City Life Starter

The Word

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. ² 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!”

¹¹ While the women were on their way, some of the guards went into the city and reported to the chief priests everything that had happened. ¹² When the chief priests had met with the elders and devised a plan, they gave the soldiers a large sum of money, ¹³ telling them, “You are to say, ‘His disciples came during the night and stole him away while we were asleep.’ ¹⁴ If this report gets to the governor, we will satisfy him and keep you out of trouble.” ¹⁵ So the soldiers took the money and did as they were instructed. And this story has been widely circulated among the Jews to this very day.

Matthew 28:11-15

Exegesis

If Jesus had never revealed himself to Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, His disciples, and then to over 500 people, we would have two very conflicting reports about who stole Jesus’ body and both sides pointing fingers at each other. How different the story would’ve turned out. Mary Magdalene and the other Mary both heard a report from an angle and then saw the risen Jesus, this should have been enough. But Simon Peter and John did not believe them(Mark 16:11). They thought Jesus’ body was taken!

At this point in time, the disciples were accusing the Romans and Jewish leaders for taking Jesus’ body while the other side were accusing the disciples of the same! If you wanted to start a fight, this would be the perfect way to do it. Who took Jesus’ body?? In the middle of all this, the women were exasperated as they knew the truth and no one would listen to their testimony.

Men can be very stubborn.

Jesus had to reveal himself to His disciples before ascending to heaven. If this did not happen, we would have two conflicting reports and the gospel message would have been lost through all the finger pointing. In the end, Jesus aligned His disciples to the Truth, showed them what was important, and put them on the narrow path and to spread the gospel message to the ends of the earth.

I’m sure the disciples were always being reminded that the women were right. For this reason, God probably made a point to have this written in all four gospels.

Application

Stop pointing fingers and set your mind on Jesus. Many times we ignore the miracles that Jesus is doing and start thinking too much with our rational and logical side of our brains. The women knew, they believed, and they were transformed. The thick-headed disciples had to take some more pushing and prodding from Jesus to fully believe. It teaches us how we need to trust that God can do the miraculous in our lives and in those around us when we choose to believe it.

Stop fighting and don’t do the finger pointing between you and another. God is trying to do something completely different and we miss it when we do not focus horizontally on Him. Align yourself again with God, so you do not veer off on a tangent, fighting over something that misses the mark completely.

Trust your wife.