Grace and Peace to you from God our
Father and the Lord Jesus Christ and may our Lord and Savior sanctify you in
the truth, for His word is truth. Amen
Easter Sunday
(2010)
Loving, but Pointless Tears
John 20:11-18 (ESV)
But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb, and
as she wept she stooped to look into the tomb.
[12] And she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus
had lain, one at the head and one at the feet.
[13] They said to her, "Woman, why are you weeping?" She said
to them, "They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have
laid him." [14] Having said this,
she turned around and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know that it was
Jesus. [15] Jesus said to her,
"Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?" Supposing him to
be the gardener, she said to him, "Sir, if you have carried him away, tell
me where you have laid him, and I will take him away." [16] Jesus said to her, "Mary." She
turned and said to him in Aramaic, "Rabboni!" (which means
Teacher). [17] Jesus said to her,
"Do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to
my brothers and say to them, 'I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my
God and your God.' " [18] Mary
Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, "I have seen the
Lord"—and that he had said these things to her.
Christ is risen! He is risen, indeed! Alleluia! These
words joyously ring out throughout Christianity today. Moreover, these very
words are being eternally sung by "angels and archangels and all the
heavenly hosts" who are in the visible presence of the Lamb of God, who
sits on His majestic throne in everlasting glory. Christ is risen! He is risen,
indeed! Alleluia! These words are an ever present reason for joy and
jubilation.
However, the resurrected
Lord, in accordance with His divine omniscient’s and His unerring wisdom, unveils
to us in Holy Scriptures a different view. Our Lord describes our earthly
habitation as a veritable vale of tears. Of course, as always, He is correct,
because if there has ever been anything that every person on earth has done at
some time or other in their life, it is to cry. According to every hope and
wish of parents and doctors, a newborn baby is expected to cry. As a matter of fact,
if this is not spontaneous at birth, the physician will take measures to see
that it occurs. All who are parents know the cry of the child who fears the
dark or who has scrapped a knee. Indeed, we shed tears for many reasons; there
are tears of joy, tears of sadness, and tears of a broken heart. In fact, there
are a thousand and one reasons for tears. The psalmist often called out to God in
grief because of his sins.
However, there are tears
that although they are the result of a loving heart are truly unnecessary. There
are some for which there is no sufficient basis or cause. Indeed there are some
tears shed for sorrow, which should really be tears of joy. These are the tears
which we observe in our Gospel text this morning. In the Gospel for today, Jesus
declares that Mary Magdalene was weeping Loving,
but unnecessary tears.
It was early in the morning,
on the day of resurrection, when Mary cried and today, as you and I are able to
look back through 2,000 plus years of New Testament history, we recognize there
was no real reason for Mary Magdalene to cry. However, she was not aware of
this. She had been among the women who at dawn on the third day went to the
grave of our Lord to complete the Jewish burial tradition of preparing His body
for its final repose in the bosom of the earth. However, when they arrived,
they found the grave open; the stone blocking the entrance had been moved. Realizing
the body of Jesus is missing from the tomb, Mary rushes back to
Mary too, filled with grief,
was too confused and saddened to grasp the full importance of what had
happened. Therefore, after having told the disciples what the women had found,
Mary, distraught by the disappearance of her Lord, returns to the tomb and
breaks down and begins to cry. Pouring out her distress in loud cries and
flowing tears, she cannot be consoled. Because the grave is empty, the whole
world is empty for her as well. Although overcome with grief, she still ventures
to look into the empty tomb and there she comes face to face with two angels.
Hearing her cry, the angels
ask, “Woman,
why are you weeping?” but her grief is simply too much for her to
comprehend that those who spoke to her are angels. Her Lord had died, and even
a dead Christ was more valuable to her than a living world. Thus, she says to
them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid
him” (v. 13).
