Why Are You Weeping? (2)
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What do you see?
and
Why are you weeping?
The answer to the first question, when seriously considered with a heart open to the truth, will determine your response to the second.
What do you see? and Why are you weeping?
We find the answers in this morning’s passage from the Gospel of John. This is an eyewitness account. It includes all the characteristics of an eyewitness account - including a recollection that has no real significance to the story but is included because that’s what happened.
John 20:3–4 “So Peter went out with the other disciple, and they were going toward the tomb. Both of them were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first.”
When someone gives an eyewitness account, they tend to share those kind of details. The disciple affectionately referred to as the “one whom Jesus loved”, traditionally assumed to be John himself, got there first, but he did not go immediately inside the tomb. Instead, he stoops to look inside.
What does he see?
Linen burial clothes.
What does he not see?
A dead body.
Peter arrives, goes directly inside the tomb and he finds the linen burial clothes lying there, and the face cloth folded and set apart.
This may have been a cloth placed over the face or a cloth that was twisted and looped from top of the head to around the jaw to keep the mouth closed. But now, it is simply laying there for Peter and the other disciple to see.
Would it make any sense whatsoever for someone to break into the tomb, take the time to unwrap the burial linens from the body, remove the face cloth and fold it, before taking off with the mutilated, naked body of Jesus?
Not at all. The linen cloths were left there on purpose. It was a sign for those who would find them - Jesus had risen.
We are told that when the beloved disciple saw for himself the cloths laid out - he believed. What he believed is not spelled out. It was unlikely that he understood in that moment that Jesus was resurrected - that he was fully alive and present - that would still need to unfold- he most likely believed what Jesus had shared with them a few days before in…
You have heard me tell you, ‘I’m going away and returning to you.’ If you loved me, you would be happy that I am going to the Father, because the Father is greater than me. I have told you before it happens so that when it happens you will believe.
The disciple most likely believed that Jesus had gotten up and had gone to be with the Father.
What he could see was that the tomb was empty. All that remained was the linen burial cloths.
What do you see when presented with the empty tomb?
Death defeated, Jesus risen or a fanciful tale?
Today, the overwhelming consensus among historical scholars is that a little over 2000 years ago, the man Jesus of Nazareth was crucified on a Roman cross, he died and was buried and three days later, his tomb was empty. The evidence is pretty overwhelming. He was buried in Joseph of Arimathea’s tomb, a wealthy member of the Sanhedrin, and Roman guards were posted at the tomb entrance - that means the Jewish and Roman authorities knew exactly where his body was laid to rest, and if there was any question as to if the tomb was empty, all they had to do was go and see for themselves. But there is not record of anyone disputing that the tomb was empty. In fact, in Matthew’s account, the Jewish religious leaders conspired to spread a false narrative - that the disciples stole the body while the guards slept - and they bribed the guards to keep quiet.
From the day of Pentecost onward, Christian preaching centered around the fact that the tomb was empty and that Jesus rose from the dead. If the tomb was not empty, that proclamation would have been easily disproven and the rapid growth of the Jesus movement would have been over before it started.
In addition, all four gospels report that women were the first eyewitnesses of the resurrection - they arrived at the tomb, saw it was empty and went back to report it to the men. In the first Century, if you were making up a story about a man who rose from the dead, you would not use women as your eyewitnesses. In first-century Jewish society, a woman’s testimony was worth far less than that of a man. If this was a made up story, then Peter would have arrived first, not Mary. But if true, you report what really happened.
The tomb was empty.
Well, not totally empty. There were the burial linens.
What happened to the linen clothes found laying in tomb? Were they taken by the disciples and shown to others - did they hold onto them as proof? Did Joseph of Arimathea keep them secured at his home - showing them to those seeking the truth?
I ask because there is a Christian relic that I and many others find very fascinating. How many of you know about the Shroud of Turin? It is the linen cloth that millions of Christians believe is the shroud that Jesus was buried in. The Shroud of Turin is the most studied relic in history. The sheet is roughly 3 1/2’ wide and 14’ long - so a body was laid onto it, then it was folded over the top of body, therefore completely covering the full length of the person. This particular shroud has an image on it of a man who shows all the markings of being scourged and crucified, including wounds from a crown of thorns, nail wounds in the hands and feet, and a sword piercing in the chest. The body is bruised on the shoulders and back - consistent with a man who would have carried the cross through the streets towards Golgotha. The blood on the shroud was tested and found to be from human male.
For over 400 years, the Shroud has been located at the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in Turin, Italy. It has been the subject of a lot of controversy and back in 1988 - a sample of the shroud was radio-carbon dated and the date was determined to be 14th century. I remember that being big news at the time - the story being that the Shroud was a medieval forgery.
