Rubbing eyes still blurry from sleep, they slipped out of bed. The inky darkness of pre-dawn night covered the house, making clear sight impossible. Feeling their way along walls and chairs, they crossed the room to don cloaks and robes and sandals carefully laid out in preparation for this early morning trek. Rushing through their morning ablutions, they hurried to the door as the first streaks of dawn began to light the horizon. Hastily collecting previously packed baskets of spices and perfumes, they set out to attend their final task of devotion.
Two days ago they watched Joseph of Arimathea gently wrap Jesus’ body in linen and cart it away to a fresh tomb. They had followed him. Sneaking along with the lightest possible footsteps. Hiding behind trees and bushes when necessary. Feigning interest in flowers and leaves. They knew exactly where he’d placed that precious body. And from the moment they saw Joseph leave the tomb, they had been planning.
The final hours of preparation day had been filled with exactly that. Preparations. Working quickly and efficiently to complete their labor of love before the Sabbath, they gathered spices and created perfumes. The last minutes before observation of the Sabbath forced their labors to cease were a flurry of preparation and assembly of baskets for a dawn-lit journey the following day.
It would be the third day. Their hearts broke that they had been unable to lovingly anoint Jesus’ body sooner. They were saddened to think of Him lying in that cold, dark tomb shrouded in linen, rotting away. Their aching sorrow at His death, the events leading up to it, and their lack of preparation afterward, filled them with a sense of urgency. They needed to get to that tomb. They were determined to fulfill their duty, enact their final gift of undying love.
Nearly tripping over one another in their haste, baskets swinging on elbows, garments swishing around ankles, they rushed out the door and down the path to their destination. Arriving at the tomb, slightly breathless and disheveled, they stopped short, colliding with one another and staring in open astonishment. The stone was moved! It had been sealed and guarded, they knew. Not now. Now the tomb stood open, the guards nowhere in sight.
Edging forward, they cautiously entered the tomb. Step by step they walked to the place the body should have been. It wasn’t there. Only a lump of linen rested where Jesus’ body would have lain. Casting questioning glances at one another, their minds reeled with questions. Had someone stolen the body? Had His disciples gotten there before them and moved it to a different tomb? Were those missing guards up to shenanigans? Or, in the emotional upset of that day, had they forgotten the directions and ended up at the wrong tomb? What, exactly, was going on? And where was the body of their beloved Lord?
Silently agreeing they should go and solve this mystery, the women turned to find two men had entered the tomb as well. Strange men. Curious men. Not like anyone in town. Their clothing dazzled in the damp darkness of the tomb. Their faces shone with angelic light. And their words, when they finally broke through the barrier of terror engulfing the women, asked the probing question, “Why are you looking for the living among the dead?” And followed it up with the victorious revelation, “Jesus isn’t here. He has risen. Just like He said He would.” (Luke 23:50-24:8)
One can hardly blame the women for scooting closer together and gripping one another’s hands a bit more tightly. It was a startling question. A rebuke. An indictment of their measly faith. It would, however, be impossible to find fault with their response to the ensuing statements, either. With not so much as a fare-thee-well, they squeezed through the entrance and raced toward town, sandals slapping hard-packed dirt, billowing cloaks flowing behind them, robes tangling in flailing legs. Their carefully packed baskets full of spices and perfumes lay in mangled disarray in the dirt outside the tomb. They didn’t need them anymore. There was no awful smell to cover. No rotting flesh. No decomposing organs. No dust returning to dust. Jesus wasn’t in that cold, dark, damp, sullen, silent, saddening place! He had risen, just like He said!
The staggering exuberance of those women is nearly palpable in the reading of the account. Bursting into the place the disciples were hiding, they related the morning’s events. Early morning hiking. Mid-morning race. Excited voices talked over one another. Rapid-fire words tangled together. Yet one clear, concise, unified exclamation rushed out of the babbling stream joyously announcing, “Jesus is alive!” (Luke 24:8-10)
A thousand accounts throughout the Bible draw our amazed minds to a place of wishing we could have been there, witnessed them. Physical healing. Temple cleansing. Water walking. None pulls so greatly as this. How magnificent would it have been to witness this most glorious pronouncement of who Jesus truly was! How fantastic, phenomenal! What a boost for one’s faith! What a life-changing moment to hear, “Jesus is alive!”
