Word of Salvation – Vol.11 No.13 – April 1965
The Transforming Word Of The Risen Christ
Sermon by Rev. F. Channing on John 20:11-16 and vs.18
Scripture Reading: John 10:1-28
Psalter Hymnal:182:1,5,6; 10:1,2,4 (Law); 365:1,2,3,4;
364:1,3; 189:1.2,3; 242:9,10
Dearly Beloved congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ,
Have you ever listened to some piece of music which commences with the dismal whine of violins and other instruments… and then a little further on, the music becomes more joyful, more gay, more hopeful, and then finally, it bursts forth into a delightful, majestic thunder of sound? That is what our text is like. It commences with Mary of Magdala, standing before the open, but empty tomb of the Lord Jesus Christ… weeping… despairing… downcast… without hope! And our text finishes with the joyful thrill of running feet… running to proclaim the glorious Gospel message… “JESUS CHRIST IS RISEN FROM THE DEAD!”
What has caused this sudden change from weeping to joy? What has caused this sudden change from despair to hope? What has caused this sudden change from unbelief to a living faith? That is the message of our text this morning… What happened to Mary of Magdala. How she heard the transforming word of the Risen Saviour.
Mary had come early in the morning of the first day of the week, to the sepulchre in which the body of the Lord Jesus Christ had been laid. Mary had come to lovingly care for that body… the body of Him, Who had become to mean so much to her. The body of Him Who had delivered her from the gripping domination and control of seven devils! But as she approached that tomb, she sees that the stone had already been rolled away, AND THE TOMB WAS EMPTY! She immediately returned to the house in Jerusalem where the disciples were gathered. There was but one thought in her mind, and that thought was, that the body of the Lord Jesus Christ had been stolen. You see, she did not realise the glorious truth that HE HAD RISEN FROM THE DEAD! As she hurried along that pathway back to Jerusalem, to tell the disciples of this new calamity, she was met by John and Peter.
They were on their way to the tomb also, and so altogether they returned to the tomb. Perhaps together they would be able to solve this new mystery.
But the tomb remained silent and empty!
Whatever its secret, it would not display to these three people, what had happened to the body which had been wrapped and laid within!
In the minds of the two disciples, John and Peter, there was no doubt about it. The body of the Man of Nazareth had been stolen away. Why! The empty tomb bore witness to this fact! And so with certainty in their hearts, John and Peter retraced their steps to Jerusalem, leaving Mary of Magdala standing at the entrance to ti tomb.
To Mary that empty tomb stood as an example and as a monument of her EMPTY HEART!
For some time before the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus Christ, Mary of Magdala had been amongst those women of whom it is said that they followed the Lord Jesus Christ and ministered to him out of their own substance. That is, they had helped support Him and His disciples out of their own money. In fact there is every good reason to believe that Mary was a woman of certain wealth, and that she had a certain rank in the society of that day. And there that woman… Mary of Magdala stands before the entrance of that empty tomb, and she weeps. We may not know much about who she was, but her weeping does tell us what she was. She was one who had hoped in Jesus of Nazareth. She had hoped – as did the two men who would later that very day walk the road to Emmaus – she had hoped that Jesus of Nazareth had been He who should have redeemed Israel! She dared to think it possible that this Man of Nazareth, was indeed the promised Messiah of God!
But on the preceding Friday… three days before the time our text, the Roman soldiers and the Jewish priests and leaders, they had all shown her that she was wrong, because on that day the world had taken this self-styled Messiah and they had crucified Him on a Roman Cross. A dead Messiah could be no Messiah!
And there she stands before the tomb where His dead body had been laid. All her hopes had been crushed… crushed under the load of unbelief. She was slow of heart to believe the prophets of the Old Testament, that the Messiah should indeed suffer these things, so that by His suffering He might merit deliverance for His sin-enslaved people. Yes, finding that empty tomb had been just too much for Mary of Magdala.
