The Invitation - Day 43

But very early on Sunday morning the women went to the tomb, taking the spices they had prepared. 2 They found that the stone had been rolled away from the entrance.

“If one refuses to believe in the possibility of miraculous occurrences altogether, the resurrection will seem an absurdity. But large numbers of ‘modern, scientific’ people recognize that science itself is merely descriptive rather than prescriptive. If a God exists, it is only natural to expect him to have powers beyond that which science has discovered or can explain and to be able to use them for his purposes. It is arguable that of all the alleged miracles in ancient history, the resurrection is actually the one with far and away the most historical support.” –Craig L. Blomberg

This quote makes us understand that what we discuss is essential and outside what we see as usual. However, it also helps us to recognize that if we are to believe in a God as we have been studying, the idea that this God can move outside of natural law shouldn’t surprise us. Not only shouldn’t it surprise us, but we should be expecting this from a God full of compassion and power for his people.

We enter into the text with the women wanting to go and prepare the body for burial. Because of the proximity to Sabbath when Jesus died, they were unable to prepare the body properly. At the earliest moment, they went to the tomb to do what needed to be done. However, the stone had been rolled away from the entrance when they arrived.

Other accounts seem to have a more detailed rendering of this story, but Luke’s account is brief. There are not a lot of details, but the story gets across. As Luke spoke to eyewitnesses, he did not elaborate as much as some of the other Gospels. But we do get the point. This is a foreshadowing that something unexpected is going to happen.

Have you ever come to your car and realized something is wrong? My son had his car broken into a few months ago, and he said that when he walked up to the car, he knew something was wrong, but he just wasn’t sure what it was. As he walked around the car, there was a sense of transgression, of something not being right and someone had been where they shouldn’t be. They had broken out a window and stolen his backpack. The most valuable thing they stole was his homework, but he still felt violated.

Perhaps this was the feeling of the women as they approached the tomb. That something was amiss, something was wrong, but they couldn’t know until they walked in.

Have you ever felt like there was something amiss in your life? Like there was something that was supposed to be there that was missing? Did you expect to find God somewhere, but God never showed up? Or maybe you didn’t show up?

We often wonder why things are wrong and not how they are supposed to be. In his book Pensees VII(425), Blaise Pascal said this: “What else does this craving, and this helplessness, proclaim but that there was once in man a true happiness, of which all that now remains is the empty print and trace? This he tries in vain to fill with everything around him, seeking in things that are not there the help he cannot find in those that are, though none can help, since this infinite abyss can be filled only with an infinite and immutable object; in other words by God himself.”

Perhaps this is what you have felt, and maybe the recognition of this God-shaped hole is the recognition of an empty tomb.

1. Have you ever felt as if your life were not quite complete? 
2. Do you think the women were concerned as they approached the tomb? 
3. What have you tried to fill the God-shaped hole in your life with?