John 20:11-29

John 20:11. But Mary stood without at the sepulcher weeping: and as she wept, she stooped down, and looked into the sepulcher, and seeth two angels in white sitting, the one at the head, and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lain.

You see, dear friends, love is very patient and persevering. The other disciples had gone away home, but not so Mary, she stands outside the sepulcher, and still waits, for she cannot go till she has seen her Lord. Love, however, has many sorrows for, as Mary stood without the sepulcher, she was weeping. Oftentimes your love to Christ will make you sorrowful when you for a while lose his presence; it will be a great sorrow to you if your Lord should seem to have hidden himself from you. But see how quick-sighted love is; Mary saw the angels, whom the other disciples might have seen if they had not gone home. One of the beatitudes is, «Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God;» and love is one of the most eminent signs of purity. I do not wonder, therefore, that love saw angels, since love sees God himself.

John 20:13. And they say unto her, Woman, why weepest thou?

They could not understand Mary's tears, their question seemed to say «Christ the Lord is risen from the dead, and all the streets of heaven are ringing with hallelujahs because the great Conqueror has returned bearing the spoils of his victory. Why weepest thou? Art not thou one of those for whom this redeeming work was done? ‘Woman, why weepest thou?'»

John 20:13. She saith unto them, Because they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid him.

That was enough to make any of Christ's loved ones weep, and if ever you hear a sermon which has not Christ in it, you may well go down the aisle weeping, and if any ask why you weep, you may reply, «Because they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid him.»

John 20:14. And when she had thus said, she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing, and knew not that it was Jesus.

A strange and sad unbelief had taken possession of her, and there is nothing that blinds the eye so quickly as unbelief. Christ is near thee, poor soul, near thee in thy trouble, but thou dost not know that it is Jesus. Open thine eyes, may God the Holy Spirit touch them with his heavenly eye-salve, that thou mayest see that it is Christ himself who is close beside thee!

John 20:15. Jesus saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? whom seekest thou? She, supposing him to be the gardener, saith unto him, Sir, if thou have borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away.

Her supposition was wrong in one way, but right in another, for Jesus is the Gardener, and his Church is his garden. There was one gardener in whom we fell; here is another and a better Gardener in whom we rise. It is he, and he alone, who can properly tend all the plants of his Father's right-hand planting. He is the Gardener, though not the one that Mary supposed, but what a strange request this was for her to make: «If thou hast borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away.» Could she have carried away the body of Jesus if it had been there? If so, what a ghastly load for her tender frame to bear! Ay, but she would have done it somehow or other; for, if faith laughs at impossibilities, and cries, «It shall be done,» it is love that actually does the deed of holy daring. The task that seems well-nigh impossible is readily performed when the spirit is invigorated by love.

John 20:16. Jesus saith unto her, Mary.

In the simple utterance of her name, there were tones which she could not mistake, it was the sweetest music she had heard since her Lord's last message from the cross: «Mary.» «Why, surely,» she must have thought, «it was the Master's voice calling me by name!»

John 20:16. She turned herself, and saith unto him, Rabboni; which is to say, Master.

Or, «My Master!» The word «Rabboni» means something more than «Master.» Mary seems to say, «Greatest and best of all teachers, I know thy voice; now that thou hast called me by my name, I recognize thee, and I wait to listen to the instruction thou art ready to impart to me.»

John 20:17. Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father:

«There will be time enough for the fellowship your heart craves:»

John 20:17. But go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God.

Practical service is better than personal rapture. Mary would fain have held her Lord, but he says to her, «Go to my brethren.» You will always find that it is best and safest to do what Jesus tells you, when he tells you, and as he tells you. What a delightful message is this from the risen Christ! «Go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God.»

John 20:18. Mary Magdalene came and told the disciples that she had seen the Lord, and that he had spoken these things unto her. Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you.

