Matthew 28:1-10

Matthew 28:1-10

It is interesting that the account of the resurrection is so brief. In fact, the moment of the resurrection is not mentioned at all. By the time chapter 28 begins the resurrection has already occurred. It might seem a bit odd that the post-resurrection history is so short. Matthew spends 140 verses on the Lord’s Supper, passion and execution. Before that he took 228 verses on the last week of public ministry and in teaching the disciples. But he only spent 20 verses on the post resurrection- 40 days and only 20 verses. That is hardly the way we would report an event today. Our human curiosity would be asking, “What was it like to be dead?” “Who did you see?” “What was it like to come to life again?”

But the Holy Spirit inspired Matthew to pursue a different track. He pursues two very simple themes. First is that the tomb is empty. The stone was removed from the tomb entrance not to let Jesus out, but to let us in. He who has just defeated death didn’t need help getting out of the tomb. Interestingly, for at least the last part of their watch the guards were guarding a vacant tomb. The romanticized pictures we have of Jesus walking out of the tomb on Easter morning is not supported by the statement of Scripture. The stone rolled away to show what had already happened. The massive stone was tossed to one side, the glorious angel, and the fainting guards were all about an empty tomb-no one was there. We are not told where Jesus was at that moment. For the unbeliever, skeptic, or the agnostic there is the empty tomb that must be dealt with. Either it was empty for supernatural reasons or for natural ones. The natural reasons are simply too unbelievable.

The second theme is the resurrected Lord. The post resurrection accounts of Jesus vary widely, but that should not surprise us. This is the first time anything like this has ever happened and it might take a little getting used to. After the women left the tomb Jesus met them and greeted them. That greeting was a typical greeting. It was so casual, so ordinary. We might expect “zing”, more “wow”, more “sha-bam”. But Jesus simply walks up and says, “Hello.” There is something special about that casualness. For the believer this resurrected Christ greets people with a casual hello. He is acting as if the resurrected life is the new normal and it is. While there is a “not yet” aspect of the resurrection life there is an aspect in which the new normal for us is the resurrection. There are many implications for that which we haven’t grasped yet, but all the same, “Welcome to the new normal.”

"Lord, thank You for and help me to live this new normal this resurrection life. AMEN"