Christian Counseling Service -- Devotions

Attending Jesus - Sunday

Sunday, March 27, 2005

John 20:1-18
Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the entrance. So she came running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, and said, "They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don't know where they have put him!"

So Peter and the other disciple started for the tomb. Both were running, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. He bent over and looked in at the strips of linen lying there but did not go in. Then Simon Peter, who was behind him, arrived and went into the tomb. He saw the strips of linen lying there, as well as the burial cloth that had been around Jesus' head. The cloth was folded up by itself, separate from the linen. Finally the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went inside. He saw and believed. (They still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.)

Then the disciples went back to their homes, but Mary stood outside the tomb crying. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb and saw two angels in white, seated where Jesus' body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot. They asked her, "Woman, why are you crying?"

"They have taken my Lord away," she said, "and I don't know where they have put him." At this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was Jesus.

"Woman," he said, "why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?"

Thinking he was the gardener, she said, "Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him."

Jesus said to her, "Mary."

She turned toward him and cried out in Aramaic, "Rabboni!" (which means Teacher).

Jesus said, "Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet returned to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, 'I am returning to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.' "

Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news: "I have seen the Lord!"

Jesus, I am on top of the world. You were dead, and now you're alive. My heart was so hollowed out with grief, and now you stand here, black bloodstains gone, shining in new white clothes, smiling at me. How can this be?

Your mother couldn't believe what was happening to her, either, when the angel said you were coming, that you would be born through her. The angels today in your tomb seem so protective and so proud of you. I am too, Jesus. But I could do nothing to save you from the whip and the spit and the laughter and from dying.

Now you have been lifted up from death by power much greater than anything I can imagine. Those angels are just the edge of it, aren't they? The words that confused us about you and your Father now feel so much more right. Your Father would never let anything happen to you!

And you say with such sweet assurance that He is my father too. Your words and your presence here seem to make it true. He is my father too. Are there angels beside me, protecting me and keeping me safe? If you say, Lord, then it must be so. Are all the black stains of my failures and sin removed from me? These clothes I wear, are they white and fresh and pure like snow? If you say, Lord, then it must be so.

You have risen, Jesus, from death to life forever with our Father. Rejoice! Rejoice!

Devotions Archive

Attending Jesus - Sunday

Sunday, March 27, 2005