What I didn’t know at the time was that many questioned the testing method and sample used for dating - but for 30 years, the data was not released for outside review. As it turns out, the Shroud is made of linen, but the sample came from the edge of the shroud and was made of cotton. The edges of the Shroud were burned in a fire long ago, and it is believed that the nuns in the 14th century repaired the edges of the Shroud by patching in cotton fabric. The sample dated may have been from the patch and not the original material.
Recently, a different test was done - this one Wide-Angle X-Ray Scattering (WAXS) test that showed that the shroud was indeed 2000 years old - the linen fabric weave matched a similar linen sample found at an Israeli archeological site dated from the time of Jesus.
Researchers have also found in the fabric particles of pollen that originate from the area around Jerusalem, as well as pollen from Italy.
This could very well be the Shroud of Jesus.
What makes the Shroud so fascinating is that the image on the cloth cannot be replicated even with today’s technology. In 1898, the first photograph was taken of the Shroud by Secondo Pia and he realized it had the characteristics of a negative - that when you reversed the light and dark colors, you get a clearer picture of the man. Not only is the image a negative, it is also in 3D. The image itself is actually burned into the fabric which could only occur if there was a sudden burst of intense light. John Jackson, a scientist who worked on a team that examined the Shroud, wrote that “the body wrapped in the Shroud emitted a powerful flash of vacuum ultraviolet radiation, forming the perfect 3D negative image of the body on both the front and back of the cloth without scorching it. This process, however, is unlike any natural phenomenon we know of, as no known human body can emit such radiation.”
I know what I believe - but I also know that this is not conclusive evidence. We will never have 100% conclusive evidence, because it is God’s plan for belief in Jesus and the salvation he gives to be an act of faith. I don’t need the Shroud to be real in order to know Christ lives - the transformed lives of so many people, including my own, is evidence enough.
However, for those who are seeking, who are open to the facts - there is a preponderance of evidence.
The answer to the first question, “what do you see?” when seriously considered with a heart open to the truth, will determine your response to the second.
“Why are you weeping?”
We know why Mary was weeping. Three days earlier, she witnessed her Lord, this man whom she dearly loved and followed, brutally killed on a cross. She was there when he breathed his last breath.
She was in grief following the horrific death of her friend. Now to make matters worse, his body was missing. Of course she was weeping.
Most, if not all of you, have experienced the grief of losing a loved one. Whether it was sudden or expected. shock or sadness - you felt the finality of death. We all grieve differently, but tears are often shed when the death of a loved one occurs.
Of course she was weeping.
She was weeping - until she heard Jesus’ voice speak her name.
Mary.
My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.
At that moment by the empty tomb, sorrow gave way to rejoicing.
Mary was the first to see the resurrected Christ face to face.
Her eyes were opened, the tomb was empty because He lives! And if He lives - there is no reason to weep.
The Apostle Paul would later write to Christians who were wondering what happens to believers when they die: He wrote in 1 Thess 4:13-14
But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope.
We have hope because the tomb is empty! Because Jesus lives, we live also. Death has been defeated. There is life beyond the grave. All that we experience today is simply preparation for tomorrow.
Why do you weep?
If you know the risen Jesus, there is no need to weep - it is unwarranted. Rejoicing is the appropriate response to the living Christ.
And yet so many still weep.
To be clear, I’m not talking about weeping in the sense of mourning the absence of a loved one for a time - tears shed are evidence of a deeply held love. As Paul said, we do grieve, but not as the world grieves.
The weeping I’m talking about is hopeless weeping. Not just over death, but weeping over difficult situations or every unfair circumstance. The hardships of life.
People weep and mourn like there is no tomorrow, they rage and shake their fist at God when things don’t go as planned, they worry and fret until all their joy is gone.
And yet the tomb is still empty. Jesus lives. He is still Lord. And as our risen Lord, he has given us full access to the Father. We can take every loss, disappointment, difficulty and lay it at the cross. And in His power, rise up and keep moving forward with hope.
When we see the empty tomb, believe that Jesus lives, and choose to follow Him, then we become a people who possess a hopeful future. We no longer weep as the world weeps.
Psalm 30:5b “ Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes with the morning.”
I would like to close by inviting you to listen to Paul’s teaching on the power of the resurrection:
Therefore, since we have been made righteous through his faithfulness, we have peace with our God through Jesus Christ. We have access by faith into this grace in which we stand through him, and we boast in the hope of God’s glory. But not only that! We even take pride in our problems, because we know that trouble produces endurance, endurance produces character, and character produces hope. This hope doesn’t put us to shame, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us. While we were still weak, at the right moment, Christ died for ungodly people. It isn’t often that someone will die for a righteous person, though maybe someone might dare to die for a good person. But God shows his love for us, because while we were still sinners Christ died for us. So, now that we have been made righteous by his blood, we can be even more certain that we will be saved from God’s wrath through him. If we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son while we were still enemies, now that we have been reconciled, how much more certain is it that we will be saved by his life? And not only that: we even take pride in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, the one through whom we now have a restored relationship with God.
What do your see? and why are you weeping?
Let us pray.
