The First Witness

Our final station of the cross is the resurrection of Jesus. We have arrived at our celebration of Easter and of our salvation. After the death and burial of Jesus, the women returned to his tomb in order to prepare his body. You can imagine their shock when they discovered the stone had been rolled away and there was no one in the grave. Everyone assumed someone had stolen the body of Jesus. Even after all his signs and wonders, they still struggled to believe his promise that he would rise again after the third day. One of the women was so distraught that she could not leave the small garden by the empty tomb. That woman was Mary Magdalene. Even the appearance of two angels still could not stir her faith in his resurrection. Suddenly, Jesus appeared before her and asked her why she was crying. It took Jesus speaking her name in love before she finally recognized him.

In our Easter devotion, we have been considering the final hours of Jesus Christ’s life before his crucifixion and death. However, now with the resurrection, we can consider some firsts. Who was the first person Jesus appeared to after he rose from the dead? What were the first words that Jesus said after rising? The disciples (and many others) were probably surprised that the first person Jesus appeared to was Mary Magdalene. This was a woman out of whom Jesus had cast 7 demons. At this time in Jewish history, a woman's testimony would not have been as valuable as a man's. We would assume the first person Jesus would have appeared to would have been a male disciple such as Peter, without an embarrassing back story. This would be only a small taste of the revolution that began in the early church of Jesus.

And what were those first words that Jesus spoke to Mary? He told her not to hold on to him. This might seem like a strange thing for Jesus to say if he were trying to comfort her. Yet Jesus was trying to prepare her for the Great Commission of his disciples. As he would soon ascend to the Father in heaven, the mission of spreading the good news would require his people to leave Jerusalem to travel to the ends of the earth. Mary understood and obeyed by running to the disciples and saying, “I have seen the Lord.” As the first witness to our faith, we can only imagine how many more times she repeated these words throughout her life.

As we prepare for Easter, we need to remember the first witness of the resurrection. Like Mary Magdalene, we know that Jesus has given us his resurrected life. Now we too are his witnesses as we tell the world, “I have seen the Lord.”

Let us pick up our cross and follow him.