Mary and Her Lamb

On believing the women

[Note: After Holy Week, I will resume giving my Theology Thursday writing efforts toward fleshing out lessons I learned after publishing my book After Doubt. However, this week, I am sharing a modified Easter piece that will likely run in my local newspaper here in Eugene.]

As a holiday, Easter has a way of rushing right past us. Without fail, it never ceases to catch me unawares in the midst of the flurry and busyness of the teaching semester. Still, it is most beneficial for us to be given space every Spring to pause, reflect, and remember. What are we remembering? Easter is the time of year when Christians from around the globe and from countless traditions and cultures come together to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Easter—as one Puritan cleverly put it long ago—is the ‘death of death’ that is accomplished by the resurrection of Christ. Despite the sacredness of this season, it always seems just to run on by us. It comes up quickly. And just as quickly is behind us. This became particularly clear when I pastored a church in my younger years. Year after year, what struck me was how busy life around the congregation became around Easter—especially a pastor's schedule. Somewhere along the way, I’d reflected in my journal how unprepared I always found myself for how much administrative work resurrection seems to create.  

Things seemed to move equally fast on that first Easter—especially in John’s gospel. The Apostle offers a cluster of references to how things sped up at the twilight of that new morning. Mary Magdalene, we are told, came “running” (Jn 20.2) to the apostles to declare the tomb was no longer occupied. Soon after, Simon and John come “running” (v. 4) to the tomb to see for themselves. In what can only be interpreted as biblical trash talk, John even comments that he “outran” (v. 4) Peter to the tomb. Things seem to speed up that first Easter morning. There is a buzz in the air. New life seems to have sprung as if from nowhere. 

Photo by MohammadHosein Mohebbi on Unsplash

The pinnacle moment in John’s account comes as Mary returns to the tomb after proclaiming the first Easter message to the apostles. She stands outside the tomb, afraid, sad, and seemingly defeated. Jesus’ body was nowhere to be found. Coming out of the tomb, Mary is surprised to discover a mysterious man—unknown to her—standing outside the tomb. She is unaware of who this man is. That is until he speaks her name: 

“Mary.” 

This moment, for Christians, is perhaps the most consequential moment in history. Many who have reflected on this account say that this is the moment in history that time goes from BCE to CE. At this moment, Mary’s eyes were opened to who she was speaking to. It wasn’t some random encounter with an early morning tomb visitor. The unrecognizable man was the resurrected Jesus himself. And Mary becomes the first to experience what every Christian throughout history has experienced. Christ would be seen by Mary. But only through the tears.

Mary returns and declares the first resurrection sermon to the terrified men hiding in Jerusalem. Over the years, many have ridiculed Christians for believing a message of such miraculous proportions. A particular school of white German scholars—beginning in the 18th century—gave their academic energy to rob this story of its miraculous wonder and power. The resurrection, they argued, could only be a myth. We can learn from Jesus in his teaching, morality, and acts of service. But they believed there was no way that the resurrection could have actually happened.

Back to the women. As historical documents, it is wildly critical to acknowledge who the first witnesses of the resurrection were: women. And it was the women who proclaimed its reality to the world. In an ancient context where women were rarely (if ever) believed—often being barred from serving as ‘witnesses’ even in a legal setting—it is remarkable that the earliest Christian community would hang their most important witness on the words of the women who came to the tomb that first Eastern morning. The early anti-Christian critic Celsus famously wrote that the Christian message was based on what he called the “hysterical testimony of one woman.” Clearly, the very idea that the witness of the resurrection of Jesus was stable on the shoulders of those women was preposterous to many in the ancient world. Just as it is in our own. 

So, who are we to believe? A group of white German cynics from the 18th century who could only believe the gospels through the rubric of their own rationality? A group, Will Willimon famously said, who was implicitly arguing “the Easter women were lying.” Or these humble (and often disbelieved) Jewish women who claimed to find an empty tomb? It has been—and continues to be—the belief among recognizable Christians that the women at the tomb are to be believed. Their testimony is true.  

And it is still true.  

We will only be transformed by the story of the resurrection in its entirety if we believe those women. And on this Easter, billions of Christians will worship on Easter morning because the women are to be believed. As historians and scholars often point out, it is remarkable how utterly incompetent and foolish the male disciples are made to look in the Easter appearances of the gospels. While they are terrified in a hidden house with their door locked somewhere in Jerusalem, it is the women who first go to the tomb and come back with the news that it has been vacated. If Christianity were nothing more than a patriarchal religion seeking to prop up the power and prestige of the men, then the Easter narratives in the gospel fail at their task.  

It is the women who first come to the tomb. Women like Mary. The minute she heard her name, she believed. She won’t recognize Jesus until he speaks her name. And, upon hearing her name, realizes it is, indeed, Jesus—her Lord. Everything slows down as she hears her name, “Mary.” This is the most crucial moment in history. And for us. One New Testament scholar by the name of Thomas Schmidt speaks to this very moment: “There is a curious and important detail in this story that is the main point. Mary didn’t recognize the risen Jesus until he called her by name. Everywhere that Mary went the Lamb was sure to go.”¹ 

Jesus goes with us too—hidden, watching, and present everywhere we are. Just as with Mary, Jesus is with us. The problem for us, then, isn’t the event. It is the busyness around the event. What if, for just a moment, we stopped to enter that empty tomb for ourselves? What would you find? You’ll find that it is still empty just as Mary said.

And that the guy standing outside the tomb has your name on his lips too.

1. Thomas Schmidt, A Scandalous Beauty: The Artistry of God and the Way of the Cross (Grand Rapids: Brazos, 2002), 70–71.