Resurrection Reality; John 20:1-9

John 20:30 ^NASB “Therefore many other signs Jesus also performed in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; [31] but these have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing you may have life in His name.” This is John’s overall purpose for writing this Gospel. The sign that he is talking about here, the eighth, is the sign of the resurrection. The context of verse 30, as we will see later, is that Jesus has made a statement to Thomas who has not accepted the resurrection until this particular point until he had a little empirical data on which to base his faith. When the evidence is given Jesus said to Thomas, v. 29: “Because you have seen Me, have you believed? Blessed {are} they who did not see, and {yet} believed.” So one of the major themes in this entire Gospel that we have seen is the emphasis on faith. Over and over again John drives home the point that our relationship with God is based on faith alone in Christ alone. What we realise is that one of the most misunderstood doctrines of the Scripture is faith. It is tremendously distorted and a controversy that has been engaged in by seminaries, by theologians and pasters for the past 25-30 years in evangelicals—the Lordship-free grace debate. We will focus on that because as we come to the end of John, John returns our focus to this theme of faith and it is most clearly expressed at the opening ten verses of the 20^th chapter, the great sign of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

John Locke, the famous 18^th century philosopher, once wrote: “Our Saviour’s resurrection is truly of great importance in Christianity, so great that His being or not being the Messiah stands or falls with it; so that these two important articles are inseparable and in effect make one. For since that time you believe one and you believe both; deny one of them and you can believe neither.”

Locke in that quote emphasises the fact that Jesus or not being the Messiah stands or falls with the resurrection. Messiah means the anointed one or appointed one, and it is translated into Greek, christos [Xristoj], and that is what John is demonstrating in this Gospel, that we might believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the anointed one of God. That is his thesis statement for the Gospel; overriding everything is that thesis statement. There is a sub-theme and that has to do with the Christian life. When Locke makes his affirmation that the gospel stands or falls with the resurrection he is simply echoing what the apostle Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:12-14 ^NASB “Now if Christ is preached, that He has been raised from the dead, how do some among you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, not even Christ has been raised; and if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is vain, your faith also is vain. Moreover we are even found {to be} false witnesses of God, because we testified against God that He raised Christ, whom He did not raise, if in fact the dead are not raised.” As Locke observes this is so inseparable to the essence of the gospel that in effect it makes belief in Christ as Messiah tantamount to belief in the resurrection and belief in the resurrection tantamount to belief in Christ as Messiah.

That is why Paul ties these together as the essence of the gospel. 1 Corinthians 15:3 ^NASB “For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, [4] and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures.”

Satan attacks through vocabulary and there is an assault on the meaning of faith today. It is the object of faith that saves, it is not faith that saves.

John 20:1 ^NASB “Now on the first {day} of the week Mary Magdalene came early to the tomb, while it was still dark, and saw the stone {already} taken away from the tomb. [2] So she ran and came to Simon Peter and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and said to them, ‘They have taken away the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid Him’.”

What we have been doing, especially during the trials and the crucifixion, is trying to relate John’s account to the Synoptic accounts and giving a full picture of what went on during these important days. None of the Gospels give us all of the information. They are not writing history, they are writing Gospels; and a Gospel is a treatise designed to convince the reader that, as John states, Jesus is the Christ the Son of God. Matthew was trying to show that Jesus is the messianic, Davidic King. For Luke, he was showing that he is the divine one; he was writing to a Gentile. Mark is writing Peter’s account and has a different theme. So each is a little different and they pick and choose from the life of Christ that relate to the development of their argument. So they each leave out information and contain unique information and we need to combine them and harmonise them to see what was going on.

Matthew gives a little more detail here. Matthew 28:1 ^NASB “Now after the Sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first {day} of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to look at the grave.” We know that there were other women along with them, a group of three or four. This is not a statement of their arrival as much as it is a statement of their goal and procedure. [2] “And behold, a severe earthquake had occurred, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled away the stone and sat upon it. [3] And his appearance was like lightning, and his clothing as white as snow. [4] The guards shook for fear of him and became like dead men.” The guards ran off and told the temple authorities, not Pilate. Then the angel answers when the women come. [5] “…“Do not be afraid; for I know that you are looking for Jesus who has been crucified. [6] He is not here, for He has risen, just as He said. Come, see the place where He was lying.” Jesus continually prophesied His resurrection, this wasn’t some accident that occurred but something that was planned for and announced ahead of time. [7] “Go quickly and tell His disciples that He has risen from the dead; and behold, He is going ahead of you into Galilee, there you will see Him; behold, I have told you. [8] And they left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy and ran to report it to His disciples.”

