This world is a dangerous place. If there’s any lesson the congregation of Risen King may have learned over the past three months or so is just how vulnerable we human being are to tragedies that may overtake us very suddenly.
That the world is a dangerous place is something that most of being to understand when we’re very, very young. I remember it being emphasized, even as many of you do, in those first days and years that I began attending school—as a kindergartener and first-grader in Southern California, at Mira Linda Elementary School in Buena Park California, in the late 1950s. For it was there, as a tiny new student, that I learned a clever phrase which would be repeated by my teachers over and over again whenever we approached bus tops and cross walks, a phrase that has served me well ever since, “Stop, Look and Listen.” Most of you are familiar with that refrain, having heard and learned it yourself. Every time you approach a street, and consider crossing it, first, stop, don’t go running across without a thought. Look. Look to the right and to the left for any approaching traffic that might mow you down in a second. Finally, Listen. If you don’t see anything, open up those ears, just to make sure that if you can’t see something that there isn’t something or someone coming that is out of sight, before you make that fateful step into the street, and possibly into harm’s way.
This morning I want to suggest to you that the same wise reminders can be extremely important in the spiritual realm when it comes to addressing the issues of life and death, and how to find eternal life and a right relationship with God. In our busyness as adults, especially in modern society with all its demands and now all its technological distractions, it’s hard to find a moment in which we stop and consider anything God has said or done. It’s hard to take time, serious time to look into the evidence that resurrection and eternal life are real options which people may take hold of for them. And finally, with all the racket from cell phones, i-phones, TV and radio, it seems impossible at times, to listen to the promises of God and give them our serious attention.
But the spiritual realm, in terms of it dangers, is no different from our physical world. What is at stake for those who will not Stop, Look, and Listen to the things God has provided for us actually risk even more than those who send their children out without instructions about how to cross a street. For it can be a matter, and is a matter, of spiritual life or death, even eternal destruction versus eternal life.
And it was on, coincidentally, a Sunday morning now 2,000 years ago that three special people discovered just how necessary it is to Stop, Look and Listen for their own eternal welfare. The three were among the half-dozen or so people who were most devoted to the Lord Jesus Christ during his earthly sojourn. Two of them were men, Simon Peter, the most prominent of the disciples, and the humbly Apostle John, who described Himself in his own eyewitness account of his time with Jesus, the Gospel of John, as the disciple whom Jesus loved. Indeed, each of them was a member of that intimate inner circle three of Jesus’, and each were destined to become reckoned as leaders among the Apostles of Jesus Christ. And then there was Mary Magdalene, whose devotion to Jesus Christ was perhaps only rivaled by Mary of Bethany—who with John was among those select followers of Jesus, including Jesus’ mother Mary, who stood next to and closest to the cross of Christ as their beloved Savior uttered his last words and gave up his life. It was Mary Magdalene, the apparent leader of the women who followed Jesus, who then remained behind to see what would happen to Jesus’ body, and followed Joseph of Arimathea to his tomb to watch as He and Nicodemus would prepare Jesus’ body for burial by wrapping in linen strips filled with burial species for his eventual, and apparent, final resting place in Joseph’s. For Mary Magdalene had a plan—once the Sabbath day had passed, on that third day, Sunday, after Christ’s death on the Passover—that she and other women would return to the burial site to honor Jesus’ body with even more burial spices before they said their final good-byes to the one she so dearly loved.
Now before we go any further with the story, I want to ask you a question—for you personally. What assurance do you have of eternal life? When loved ones have experience what all of us are destined to experience, death, have you had any hope, any confident expectation—that you might see them again. Or is there just some vague, and perhaps, superstitious notion in your mind, that there might be a possibility, but you don’t know or where you will see them again. When you think of those you have loved who have passed on, is there an emptiness and a still unrequited, unsettled grief about your loss of them, because in your heart of hearts, you believe the loss is probably permanent.
Well, listen carefully this morning. Be careful to stop, look and listen. For the three persons whose actions we consider on that fateful Sunday were people who had had some hopes that had been terribly crushed, who were perplexed, confused and disillusioned, whose faith had been torn to shreds, but because they finally did stop, because they finally did look, and because they finally did listen, they experienced an unspeakable joy and confidence that only God almighty can provide of a better future than anything this mortal life can offer.
