Why Couldn't Mary Touch the Risen Christ?

Tom: We’re continuing with the gospel. We’re in the Gospel of John and Dave we began the program the first segment talking about your book, but we used these materials really as items to talk about the scriptures. The name of the program is Search the Scriptures Daily and we just want to encourage our listeners if you haven’t read the Bible, maybe some of the things that we’ve said would encourage you or you may have a desire to do that. And our recommendation would be start with the Gospel of John.

Well you know, every book of the Bible is wonderful. It’s given by inspiration of God. It’s the word of God and we would encourage you to read it and this is a good place to start, the Gospel of John.

We are in John:20:16Jesus saith unto her, Mary. She turned herself, and saith unto him, Rabboni; which is to say, Master.
See All..., but Jesus just resurrected from the dead. And the disciples went to the tomb. They found his burial clothes there. And then….

Dave: Like the body had mysteriously been taken out because they were wound around like they were wound around his body. There’s no way grave robbers could get him out of that.

Tom: Right. And Mary Magdalene was there and she saw two angels sitting there and they had something to say to her. And she was concerned. Dave we talked about this last week. She didn’t understand that Jesus had resurrected. She thought the body was still missing and as you said, somebody had stolen the body. Then Jesus appears to her and it’s interesting that although John and Peter were there just previous to that, he doesn’t appear to them. He appears to Mary Magdalene.

Dave: Well he’s going to appear to them later. Each in his own way and time.

Tom: Verse 16: “Jesus saith unto to her, Mary. She turned herself, and saith unto him, Rabboni; which is to say, Master. Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father, and to my God, and your God.”

Now some think it’s strange that he said, “Touch me not,” but it wasn’t that she couldn’t grab onto him. I think it had to do with what Jesus needed to do. Things that he needed to attend to. What do you think?

Dave: Yeah Tom, I don’t understand that part of it. Some think that he had to ascend to the Father first before human beings could touch him, but I don’t think he was ascending to the Father until the end of the forty days. That seems to be the ascension. Whether he meant don’t be clinging to me, don’t try to keep me here, or don’t see me as you once saw me, Paul says, “Though we’ve known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we him no more.” He’s in a resurrected, glorified body. He’s not going to stay on this earth. He is leaving. He is going to the Father. I’m not sure.

Tom: Well certainly later, we’ll get into it, when Thomas arrives, Jesus tells him, “Put your hands in my wounds.” So….

Dave: Right, right. No it wasn’t just a literal touching, you make a good point Tom. But anyway, he says, “I’m going to ascend to the Father; your Father, my God, your God and go and tell my brethren that I’m alive.” And Mary Magdalene came and told the disciples that she had seen the Lord and that he had spoken these things unto her. In anther gospel it says but they still don’t believe, they find it very hard to believe.

But I was, you know Tom, well I’ll tell a little secret of our household. I make my own breakfast and my own lunch at home as you know.

Tom: You do have a uhhh….

Dave: Some peculiar diet.

Tom: A menu that not everyone would go for Dave.

Dave: Right, right and when I’m putting it together you know, morning and noon. I like to listen to the Bible. King James, you know, someone is reading it and I was just hearing and noticing this morning how many times Jesus told the disciples plainly, “I’m going to be killed.”

The chief priests and so forth, they’re going to reject me; they’re going to kill me. I’m going to rise again the third day. How many times did he tell them that? And I’m sure the Bible doesn’t record every time. He wasn’t keeping this a secret. He had said this again and again. But rising from the dead? Well he has demonstrated. He’s raised Lazarus from the dead. He’s raised the widow of Nain’s son from the dead. He’s raised a number of people from the dead. They’ve seen that he can do it. But that he himself would be killed. That he could allow men to do that to him? I just don’t think they could fathom that and when it happened, they rather saw it as evidence that well, even in spite of the miracles, maybe they were deceived. Maybe they imagined these things, but the fact that he was killed as the rabbis said, mocking him on the cross. “If you’re the Messiah, what are you doing up there? Come on down, then we’ll believe.” The fact that he did not come down from the cross; the fact that he was laid in a grave dead, I don’t know Tom, it just obscured any possibility I think, to them. And she doesn’t believe, they don’t believe. So now Christ is going to come and he’s going to appear to them. He’s going to come right into the room where they are.

Tom: Dave, when you say they didn’t believe, sometimes we put ourselves in a situation in which it’s too good to be true. We don’t want to be disappointed again.

Dave: Mmhmm.

Tom: In other words, I’m just thinking of it from a fleshly standpoint…

Dave: Right.

Tom: …for these individuals. Their hopes seem to be dashed.

Dave: Yes.

Tom: Destroyed.

Dave: Right.

Tom: Totally obliterated.

Dave: Mmhmm

Tom: And now there looks like a glimmer of hope, but would they dare having you know, I mean they’re even (chuckling), I remember when the disciples were praying that Peter would be let out of jail, you know? And there he is at the door! And they can’t believe it. They said, “No, no, it can’t be him, we’re praying for him.”

Dave: Right.

Tom: So.

Dave: Tom, that’s a good example of the fact that it does not take our faith for God to do something. Now he does give us the opportunity of believing and praying and so forth. But he can do what he’s going to do whether we believe it or not. If it’s for his own purpose.

Well that brings us to verse 19, you going to go ahead and read it?

Tom: Yeah. “Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you.

Wow!

Dave: Wow is right. Well they’re afraid. They have been his disciples; they have fled. They forsook him, not just Peter, but it says they all—“then all the disciples forsook him and fled.” They’re hiding out.

Tom: And the body’s missing. They can’t put that together, although Mary Magdalene certainly understands, but they’re not believing her.

Dave: Yeah, they’re hiding out. Now John it says, has believed. He believes, but still…he believes, but as you said, too good to be true perhaps. I don’t know, the Bible doesn’t give us all those details. But the disciples, they’ve got the doors locked. They’re hiding out somewhere. And what do you know, suddenly here is Jesus.

We’re going to have bodies like that Tom. This is the promise. Spiritual bodies. We talked about materialism and the soul and the spirit, but there is a spiritual body and a physical body, and we’re going to have spiritual bodies that are both physical—Jesus could say, “You got something to eat here? Come on, I’ll eat it to show you that I’m not a ghost.” Or, “Handle me,” and yet he could walk through a wall or he could instantly be somewhere else. That is beyond modern science. That is beyond our comprehension, but wow, we have to come back and talk about that. What the “that” meant to these disciples.