16. Welcome to day 16 of our 4 week prayer adventure.

Happy Resurrection! What a great day yesterday was! Easter is the most triumphant and joyful day of the year. And now after Easter, we can live each day with that tremendous good news ringing in our ears and hearts: He is risen, He is risen indeed! Hallelujah! Should not and could not that be our attitude each and every day?

John 20:11-18. In verse 13 it says: “They (the angels) said to her: ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ She said to them, ‘They have taken away my Lord and I do not know where they have laid Him.’”

I’d like to point out 2 things from this passage, although there is so much here and it needs to be handled with great humility and reverence.

One is that those who most diligently and carefully love Christ the most, receive some of the greatest blessings from Christ’s hand. This is Mary Magdalene of whom it was said that Jesus cast out 7 demons who had taken up residence in her. Luke 8:2. As a result, her gratitude knew no bounds. She was the last person at the cross and the first person at the tomb on Sunday morning, even while it was still dark out; she was so eager to get there she couldn’t even wait for daylight. Having received much, she loved much. Notice, she got to see the angels. She heard the angels speak just to her and they spoke encouraging words to her. She was the first to see the Lord after He rose from the dead, the first to hear His voice, the first to have a conversation with the risen Christ! This little incident shows the truth of the principle that those who honor Christ will be honored by Christ.

Second, it’s a good reminder to us of how often our fears and anxieties are not needed. She was weeping and saying that she didn’t know where Jesus was, where His body now was and yet all this time, Jesus, in body and spirit was actually quite close to her! It turns out her tears were needless. Her anxieties were not necessary.

This is a picture of many believers as we journey on through this life onto that heavenly city. How often we are anxious when we don’t need to be. Two-thirds of the things we worry about never happen!

Instead, let us pray for more faith, more patience and give God time to work out His perfect plan.