As we’ve read, Mary Magdalene came very early to the tomb on that Sunday. The other Gospel accounts indicate she was accompanied by three other followers of Jesus, Mary, the mother of James, Johanna and Salome, and Luke tells us that there were other women also in the party that arose before dark and began their journey before the sun rise. But it had clearly risen according to Mark 16 that morning by the time they reached the tomb. But something very disturbing had happened on the way to the tomb. Those first rays of sunlight that peeked over the horizon that morning revealed to the women that the great stone that secured the tomb had been moved out of the way. The other Gospel accounts tell us that the women continued to the grave where they encountered angels who announced the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ to them. John’s account here only concerns Mary and does not include this encounter with angels in her experience. We don’t know whether she remained with the women and encountered these angels and their announcement or not. All we know is that she came away from the tomb not believing that Jesus had indeed been raised from the dead. Rather, despite the fact that Jesus had promised he would be raised on the third day after his crucifixion, she came away unbelieving, unimpressed. She assumed the worst. She simply could not get her head around the idea that anything other than what always happened to people when they died was true of Jesus—once they died, they were dead for good. The only reasonable explanation for that stone having been removed and for that body was missing from the grave was that natural one—that someone had taken the body. Maybe grave robbers, despite the fact that a Roman Guard and the authority of the Roman Emperor Himself had secured the grave, had stolen Jesus’ body. Or maybe it was the Romans, or the gardener. This one terrible fact remained regardless of what happened, Jesus was still dead, no matter what, and another great indignity, another great insult had been added to her incurable injury—that she would not have the opportunity to honor Jesus in his death as he had so blessed her and delivered her from those seven demons who had so cruelly possessed her in this life.
You see, Mary had forgotten, forgotten completely and seemingly irretrievably that Jesus had repeatedly, when he predicted his crucifixion, also predicted his resurrection on the third day. He had done so in Matthew 16:21, only moths before, where Matthew tells us: From that time Jesus began to show his disciples that He must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priest and scribes, and be killed, and be raised up on the third day. The same thing was repeated a number of times in other passages up to and including Luke 18:32-33. But when the unthinkable took place, when the body was missing from the tomb, despite whatever experience she might have had with angels that day, she did not stop to remember the promises of Jesus, or the promises of God.
And that’s our first point this morning. Stop, and remember Jesus’ promises. No matter what takes place, no matter if a precious child should pass away suddenly, no matter what befalls, don’t panic, don’t run off as though all is lost, and there is no hope. Don’t let your anxious thoughts rule you. Rather, stop for a moment, and remind yourself of the promises of Jesus, and the promises of God. The promise which could have made all the difference for Mary Magdalene that morning was the promise she had heard repeatedly herself from the mouth of Jesus, the most incredible miracle-worker in the history of mankind that he would raise on the third day. Oh, what needless pain we bear all because we so often panic. We so often run off in worry and anxiety, when all we need to do is remember the promises of God. He is in control. And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love him and are called according to His purpose. And His promise is resurrection and eternal life and bliss in the kingdom to come. And nothing can separate those of us who believe from the love of Jesus Christ, not death, or famine, or sword, or angels or principalities of powers above or below. We are, if we have believed and trusted in Jesus as our Savior, secure in Him and in his mercy and love toward for all time and eternity.
Have you memorized the promises of God, some of them at least! Do you make a point of reminding yourself of those promises day by day, especially when things don’t go your way? Or do you become anxious and grumble and complain, and in some instances, just like this one panic, and go off and believe something that is not true to your detriment, and unnecessary pain and anxiety.
For some of you, the bigger question is whether you have really believed those promises.
Well, John and Peter apparently hadn’t believed them either. Here they were, the most prominent of the disciples of Jesus, those closest to Him, but on the third day after Christ’s crucifixion, were they even concerned to show up at the tomb for any reason whatsoever, much less an anticipated resurrection of Jesus, the Christ. No, they were as convinced, apparently, as Mary Magdalene had been that death had once again had the final and ultimate victory over even Jesus of Nazareth, despite His claims, His promises, His miracles, His wisdom, and His specific predictions to them about what would happen on the third day. So they were in hiding, cowering somewhere in Jerusalem, fearing that as followers of the Jesus whom the authorities hated, they might meet the same hate that he had met.
But their memories, apparently, were better than that of Mary Magdalene. For upon hearing her conclusion about what was going on at the tomb that morning, strangely, they did not stop to console her. They did not politely wait for her to gather herself and escort back to the tomb to find out what happened. No, they immediately took off for the tomb themselves. Driven by the memory of what Jesus had predicted would happen on the third day, they began to run, and to run with all their strength. No, they weren’t sure what had happened themselves, but they were sure going to find out. They were going to look into what had happened and see for themselves as though their very lives depended on it, and they did. They began running with all their strength, and they were running with anticipation. They suspected that God, even Jesus, might be up to something. They realized that maybe, must maybe this time, death would not be not victorious, that maybe, just maybe this time, someone had actually overcome death, that maybe just once in all of time and in all of history this greatest miracle worker of all of history might have done the unthinkable, and come back from the dead just as He Himself had predicted just as He Himself had enable three other people in their sight to do so. That day they were running not just for themselves, but they were running for everyone of us who has lost a beloved grandmother or grandfather to death, they were running for everyone whose beloved mother had passed on so that we could not any longer enjoy their beloved fellowship; they were running everyone us who have had inexplicable and unfathomable of having a lost a friend or a precious child before their time. For they were running for the hope of the resurrection, for the hope of eternal life, for the hope that there is indeed a better life beyond this life which is so imprisoned by the reality of mortality and the emptiness it leaves behind.
