood I will pass over you.”

Martin Luther wrote in his classic Bondage of the Will:

God has surely promised His grace to the humbled: that is, to those who mourn over and despair of themselves. But a man cannot be thoroughly humbled till he realizes that his salvation is utterly beyond his own powers, counsels, efforts, will and works, and depends absolutely on the will, counsel, pleasure and work of Another – God alone. As long as a man is persuaded that he can make even the smallest contribution to his salvation, he remains self-confident and does not utterly despair of himself, and so is not humbled before God. Such a man plans out for himself – or at least hopes and longs for – a position, an occasion, a work, which shall bring him final salvation, but which will not. Conversely, the man who is out of doubt that his destiny depends entirely on the will of God, despairs entirely of himself, chooses nothing for himself, but waits for God to work in him; and such a man is very near to grace for his salvation.

The Feast of Passover is also known as the Feast of Unleavened Bread. God commanded them to remove all of the leaven from their homes and to bake their bread without leaven because they would not have time for their bread to rise before they were rescued. So with that, it is much easier to understand Paul’s words to the Corinthians: “Clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. For Christ our Passover also has been sacrificed. Therefore let us celebrate the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.” (1 Corinthians 5:7-8)

The bread and the cup of communion before you are to serve as a reminder that Christ is our Passover lamb and we, by faith, consume all that He is, and by faith we place our hope firmly and exclusively on the Person and work of Jesus Christ so that when our heavenly Father sees the blood, He will pass over us.