If they had possessed more faith, they would have left a door open for Jesus to come in, however anxious they might have been to shut out the Jews. I am afraid, dear brethren and sisters, that we also are sometimes more anxious about shutting out the Jews than we are about letting in Christ. I mean, we are very particular in trying to keep out our own troubles and cares, but if we get Jesus within, we shall not think of the Jews, nor of our troubles and cares; they will all disappear as soon as he appears.

John 20:20. And when he had so said, he showed unto them his hands and his side. Then were the disciples glad, when they saw the Lord.

That was enough to make them glad. The gladdest sight out of heaven, and the gladdest sight in heaven itself, is to see the Lord.

John 20:21. Then said Jesus to them again, Peace be unto you: as my Father hath sent me, even so send I you.

«I am the Messiah, the sent One; you, too, shall be my missionaries, my sent ones;» it is but another form of the same word.

John 20:22. And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and saith unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost: whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained.

That is to say, «As you proclaim my gospel, I will back up your message; when you preach of pardoning blood, I will make it efficacious. When you declare to penitent sinners that their sins are remitted, it shall be so; and when you tell those who believe not that they are condemned already, and that except they repent they shall abide in condemnation, their sins shall still be retained.» The true minister of God speaketh not apart from the Word of God, and when he speaks the Word of God, the God of the Word is himself there to make it effectual. It shall be no brutum fulmen, no wasted thunderbolt; it shall fall in reality, and what the servant of Christ declares, according to the Scriptures, shall really be proved to be true.

John 20:24. But Thomas, one of the twelve, called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came.

Possibly he did not go out of an evening; it may be that he was a half-dead sort of Christian, like a great many people are in London. They think they have done finely if they go out on the Sabbath morning, but the evening, well, it is too cold for them, or they must find some other excuse for keeping indoors: «Thomas, one of the twelve, called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came.» That was a great pity, because Thomas would not only be a loser by his absence, but he would be sure to influence others, for he was an apostle. Surely, whenever it is possible, we who are leaders in the church, ministers, deacons, and elders, should take care that we are not absent from the house of the Lord.

John 20:25. The other disciples therefore said unto him, We have seen the Lord.

But he said unto them, Except I shall see in his hands the print of the nails and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into his side, I will not believe. There is something good about that declaration of Thomas, for a man is not bound to believe merely on the testimony of others. He should, if he can, endeavor to get evidence for himself, and as Christ is still alive, the very best thing is to go to him. But there was also much that Thomas said which was very wrong, he had no right to demand that he should see the nail prints in Christ's hands, and, worse still, that he should be permitted to put his finger into them, and to thrust his hand into his Lord's side. There was more than a little impertinence about that utterance, and something more even than an ordinary unbelief; and when we ask for signs and wonders from God, and say that we will not believe except we have them, we are guilty of very presumptuous conduct. We are bound to look for evidence concerning Christ; but when the evidence is sufficient, we ought not out of curiosity to crave for more.

John 20:26. And after eight days again his disciples were within, and Thomas with them.

That was an improvement upon the meeting of the previous Lord's-day evening; Thomas had learnt by this time what he had lost the week before, so he was present on this occasion.

John 20:26. Then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, Peace be unto you. Then saith he to Thomas,

Picking out the one who most needed to be addressed, like the Good Shepherd seeking out the sick sheep first: «Then saith he to Thomas,»

John 20:27. Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side: and be not faithless, but believing. And Thomas answered and said unto him, My Lord and my God.

It has been well observed that Thomas was the first person who ever proved to himself the Deity of Christ from the exhibition of his wounds. There is a good argument in it, which we cannot stay to explain at this time; but the very humanity of Christ has in it the doctrine of his Deity; you can easily argue from the one to the other. How divine must he be who, in his condescension, took upon himself our nature!

John 20:29. Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.

That blessedness can be reached by all of us who believe in Christ. Those who lived in this world before Christ came, saw his day by faith, and they were blessed; those who lived in his day, and saw him in the flesh, and trusted him, were blessed; but we who cannot see him, yet believe in him,

are the most blessed of them all.