Easter 2005

Pastor Christa von Zychlin

Our Saviors Evangelical Lutheran Church

Hartland, WI 

The Gospel According to Mary Magdalene

John 20:1-18

Early in the morning while it was still dark…

Mary Magdalene came to the tomb. 

Some of you, sitting here this morning, have read The Da Vinci Code

That  blockbuster whodunit about a supposed Vatican cover up of Mary Magdalene’s Gospel.  It’s sold over 18 million copies worldwide now.  There’s going to be a movie with Tom Hanks.

Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone broke the Vatican's silence on the book just last  week and said that nobody should read it and certainly Catholic bookstores should stop selling it.

He’s a little late, I’m afraid…

In the book, we hear that there is a hugely important “Gospel of Mary Magdalene” that’s been carefully  hidden away by the Vatican all these years…

          Well that kinda surprised me, as I went to my book shelf, dusted off the Nag Hammadi Library book I was supposed to read in my seminary studies, and guess what!  It’s as I vaguely remembered it!  It’s right here!  On pg. 471, a confusing and not so very interesting 5 pages called “The Gospel of Mary”  It hasn’t been banned or hidden at all, it’s part of the curriculum for most seminary students, including Catholics & Lutherans.  493 moldy pages of the Nag Hammadi Library and in it voila!  The Gospel of Mary… one of the many books that didn’t  make it into the Biblical canon. 

I personally think reading the Da Vinci Code is first of all a fun read, and secondly and more importantly, it can be a good thing if it pushes you back to the Bible, to see what really happened according to the Biblical Word of God.

Today as we read again the Biblical Gospel of John’s account of the resurrection of Jesus,  you need to know that  that we traditional Christians actually have a Gospel of Mary Magdalene already, and it’s right here, nestled like a Russian Easter egg, inside the accepted Biblical Gospel of John, the 20^th chapter. 

Like the so-called “Easter eggs” found in special editions of DVD movies… where you click and find a whole extra scene or outtake from the movie you’ve been watching,

This time, as Pastor Wayne reads the Gospel of John, the 20^th chapter, for maybe the umpteenth time, that you’ve heard it, listen, pay attention, see if you can hear the true Gospel of Jesus Christ, according to Mary Magdalene:

Xxxxxx   [please stand for the reading of the Easter Gospel

John 20:1-18]xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Did you hear it?   We’ve got ourselves a little Gospel scene nestled right inside the big one.  And this scene features the eye witness account of the woman of Magdala, named Mary.

It’s an interview with Mary Magdalene that’s hidden in plain sight, really.  Because you know of course that the Bible didn’t come down ready made from the sky, nicely numbered, leather bound, and important parts highlighted in red!

The Bible, and today we’re talking in particular about the  Gospels, and this morning, the Gospel according  to John specifically, Each Gospel is a compilation of eye witness reports from people who had been there when Jesus walked this earth, 

and interviews: people who had asked questions of the people who had been there when Jesus walked this earth, and then each Gospel had a good editor or two, (who we evangelical Christians believe were totally inspired by the Holy Spirit!).  Well, these editors are the ones who put it all down in writing, and arranged the stories into the Gospels that have now been handed down from generation to generation, and from mature believer to new believer these past 2,000 years.

And in the Gospel of John, the 20^th chapter, we have an account of the Resurrection of Jesus, according to Mary Magdalene because no one else was around to tell the story that is told here.

It was early in the morning while it was still dark, that she came to the tomb.  Now the other 3 Gospels tell us that Mary Magdalene was not alone, she was in the company of other women.  But in her mind she was alone.   Because this Gospel makes no mention of the other Mary that Matthew mentions, or Salome, from the Gospel of Mark, or Joanna, from the Gospel of Luke.

I think that it’s quite probable that a whole troop of women was there.  We women do have this tendency to travel in packs.  Especially when it’s dark.

In this broad company of women, and it was just women, the Gospels’ male editors not withstanding, are pretty clear on that… but in this little crowd of women,

Mary Magdalene, nevertheless, is totally alone.

Whether you’re male or female, you’ve had that experience.   You’re with a whole pack of friends, but you’re alone.

Especially if you have ever experienced defeat, or loss, or cruelty, or the death of someone close,  You know exactly what that means.

You might find comfort in the presence of others, your family, your friends, but somehow you are totally alone, because nobody experienced the hurt like you did.  And nobody knew the one who died, in just the same way as you did. 

Maybe you were four brothers and the oldest dies, but nobody else was his next oldest brother. 

Maybe your Dad dies and your family is all gathered around, but nobody else was as passionate about baseball, as Dad & you were passionate about baseball. 

Maybe you have a cousin who died and you’re at the funeral, and nobody has just the same memories of playing in the fields behind the barn when you were both kids.  Nobody knew your cousin like you knew your  cousin.

There’s always a way in which the closer you were to someone, the more you’re alone, shockingly alone in your grief when that someone has died. 

In the hood of the night & in the inner part of her belly, Mary Magdalene is alone.  She’s alone when she gets up in the dark,

she’s alone when she sees somebody’s been messing with the gravestone,

she’s alone when she runs to tell Simon Peter, and John to get up and get over here and tell me what’s going on,

and then she’s alone again, as they rush off to wherever men go when they are trying to figure out something massive & mysterious, a disorientation in their hearts and their minds, maybe they go off to chop wood or find an upper room to hang out in or take the dog hunting, I don’t know, Mary Magdalene doesn’t seem to know either, or care much anymore about them, those men disciples, because now she stands again alone, weeping,        loudly,        bitterly,           forlornly,          wildly,           as passionately as strong  Middle Eastern women do, for the man she had loved, the Teacher who had not been afraid to allow her, a mere woman to  be not just tolerated but named among his students, for the brother, who not only had been totally innocently  tortured & killed, but now it appeared that his body was being violated, and carried off to be eaten by hyenas, or maybe to be displayed again, to the jeers of the Roman occupation. 

Look, the protective grave stone was rolled away.  How could they.

And then there are some angels, I don’t think she knows they’re angels. 
They say woman why are you weeping and she’s says     “They’ve taken away my Lord, I don’t know where they’ve laid him.”     

 She’s worried about the hyenas and the crows.  She’s sick to death in thinking about one more mutilation of that broken flesh that had once held the voice that made her whole, that made her love, that made her so very not alone.

And then was it a sound, or a step, or an intake of breath that made her turn around?  She’s still alone when she sees that gardener, did you take him? Where is he?  What have you done?

Mary he says.

And when he calls her name, suddenly, she is no longer alone.

“Rabboni” she says, with all the passion of a woman who’s just found her love

“My teacher!” She says, with all the joy of a woman whose joy has just come home.

She’s not alone anymore, and never need be again.

And the Living Jesus sends her to tell the others,

She, a woman, whose testimony was no good in any court of law at the time…

Was commissioned by the Risen Lord to be the first preacher of the Gospel of Jesus Christ,

And this part of it, this joyful, emotional, wonderful, true, most hopeful part of it,

That Jesus was raised from the dead, and comes to show Himself to people today—

This Is the Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Mary Magdalene.

An Easter egg, hidden in plain sight, really.  Within the true canonical Scripture of the New Testament.

May Mary Magdalene’s  witness be our Gospel too.  

And  may her Easter joy be ours as well.  Amen

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