Anyone who has visited the Rembrandt museum in Amsterdam has probably, like me, stood and starred in awe at his 12’ by 14’ painting called the “Night Watch”. The surprising experience is the longer you look, the more details you see in the shadows. That’s the closest earthly comparison I can give to studying the Resurrection of Jesus. Even after fifty years as a student of the Bible, the more I study the accounts of His resurrection, the more I see. Here are a few.
We can only imagine the anguish and confusion Jesus’ disciples must have felt in the hours after His crucifixion. Each one had left a career behind, friends and family, and put all their hopes in Jesus. Now, all they knew for certain was He was dead. Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus removed Jesus from the cross and carried Him to the tomb. The two of them bound (knit, tie, wind) His body in linen wrappings with a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about seventy-five pounds (Jn 19: 39, 40). They laid the wrapped body inside and one of them covered His face with a napkin. Then Joseph rolled a wheel-shaped stone against the entrance of the tomb. The stone weighed up to two tons and was placed in a channel on a slight incline above the opening. It would have required 20 or more men to lift it into the track. Joseph simply removed what was stopping it, perhaps a wedge, and it rolled into place.
Sunday morning, Mary Magdalene came early to the tomb, while it was still dark, and saw the stone already taken away from the tomb (Jn 20:1). The word John used for “take away” doesn’t mean rolled away as it had been rolled into place, but it indicates someone had lifted the huge stone and moved it a distance from opening. She ran and told the disciples. John and Peter raced to the tomb. John arrived first. In his Gospel, he recounts what took place (John 20:3-8) and what turned his despair into hope. Three different words are translated ‘saw’ (v5, v6, v8). John stooped and looked in, he saw the linen wrappings lying there; but he did not go in. John saw but only gave a momentary glimpse. Peter arrived and entered the tomb and saw the linen wrappings lying there, and the face-cloth. Peter ‘saw’; he scrutinized the scene looking around with a keen eye. Something caught he attention. The face-cloth was not lying with the linen wrappings, but rolled up in a place by itself.
After His resurrection, Jesus hadn’t been in a hurry. He didn’t just scramble out of His grave clothes and quickly depart. He took time to fold the napkin in order to leave a message for His disciples. A folded napkin had to do with a master and his servant, and every Jewish boy knew this tradition. When the servant set the dinner table, he made sure it was exactly the way the master wanted it. After he set the table perfectly, the servant would wait, just out of sight, until the master had finished eating. The servant wouldn’t dare touch the table until the master was finished. Now if the master had completed his meal, he would rise from the table, wipe his fingers, his mouth, and clean his beard, and would wad up the napkin and toss it onto the table. The servant would then know to clear the table. In John’s time, the wadded napkin meant, “I’m done”. But if the master got up from the table, folded his napkin, and laid it beside his plate, the servant knew that the folded napkin meant, “I’m not finished. I’m coming back!”
Peter immediately recognized what Jesus’ message meant. He was telling His disciples, “I’m not done yet, I’m coming back.” Peter must have responded in a way that got John’s attention. Now he entered the tomb and saw what he had overlooked. This time the word ‘saw’ means; to look with understanding and grasps, what you see. Jesus hadn’t wadded up the napkin and thrown it aside but folded and laid it by itself. This was the evidence John needed. When he saw this, he believed.
When the Jewish elders learned of the empty tomb, they paid a large sum of money to the soldiers to say, ‘His disciples came by night and stole Him away while we were asleep.’ (Mat 28:13). Skeptics still put forth this argument that someone stole Jesus’ body. Note other lessons that refute this. Why would a thief have taken the time to unwrap Jesus from the linen cloth? But also remember, He was bound or wrapped literally enclosed in the linen. Peter and John saw a piece of still wrapped linen cloth with no body inside. If the spices had hardened, the wrap would have looked like an empty cocoon. Why would a thief have folded the napkin? This was a Hebrew custom.
Yesterday, church attendance was greater than any Sunday of the year except for Christmas. How many only saw a brief glimpse rather than seeing and understanding the message? Believers can often be disappointed in their Christian journey when they don’t see the whole picture. We can take a mere glimpse in our troubles and despair and miss the message Jesus has for us. Take another look. For John – it was a folded napkin. Your message may be different, but it will bring new hope.
Sustaining Word for the Week: The answer you have been searching for is there, you just haven’t seen it yet. Look again.