The Return of the Lost Ark
“Now Mary stood outside the tomb crying. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb and saw two angels in white, seated where Jesus’ body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot. They asked her, “Woman, why are you crying?” “They have taken my Lord away,” she said, “and I don’t know where they have put him.” At this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was Jesus.” John 20:11-14
This is a most curious of passages. In all the other gospel narratives of the resurrection of Jesus, the angel(s) at the tomb give dramatic revelatory statements like “Why do you look for the living among the dead;” “He is not here, He is risen.” However, in John the angel makes a seemingly obtuse and even insensitive statement. He asks a woman standing outside a tomb why she is crying? Why might a woman standing by a tomb be crying? This seems blatantly obvious to anyone, let along an angel. This hints to us that more is going on here.
Rather than a revelation coming from the words of the angels, we get a description of the location of the angels. They are were Jesus’ body was, one at the head, and one at the foot. This creates a visual image that would have been familiar for first century Jews (by story and Scripture, rather than from experience of course!), that of the Ark of the Covenant. This sole item that occupied the central and holiest part of the tabernacle and later the temple was covered by two cherubim, which from the best that we can tell are angelic-like figures.
Between the two cherubim was the precise place where God would meet with His people (Ex. 25:22). Moses would hear the voice of God speak to him from between the two wings of the cherubim (Num. 7:89). Between the two cherubim was the place where the Lord of the hosts of heaven was considered to be actually enthroned on earth (1 Sam. 4:4. 1 Chron. 13:6). The central ritual by which the forgiveness of sins was mediated to the people was through sprinkling blood on the cover of the ark (Lev. 16:15ff). In between the two cherubim was the place where God’s glory, his manifest shekinah presence dwelt. The ark was in a sense the meeting place between heaven and earth, where God and sinful humanity met and in a remarkable way met in mercy and forgiveness.
The irony here is that the place of the ark of the covenant – lost for centuries (since the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 B.C.), and certainly not dwelling in Herod’s temple has shown up in the most unlikely of places – in the place of death – in a tomb. The glory of God – his holiness and very nature on display is manifested in the place traditionally most antithetical to holiness – death. Here the victory of God over even death itself is displayed as Jesus rises from the dead and now the glory of God dwells in that place of triumph. This is not the redemption of death, but rather its reversal. The very glory of God dwelt in a tomb and defeated death in the resurrection of Jesus. Death, far from being outside of the reach of God is what He decisively defeated in the death and resurrection of Jesus. That which seems farthest from God’s intervention, those areas of pain, weakness, depression, despair, disease and death are not simply to be reconciled with and resigned to. Rather, these are the very places where God’s glory and resurrection life will manifest and display the character and heart of the loving, compassionate, merciful God who “gives life to dead and calls into being things that do not exist.” (Rom. 4:17)
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