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Luke 24:1-12

But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they went to the tomb, taking the spices they had prepared. And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel. And as they were frightened and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to them, “Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen. Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, that the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified and on the third day rise.” And they remembered his words, and returning from the tomb they told all these things to the eleven and to all the rest. Now it was Mary Magdalene and Joanna and Mary the mother of James and the other women with them who told these things to the apostles, but these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them. But Peter rose and ran to the tomb; stooping and looking in, he saw the linen cloths by themselves; and he went home marveling at what had happened.

It was early Sunday morning when the women came to Jesus’ tomb, ready with the spices to embalm His body. We know from the other gospel accounts these women were very concerned about who they could get to roll the massive stone away from the tomb so they could get to the body. So when they got to the tomb they were shocked to find the stone already rolled away with no body inside and no one else around.

1. What was the Response?

The women were perplexed. They were unable to find any logical explanation for the empty tomb. What do you think was going through their minds? Maybe they were asking: Are we at the right tomb? Is this the right address? Where are the guards? What’s going on? They had witnessed the crucifixion, saw the Roman guards take Jesus’ dead body off the Cross, saw where Joseph laid Jesus. Did someone steal His body? How did they get past the Roman guards? While they were scratching their heads, they were startled by two men in radiant, gleaming clothes that appeared out of nowhere.

One of the angels asked a strange question: “Why are you looking for the living among the dead?” Can’t you just imagine the women standing there with the embalming materials, hearing this question and the wheels in their brains begin to spin? Who are these men, why are they here, and how did they know who we are looking for? The angels were basically saying, if you are looking for a gravestone, an epitaph, a person to mourn over and pay respects to, this is not the place to find Him. He’s not here, He is risen! Don’t you remember what He told you would happen to Him after three days?

Obviously, they didn’t remember that Jesus told them how He would be delivered into the hands of sinful people, crucified, and raised on the third day. They had no clue what Jesus was talking about when He told them and didn’t make the correlation when they saw the empty tomb. It wasn’t until the angel reminded them about His words that the light went on, they woke up, and ran to the disciples and all the others to tell them what they had seen and heard. You would have thought the disciples would have been excited about the news but…

The disciples were unwilling to believe. V. 11 says that what Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Jesus’ mother, and the other women told the disciples in their excitement, was like a fairy tale, nonsense. Can we really blame the disciples who were there for Jesus’ trial, were there as He was crucified, when he cried out and took His last breath, and was then laid in a tomb? They loved Jesus as Teacher and Savior and expected Him to usher in the kingdom of God in ways that made sense to them. None of this made sense. The events of that dark day were devastating - extinguishing their faith in Jesus and in their grief, and they were not about to get their hopes up again.

The crucifixion and death of Jesus meant that he was not the true Messiah they had been waiting for and that the Kingdom of God had not come. The disciples were in shock and mourning as their hopes had been shattered. In their minds they were done – “don’t tell us any more of your stories, no more false hopes.” Maybe they were wondering, “Now what do we do?” Back to the same old, same old? Back to work, to old stomping grounds, to old friends and acquaintances (what would they say to them?), and life as it was before Jesus?