Only Mary's Get Him

Resurrection Of Christ

Luke 24:37-43 When the disciples saw Jesus alive in their midst, they were terrified, startled, disbelieved, wondered in amazement. These are not emotions that many Christians can relate to today, because the truth of the resurrection of Christ has been spiritualized. It’s almost like Luke anticipated it and wrote this little account to remind us of the significance of believing a physical, bodily resurrection of Christ from the dead.

If you spiritualize the resurrection of Christ, you will have comfort but not the truth. Only truth can transform and set you free. 

The resurrection message is that Jesus Christ has flesh and bones right now. This changes the way you think, you live, and you feel.

Firstly, it changes your thinking (MIND): 

If Jesus has flesh and bones (v39), the implication is that He is Lord of the living and the dead. What does that mean?

The apostle Paul addressed the philosophers on Mars hill (Areopagus). Among them were the Stoics and the Epicureans. While the Stoics emphasized virtue and virtuous living, the Epicureans emphasized avoidance of pain, and seeking pleasure.  Here’s what the apostle Paul emphasized at the end of his lecture.

Acts 17:30-31 And the times of this ignorance God winked at; but now commandeth all men everywhere to repent: Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead.

The apostle Paul was saying to the philosophers and sceptics ‘your search for truth is over; Jesus Christ is here, in flesh and bones; it’s time for decision.’ Paul attested to the truth that Jesus was raised physically in flesh and bones and is alive forevermore. By contrast, Lazarus was raised to life but eventually died. Elisha raised the widow’s son who eventually died. Jesus is the only One who was raised to life never to die again.

In Jesus’ resurrection, He was not offering mere clues and teachings pointing to life, He is life. “I AM the resurrection and the life” (John 11:25). By virtue of His resurrection, Jesus lives beyond death, disintegration, decay, time, and space. He is not like any other religious leader; He is the Son of God, who broke the bonds of death. Jesus revealed Himself to the apostle John with these words, “I AM He that liveth, and was dead; and behold I am alive for evermore. Amen. And have the keys of hell and of death.” (Revelation 1:18). Jesus was not just resuscitated; He died to rise again; Jesus is the first fruits of them that slept (died) (1 Corinthians 15:20). He is the firstborn of all creation, this new creation that He inaugurated. (Colossians 1:15). Through His resurrection, Jesus is saying, “I AM the life to which all other clues point. If you need to get past death and hell, you must pass through ME. There is no other way.” It is a time of decision, a time of repentance for those who have only spiritualized the resurrection, without understanding that Jesus is alive with flesh and bones now.

In the pluralistic society we live in, those content with pat answers would say something like this, “Oh well, we are all searching for the truth. I have a piece of the truth and so do you. Who knows who has the truth? We are all spiritual seekers in a way. We all mean well, we all know God in a way” The truth of the resurrection will disturb man’s wisdom, causing the world to label believers as fanatics, unreasonable, and rigid with their beliefs. If people hold to this mindset, what they do not realize is that their position is convenient to enable them to live the way they want, without deciding. It is a convenient way to escapist living. They do not realize they are falling into the hands of a God who is also a righteous Judge.

Secondly, it changes the way you live and relate to the world (WILL):

The bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ means that your eternal future has a physical dimension to it. Jesus is not saying that when you die, you will leave this awful world and go to a spiritual vacuum where you will be happy. What He is saying through the resurrection is that this material world is so important to you and to Him. He came into this world to redeem it. Your future is what you see in the resurrected Christ. You are going to have a body, a resurrection body. If you believe in a physical resurrection, you can live without regrets. You will live without the fear of missing out in this life. The resurrection says, “if you unite with Christ, you will miss nothing. Relax, give yourself sacrificially on behalf of others. Let people impose themselves, but you be different. Give your money to bless others. You do not have to work 100-hour weeks, because you are not going to miss anything.”

C.S. Lewis in the Weight of Glory:

“The faint, far-off results of those energies which God’s creative rapture implanted in matter when He made the worlds are what we now call physical pleasures; and even thus filtered, they are too much for our present management. What could it be to taste at the fountainhead that stream of which even these lower reaches prove so intoxicating? Yet that, I believe, is what lies before us.”

The resurrection not only shows us that the resurrection life is physical, but it also shows us that this world is incredibly important to God.

N.T. Wright has written:

“The message of the resurrection is that this world matters! That the injustices and pains of this present world must now be addressed with the news that healing, justice, and love have won. If Easter means Jesus Christ is only raised in a spiritual sense—[then] it is only about me and finding a new dimension in my personal spiritual life. But if Jesus Christ is truly risen from the dead, Christianity becomes good news for the whole world—news which warms our hearts precisely because it isn't just about warming hearts. Easter means that in a world where injustice, violence and degradation are endemic, God is not prepared to tolerate such things—and that we will work and plan, with all the energy of God, to implement victory of Jesus over them all.”

Thirdly, it changes the way you feel (EMOTIONS):

If Jesus has flesh and bones, we can have Him. What does it mean?

In John 20:17 Jesus tells Mary Magdalene “Touch me not” but in Luke 24:39 Jesus invites the disciples to “touch me.” In Matthew 28:9 the women “clasped His feet,” Jesus allowed their touch. What does all this mean, touch me, touch me not?

The gospel writers want us to fall in love with Jesus. This may have been some of our experience. Jesus is an inspiration, an example. Jesus is the hero of all heroes. But when Mary wanted to grab Jesus, she was saying, from Friday night to Sunday “Jesus, you were an inspiring example to me. But now, I want to have you, I want Your Presence with me, I want Your embrace, Your love. It is not enough to just be an inspiring example, but Jesus You are alive in flesh and bones.” In response, Jesus dissuaded Mary from touching Him, because He was ascending to the Father; because of His resurrection, not only Mary, but everyone who believes can have Jesus by faith. “Mary, you can have Me, and so can everyone else. I am not limited to time and space.” Historically, the early Christians even lost the tomb because they had Jesus. They did not feel the need to venerate the tomb or build a shrine and make it a place of pilgrimage. Unfortunately, many Christians have spiritualized the resurrection, they do not have Jesus, and so they venerate the tomb, they attach more importance to the physical reminders than the daily living Presence of Christ within them.

Do you have Jesus Christ the way Mary had Him or as the early Christians did?

If Jesus is just an inspiration, then you do not have Him the way He intends. To have Him, you are going to have to work through the first two points i.e., allow Him to change the way you think, and the way you live and relate to this world. You must be willing to let Jesus be the absolute Lord of your life and allow Him to change your life. You must stop spiritualizing and admit the implications for your life.

Mary Magdalene, whom Jesus had delivered from demonic spirits, was the first one to have Him, because she knew she was a sinner saved by grace. So was the apostle Paul who was deeply aware of the grace of God in his life.

If you do not see yourself as a sinner in need of saving grace, but choose to live self-absorbed, with idols in your life, then you will only see and know Jesus as an inspiring example, not really have Him in your life to experience daily.

Only Mary’s and people who know they are no better than Mary get Him.

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