Jesus went to the temple and started to drive out the money lenders and merchants who were profiting off others in the courtyard. Judas started acting a bit cagey. Jesus' stories and teachings got even more long winded, like he was in a rush for some reason. Then Jesus gets taken by a mob that Judas led to them in the garden. Peter followed them for a time, but he ran off when he got worried they would take him too. Jesus was taken first to the chief priests and then handed over to the governor and accused of sedition. Beaten, he was bound to a tree to die.
And then he did.
He died. The women were there. They couldn't stay away. But his male followers? In their fear of being next, they stayed away. They went into hiding.
All of their plans for a free Israel, all their dreams of a new reality, all their hopes for a better future? Gone.
The One whom they followed, the One in whom they had placed their love and their trust, the One they had come to know as a true prophet of the God Most High?
Executed by the Roman occupiers.
Handed over by the chief priests.
Betrayed by one of their own.
And then Sunday comes.
Jesus had tried to help them understand what was coming. Sure, he spoke in metaphors and parables, but so what if he had spoken plainly? Who would have believed him? For that matter, if he had clearly stated that going to Jerusalem would lead to his death as a criminal of the Empire, do you think they would have let him go there much less gone with him? We still can't quite comprehend the Resurrection now; there was no way the disciples were going to understand.
More likely they would have been much more like Leia arguing with Luke on Endor. Just as she urged him not to turn himself over to Vader, to leave this place and run faraway, I imagine the disciples would have said much the same if they knew what was coming. But just as Luke placed his trust in the man who had been his father still having a spark of good within, Jesus placed his faith in the one he called Father to bring him safely to the other side.
Just as the women followed even to the cross, the women remain faithful even after death. On Friday, Jesus' body had been whisked away before the start of the Sabbath. There had been no time to prepare the body for burial. It had been wrapped only in simple cloths and laid in a new tomb. So, early on Sunday, the women showed up at the tomb to perform the remaining preparations. This would likely have included the appropriate burial materials as well as perhaps cleansing the body and preforming certain rituals.
Knowing that a large stone had been rolled across the entrance, the women wonder how they are going to move it. Perhaps they thought together they might move it or perhaps they hoped others would be meeting them there. What they were not prepared for was the stone to already be removed from the entrance. They had seen the tomb sealed. How is it now unsealed? Are other followers already here? Have the Romans come for some reason? Have the priests opened the tomb so that wild animals can drag the body away?
I doubt the idea of Resurrection ever entered their minds as a possibility. Perhaps some ran off in fear. But not the beloved disciple, Mary Magdalene. She peers inside, sees there is no body. The other disciples must know. She runs off to tell Peter. He is afraid, but if someone has desecrated the body, he is ready to fight. He is ashamed of his actions of the last few days, of his own fear.
The folded cloths in the empty tomb are confusing. Surely if the Romans or the priests had done something to the body, they wouldn't have left the cloths behind, much less folded them. No, this is something else. What was it Jesus was saying just the other day? He wanders away confused.
But Mary remains near the tomb crying. Her beloved teacher is gone and now she cannot even properly say goodbye. She hears someone and looks up through tear-stained eyes. "Where have you taken him?"
"Mary."
She didn't recognize him in her state. Why would she? She was not expecting to see him. Her grief and her tears kept her from seeing, from hearing his initial question.
But she knows the way he has always said her name.
She goes to him and embraces him, still not clear how any of this can be, only that it is her Jesus here before her, alive.
"We saw you die. I thought I would never be able to see you or hold you again."
"Uh, April Fool's!"
"What?"
"Oh, nevermind. I need you to go tell the others. Tell them I will see them soon."
"Why me?"
"Please, Mary. There is so much to do and if you don't let me go, I may not be able to. Do you think you can get the word to the others?"
"Tell the others? You're alive! If you want I can fly."
He watches Mary leave. It is so tempting to call her back, to find a place the two of them can live out their remaining days in peace. Instead, not his will but God's be done.
He turns back to continue walking through the garden, singing as he goes...
(Image downloaded from Unvirtuous Abbey on Facebook)