Sorrow turned into Joy

John 20:1-18

The morning that Mary went to the tomb, she lost hope. The Jesus who she believed to be God was not only dead but nowhere to be found. The text says in verse 9, “They still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.” They were without Jesus and, for a morning, without any hope that He would return.

Imagine the crushing feeling of believing that Jesus was not only overcome by death but that His body was stolen. After seeing the empty tomb, the disciples “went back to where they were staying” (20:10). I imagine them walking in silence back to their house, their heads hanging in sadness. Mary couldn’t even bring herself to leave. She just stood outside the tomb weeping.

But then Mary heard a man say her name, and her weeping became a cry of joy. The woman who couldn’t bring herself to leave the tomb because of her sadness “went to the disciples with the news: I have seen the Lord!” (20:18)

She went from someone hopeless and separated from God to a woman with a Father and a relationship with God. Jesus tells her that He is “ascending to My Father and your Father, My God and your God.” (20:17, italics added)

Jesus defeated the sin and death that separated Mary from God by resurrecting from the dead. Because of her belief in the resurrection, Jesus’ God and Father is Mary’s God and Father.

When Mary saw and believed the resurrected Jesus, everything changed. The same is possible for us.

Because Jesus crushed death, death will no longer crush us. Because Jesus is ascending to the Father, so will we in eternity. When we weep, Jesus meets us and comforts us with His presence. Because Jesus united us with Him in His death, we are also united with Him in His resurrection.

This is how the author of 1 Peter puts it in 1 Peter 1:3-4,

“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you.”

Through Christ’s resurrection, we, like Mary, have an inheritance and hope. We have a Father and a God. Nothing can change the fact that the tomb was empty on that morning. Therefore, nothing can take away, corrupt, or defile the hope and inheritance we have through Christ.