Earlier, when she had
reported to the disciples, she said, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb,
and we do not know where they have laid him” (John 20:2 ESV). But now,
in response to the angles her sorrow is more personal, more intense, she is
alone and therefore she significantly changes the pronoun and says “my
Lord” and “I know not where they have laid Him.” She was resolute in her
love for her Lord. The whole wide world could leave Him and the disciples could
abandon the tomb, but she would not. She returned, as love will do, to seek and
to search even more. She went from one place to another, looking for the body
of her Lord. Finally she came back to the place where she had started. She
simply could not reconcile herself to a loss so total that she would not be
able to regain His presence in any way. Thus, she says, “They have taken away my Lord,”
as if no one could feel the bereavement she felt. However, her grief, as
sometimes our own grief in this world, is unnecessary, because a magnificent
awakening was about to occur; Jesus appears to her.
She had been looking for a
dead Christ, but such a Christ did not exist. Therefore, she could not find
Him. But He could find her, and this He did. He stood behind her and in His
first recorded words after His resurrection He said to Mary, “Woman,
why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?” (v. 15)
Her grief was so great that Mary
did not even look at the one who spoke to her. Failing to recognize the voice
of the Lord, she mistakenly thought he was the gardener and said to him, “Sir,
if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take
him away” (v. 15). Mary is adamant, it matters not why he removed the
body of Jesus from the tomb, just let me know what you have done with Him and
I’ll take care of His body. She would relieve him of any responsibility of
caring for the body of her Lord. She would do for Jesus what she thought no one
else would. Then our Lord said to her, “Mary”― that one personal and
recognizable word― her name. Mary immediately recognizes the voice and
turns to face our Lord and excitingly exclaims, “Rabboni!” which in
Aramaic means “Teacher” (v. 16). Overcome with joy, she clutches at our
Lord’s garments, holding fast to Him. She has found Him, or rather, He has
found her and she is not about to let Him go again. She supposes that as long
as she clings to Him, He would be with her and never again would she feel such
grief and despair.
Undoubtedly, before the Lord
came to her and while she was standing at the empty tomb she had wondered, as
people often do, why she had ever been so foolish, so heartless, so
inconsiderate, and so unloving to have left the tomb at all; why had she
allowed herself to become separated from Jesus for even a few hours? Undoubtedly
she thought that if she had been present, perhaps she could have prevented the
tomb from being emptied. But she had failed. Moreover, she could not fill it
again. The body of Jesus had disappeared and her grief mounted higher and
higher.
Is not the picture of Mary a
picture of ourselves? In Mary, can we not see how often we look for a dead
Christ; a Christ we’re unable to find? Consider how we drift away from Him
because we fail to see that He lives for us and in us. The Christ we confess,
we feel is a Christ who lived many, many centuries ago. Oh, to be sure, He was
a wonderful Jesus. The record of what He did, what He taught, what He said, and
how He suffered moves us and impresses us very deeply. In spirit, on Good
Friday, we stand before the cross of
We know that at His
Ascension, He promised to be with us to the end of the world, but we easily
forget His presence. The pressures of living; our jobs, our recreation, our
pleasures, our chores too often are not shared with Christ and more often than
not, they get in the way of Christ. More than we want to admit those functions
of living are too often shared with the devil, and at such times, when we feel
Satan’s presence in our lives, we, like Mary, fall into grief and despair.
How empty a person, who
professes faith in Christ, must feel who has not kept in close communion with
our heavenly Father and with Jesus Christ our Savior! Maybe they have lost a
dear one in death and suddenly realize they hadn’t done all they could to proclaim
the Gospel of Christ to that poor soul. Once, having regularly given themselves
to quiet hours of devotion, prayers, and to services devoted to Jesus, these
acts of faith, for quite some time, have been left to lie as empty as the cold,
pale forms of those linen clothes left lying in Jesus’ tomb. In short, such
people who once may have been a true child of God, having now drifted away are
like Mary, grieving and weeping because they fear they have lost Christ. Their
lives have taken Him away and they fear they know not where to find Him.
Overwhelmed by the enormity of their sin, they allow Satan to convince them
they are unworthy of redemption. Thus, in their despair, they reject the
suffering and death of our Lord Jesus on the Cross of Calvary for the
forgiveness of sin and the complete justification and redemption of all
mankind.
