I have seen the Lord

From Helen

There are some names in life that we hear and have an immediate response. For example if I said Eddie the Eagle, the Queen, Vladimir Putin, the Prime Minister, Sam Warburton, Lily Savage, Mary Magdalene…

We all have views of people that are sometimes based on personal experience of meeting them, sometimes on news articles or other people’s stories. We all have a view of different people. Today in the Church we are celebrating a person who is infamous and that person is Mary Magdalene.

Over the years lots of different stories have been made up about Mary. They all paint her in a very bad light.  There is one story that she was a bit of a scarlet woman and so was portrayed as a red head .. I personally find this a bit offensive !! All we know for sure about Mary Magdalene is that she was a follower of Jesus. 

In our gospel reading (John 20:11-18) this morning we heard what is one of the most important points about Mary Magdalene and that is that she had an amazing encounter with the Risen Jesus that made her run and tell people find that she had seen the Lord. 

There is always one part of this amazing encounter that bothers me. In the story Mary was so upset that she didn’t realise who Jesus was. Now we may think, how silly it’s her friend ,how come she didn’t recognise Him. To be fair for Mary to see Jesus resurrected was rather unexpected ! She didn’t recognise Him until He called Her name and then she knew who it was. 

The bit that always bothers me though is that Mary, rather naturally, wanted to hold on to Jesus to keep Him where He was. I can understand the need to hug people, you may have noticed this, but for Mary she must have been desperate to hold on to Jesus, the unbelievable had happened, her Lord was alive and He was right in front of her. But Jesus told her not to hold on … of course this was so that she could go and share the news that she had seen Jesus as quickly as possible. 

Can you imagine ? It must have been a mix of shock, relief and an overwhelming surge of love wrapped into one moment that ended with Jesus sending Mary to tell the others. 

I really like the T.V. series Friends. In one episode there is a man who turns out to be annoying because he is too happy and positive. Whenever he is enjoying himself he takes a mental picture by going ‘snap’ so he never forgets the moment. 

We have all been in situations that we don’t want to ever end because they are so perfect. It must have been the same for Mary. Jesus though told her not to hold on to Him. Jesus could see that the news that He had returned was so important that Mary needed to tell the disciples so that they too could rejoice. 

Mary had seen Jesus and been surprised and now she was to go and do something so exciting, which was to go and tell the others that amazing news, that she had seen the Lord. The disciples knew that Jesus had risen but Mary was the one who went and broke the news, “I have seen the Lord.” 

The first person to see Jesus alive was a woman. This is great news for us women obviously but men, so you don’t feel left out, it is great news for all of us. 

By Jesus picking Mary we are reminded that Jesus picked and still does pick the most unlikely of people to spread the news about Him. The disciples weren’t highly trained theologians,they were people who had met the Lord. Jesus picked Mary to tell the great news that not only was Jesus alive but she had seen Him. 

This is so important for all of us, we are called to share the good news that we know Jesus and we have seen Him. I said a couple of weeks ago that I wanted us to try some new things as we reach out to the people around us. The first is a little bit of a challenger, how comfortable would we feel saying to someone else that we know Jesus and pray to Him ? Would we have the bravery and excitement to do this? I want us to pray daily the growth prayer that has been given out and then to pray for ourselves that we will use every opportunity that God gives us to proclaim, (not in a shouty way) that we have seen the Lord and He makes a difference in our lives.

Back to Mary and Jesus. I said that at the moment for Mary she must have felt the most incredible feeling of shock, amazement and excitement and there must have been an overwhelming surge of love. 

Mary wanted to hold on to Jesus because she loved Him. We all have those moments when we are overwhelmed by love. I don’t mean the birds are singing and everything is perfect kind of way, I mean the type of moment when we know we are loved. Mary loved Jesus and she knew in this moment that she was loved. She recognised His voice and that’s how she knew it was Him. Mary knew the voice of Jesus and she knew Him in her life.

For us we know Jesus and we know His work in our lives and in the lives of those around us. 

I love Liverpool, in Liverpool Cathedral it was decided that they wanted a new piece of art. They approached Tracey Emin, who was rather notorious for her artwork pieces such as the unmade bed which literally was an unmade bed but it was decided to approach her.

When her artwork for the Cathedral was seen it was quite amazing. It is a part I have grown to love when I visit.  She created a sign in pink light up letters that say, 

“I felt you and I knew you loved me”. 

We have felt Jesus and we know He loves us. This is the most amazing thought ever. We like Mary have seen the Lord because we have felt Him in our lives and we know that He loves us. 

May we be ready to share that incredible news with all those that we meet. AMEN