The Real Truth About Christ's Death, Pt. 6

Ron Weinland

June 24, 2017

We are currently going through the series entitled The Real Truth About Christ's Death and today is Part 6 of this particular series.

We'll have a quick review of what was covered at the end of Part 5 last week. It's important that we cover certain points again before proceeding because these things need to be in your mind to get a little bit of the flow, because it's very easy to get mixed up and twisted up in some of the timing of events as they're happening and it's good to have just a little bit of repeat of some of that toward the end of what we covered the last time. As we go through this particular process in getting a complete story this all is becoming much, much clearer as we go along and everyone, especially that’s new, is going to need that in order to have the kind of knowledge and understanding that they need to be able to grasp what this is all about in the first place, about the real truth about Christ's death, because the Protestant world, the world of traditional Christianity, it's all messed up. It's all confused and they do not understand the timing of events that took place.

Yet the story itself here is very clear and if people just have a little bit of knowledge it can be clear. It isn't a matter of having to have God's spirit to be able to grasp these things; it's a matter of just a little bit of knowledge of certain things that you can prove to yourself. Now, to truly understand that which is spiritual, to understand all the things concerning God's Holy Days and so forth, we do need God’s spirit as human beings to grasp those things on a spiritual plane.

It's just like in John 3; Jesus Christ was talking to Nicodemus and basically told him (paraphrasing some of what was said, putting it into modern English): "You can't understand. You can't understand because you don't have God's spirit." That's basically what he was telling him, and he was revealing to him there are spiritual things that you're not able to see and grasp and comprehend. Yet Nicodemus was (supposedly) a great teacher of and having understanding of the Old Testament, but he couldn't "see." He couldn't understand because it requires God's spirit to understand that which is spirit. So if an individual doesn't have that spirit, that life that's coming from God into their life, there is no way to grasp and comprehend the things that are true. That's why traditional Christianity is so messed up. People hold on to ideas of a trinity that aren't true, ideas of Christmas and Easter that aren't true, that don't come from God, that are nowhere in the Bible. So there's a lot of confusion.

But this is simple and easy to understand if people will go to the trouble of making a little bit of a graph, looking at certain verses as we've been doing here, and striving to put an entire story together that isn't all that difficult. So Leviticus 23, as we've talked about in the past, gives God's holy days; it tells what those holy days are and it begins with a particular day that isn't a holy day, it is Passover, which is the fourteenth of the first month of God's holy calendar, and that is the day that Jesus Christ died. That is the day that he was beaten like he was, that he was put on a pole and died, and we've been going through some of that timing, but what people don't understand is there are two Sabbaths in that week. The world of traditional Christianity especially only grasp a limited amount of knowledge in thinking that the Jews were keeping the seventh day Sabbath, and so when it talks about a Sabbath it had to be that Sabbath. So the preparation day before the Sabbath had to be Friday. That's why they believe he died on a Friday, which he didn't. Incredible!

So let's pick it up here in Matthew 28. We had looked at verses in Matthew that had been purposely (as I stated last time) or ignorantly mistranslated that have great clarification concerning the time of Christ's resurrection. This says a lot right here.

So it says here in Matthew 28:1—In the end of the Sabbath… Again here, as it was brought out, the words "in the end of" are really better translated "after." It's “at the end of” but it's really “after” when you start looking at what's taking place here just by the context alone. So there are some times when you don't have to understand Greek, or in this case Aramaic; and people don't have access to that anyway, of what these verses were originally written in because they were originally written in Aramaic, later translated into Greek: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Other scriptures, Paul's writings and so forth, are in the Greek language. But anyway, "After the Sabbath." Again here, this is either done on purpose or as a matter of absolute ignorance of what is true. The word in the Greek language is plural and so it's saying, "After the Sabbaths." So even in the world of traditional Christianity this doesn't make sense to them because they think, "Well, there was the previous Saturday. That must mean a week ago. And then this week." But that doesn't make sense to them because they don't understand there was an annual Sabbath that year that was before, right after Passover, but before the weekly Sabbath. So it's talking about two Sabbath's in that week.

…as it began to dawn toward, or into, as the word is, the first of the week, "the first day of the week," as it's translated there, but it's not the word for "day." …in the first of the week Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to see the sepulchre where Jesus had been placed. Again here, the first of the week is a Sunday, and that's when they were coming. They didn't come at night when the day began, when this particular first day began, the first day of the week, this particular Sunday, as a day begins at sundown. So after the Sabbath was over no one tried to come to the sepulchre at night. It's not like we have today with all the lighting and streetlights and everything else you can see, or having flashlights or other kinds of lights that you can use. So they were going to come in the following morning, and this is exactly what they did.