It is nearly impossible to believe any follower of Jesus could feel differently. But the disciples did. Sequestered away in clandestine crews, anxiously awaiting the arrival of those who would do to them what they had done to Jesus, the disciples were too afraid to believe. Too hesitant to rejoice at the news. Too faithless to believe that a dead man could walk. At least ten of them were. (Luke 24:11)
Not Peter. Bouncing to his feet, he ran out the door and sprinted to the tomb. He didn’t go inside. Didn’t need to. Bending to look in the doorway, he saw all he needed to see. Empty linen clothes. No body. No bones. No decaying stench. A smile pulled itself across his face as he straightened and turned back toward town, a skip in his step. It was a time for rejoicing. The marvelous truth settled deep in his soul. It had all been true. Jesus had died to bring life to those dead in trespasses and sins. People like Peter. Like you. Like me. But He hadn’t stayed dead. He’d kept His word. He had risen. Jesus was alive! The party was just getting started. (Luke 24:12; I Peter 1:3)
I wonder when the party ended. It must have. I see no sign of its continuance. Our churches are full of clock-watching, list-checking attendees who have places to go and things to do. The rejoicing is muted. The praise is stifled. The reveling in the presence of Jehovah is kept to a minimum. It’s as if the message of the resurrection never made it down through time to you and me. Not because we haven’t heard it. Not because we don’t believe it. It simply seems to have lost its luster compared to the shiny baubles of the world. Perhaps we need a reminder. Of who we are. Of what Jesus did. Perhaps we need to hear it again, not in cunning, beautiful phrases of poetry but in the raw truth of what actually happened.
When you were worthless, useless, disgustingly filthy, completely dead, beyond resuscitation, crushed by the enormous millstone of your sins, God sent Jesus to die for you. He didn’t have to. As horrific as that death was, He chose it over His own life, dying to rescue you. But He didn’t stay dead. He rose again. His death and resurrection removed the weight of your sin, breathed life back into your soul, and provided you the privilege of walking in Him, sitting with Him in heavenly places. Your death is now to sin and self! You are alive in Christ alone! Jesus is your peace, your reconciliation, your hope. He is your access to the Father. You are no longer a stranger or alien, but a living, thriving citizen of God’s own household. If you know all this, have experienced it, and are still not rejoicing, you need to read it again! (Ephesians 2)
Read it until the overwhelming exuberance of being alive in the risen Savior forces you to shed the shroud of mourning and strike up the band for dancing! Act like you know what that “He is risen” flag you are touting means! It means you don’t have to be a captive to sin anymore. It means you don’t have to let sin suffocate your soul. It means you don’t have to die in your sin and sacrifice Heaven. It means you can be alive. Alive in Christ. Alive to rejoice and dance and sing. Alive to run free with exuberance, trip over your sandals, muddle your excited words, and get busy telling someone, anyone, everyone that since Jesus is alive, they can be, too.
They can come to Him in repentance, accept the free gift of His forgiveness, and Jesus Christ will set up housekeeping in their very being. Sin will die and their soul will live, because the resurrection of Jesus Christ brought life. Abundant life. Resurrected life. Life for everyone who realized they were dead in sin and opted to do something about it. For everyone who asks. Whosoever will. Everyone. Everywhere. No exceptions. (John 7:37; Revelation 22:17; Mark 8:34-38; Romans 6:4-14)
I am so glad eternal life is for everyone! Me. You. Your co-workers. Your neighbors. Your friends. I’m ecstatic that Jesus isn’t dead! We’d be hopelessly, eternally lost without Him. Seriously. We’d have nothing to say in this day when the world so desperately needs words of hope. Words from the living dead. Words from me. Words from you. Words that tell them their sin doesn’t have to be a death sentence, it can be commuted because Jesus didn’t stay dead and they don’t have to, either. Sin brings fear, torment, anxiety, worry, and death. Jesus brings peace, calm, hope, strength, courage, and life. And this is their day. Their day to choose death to sin. Choose life in Christ. Their day to rejoice as only the living dead can. Our omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent God is alive. He is sovereign. He reigns. The party is just getting started! (I John 4:18; Colossians 2:13-14; John 14:27; Romans 6:23; Deuteronomy 30:19)