However, such tears are not
necessary because Jesus is alive. He says to Mary, “Do not cling to me” That
is, do not impede me, do not prevent me from my appointed mission. “For
I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brothers and say to them,
'I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God’ ” (v.
17). To be sure, Jesus is not rebuking Mary. On the contrary, He
understands Mary’s love and grief. He understands she was doing what she did
without a clear understanding of how He could be with her and with us now. He
understood that Mary did not understand the full impact of His Resurrection.
She is simply overcome with joy at the sight of Her Lord.
Our Lord understood that
Mary had made a mistake. She thought she could keep Him with her just as He
was; that the “little while” of which Jesus had spoken had come to an end and
that she could now keep Him with her in His physical and visible presence as He
had been before. Had he not raised Lazarus from the dead? Is he not living with
Mary and Martha today? Surely, Jesus will remain with us and we shall live in
happiness and harmony all our days. However, Jesus tells her this cannot be; He
must ascend to His Father, to God. All on earth who love Him must learn to live
without His physical presence. No longer will they be able to physically kiss
His feet and anoint His head with oil or serve Him food to eat. No, these acts
of love and adoration will only be possible when we sit at His feet in heaven. In
this life we must learn, through faith, to see Him, touch Him, and hear Him
through the revealed Word of Holy Scripture. We pay homage to Him through
worship, prayers, and hymns while clinging to that which He did leave us, His
body and blood in the holy Eucharist and the waters of Baptism. Through these
physical means He comes to us, bridging the gap between heaven and earth,
touching our bodies and souls, granting us forgiveness from our sins and
strengthening our faith.
Having seen the Lord and
knowing He has truly risen, Mary waste no time, immediately she leaves the garden
going to the disciples and announces, “I have seen the Lord"—and that he had
said these things to her” (v. 18). Her tears of grief and despair had
changed to tears of joy and happiness, she was going to the disciples to bring
them a message of life, her Lord lives and He lives for all. What a marvelous
message to carry to the world!
What is this message? It is
that God is not a God and a Father of Jesus Christ only, but that He is a God
and Father of us, too; that through His risen and now ascended Son, Jesus
Christ, all who believe and are baptized are made children of God and heirs of
God’s kingdom of heaven; that there is reconciliation for all before God
because of His Son’s sacrifice on Calvary and that a day will come when all who
confess Jesus as Lord shall be reunited with our Savior visibly in the realm
where with glorified bodies and eyes we shall see Him as He truly is. This is
what it means. The love of Jesus binds us to Him and He can no more abandon us
as God the Father could abandon His One and only begotten Son. This is what our
Lord Jesus meant when He told Mary, “Do not cling to me. For I have not yet
ascended to the Father; but go to my brothers” (v. 17).
Ah, but how beautiful is the
truth; the Lord Jesus lives. He has paid the price for our sins with His
sacrifice on
Today, we celebrate His
miraculous resurrection from the dead. Leaving the tomb, our Lord Jesus will be
willingly received by our heavenly Father. This truth makes all who are
children of God the happiest people in the world. Yes; He has even called us by
name. He has said, Mary, John, Joe, Martha, all of us, can you not see Me? When
we are deeply burdened by grief, by sin, by illness, or even a death, Jesus brings
us the assurance that all is not ended. Instead, He will make our joy to be
full as He says, “Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to
Thus, we pray, that the Holy
Spirit would not let us become so busy with the things of this world, so
committed to worldly things, that we cannot hear the Lord call our name. Instead,
like Mary, when Jesus calls, let Him only call us once, let us recognize His
voice and eagerly turn to Him and say, “Savior.” Moreover, let us shed no more
tears because we despair of Christ’s presence. On the contrary, let us realize
that all such tears are pointless,
because our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, lives. Christ is risen! He is risen,
indeed! Alleluia and Amen.
May the peace of God which passes all understanding
keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.