Now, you don't need to turn there because I'm going to continue in Matthew 28, but John 20:1 says, The first of the week Mary Magdalene came early, when it was yet dark. This is what's inspiring. When you put all four accounts together it's very clear about the timing. There is no contradiction, as a whole; there just isn't any contradiction. It's a matter of grasping and understanding what each individual is recording from their perspective and from what they witnessed, or what they heard from other people. Because some of these are not a matter of a direct witness of something they saw, it's something they were told by others, as we talked about, and we'll talk about some more here today. So it's very clear here that they started to the tomb, they started to the sepulchre while it was dark. The sun wasn't up yet; it was dark out, but they started their journey. Now, we don't know how far away they were and it was likely two miles away because this is where they'd been coming back and forth, Jesus Christ and the disciples as well, when they were coming into Jerusalem. This is where Lazarus was and his sisters. So again here, this is the house, most likely, that they were going back and forth from. So, Mary Magdalene came early to the sepulchre while it was still dark.

Now, continuing on in Matthew 28:2—And, behold, there was a great earthquake. So not a matter of specific timing when this took place. It's just saying there was a great earthquake. …for an angel of the Eternal descended from heaven and came and rolled the stone from the door, from the opening of the tomb, and sat upon it. So this is John's account and each one gives a little bit different account of where the angels were at different times because they're not talking about the same instant in every case. The angels said some things while they were there (one angel did, anyway) and some while they were inside the tomb. So again, if people read these stories, sometimes they get very confused because it says something about one angel saying certain thing in a certain location, then another one in another. It doesn't specify which angel was speaking, whether both were or one was, but they were in different places at different times here. You know, people make things complicated. Just hear the story, follow the story.

And verse 5, we'll pick that up. And the angel answered and said unto the women, Do not fear, for I know that you seek Jesus, who was hung on a pole. He is not here. He was already gone by the time they got there, which they make very clear later what time it was, because by the time they actually arrived at the tomb the sun was at the point where it was beginning, ready to rise in the horizon. It was getting light out. So they started when it was yet dark, walked the two miles, whatever it was, the distance from wherever they were, and by the time they got there it was starting to come up. So that's how close it was then. The angel then said, "He's not here. He's already risen. He's already gone." …he has risen, as he said. Now, they didn't grasp all this. "What do you mean, 'As he said?' And what do you mean, 'He has risen?'" They still didn't understand all this. They really didn't grasp what they were being told. So they said, Come and see the place where the Lord was lying.

Because you remember the other accounts when they went back and told the story here and they said somebody has taken the body and we don't know where they've placed him, because it just couldn't gel in their mind he's actually alive! That really couldn't hit them that well at this point, in the early part of the story.

Now let's go back over here and pick up the account in Mark 16:2 because all these go together. If you read just one story you won't (as John, as an example), you won't know the rest of it. You have to put it all together. Mark 16:2—And very early in the morning, the first of the week, they, and this is in context here (going back up, speaking of Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of James, as they are identified), came to the sepulchre at the rising of the sun. So again here, the scriptures don't contradict with John. John says, in essence, they'd started this journey while it was yet dark and it just adds here now they were there at the sepulchre and it was beginning to be light. So it says, "at the rising of the sun." And they said among themselves, Who will roll away the stone for us from the door of the sepulchre? And when they looked, they saw that the stone was, as it is again here, was already rolled away: for it was very great. And upon entering the sepulchre they saw a young person sitting on the right side… Now, it was an angel, but sitting on the right side there. Again here, a different account, a different perspective. They're taking you ahead to a specific moment, and it says here, clothed in long white raiment, or garment, if you will; and they were afraid.

Now, finally we finished in Part 5 by looking at the account of Luke 24. So we're just putting all these together again at this moment in time when they were coming there the first time (because they came twice), and the first time when they came here, starting their journey when it was dark, and they got there when the sun was rising, and they were told, "He's not here. He's already risen." And Luke 24 then has this part of the story. Verse 1—Now upon the first of the week very early in the morning they came unto the sepulchre, bringing the spices which they had prepared, and certain others with them. So certain others came along with them. So basically identifying the two Mary's in scripture here, but also making it clear why they were coming. We'd already gone through (not going to go back and repeat it again), that on the preparation day for the weekly Sabbath, which was Friday, is when they went to purchase the spices and the like and prepare them to bring them to the tomb. They didn't do it on the Sabbath; they didn't do it on the seventh day of the week. They were going to do it on Sunday. So it all has to do with their belief about working on the Sabbath and so forth. So this is a continuation of that story.

Verse 2—And they found the stone had been rolled away from the sepulchre. And they entered in, and did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. So again here, just a little bit different perspective of how the story is told here. They found the stone rolled away, just a quick summary here, they entered in, found that Jesus wasn't there. And it came to pass, as they were very perplexed about all this, behold, two men stood by them in shining garments, so again here, two angelic beings. It doesn't say that they knew that they were angels. Later on they understood that they were, but to them they appeared as two young men. That's why they're recorded like this, and yet bright clothing, something they didn't, couldn't understand, couldn't comprehend fully.

