Eyewitness Accounts
Dearly beloved of God, the Lord Jesus Christ’s resurrection appearances provide us with divine assurance that God did indeed raise His Son out from among the dead. The scriptures supply us with firsthand accounts of chosen eyewitnesses to the most momentous event in history.
The first record occurred, “The first day of the week…when it was yet dark….” Mary saw that the stone was removed from the entrance of the sepulchre.
John 20 records the first witnesses to view the open sepulchre containing the empty mummy lying there in the shape of Jesus’ body.
Mary ran and came to Peter and to the disciple whom Jesus loved. The two men ran to the sepulchre and saw the undeniable proof along with Mary. Three times we are told what they saw.
The grave clothes [othonion] were still intact; they were undisturbed, but there was no longer a body in them.
After the men left, two angels inside the sepulchre told Mary that Jesus was not there; then she turned around and Jesus spoke to Mary in the garden.
Mark 16:9 confirms that Jesus appeared to Mary Magdalene. After Mary had seen and spoken to the Lord she reported what had taken place to the disciples, but they did not believe her.
Mark 16:2 reveals the next event which occurred “very early in the morning the first day of the week…at the rising of the sun.” The women were going to the sepulchre to anoint Jesus’ body because they had only seen Joseph of Arimathea wrap Jesus in a sheet.
The women believed that the stone had been rolled away from the entrance to the sepulchre, but they did not believe Mary’s report that Jesus had been raised from the dead.
The women could not have gained access to Jesus’ body any earlier because of the stone, the Roman seal denying entry, and the guards that were posted to forbid entrance to anyone.
The women saw that the great stone had not just been slightly rolled from the entrance; it had been rolled a good distance away from it.
They entered the tomb, but found not the body of the Lord Jesus. They saw “a young man sitting on the right side, clothed in a long white garment; and they were affrighted.”
The angel said, “Fear not ye: for I know that ye seek Jesus, which was crucified: he is risen, as he said. Come and see the place where the Lord lay. And go quickly, and tell his disciples that he is risen from the dead; and behold, he goeth before you into Galilee; there shall ye see him: lo, I have told you.” Matthew 28:5-7
“And it came to pass, as they were much perplexed thereabout, behold, two men stood by them in shining garments: and as they were afraid, and bowed down their faces to the earth, they said unto them, Why seek ye the living among the dead? He is not here, but is risen: remember how he spake unto you when he was yet in Galilee, saying, The Son of man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again, and they remember his words."
The women hurried to tell the disciples what had occurred. The angels reminded the women what Jesus had told them previously.
When the women reported the incident to the eleven, and to all the rest of the disciples, “their words seemed to them as idle tales, and they believed them not.”
Their report stirred Peter to return to the sepulchre for a second look.
“Then arose Peter, and ran unto the sepulchre; and stooping down, he beheld the linen clothes [othonion] laid by themselves, and departed, wondering [marveling] in himself at that which was come to pass.”
Having heard the women’s testimony and seeing the evidence of the empty mummified grave clothes for the second time, Peter left marveling at what had occurred. Sometime after this the Lord himself appeared to Peter, also.
What a morning! You would think that the disciples and the apostles would have rejoiced at the news that the Lord Jesus was risen from the dead, but that was not yet the case.
Mary, the women at the sepulchre, the disciple that Jesus loved, and then Peter, after seeing the evidence for the second time believed, but the others were still overwhelmed with grief and could not grasp the magnitude of what had occurred.
The day is still young. The next recorded event occurred on the Road to Emmaus.