That is a slightly different scenario than we have in John 20. John just tells us that it was Mary Magdalene who leads out the other women. That doesn’t mean they weren’t there for Him, it just means that isn’t the point John is talking about. The presence of the angel is not an issue for him so he doesn’t discuss it. So she ran and came to Simon Peter.

1. Somewhere in the early hours of that Sunday morning there is a violent earthquake which shakes the earth and then the angels roll back the stone and Jesus is resurrected. The stone itself is a remarkable factor here. Matthew 28:2-4.

2. The women leave from Bethany which is about a two-mile walk, and they are on the way to the tomb in order to finish the preparation of the body and putting spices on the body. They do not expect at all that Jesus has risen from the dead. On the way, we learn from Luke, they are concerned about the fact that they might not be able to complete their mission because of this enormous stone that has bee rolled in front of the tomb, which was standard procedure to protect the body from either grave robbers or from wild animals that might get in there. While they are talking Mary runs ahead and is the first one to get there.

3. She arrives first and sees the stone rolled away and the angel there, and she discovers that Jesus has risen from the dead, so she turns and heads off to inform the disciples. She goes in another way from where the ladies are coming because they are coming from Bethany and she is headed to Jerusalem.

4. While she in on her way to tell the disciples the other women arrive from Bethany and see two angels. One is mentioned in Matthew but there are two. One is the spokesman and gives them an urgent message to the disciples (Matthew 28:5).

5. So then on an emotional high and not knowing what to expect and overwhelmed by the events of the morning they head off to report to the disciples. In the meantime Mary has already reported to Peter and John, and they run as fast as they can to the tomb. John arrives first. When we get to the text the verbs are very important to understand some doctrinal principles.

6. John just looks in the tomb. The Greek word is blepo [blepw] which indicates a glance or a quick look. By this time Peter has caught up with him and Peter pushes his way into the tomb and just stares at the empty grave clothes. The Greek shifts from blepo to theoreo [qewrew] which means to gaze or stare. He can’t comprehend it. He is stunned mentally, stops thinking, and is in a state of shock.

7. John comes in behind him and looks from oida [o)ida] and at this point he sees the entire thing and begins to put things together, understands the significance of the resurrection and believes. Then they leave.

8. Mary comes back and at this point sees the two angels there, has a dialogue with them and then leaves and sees Jesus. He reminds her again: Tell the disciples—all of them—to go on to Galilee and He will meet them there.

That is the basic structure of the events of that morning, but John wants to focus on some aspect to this related to his purpose for writing the Gospel, as per 20:31. So John is going to come at this from the perspective of emphasising the faith of the disciples in the context of the resurrection, the eighth and greatest sign.

The death and burial of Jesus Christ has been called into question by those who wish to attack the resurrection because the opponents of Christianity throughout history recognise, as Paul stated, that it is the resurrection that is the lynch pin, the corner stone on which the entire Christian faith rests. If you can destroy the resurrection then you can destroy Christianity. It has never been accomplished, in fact there has been numerous people in history who have set out to disprove the resurrection and Christianity only to wind up writing some of the greatest books in defence of Christianity because in the process they came to realise that the Scripture is true and that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God.

Evidence

1. We know He was buried in a garden tomb, a place that has clear space-time reality, it is not just being thrown in a grave with a bunch of other criminals, this doesn’t say that He was buried or that He is removed somewhere. John locates it at the time it was written it was a place that was known to people in Jerusalem. In other words, the evidence is presented, He was buried in a garden tomb which was owned by Joseph of Arimathea. The grave was empty. They couldn’t get away with those kinds of claims at that time if there was still a body in the grave.