Going on here in verse 5 (Luke 24) it says, and as they were afraid, and bowed their faces down to the earth, they said to them, Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen. Remember how he spoke to you when he was yet in Galilee, saying, The Son of man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be hung on a pole, and the third day rise again. And it says, And they remembered his words. But again here, please understand, they didn't remember it right then. Sometimes we can read things into a story and we don't grasp what we are doing. Human beings have a bad tendency of doing that, especially in the Bible. You have to put the entire story together as to what was taking place. They still didn't get it so they didn't remember all this stuff right then because if they had put it all together and could see it all they would grasp exactly what they were being told, that he's alive! But they still didn't grasp all this, not fully. They were told certain things that they were to go back and tell the disciples, but it still wasn't gelling yet. So again, it doesn't say when they finally remembered.

Let's go back now to John 20. We're going to continue from this point where we left off in Part 5. This is just a bit of a summary here to catch some of these things at the beginning, of what they were experiencing. When they started the journey at dark, by the time they got there the sun was right at a point of rising, and here they're being told specific things by these two angelic beings.

John 20:1, picking up that same verse: And the first day of the week Mary Magdalene came early, when it was yet dark, unto the sepulchre and saw the stone taken away from the sepulchre. Then she ran (verse 2)… So again, this is jumping ahead. If you don't have the rest of the story of what was said there you would miss all that part. Then she ran and came to Simon Peter, and to the other disciple, whom Jesus loved. Now, I love the way this is written because John is tending to write this way. He's writing about himself, "the other disciple, whom Jesus loved." He's not lifting himself up, he has a humble attitude and spirit, and even as he goes on here when he talks about some of this and when they ran to the tomb, how they did it, he doesn't identify himself, in that respect, but he does.

Again here, saying to Peter and to John, They have taken away the Lord out of the sepulchre, and we do not know where they have laid him. So obviously they didn't grasp that he was risen. They didn't grasp what the angelic beings had told them yet. They didn't grasp that he was alive. They thought he'd been taken someplace else, and that's why they're saying this in these terms. Therefore, Peter went forth, and the other disciple, and came to the sepulchre. So they ran there because they're wanting to know what happened to Christ, what happened to Jesus Christ. Where is the body? So they both ran together: and the other disciple did outrun Peter; so John outran Peter. He got there first. …and came first to the sepulchre. And stooping down he saw the linen clothes lying there, yet he did not go in. Then came Simon Peter following him, and went into the sepulchre, and saw the linen clothes lying there,  and the napkin that was on his head not lying with the linen clothes, but wrapped together in a place by itself. So that part was folded up in a place by itself where the head was. The rest of that, the cloth, was just lying there, that his body had been wrapped in.

And it says, Then went in the other disciple, who came first to the sepulchre… I'm not sure why, but he's making sure that you understand who it was. It was the one who came first, who outran Peter, and he saw and believed.  For as of yet they did not know the scripture, that he must rise again from the dead. Then the disciples went away again unto their own home.

Now, again here, you can read things into this. It doesn't say he instantaneously believed because of what he experienced and what he witnessed. Later he came to believe exactly what transpires in the story as we go along. But again here, it's the way he's written this. It's the way he's talking, and he's just making a comment here. You've got to understand when they were writing this it was long after Pentecost of 31 A.D., long after they'd received the impregnation of God's holy spirit. So this entire story from Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, they didn't write it right away. They wrote it years later in some cases, when they started recording all this. They're looking back in time and they're writing in that context, "This is what was taking place." So you have to read it in that way. It says, "and he believed." Well, yes, because he hasn't told the rest of the story here of what took place. As it goes along here, because of what he saw, because of what he witnessed, he came to the point where he believed and understood that Jesus Christ had been resurrected from the dead, but he didn't believe it yet. It's amazing how we are as human beings and what we read sometimes and why we can mess up the story. And frankly, a lot of this is because of our past. If you've come out of traditional Christianity and you've had this stuff crammed down your throat year after year as a child, and you get older, you've had these little stories in your mind and it's hard to break away from them. It's hard to break loose from some of that and to understand there is a different story being told in your Bible than what you were told. Incredible!