She could no longer restrain her sobs of despair. Perhaps there was even a little sob of despair for her own self! Now she saw what an illusion she had lived under. Perhaps she was now even unsure of her own deliverance from the seven devils which had plagued her life. Could she be sure of anything that was connected with the Man whose body had been laid in this tomb? When He had died…. her hope had died! As His life blood had dripped to the ground on Calvary, so too had Mary’s hope drained away. Now she stood at the entrance to the empty tomb a figure of dejection, and a figure of unbelief!
And it is while she stood there, that there appeared in the empty tomb, two angels. Our text speaks of one sitting at the head and the other at the feet of where the body of Jesus has lain.
Now this is a startling thing that we should not fail to notice. Here two supernatural beings… angels… appear before a woman… and yet the woman just goes on weeping! A minute before the tomb had been investigated closely by Simon Peter… and declared empty. Yet now, there are two angels dressed in white, seated in that tomb. But Mary Magdalene did not even seem to notice them. She was not even startled by the angelic visitors. She was so gripped by her belief that the Lord was dead, and that HE WOULD REMAIN DEAD… she was so gripped by her unbelief of the words of the Lord Jesus Christ which He had spoken so often in her presence, as she followed Him… that He would rise again on the third day… Mary was so gripped by unbelief, that it blinded her to the heavenly origin of those angel visitors. Throughout the Scriptures you can read of men, when suddenly faced with visitors from heaven, they fell down as if dead…! They trembled and shook before the brightness of the messengers who had come from before God’s throne. But Mary goes on weeping!
We have heard people say, “If I could only have a visit from an angel. If an angel would only come and tell me that the Bible is true, and that Jesus Christ has risen from the dead… then I would know for certain!” Mary had such an angelic visitor.. two of them…! But she did not even recognize their heavenly origin.. She could not understand what they were doing there in that empty tomb. She could not perceive that their presence could mean only one thing… that HE WHO DIED ON THE ROMAN CROSS, HE IS RISEN FROM THE DEAD: She could not understand it, because her eyes were blinded and closed with the scales of unbelief.
First those scales of unbelief must be removed… first that despair must turn to hope, and that unbelief to faith.
But could Mary, the weeping, despairing, faithless Mary of Magdala, could she believe and have hope in that which is against all earthly reason, and against all earthly hope?
Can you and I, looking about us at the despairing situations that exist in life… at the despairing things that happen in our own families and personal lives… seeing the power and the domination of sin in human life, and feeling the power of temptation in our own lives… CAN YOU AND I, looking at all these things, hope for something better?
Can we, with our earthly reasoning, hope for a better world than we now have? Men do hope for it… men do work for it… but if you look the facts right straight in the face, you must admit, that instead of better, the world is growing worse, in spite of all that man does to try to build something better!
Can we with our earthly reasoning hope for better families and improved personal lives…? We might want such to be the case, but as each year goes by, we will have to confess that really we are no better at all! And we might think that next week, or next year we will be overcoming that special temptation in our lives… but when, the next week and next year has gone, we find it is still with us…! Perhaps it has overcome us! Can we by our own reasoning, and our own searching find out, and grasp hold of the ONE MESSAGE that does enable men and women to hope for a better world… and for power to live better lives… and for power to overcome Satanic temptations…? Can you by your own earthly reasoning find out that ONE LIBERATING, CLORIOUS MESSAGE?
Could Saul of Tarsus find out such a message? He was a man well schooled in the knowledge of the Old Testament. He was a man who had heard the dying testimony of Stephen the martyr. Of all men, you would expect Saul to understand and to be able to reason out that Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah, the Redeemer. Why is it that Saul cannot reason that out? He cannot, because he is helplessly blinded by unbelief and sin! He does not want to understand the message of Stephen, and he cannot understand the heaven sent message of the prophets. No! Saul must have the Son of God reveal Himself unto him. Saul must hear the transforming word of the Risen Christ, before the scales of unbelief fall from his eyes. And so it is with Mary of Magdala. Even the message of the presence of the angels could not change Mary’s despair to joy, or her unbelief to faith!
