Last evening, my children and I sat outside after dark and read the Scriptures for church today in preparation for worship. That was a first for the family!
We didn't make it to Sunday School this morning, but we did read Psalm 119: 9-11
Only God's Law can help us keep our way pure. The way of the one who seeks God's Law, stores is up in his heart, and seeks wisdom from Him will be guarded by that Law. How do we store this Word up in our hearts? By speaking it, delighting in it more than earthly things, and meditating (thinking) about it much.
The godly will NOT forget God's Word. Nor will he neglect it.
The sermon text was John 20:11-18.....focusing on Mary Magdalene's response to the risen savior.
So many details that I have never really attended to in this passage, and the verses before!
I read back over verses 1-10 to get the context for the setting we find Mary in. She was at the tomb of Jesus early, and found the stone rolled away and the tomb empty! She rant to tell the disciples,, and Peter and John ran to check it out, and discovered it to be true. Not only that, but everything was in neat order.
Then,......the men go home. The didn't understand.
Mary, however, hung around. She was in such great sorrow! She was a close follower of Christ, as He had set her free from seven demons! She was there at the crucifixion, there for the burial, and now she weeps at the tomb. In her distress, she is seeking only one thing....the body. John doesn't tell us anything about her reacting to the fact that she was speaking to an angel, however other gospels do. Even still, she asks for only one thing......to know where they have taken Him. She didn't even recognize Jesus in her distress, when she faced Him. I wonder, though, if she even looked at him really. She was weeping, and I am sure her vision was blurry. Was it shameful in that time for women to cry in public, so perhaps she had her head down? At any rate, she assumed the gardener was before her, asking whom she sought, and replied that if he had taken Him, please tell her and she would take care of the body. It wasn't until He spoke her name, Mary, that she recognized Him!
I have always wondered about that word. Was it spoken in a loving, tender tone? Or in a powerful voice that commanded attention? It doesn't matter.....she recognized Him.
His next words to her about not clinging to Him have puzzled me at times. He doesn't want her to 'cling' to Him,.....and I have always pictured in my mind her reacting as any one would to seeing someone they loved, who'd been dead, now standing before them! I imagine she went to touch Him, to hug him, and not let go! But later, Thomas is encouraged to touch Him. What's the difference?
This morning I thought that maybe part of what Jesus was saying was that she didn't need to get attached to the idea of Him being there for long. He hadn't yet ascended to the Father, but He would. And when He did, they would SEE Him no more, but the Helper would come to dwell in them. Is that the sore of 'clinging' that He meant? Or perhaps He meant that she shouldn't stay there (who would want to leave?!), but to go and tell the disciples.
No matter.......He told her to go tell the disciples what she'd seen and heard, and she did. She didn't cling, or hold on to Him. She obeyed, immediately.
There have been times in my life that I have heard the Lord say my name.....not audibly, but in my heart. Usually at times of great distress and turmoil. The first time I recall that happened at a very troubling time for me, early in my marriage. I was very upset, and hurt, but felt like I had no one to turn to. Talking to anyone about it was out of the question, and I was weeping and mourning, feeling not only the hurt done to me, but also the intense loneliness. As I cried and wept, I heard the Lord say to me, "Linette, cry out to Me. I am here". I am ashamed to say that I didn't. At least not then.
there have been other times that I can't describe here. But I know Him by His voice. That I can say with certainty.
It was pointed out this morning that Mary was seeking a thing, while Jesus asked her WHOM she was seeking. She assumed him to be a corpse, yet He was alive, and a 'who', not an 'it'.
It seems to me there's a lesson there......Still today many see Jesus as an 'it'.....a historical figure, a religious icon, etc., etc. But we need to see Him as a "WHO". He is alive! And he intercedes for us with the Father!
Seek Him!
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