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do you look for the living among
the dead?” (Luke 24:5); and an
explanation for the empty tomb:
“He has risen! He is not here!”
(Mark 16:6).
The women struggle to
comprehend what the angel has
told them. Jesus’s body has not
been stolen—He is a living,
breathing human being again. The
women then hear the angel give
them a task. “Go quickly and tell
His disciples: ‘He has risen from
the dead and is going ahead ofTHE EMPTY TOMB
Raphael’s The Resurrection
of Christ (c.1501–1502) imagines
the reaction of the Roman guards.
Mathew’s Gospel says they “shook
and became like dead men” (28:4).you into Galilee. There you will see
Him’” (Matthew 28:7). Galilee was
a significant place for the disciples,
since it was where much of Jesus’s
ministry had taken place.The resurrected Jesus
The women, “afraid yet filled with
joy” (Matthew 28:8), turn from the
tomb and head away to relate
these incredible events to the
other disciples. On the path, the
women suddenly come across a
man. It is Jesus, who utters onesimple word: “Greetings” (Matthew
28:9). Falling to the ground, the
women cling to His feet, realizing
what the angel had said was true—
Jesus is really alive—and they
begin to worship Him. Stooping,
Jesus encourages them to their
feet and tells them to go and pass
on their joyful news.
Women were not normally asked
to give testimony in Jesus’s day,
since they were considered to be
incapable of presenting the truth.
Here was a clear signal that God’s
kingdom is turning expectations
upside down, as women become
the first to meet and then share
news of the risen Jesus.The Gospel of John
John’s Gospel focuses on Mary
Magdalene’s experience that
morning. Upon seeing the empty
chamber, she immediately rushes
back to tell the other disciples that
“they have taken the Lord out
of the tomb, and we don’t know
where they have put Him!” (John
20:2). Peter and John race to the
tomb and look inside, seeing for
themselves that Jesus’s body is
gone. Peter and John leave, but
Mary, overcome with emotion,
stays by the tomb. She sees a man
near her and, presuming it to be
the gardener, says, “Sir, if you have
carried Him away, tell me where
you have put Him, and I will get
Him” (20:15). It isn’t the gardener,
however; it is Jesus. Through her
tears, Mary does not recognize
Jesus until He speaks her name.
When Mary realizes who it is, she
turns and clings to Him, crying
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for “teacher” (20:16). Jesus gently
tells her to return to the other
disciples to share the news of His
resurrection. Back at the house
where they were gathered, Mary
bursts in on the others, shouting,
“I have seen the Lord!” (20:18).
Mary’s mistake, thinking Jesus
was the gardener, is a profound
discovery: just as God planted the
Garden of Eden at the beginning
of the Bible, now, through Jesus,
God is restoring that garden.
As Peter put it in his sermon a
few weeks later, human authorities
may have killed Jesus, but God
raised Him to life (Acts 2:23–24).Jesus’s disciples begin to
understand the logic of what had
happened: if Jesus is alive, that
means death is not all-powerful
and that sin—understood to be the
inevitable human tendency to turn
away from God, leading to death—
does not have to mar human life
forever, but can be forgiven.Faith and reason
All that Christianity believes
about God—forgiveness, salvation,
and transformation—depends on
Jesus’s resurrection. As Paul puts
it in 1 Corinthians 15:14, “if Christ
has not been raised, our preaching
is useless and so is your faith.”
Still, the accounts of Jesus’s
resurrection raise many questions
and demands for events to be
explained in terms of natural
causes. In place of the Gospel’s
explanation, some have suggested
that the disciples experienced
mass-hallucination or that local
leaders hid Jesus’s body to prevent
His disciples from removing it
themselves and then proclaiming
His resurrection. These theories
do not explain why the disciples
would later allow themselves to be
martyred for preaching a message
they knew to be false.
If the Gospels are to be taken
literally, the women discovered an
empty tomb; Jesus’s body was
never found, there or anywhere else;
and the women and other disciples
met Jesus, not just as a memory
but as a living person. Discovering
what the resurrection of Jesus
means is the concern of the rest
of the New Testament, and the
ongoing task of the Church today. ■THE GOSPELS
Thomas the Apostle doubts the
man before him is the risen Jesus until
he touches His wounds. Jesus says,
“Blessed are those who have not seen
and yet have believed” (John 20:29).Mary Magdalene
One of Jesus’s closest
followers, Mary Magdalene
is remembered particularly
for being one of the early
witnesses to Jesus’s
resurrection. Mary’s name
indicates she was from the
town of Magdala Nunaya
on the shore of the Sea of
Galilee. Luke 8:2 records
that she received healing
from Jesus when He cast
seven demons out of her.
Grateful for the wholeness
that Jesus had given her,
she became a prominent
disciple, accompanying Jesus
on His final trip to Jerusalem
and bearing witness to both
His crucifixion and burial
(Matthew: 27:56–61). Later
tradition associated Mary
Magdalene with Mary
of Bethany, the prostitute
who anointed Jesus’s feet
with expensive perfume while
He was in the house of Simon
the Pharisee (Luke 7:36–50),
although most modern biblical
scholars believe that this
association is apocryphal.
It is noteworthy that
several of Jesus’s most faithful
followers were women (Acts
1:14) and that they continued
to play key roles in the life of
the early Church.God has raised this
Jesus to life, and we are
all witnesses of it.
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