Jesus Christ with His transforming word of Grace alone could do that! And that is exactly what the Lord Jesus Christ does. He comes seeking Mary. It is not Mary who says to this supposed gardener: “Who are you?”. NO! It is the Lord Jesus Christ Who reveals Himself to Mary.
Let us be gripped by this… by the wonder of it! The Lord Jesus Christ, He unto Whom all authority in heaven and earth had been given… He comes to the despairing, and unbelieving and with His mighty transforming word He banishes the scales of unbelief! That is what had happened so often in His earthly ministry amongst the blind and the lame and the dead…! He had come, speaking the transforming word of grace… “Be opened!” “Rise up!” “Come forth!” No mental reasoning had changed these men and healed them, and restored life to dead bodies, but the transforming Word of the Christ of God! And so it was with Mary. Mary of Magdala would have remained forever unchanged… a sorrowing figure of despair and unbelief if Jesus Christ, the Risen Lord had not come speaking this transforming, self-revealing word! That ONE WORD – it pierced through the veil of unbelief, and filled the soul and heart of this sorrowing woman with joy and faith!
And it is the same with us! We should be gripped with the wonder of it! Jesus Christ, He Who died for our sins, He Who rose for our justification, yes He comes to us in our despair, in our hopelessness, in our sorrow… in all the things that are in this world and are the results of sin…! He comes speaking the WORD OF LIFE… the transforming Word of Grace: “Rise up out of your sin! Stand up and come forth out of the kingdom of darkness and death”, and we, who could not so much as move a finger to improve this rotten society of this world, or to improve the life of our family, or to improve the personal life of ourselves… we who could not move a finger of ourselves, being dead in sin, could not move a finger to improve our own rotten unbelieving hearts, we BY GRACE rise up! …come forth …BELIEVE …and see before us not just a common man whose code of ethics and way of life was to set a good example for us, but we see, by that TRANSFORMING, SELF REVEALING WORD of the RISEN CHRIST… we see OUR SAVIOUR: We see the One Who has been victorious over sin and death and hell, and Who now is having all authority in heaven and on earth, and Who is moving all things according to the counsel of His Own will, so that HIS KINGDOM will surely come to replace the rotten society of this world!
HIS KINGDOM SHALL SURELY COME, to transform our families and our personal lives!…! HIS KINGDOM shall surely rule more and more in our lives to overcome the power of SATAN, the WORLD and our OWN FLESH! This is the truth! If our Saviour did not come and open our eyes that were tightly shut with sin and unbelief, then, we would go on in darkness, and blindness, and eternal death and destruction… in our unbelief!
The Lord Jesus Christ comes to despairing Mary of Magdala. He came speaking that self revealing Word… “MARY”. Actually the Lord called this woman by her own name in her own Aramaic tongue. “MIRIAM…!” Can you not see the tenderness in that word which the Risen Saviour spoke? Does it not remind you of the word of this same LORD to Israel: “Fear not, for I have redeemed thee, I have called thee by thy name; thou art Mine”. “I have called thee by thy name… though thou hast not known Me!” And here in our text it is as if the Risen Lord is saying to that sorrowing woman “Miriam, are you so slow of heart to believe? Miriam, open your eyes, see it is I MYself.. your Lord and your Saviour! Open your eyes and believe, and know that I am alive forevermore. I have not died and left you in despair!… I have not died and left you to the power of the devils!… I have not died and left you alone!… BELIEVE MIRIAM!” And the scales fall from her eyes and she sees, and knows, and recognizes this person before her.
What the presence of the angels could not do, this one transforming word of the Risen Lord accomplished… even as He said, “My sheep hear My voice and they know Me and are known of Me”. Mary heard His voice and she knew Him.
