Run, Mary, Run: Go and Tell!

Isaiah 65:17-25   1 Corinthians 15:19-26   John 20:1-18

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

Christ is risen indeed! Alleluia!

But let’s be honest—this Easter doesn’t land easily for everyone.

Because we live in a world still filling up too quickly with graveyards.

Night after night on the news we watch mothers grieving in Gaza and Kyiv, and learn about migrants disappearing in deserts and jails.  We witness protests and marches that reveal communities ripped part by division and fear. Many, many, many people are weeping not knowing what the future will bring.

So how do we say, “He is risen,” when it looks like death is still in charge?

This is the very question Easter answers.

Let’s return to that early morning scene. Imagine it is early Easter morning in Israel.  Come with me to the tomb.  It is dark, I imagine - foreboding.  We are after all in a cemetery.  In John 19 we’re told that

There was a garden in the place where Jesus was crucified, and in the garden was a new tomb in which no one had ever been laid. Because it was the Jewish Preparation Day and the tomb was nearby, they laid Jesus in it.” (John 19:41-42)

It is dark.  Ominous.  We might even say, “Spooky.”  This morning centuries ago, it is Mary Magdalene, likely after a sleepless night, who enters into the garden of death, alone.  Solitary.  Only her own thoughts to accompany her.

And what does she see? The stone rolled away.  Archeological history tells us that this stone was likely between 2000 and 4000 pounds

Only one thought is likely looming in Mary’s mind.  Jesus is gone.  Body snatchers.  At least two people must have stolen Jesus.  Was Mary struck dumb or was she screaming.  We don’t know.  We do know that she took off running.  Running to Peter the Rock and John the writer of this Gospel, the one whom Jesus loved.   Me? I’d scream and run!

“They, they, they”  - she likely stuttered, have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.”

So Peter and John set off running.  And not surprising the writer of this gospel wins the race.  But John evidently could not bring himself to go inside the tomb.  He bent down to look in and saw the linen wrappings there.  So this tells us that the tomb was not eye level like I have imagined until recently, but that the opening was underground.  I have read this for years and missed this point. See the picture being passed around.

So, Peter, impulsive and courageous, the one who tried to walk on water til he sank – this Peter walked down into the tomb.  The cloth that was on Jesus’ head had been rolled up by someone.  Separate from the other cloths that John viewed from the opening.  Who could have been there?  What could have happened?  Then John went in.  And he believed.

It’s surprising, yes? that then he and Peter go back home.  What an anticlimax.  Why are they not running around to the other disciples telling the news?  Scared, shocked.  Immobilized? But Mary, who had obviously ran back with Peter and John, stayed by the tomb.  She bent over, evidently looking down, to see into the tomb.  Still faithful, still present, still waiting.  And still weeping.  Weeping because her Lord was taken, and she did not know where.

We know why she was weeping because she told this to the two angels sitting in the tomb. Her reaction to seeing them is not explained   So likely stunned, Mary may be incapable of feeling surprise.

Angels at Jesus birth, and now at his resurrection.  How many of you believe in angels?  Psalm 91:11-12 declares about God: “For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways; they will lift you up in their hands so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.”  In Matthew 18:10, Jesus Christ gives important advice, “See that you do not despise one of these little ones. For I tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father in heaven.

I’m thinking that if we accept the story of Jesus resurrection, we are asked to embrace all of this.  And as if this story is not bizarre enough, Mary talks to someone she thought was a gardener and it turns out to be Jesus.  The suspense is short as Jesus soon reveals himself to Mary.  But only after he asks, “Whom are you looking for?”   Mary is blessed to be the first to have seen the Lord.  Wanting to hug him, Jesus restrains her, “Do not touch me,” words indicating that he has not gone up to be with God yet.    He has been brought back to life, but it seems like, not quite fully resurrected.  Mysterious.

For our 21st century scientific minds, this is a lot to take in. Yet, sometimes truth is stranger than fiction.  With God, all things are possible.  And that I do believe.

Jesus instructs Mary to talk to the other disciples, his brothers, to tell them he is on his way up to God.  And so she did.  No longer waiting, no longer weeping, and no longer needing to be at the tomb.  Jesus tells her, “Go and tell.” And in that moment, Mary Magdalene becomes the first preacher of the resurrection.

Go, Mary and tell everybody.  Christ is risen.

We now have Mary, running with joy, not grief.  Has anything ever happened in your life or to someone you know that seemed too good to be true?  Have you ever received news so good that you had to rethink your glass is half-empty approach to life?  Where you felt life turned suddenly in your favor?

This is the Easter story.  The resurrected Jesus emerging from brokenness to a new life, from death to our Savior.  The Word created anew.  And, It happened in a garden.  And while the world we live in is filled with violence, injustice, and hate, we Easter people are saying this is not how it has to be.

Death is not victorious!   We are given the possibilities of a new heaven and a new earth. The resurrection is about transformation.   So on this glorious Easter morning, let’s shout Alleluia as we celebrate the miracle of Jesus, on his way to God, and then on his way back to us.  Easter is not about something that happened; it is about something that is happening! Bringing love, hope, salvation, and eternal life.  Christ is risen.  He is risen indeed.  Allelulia.  Thanks be to God.   Amen.

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