Week 20: He Is Risen

The Big Picture

Everything hinges on this week. If the events recorded in these chapters did not happen, then, as Paul wrote with unflinching honesty, “our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain” (1 Corinthians 15:14). But if they did happen – if the stone was rolled away, if the tomb was empty, if the grave clothes lay undisturbed, if Jesus of Nazareth walked out of death and into the morning light – then everything changes. Every promise is validated, every sin is atoned for, every fear is answered, and death itself has been permanently defeated. This week we read the resurrection accounts from all four Gospels, and together they form the most consequential testimony in human history.

We begin with Matthew’s account of the crucifixion, death, and burial, including details unique to his Gospel: Judas’ suicide, the dream of Pilate’s wife, Pilate’s hand-washing, the earthquake, the raising of dead saints, and the posting of a Roman guard at the tomb. Matthew then gives us the resurrection morning – the angel descending like lightning, the soldiers fainting like dead men, and the risen Christ commissioning his followers to make disciples of all nations. Mark’s compressed narrative of the crucifixion and burial gives way to the startling brevity of his resurrection account, ending (in the earliest manuscripts) with the women fleeing in trembling and astonishment. Luke contributes the incomparable Road to Emmaus story, where the risen Jesus walks alongside two heartbroken disciples and opens the Scriptures to show that the Christ had to suffer before entering his glory. And John provides the most intimate resurrection scenes in all of Scripture: Mary Magdalene weeping at the empty tomb, Thomas placing his fingers in the nail marks, and Peter being restored by the lakeshore with the threefold question, “Do you love me?”

What strikes the careful reader is the diversity of these accounts within their fundamental unity. The witnesses are different, the details vary, the emotional textures shift from terror to joy to doubt to worship. This is precisely what we would expect from genuine, independent testimony to an event so overwhelming that no single perspective could capture it all. The resurrection is not a tidy theological abstraction. It erupted into history on a specific morning, in a specific garden, and it was first announced to specific women who were not believed by the men. The risen Christ appeared to individuals and groups, indoors and outdoors, to skeptics and believers, over a period of forty days. He ate fish. He cooked breakfast. He invited Thomas to touch his wounds. He walked through locked doors. He is not a ghost, not a metaphor, not a wish. He is alive, and because he is alive, so are we.

This Week’s Readings

Key Characters This Week

• Jesus – Crucified, buried, and risen. He appears to multiple witnesses over forty days, eats and drinks with them, teaches them from the Scriptures, restores Peter, and commissions his followers to take the gospel to every nation.
• Mary Magdalene – The first witness to the risen Christ in John’s account, she initially mistakes him for the gardener until he speaks her name. She becomes the “apostle to the apostles,” carrying the news to the disciples.
• Peter – Runs to the empty tomb, encounters the risen Christ, and is restored through a threefold dialogue that mirrors and heals his threefold denial.
• Thomas – Absent during the first appearance to the disciples, he refuses to believe without physical evidence, then makes the highest christological confession in the Gospels: “My Lord and my God!”
• The Two on the Road to Emmaus – Cleopas and an unnamed companion whose hearts burn within them as Jesus opens the Scriptures, and whose eyes are opened in the breaking of bread.
• Judas Iscariot – His suicide in Matthew 27 provides a devastating contrast to Peter’s restoration: both betrayed Jesus, but only Peter returned in repentance.
• Joseph of Arimathea – Provides the tomb for Jesus’ burial, unwittingly fulfilling prophecy and establishing the verifiable location of the resurrection.
• The Roman Guards – Posted at the tomb to prevent theft of the body, they become unwilling witnesses to the resurrection and are bribed to spread the first counter-narrative.

Key Locations

• Golgotha – The crucifixion site, revisited in Matthew’s and Mark’s accounts, completing the full four-Gospel witness to the cross.
• The Garden Tomb – The new tomb of Joseph of Arimathea, where Jesus was buried and from which he rose, located in a garden setting that evokes Eden.
• The Road to Emmaus – Approximately seven miles from Jerusalem, the setting for Luke’s masterful narrative of the risen Christ opening the Scriptures to two disciples.
• The Upper Room – Where the risen Jesus appeared to the gathered disciples, passing through locked doors, showing his wounds, and breathing the Holy Spirit upon them.
• The Sea of Galilee (Tiberias) – Where Jesus appeared to seven disciples, cooked breakfast on the shore, and restored Peter with the threefold commission to “feed my sheep.”
• A Mountain in Galilee – Where the Great Commission was given, the risen Christ sending his followers to make disciples of all nations.

Key Themes

• The bodily resurrection – Jesus did not rise as a spirit or a memory but in a transformed physical body that could be touched, could eat, and yet could pass through walls. The resurrection is the foundation of Christian hope.
• The Great Commission – The risen Christ claims all authority in heaven and on earth and sends his followers to make disciples, baptize, and teach, promising his presence to the end of the age.
• Restoration after failure – Peter’s threefold restoration mirrors his threefold denial, demonstrating that failure is not final for those whom Jesus loves.
• Faith and doubt – Thomas’s doubt is met not with rebuke but with evidence, and his response – “My Lord and my God!” – becomes the highest confession of faith in the Gospels.
• The opened Scriptures – On the Emmaus road, Jesus shows that the entire Old Testament points to his suffering and glory, providing the hermeneutical key to all of Scripture.

Memory Verse

“And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying, ‘All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.’” – Matthew 28:18-20 (NASB)