And they were running with all their might, and John was faster, and he got to tomb before Peter.
And verse 5 tells us he stooped and looking in, saw the linen wrapping which had encased the body of Jesus lying there, but without Jesus’ body. But John, being more timid than the impetuous Jesus, did not go in. Peter, of course, did just that, and he also so those undisturbed grave clothes lying there. And verse 7, tells us he also saw the face-cloth which had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen wrappings, but rolled up in a place by itself.
Then, in verse eight, finally, John enters the tomb. And it says, he “saw and believed.” And thus, John became the first of the disciples of Jesus to believe in the Resurrected Jesus
Now notice that John, the writer and eyewitness, goes into great detail about the scene that he and Peter encountered in the tomb that morning. It’s because the scene that they encountered spoke so definitively about what had actually happened earlier that Sunday morning in that tomb. It’s because what they saw, and in particular what he himself saw was so convincing about what had really happened, that it, all by itself, led him to believe Jesus had actually been resurrected from the dead.
Now three different Greek verbs are used to for the words saw and see. In verse five, as John stoops and looks in and sees the undisturbed grave clothes, it uses the Greek verb blepo, which in this context means that he simply got a glimpse of them. The synonym for the verb to see very often had the sense of physical sight, seeing as the function of the eye. But when Peter saw the gave clothes after entering the tomb, the Greek verb that is used is theoreo, which more often tended to have the meaning, according to one Greek dictionary of “to observe something with continuity and attention, often with the implication that it is something unusual”, or to consider, contemplate or investigate what is seen. So, when Peter got in the tomb, he stopped and he looked carefully, he beheld, he viewed, and he reviewed in his mind what he was seeing when he looked at the grave clothes. And as he did, as the Greek verb theoreo might indicate, he was theorizing about what it might mean. He was theorizing about what it meant concerning the possibility of Jesus’ resurrection. Was this strange and interesting sight a sign, perhaps a proof that Jesus really was resurrected.
And the third verb for to see is used in verse 8 for John and what he experienced when he finally came into the tomb. Sometimes it’s used with sense of seeing and perceiving, or seeing and understanding, and here is one of those times, which is made clear by the addition to the verse which John makes—he saw the grave clothes and he believed. He perceived and understood from whatever those grave clothes consisted of that there was only one answer, one solution, to the question of what had happened to Jesus’ body that early Sunday morning. And the answer was that Jesus had indeed been supernaturally raised from the dead.
So that raises the question for us this morning about exactly what it was that Peter and especially John saw when they looked at those grave clothes that caused them to pause and think, and ultimately, in John’s case, to believe. What was it about that sight that was so unusual, so convincing, when all else that they knew about Jesus had not been?
Well, a clue, once again, is to be had from what had taken place the Friday before, which is found in John 19:38-40. After these things, after Jesus had been crucified, Joseph of Arimathea, being a disciple of Jesus, but a secret one for fear of the Jews, asked Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus; and Pilate granted permission. So he came and took away his body. Nicodemus, who had first come to Him by night also came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about a hundred pounds weight. So they took the body of Jesus and bound it in linen wrapping with the species, as is the burial custom of the Jews. Notice again, just how substantial this combination of linen and myrrh and aloes were—a hundred pounds weight. Indeed they were mummifying Jesus’ body. The Jews, according to Hal Lindsey, had learned the process of mummification from the Egyptians, and the myrrh was like shellac. It hardened quickly over time, so that by the time the third day had rolled around, Jesus’ body, except for the head, was encased in a hardened cocoon. A cloth napkin had been laid on his head or was around his head.
