“He has Risen; He is not here.”

“And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb. And they were saying to one another, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance of the tomb?” And looking up, they saw that the stone had been rolled back—it was very large. And entering the tomb, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, dressed in a white robe, and they were alarmed. And he said to them, “Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen; he is not here. See the place where they laid him.”  (Mark 16:2-6 ESV)

As emotionally devastating as Chapter 15 was, where we learned the details of the mock trials of Jesus, that he endured the outpouring of the Jewish leader’s hatred for Him, as the Roman soldiers abused their “prisoner,” all without speaking a word in His own defense, just as the prophets foretold, we read the last words that Jesus spoke on the cross before He died, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”, we remembered that it was for the sins that we had committed that the Holy Righteous God, the Father had to separate Himself from our sins. We remember that “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” (2 Cor. 5:21).

Jesus became our sin on the cross, so of course God had to separate Himself from our sin. Jesus loved us enough to go through all that for us. We continue to read that they took Jesus’ dead body down from that cross of shame and placed Him in the tomb. If the narrative stopped here, the world would have been lost, and we who believe in Jesus would be most miserable, as the Apostle Paul states in 1 Cor.15:19-20, “If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied. But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead…”.

But thanks to our heavenly Father, we have Chapter 16, which completes the redemptive story. You see, Jesus dying on the cross was only part of God’s plan of salvation; without the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, we would only have a religious leader, like all the other religious leaders from the beginning of time, who would still be dead. But Jesus is alive; He conquered death and the grave, showing the world that what He said was indeed true. Hallelujah, we have a risen Savior.

When the women went to the tomb the first day of the week, our Sunday, they were devastated. Jesus, whom they loved, was “murdered”, hung on a cross, and bled and died right before their eyes three days ago. I’m sure each of them was asking, “How could this have happened?” They knew Jesus; they knew His power over this world; they knew that with just one word, Jesus could have called legions of angels to come and defend Him. But they forgot what Jesus told them many times, they forgot what the prophets of old had foretold about a Messiah who would take upon Himself the sins of the world, He would suffer and die, and He would be raised alive on the third day.

This Sunday morning was that glorious day. I can’t blame his followers for their despair; I would have been right there with them. Now, from this side of the cross, I can see how Jesus fulfilled over 300 prophecies about his birth, life, death, and resurrection; the eyes of my understanding are not clouded by grief and tears like theirs were.

But everything was about to change for them, now when they finally made it to the tomb, or what I call “The Walk of Heartache”, “they saw a young man sitting on the right side, dressed in a white robe, and they were alarmed. And he said to them, “Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen; he is not here.” Can you imagine what they felt? How their hearts leaped in their chests, how they replayed those words over again and again: “He has risen; he is not here.”

Friends, we all need to come to terms with this announcement: “He has risen; he is not here.” If indeed Jesus has risen, and I affirm to you that He has, each one of us has to ask ourselves, How can this be? The only reasonable answer that we can come to is that this Jesus that was crucified, died, was buried, and is now raised from the dead is who Jesus said He was, “the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” My friend, if you are reading this devotional today, it is not by accident. God is speaking to your heart, to trust His Son who died in your place. God is offering you salvation for eternity if you will change your mind about how you can earn God’s love and accept the gift of salvation that He is offering you.

Believer, we can rejoice that we have Chapter 16 of Mark’s Gospel, because our Savior lives and has conquered death and sin for us.

"Living in Grace is not about what I can do, but about what Jesus has already done!"