Station of the Resurrection #3: Mary
John 20:11-18
“[Mary] turned around and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” Jesus said to her, “Mary.” She turned and said to him in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, “Do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”
I have always found it bewildering that Mary Magdalene mistook Jesus for the gardener. Why couldn’t she recognize him? Why a gardener? And how in the world do you mistake the resurrected Lord of lords for a peasant tending a graveside flowerbed? Perhaps there is something reminiscent here of the God who planted Eden and strolled its gardens looking for his people, or of the first meeting of Adam and Eve in the Garden. Hard to know. Whatever the case, we are given a front row seat to Jesus revealing himself to his grieving friend.
Jesus does not greet her in grandeur like the angels at the tomb, with an earthquake and blinding light. No, he reveals himself by the mere whisper of her name: “Mary.” That’s all, and her eyes are opened to see the Truth. Why her name? Why does that, above all things, reveal his identity? We would do well to think of Jesus’ words earlier in John, when, referring to himself as the Good Shepherd he says, “The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.” The scene before us is nothing less than Jesus calling a sheep by name, and that sheep recognizing both its own name and the voice of its Shepherd.
Jesus knows Mary in a way that even Mary doesn’t know Mary. And it is with this divine intimacy that he pronounces her name. And in the same way he calls our names, with an intimacy that is entirely familiar with us. He knows the story of our conception and birth, our first steps, lifelong longings, the gifts and callings he put within us. Yet he also knows our descent into sin, the deep wounds beneath our shallow words, the shame we bear behind the masks, the fears that haunt us in the night. He knows the things we plan to take with us to the grave. Yet what makes his calling irresistible is that, in spite of his familiarity with our entire lives, even the wretched parts, he speaks in a tone of grace that bids us come as we are.
Mary knows there is only one person in the world who can speak to her like that – her Shepherd, her Teacher. She turns to him in complete shock and cries in her native language, “Rabboni!” And by his next words, it seems that in her joy she can’t help but leap upon him in an embrace. His words may sound harsh, “Don’t cling to me,” but his reasoning is profound: “for I have not yet ascended to the Father.” Then she may cling to him, once he has ascended to the throne of God.
I have heard it said, “If only I could have been there, known him in person, followed him in the flesh. If only he could be here now in the body. Then I wouldn’t have such a hard time following Jesus.” This passage, however, says the very opposite. Only when he is as we know him today – made present by the Spirit and the Word – only now may we truly know him. Only now may we truly cling to him - by faith - with intimate oneness that Mary Magdalene does not yet know is possible and, indeed, is not possible until he ascends to give the Spirit. For through the Holy Spirit, Jesus gives us something far more intimate than a warm hug. Through the Spirit Jesus joins us to his very being and knits us into his own soul. We become inseparable: our humanity grafted onto his, our death swallowed up by his, his holiness and life and destiny woven into ours. We are in him.
I am with Mary, though. I, too, long for faith to become sight, for the marriage of the spiritual and physical, for the union of the Horizontal and Vertical. In other words, I too want to weep on the shoulder of our Lord, laugh with him over a meal, listen to him tell stories that make my heart burn within me. But until that day let it be known that we are at no disadvantage compared to his disciples. We have not been shortchanged. He is not holding out on us, for he has given us himself, and that is more than enough.