And so, what did Peter and especially John wonder at; what convinced John when he saw the undisturbed grave clothes. Well, what Peter and John both saw was incredible—an empty cocoon, and the cloth napkin rolled up neatly in another place. In other words, if grave robbers had entered and stolen the body of Jesus, and for some odd reason chosen to leave the grave clothes behind, would they not have had to rip and claw their way through this hardened mass to get to the body of Jesus. Would they have taken the time to calmly room the napkin or head band? No! IF they had taken the body of Jesus, the wrap would have been torn and ripped to shreds and left all over the tomb. Moreover, if the Romans had removed the body, why wouldn’t they have taken the grave clothes with the body. Who wants to deal with, or for that matter, even touch a rotting, stinking corpse, if it’s not necessary? And finally, if Jesus had merely swooned on the cross and awakened from his coma on the third day, how could he have possibly escaped the grave clothes without ripping, tearing and crushing into pieces himself. How could he have possibly escaped the tomb itself. No, whatever happened to the body of Jesus must have simply been supernatural. For it was clear that the body of Jesus had somehow managed to pass through that heavy hardened cocoon of grave clothes without disturbing its integrity in the least. It had to be supernatural. It had to be the act of God. It had to be the resurrected body of Jesus which would later prove its ability to pass through the hard material substances of this life without doing damage to them or to Him.
And so, John believed, and Peter would soon thereafter. All because they stopped and remembered the promise of Jesus, and then they looked, they looked at the evidence, at the facts, and the fact unmistakably pointed to the supernatural resurrection of Jesus Christ. Just as all the facts about Jesus Christ, and his repeated appearance to His disciples and the change they experienced from coward to bold preachers of Christ’s resurrection will convince you as well, if you only will take the time to investigate, if only you who believe, will take the time to review the indisputable evidence that what you believe is true, and will overcome even the greatest trials of this life that you will have to experience, even death itself.
So, stop, remember the promises of Jesus. And stop, look at the facts, investigate them for yourself, and you to will believe, and be comforted.
But what of Mary? Well, in her resilient unbelief, she has managed to follow the Peter and John to the tomb, but apparently gets there after they have already exited. Verse 11 says she was standing outside, in front of the tomb, still weeping, probably sobbing in her grief, not only over the loss of Jesus her Lord, but now over the disappearance of his supposedly still dead body.
Mary and Peter and John, despite all the miracles they had seen of Jesus, were no fools, they were not superstitious people inclined to belief myths. They were as skeptical as any red-blooded American intellectual today. And it was especially so with Mary, after all she had seen and heard. Remember the account. She also stoops down and looks in and what does she see. Something she may have already seen. Two angels in dazzling white garments sitting in the very place, at the head and the foot, of where she had previously seen Jesus body laid. You’d think this would get her attention, wouldn’t you? I find myself asking at this point what is it going to take to convince this utter skeptic that something unusual has happened, something supernatural, maybe even the resurrection which Jesus Himself had promised. But can you believe it. Even when they ask why she’s weeping, she doesn’t get it.
Apparently sensing that there’s another presence, she turns around and her own two physical eyes behold Jesus. And the word there again is the same used of Peter as he views and contemplates the undisturbed grave clothes. She takes a good look at Jesus, she views and reviews him with her tear-filled eyes, and she still doesn’t get it. He speaks to her and asks her two questions. And still unconvinced, she mistakes him for the gardener and asks him where he has laid the body of Jesus. Is this incredible, or is this incredible? This is a skeptic if I’ve ever heard of one, resilient unbelief resisting reality. Mary Magdalene was absolutely as skeptical about Jesus’ resurrection as it is possible for any objective open-minded person to be.
Finally, Jesus has to get her attention, and calls out her name. She had already turned away, but when she hears it finally, the light goes on and so does her faith. She sees, and she hears, the words of Jesus Himself, and finally she believes that which was undeniable.
Our final point this morning. Listen! Listen to word of Jesus Christ. The Word of God. Listen to the testimonies of honest men who were skeptical, and some of whom refused to believe until they saw, again and again the resurrected Jesus Christ for themselves and his many convincing proofs that he indeed alive again from the dead.
Listen to these Word. They are not the Words of dishonest men, or raving fools or the mentally ill. They are the words of men convinced beyond themselves, convinced by a reality so powerful that it drove them to turn the world upside down with proclamations of Jesus Christ, the God-Man, who died for the sins of all mankind so they could live, if only they would believe, and he proved it by being raised from the dead.
Stop, remember the promises of Jesus. Look, check it for yourselves, take the time and find what the apostles themselves found. The resurrection of Jesus is true beyond a doubt. And finally, listen to the Words of Jesus and God Himself—and Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved.
Remember that little ditty you learned so many years ago. Stop, Look and Listen. So often it involved a cross walk and taking action. And it involved the word, cross. And so, it does today. At the cross of Christ Jesus so love you that He died to pay for your sins. And at the tomb, He rose again to prove it.
And so, what must you do today? Remember His promise and believe. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes, should not perish but have everlasting life.
Let’s pray.