She knows Him to be the Lord… Her God… Her Saviour, because before her stood the One Who has conquered death and hell and sin! On the previous Friday they had wrapped His dead body and placed it in the tomb. Now on the Sunday He stood before her alive. This is God, manifest in the flesh Who stands before her, and that is what she confessed in that one word of wonder and surprise which escaped her lips… “RABBONI”… “My God and My Master!” And that she can confess, because Jesus Christ the Risen Lord of Glory had opened her eyes which were scaled with unbelief. He had placed faith in her heart… faith to see and to know that He Who was nailed to the Cross, and who being dead was placed in the tomb and Who now in resurrection life stood before her…! He is none other than God, the Saviour of the world.
He had placed faith in her heart that caused her to bow in His presence and to confess Him as her Master to rule her, and her Master to control her, and her Master to tell her what to do! His revelation of Himself had chased away all the despair…! All the fears of the seven devils that may return to plague her…! All the despair of what may lay ahead in life… BECAUSE she saw in this RISEN LORD the one with power over life and death, and sin and Satan. This TRANSFORMING WORD of the RISEN CHRIST had not just formed a cold intellectual reasoning in the heart of Mary Magdalene but He had formed FAITH and HOPE which resulted in a transformation.
A few moments before, the feet of Mary were slow to move. They were heavy with despair and hopelessness… BUT now they were changed and TRANSFORMED to run with joy, and proclaim the blessed message: “HE IS RISEN” A few moments before, her lips confessed she was looking for a dead body… “Sir if you have taken His dead body somewhere… tell me where it is”. That is what she had said, but now her lips were changed and TRANSFORMED to confess a RISEN, LIVING REDEEMER. A few moments before she had voiced, in her sobs, the hopelessness of her situation, the fear of Satanic power and domination, but now her sobs were transformed into the joyful cry, “YOU ARE MY GOD and MASTER!” She did not fear the Satanic power anymore!. It would not rule her anymore… It could not dominate her anymore, because CHRIST is her Master!
Between that sorrowful commencement of this “symphony of life” and this crashing majestic thunder of living faith… there has been the TRANSFORMING, SELF REVEALING WORD OF THE RISEN SAVIOUR.
This resurrection Sunday, we are especially considering the RESURRECTION of our LORD and Saviour Jesus Christ. Let us realise, that IF WE KNOW and PERCEIVE that the TESTIMONY of the Word of God, concerning the death and burial and resurrection of the Saviour is TRUTH… we know and perceive it ONLY BECAUSE Jesus Christ has come and revealed Himself to us, Only because He has come with His TRANSFORMING WORD OF GRACE to clear away the scales of our spiritual blindness. But let us realise also, congregation, that if He has come with that WORD of Grace, calling us by our names, telling us of His love for us, and calling us to serve Him, and opening our eyes to Whom He is, and what He has done for us… THAT WORD OF GRACE is a TRANSFORMING WORD! You cannot hear that Word… you cannot hear the Risen Saviour calling, “John!” “Mary!” “Peter!” “Anne!” – calling you by name, and telling you that you belong to HIM, because He has purchased you with the price of His blood… You cannot claim to have heard that word, if your LIFE has not been changed and transformed! You cannot claim to have received His gracious self-revelation, unless you too, like Paul, fall down and say… “Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do”… and like Mary confess Him to be “YOUR MASTER!
Have you heard the TRANSFORMING WORD of the RISEN CHRIST? And having heard His voice… calling you out of your sin, out of eternal death, into LIFE and freedom from sin, and death, and hell…, has your life been TRANSFORMED by that WORD OF GRACE?
You cannot have heard the call… if there has been no response from your life in confessing the RISEN SAVIOUR as YOUR LORD AND MASTER:
And you cannot confess Him as YOUR LORD and MASTER, unless He has, in His wondrous grace, revealed Himself to you!
Amen,