The Missing Body

Tomorrow we celebrate the greatest event in human history: the resurrection of Jesus Christ.  Everything Jesus said, did, and claimed rested on whether his claim that he would rise from the dead in three days actually happened.  There are many arguments that help validate the truth of the resurrection, but one has to do with what was contained in the tomb in which he was buried.  Each of the gospels gives a little different perspective on what happened that first Easter.  I like John’s gospel because he is reporting first hand information.  His letter is autobiographical.  John writes that the first person to arrive at the tomb that Sunday morning was Mary Magdalene.  When she saw the stone sealing the tomb had been moved, she ran back to where John and Peter were staying and told them someone had removed the body of Jesus.  John and Peter ran to the tomb.  John was younger and arrived first, but respectfully waited for the older Peter to arrive.  They entered the tomb.  When people speak of the resurrection you will often hear them make reference to the “empty tomb.”  That is an inaccurate statement.  The tomb was not empty.  The graveclothes that Jesus was buried in were empty!  John is also the one who wrote that it was Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea who prepared the body of Jesus for burial.  He tells us that the mixture of myrrh and aloes that were applied between the strips of linen that were wrapped around the body weighed about seventy-five pounds.  I have been told that the substance mixed together had a gummy consistency to keep the linen strips in place.  As those substances dried they would have hardened, creating an almost cocoon-like covering of the body.  Imagine what John and Peter might have seen that morning.  The tomb was not empty.  The graveclothes were empty!  John says, “He saw and believed.”  Imagine a cocoon-like shell lying on the burial shelf without a body in it!  No wonder “he believed!”  If you would like to know more about the resurrection of Jesus, and all the elements surrounding it, I am including a link to a teaching I gave on the resurrection.  Consider it an Easter gift!  He is risen!