Today’s
Gospel is one about grief and love.
“Love is as strong as Death, longing as fierce as Sheol, its arrows are
arrows of fire, flames of the divine.” (Eccl. 8:6) Mary did not come to the tomb to find the
risen Savior. From yesterday’s reading
we know that she came to anoint the body of a man they all loved dearly with
the precious oils and fragrant spices, mixed with their tears. Mary is compelled by love to touch Him once
more, even if he is dead, as she thinks.
But the tomb
is empty and she is denied even that one little pleasure of reaching out one
last time in love. She is
heartbroken. “They have taken my Lord,
and I don’t know where they laid him.”
Within this
Gospel in the passage before today’s reading Mary has already gone and alerted
the Apostles that Jesus’ body is gone.
They have come to see for themselves, and left again. Mary Magdalene remains, as if still searching
for her love. Desperate, she looks one
last time into the tomb.
The Easter
gospel brings comfort to the grieving.
As in the original garden when sin and death were introduced into the
world, God promised a savior that would come to triumph over these things out
of his great love for us. To herald this
savior Mary, held by her grief and love for the one who has saved her from her
sins, lingers peering again into the tomb.
Behold, there are two angels one where the head would be, the other
where the feet had lain with a space between them, as if it were for God
himself; just like the Ark of the Covenant, a new covenant, which Christ came
to establish anew with us through God’s infinite love and mercy.
In Jesus
Christ, God’s only begotten son, is divine love become manifest. In the garden Mary encounters the
transfigured glorious Christ Jesus, our new Adam. In the midst of sorrow and
grief arises joy in the new Creation.
When the angels and Jesus ask, “Woman, why are you weeping?” That is our cue that the Lord is with us in
his glory, we should rejoice and be glad.
The Holy
Spirit is the Spirit of this new creation.
Peter reminds us today, “Repent
and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the
forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.“ Like Mary Magdalene, let us let the
Spirit help us to overcome the bonds of the old creation and enter more fully
this new creation that has been given to us through the Resurrection. Amen.
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