2. There is contingent of guards that is requested by the Jewish leaders, and these are not temple guards, they are a contingent of Roman guards. That means that they were under death penalty if they fell asleep on watch or if they let the body get stolen.

3. The stone that is rolled in front of the tomb is enormous. But we know from a gloss in the margin of Codex Beza which dates to the fourth century that twenty men could not roll this stone away. It was enormous. Codex Beza is a copy of an earlier manuscript. The manuscript the copyist was copying from was probably dated back into the second century or even earlier, very close to an original manuscript, so it is a very old testimony about the size of the stone. There are other lines of evidenced that would suggest that it probably weighed several tons.

4. There was another factor, and that is that since they had called upon the guard they would have sealed the tomb. On the seal they would place the seal of the emperor of Rome, so that to break the seal was a crime against the emperor. That would carry the death penalty as well.

When Peter and John came to the tomb the strips of cloth had collapsed flat and were lying on the ground with a space between the cloths covering the body and the face cloth, just as if the body dematerialised and the material collapsed flat upon the ground.

John 20:3 ^NASB “So Peter and the other disciple went forth, and they were going to the tomb. [4] The two were running together; and the other disciple ran ahead faster than Peter and came to the tomb first; [5] and stooping and looking in, he saw [blepw] the linen wrappings lying {there;} but he did not go in.” If the body was stolen the linen wrappings would be gone. [6] “And so Simon Peter also came, following him, and entered the tomb; and he saw [qewrew] the linen wrappings lying {there,} [7] and the face-cloth which had been on His head, not lying with the linen wrappings, but rolled up in a place by itself.” Notice the detail here. Only an eye-witness would write these things. [8] So the other disciple who had first come to the tomb then also entered, and he saw and believed.” What is it that he is believing? Is this salvation? Of course not. The object of faith now is the resurrection, that is what is at issue here. He sees, and this is a different word in the Greek here, the word eidon [e)idon] which aorist active indicative and is related to the noun oida [o)ida], to know. So it is perception; it is a broad perception. So when he looks at this everything starts coming together for him. He understands that Christ predicted His resurrection, and he now understands that this is that resurrection. Matthew 12:38-40 ^NASB “Then some of the scribes and Pharisees said to Him, ‘Teacher, we want to see a sign from You.’ But He answered and said to them, ‘An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign; and {yet} no sign will be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet; for just as JONAH WAS THREE DAYS AND THREE NIGHTS IN THE BELLY OF THE SEA MONSTER, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth’.” Matthew 16:21 ^NASB “From that time Jesus began to show His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised up on the third day.” Matthew 17:9 ^NASB “As they were coming down from the mountain, Jesus commanded them, saying, ‘Tell the vision to no one until the Son of Man has risen from the dead’…. [22] And while they were gathering together in Galilee, Jesus said to them, ‘The Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men; [23] and they will kill Him, and He will be raised on the third day.’ And they were deeply grieved…. [20:18] Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem; and the Son of Man will be delivered to the chief priests and scribes, and they will condemn Him to death, [19] and will hand Him over to the Gentiles to mock and scourge and crucify {Him,} and on the third day He will be raised up…. [26:32] But after I have been raised, I will go ahead of you to Galilee.”

The point is that Jesus again and again and again notified the disciples that he was going to go to Jerusalem, He was going to die, He was going to be raised from the dead, and all of a sudden it becomes clear to John—but not fully. He believed a proposition, and that is that Jesus rose from the dead. John 20:9 ^NASB “For as yet they did not understand the Scripture, that He must rise again from the dead.” The passages quoted above weren’t written yet. He understood what Jesus had told him but he doesn’t have an understanding of the Old Testament Scriptures on this yet. That is why when Jesus walked with the disciples on the road to Emaus he goes through the Old Testament Scriptures from A to Z demonstrating that the Messiah had to come and suffer and die and be resurrected. The word in verse 9 here, that they did not understand the Scripture, is also our word oida and one meaning for oida in the Greek is that you don’t recall something. He did not recall the Scripture which said that Jesus must rise from the dead. He recognises that Jesus has risen from the dead but he hasn’t assimilated everything yet.