Anchor My Faith

Previous Lesson
Next Lesson
Author: Stephen Weller
635 words, 3 minutes read time

Two Men and A Missing Body

Scripture: Mark 16:4-5; Luke 24:3-5; John 20:1-2

We ended the previous lesson with the angel of the Lord sitting on the stone he rolled away from the entrance of the tomb with the Roman guard acting like dead men because of overpowering fear. In this lesson the women who were approaching the tomb were apparently not aware that the angel of the Lord had been there.  

^{Jn 20:1} [The women] came to the tomb [and looking at] ^{Mk 16:4} the very large ^{Jn 20:1} stone [noticed that it] had been taken away from the [entrance of the] tomb. ^{Lk 24:3} When they went in they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus.

In the harmonization process the name Mary Magdalene was replaced with “the women” to reflect what was being reported by the other gospel writers. When [they] arrived at the area of the tomb nothing is said about seeing the angel sitting on the stone or the Roman guard. As I think about this I am inclined to believe that before the women arrived, the angel had left along with the Roman guard. The angel will soon be replaced with two men and Jesus and the Roman guard probably went to report what had happened and plead for their lives for not protecting the tomb. So, at this point in time, the women find the stone rolled away and the body of Jesus missing.  

^{Jn 20:2} So [Mary Magdalene] ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.”

John speaks of only Mary Magdalene but that does say that the other two were not there. Assume that Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome were there. When they saw the tomb open and the body of Jesus missing, Mary Magdalene leaves Mary the mother of James and Salome at the tomb and she runs to find Peter and John, the disciple whom Jesus loved, and when she finds them she tells them that the body of Jesus is missing from the tomb and she didn’t know where it now was.

^{Lk 24:4} [Meanwhile, the women remaining in the tomb] were perplexed about this, [suddenly] two men stood by them in dazzling apparel, ^{Mk 16:5} and they saw a young man sitting on the right side, dressed in a white robe. ^{Lk 24:5} [The women] were frightened and bowed their faces to the ground.

The focus now shifts back to the tomb where we find Mary the mother of James and Salome wondering what might have happened to the body of Jesus. As they talked about this two men suddenly appeared by them clothed in dazzling apparel and they also saw another young man sitting on the right side, dressed in a white robe. Try to imagine how these women might have felt as this was occurring. Their response was fear, but unlike the Roman guard, they didn’t fall down as dead but instead they bowed their faces to the ground in reverence.

Conclusion

By the time the three women arrive at the tomb the angel and the guard were gone. When the women find the tomb open and the body of Jesus missing, Mary Magdalene runs to tell Peter and John, but the other two women stay at the tomb. Soon two men in dazzling apparel show up and stand beside them along with another young man dressed in a white robe sitting to the right. As they bow down before the two men in great fear, we wonder what is going to happen next.