A Memorable Resurrection Sermon
James Ritchey
There can be no question that among the most beloved passages in the Gospel accounts is John 20. One of my closest friends says that every year when it is read at Easter during public worship, he cannot make it through without tears coming to his eyes. While every account of the resurrection is inspired Scripture and therefore demands our attention and has much to teach us, this one has become perhaps the most loved and the most widely and commonly read. The reason for that is not difficult to see–in it, we see Christ’s compassion so clearly. We see Christ’s compassion to His own disciples who had fallen into unbelief, and indeed with Thomas, whose doubt is highlighted. And yet our Lord meets them in and with His grace, even inviting Thomas to see His hands and to place his hand in His pierced side. The Lord brings His disciples along in mercy and in compassion. But we cannot overlook the special compassion that Christ shows to Mary Magdalene. We know that Mary especially loved and worshipped Jesus, and we know of how Christ had delivered her and brought her to faith in Himself. Geerhardus Vos, in what may be one of the best sermons on the resurrection, a sermon titled, “Rabboni!,”1 speaks to the tension that existed in Mary with her love to and faith in Jesus but also her grief stricken state in which she was confused, and even she too, faced doubt and unbelief. I have never heard or read a sermon on this passage that has highlighted Christ’s mercy, sympathy and grace quite so beautifully as Vos does. Mary, in her interaction with the angels in the tomb, had told them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” (v. 13). Vos writes that:
Having given this answer to the angels she turned herself backward and beheld Jesus standing, and knew not that it was Jesus. No explanation is added of the cause of this movement. It matters little. Our interest at this stage of the narrative belongs not to what Mary but to what Jesus did. On his part the encounter was surely not accidental but intended. He had witnessed her coming once and again, her weeping, her bending over the tomb, her answer to the angels, and had witnessed not only these outward acts, but also the inward conflict by which her soul was torn. And He appears precisely at the point where his presence is required, because all other voices for conveying to her the gladsome tidings have failed. He had been holding Himself in readiness to become in his own Person the preacher of the Gospel of life and hope to Mary. There is great comfort for us in this thought that, however dim our conscious faith and the sense of our salvation, on the Lord’s side the fountain of grace is never closed, its connection with our souls never interrupted; provided there be the irrepressible demand for his presence, He cannot, He will not deny Himself to us. The first person to whom He showed Himself alive after the resurrection was a weeping woman, who had no greater claim upon Him than any simple penitent sinner has. No eye except that of the angels had as yet rested upon His form. The time was as solemn and majestic as that of the first creation when light burst out of chaos and darkness. Heaven and earth were concerned in this event; it was the turning-point of the ages. Nor was this merely objectively so: Jesus felt Himself the central figure in this new-born universe, He tasted the exquisite joy of one who had just entered upon an endless life in the possession of new powers and faculties such as human nature had never known before. Would it have been unnatural, had He sought some quiet place to spend the opening hour of this new unexplored state in communion with the Father? Can there be any room in his mind for the humble ministry of consolation required by Mary? He answers these questions Himself. Among all the voices that hailed his triumph no voice appealed to Him like this voice of weeping in the garden. The first appearance of the risen Lord was given to Mary for no other reason than that she needed Him first and needed Him most. And what more appropriate beginning could have been set for his ministry of glory than this very act? Nothing could better convince us, that in his exalted state He retains for us the same tender sympathy, the same individual affection as He showed during the days of his flesh.2
There is a reason this sermon from Vos continues to come to mind every Easter. I would
commend it, and I hope it will be an encouragement to you. This Easter, and indeed, each and
every Lord’s Day, let us be drawn to the Risen and Ascended Lord who still treats us, His people,
with mercy and kindness and grace and compassion.
Geerhardus Vos, Grace and Glory: Sermons Preached at Princeton Seminary (The Banner of Truth Trust,
2020), 71-85.
Ibid., 79-81.