He Is Risen, Indeed! John 20:1-10 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. (As a picture of all of us who were lost and who need Christ, this lowly woman had been delivered from darkness and now is the one first chosen to see the first evidence of the Resurrection. When we are walking in the dark, in situations of loss and pain, when we first seek the Lord, He shows us that the stone has been rolled away to allow our entry into a new reality of the situations we thought we were facing. Christ's work, unknown to her, had completely changed the situation she was fully expecting in her life. The same is true for us today. What we may expect from our human perspective is completely different from the work that Christ is completing in us and for us. The stone had been rolled away, not for Christ's sake to enable Him to escape the tomb after His Resurrection. Rather, the stone was pushed back for Jesus' beloved followers to come in and see for themselves the truth of His Resurrection. What she saw tells us that no stone in our lives is too big to be rolled away and that the Lord clears the way for us to see His truths clearly and first-hand.) So she came running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, (the younger disciple John) and said, "They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don't know where they have put Him!" (As we often do in the circumstances of our lives, she completely misinterprets what she sees, assuming the Lord is no longer accessible, seeing only what her closed perspective allows, and forgetting all the promises that He had previously made.) So Peter and the other disciple started for the tomb. Both were running, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. He bent over and looked in at the strips of linen lying there but did not go in. (The younger and faster John leans over at the entrance and intently and carefully inspects and examines the scene in the way a careful detective would minutely examine the scene to determine all the telling details and signs and to be able to draw a conclusion.) Then Simon Peter came along behind him and went straight into the tomb. He saw the strips of linen lying there, as well as the cloth that had been wrapped around Jesus' head. The cloth was still lying in its place, separate from the linen. (Peter, on the other hand, rushes hurriedly into the very center of the scene as his way of gaining his own perspective of the situation. The grave wrappings having been carefully removed and folded tidily in place show clearly that Jesus' disappearance was not the result of grave robbers having hastily stolen His Body in the night.) Finally the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went inside. He saw and believed. (Because of his careful scrutiny of the setting, the carefully folded grave clothes, and recalling what Jesus had been telling them earlier, John now sees and believes that Christ has risen. When we examine Truth, faith and facts line up. Faith and intellectual examination are not exclusive. Faith witnesses to Truth and Truth reinforces faith.) (They still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.) Then the disciples went back to where they were staying. (Although John now believed what Jesus had repeatedly said to them, neither he nor Peter still comprehended that the Scriptures themselves had foretold and pictured the necessity of, first, Jesus' death and, then, His Resurrection. To help us grasp, like these men, His message for our lives today, the Lord patiently keeps revealing to us— right where we are today in our walk with Him, whether we are still contemplating His message or running head-long into what is before us— the incremental pieces of Truth we can understand, unveiling to us all that we can take in. The Truth tells us that no challenge we face is greater than Jesus, no stone is so big that it can separate us from His love, from His Resurrection power, not even death itself. Even that challenge has been swallowed up in victory. ) Christ Is Risen! He Is Risen, Indeed!