Then the disciples went away into their own home. (Verse 11) But Mary Magdalene stood outside the sepulchre crying. So she went to tell the disciples and she came back again because the women were afraid. What they saw, they went and told them. Then they came back, obviously, a little behind the others. It doesn't say exactly when, but they came back again to the sepulchre and here they are. But Mary stood outside the sepulchre crying; and as she cried, she stooped down, and looked into the sepulchre, and saw the two angels in white sitting, so they were still there. And the one at the head, and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus was lying. And they said unto her, Woman, why are you crying? And she said to them, Because they have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him. So she's already been there. She's been told certain things that have taken place here. They've gone out and it’s like, "He's not there. They've taken him somewhere." They didn't get it. They still didn't get it. Why? It's so hard to believe. How many times in your lifetime have you known somebody resurrected from the dead? It's not a normal occurrence in life. And with our literature and history we know it's not an occurrence at all of human life, except for one that we know of, and the one before him, Lazarus, who was resurrected from the dead. It’s not a common occurrence. It’s kind of a fearful thing.

Verse 14—And when she had said this, she turned herself back and saw Jesus standing, and did not know it was Jesus. And Jesus said unto her, Woman, why are you crying? We don't know why she didn’t know. Maybe her eyes filled with water, maybe she couldn't see clearly, as some of these things talk about in some of these accounts here, of what they were experiencing and the emotion involved and perhaps looking out and she's in a darker area looking out and the sun is coming in there now. We don't know. Perhaps there is a silhouette that's there. Woman, why are you crying? Whom do you seek? And she thought it was the gardener; it must be the gardener. And said to him, Sir, if you have carried him from here, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away. And Jesus said unto her, Mary. And she turned herself, and said unto him, she recognized the voice, she heard so many times before, "Mary." And she said to him, Rabboni; which is to say, Master. And Jesus said to her, Do not touch me. Now, this becomes important. People in the world don't have any understanding of why, but it's a very important statement that's made right here, because something important is taking place on this Sunday morning that hasn't occurred yet, that Jesus Christ must fulfill in order to accomplish what is shown in scripture as being the wave sheaf offering, because during the Feast of Unleavened Bread, after the Sabbath, the weekly Sabbath within the days of Unleavened Bread, that next day, that Sunday is the day that the priests were to offer the wave sheaf offering before God. It was a ceremony that the Levites were a part of, the high priest, and they would wave the sheaf of the first fruits that were cut and saved back until that moment in time. That represented, again, the wave sheaf being Jesus Christ, the first of the first fruits offered up before God. Jesus Christ is the first among mankind to be received of God Almighty into His Kingdom, into His Family. That's why this is written in this regard. He said, Do not touch me, Mary. For I have not yet ascended to my Father. But go to my brethren and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father and to your Father, to my God and your God. And Mary Magdalene, it says here in verse 18, came and told the disciples that she had seen the Lord and that he had spoken these things unto her. Awesome! So she went back excited. She had seen Christ. She believed. She knew he was alive; she was the first to see and to know.

So it's at this point in the story after several have discovered that Christ is no longer in the tomb and angels have spoken to the two Mary's that Christ was raised from the dead, we need to go back and look a little more closely at the timing of these final events in Christ's life and then his resurrection. And again, this is all important to understand some of the things that fit together in the story flow here. We're going to begin by going back here to Luke 11. We're going to begin by looking at what Jesus Christ had to say about the only sign that he said he was going to leave mankind that he indeed was the prophesied Messiah to come. So we have to go back in time now and look at some of these things that were recorded and stated.

In Luke 11:29 it says, And when the people had assembled together, he began to say, so again, this is going back into his ministry in time here and looking at different accounts of what he had to say specifically about this sign. This is an evil generation: and they seek a sign. Now, what does he mean by this? What are you talking about? They're seeking a sign for one primary purpose, to know whether or not he was the Messiah. That's what Pilate asked him, "Are you the Messiah? Are you the Christ?" as different ones have stated there. Even the high priest and different ones as they were asking the things they did asked. So all this information was taken before Pilate and so Pilate asked different questions, "Who are you?" Anyway, we've gone through all that. But again, the high priest before all these things had taken place quizzed him and it was a matter of, "Show us. Reveal to us. Prove to us that you are who you say you are," because he told them enough to know what he was saying, that he was the Messiah, because many were following him who believed that exact thing.

When he came into Jerusalem there toward the end we saw the things that took place there where they were putting down palms and branches and so forth before him and were crying out about him being the descendant of David, and talking about, basically, he is the Messiah. And that's why so many were so disillusioned then when he died, because they thought, even as spoken of in the story here by those who followed him, and the story we're going to go into in a moment here, they thought indeed he was the Messiah. So they were disillusioned, "What do we do now?" Because what was in their mind? He couldn't have been the Messiah because he's dead. He was going to come back and rule and raise up Israel and be a power against the Roman government, to defeat other governments in this earth. Incredible.

Jesus Christ went on to say, But there shall no sign be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet. For as Jonah was a sign unto the Ninevites, so shall also the Son of man be to this generation, because of it happening in their time and what was taking place. So again here, a very specific analogy that is given here about two moments in time – one for the time of Christ and what he was going to fulfill, and one of Jonah. So there's a little more said here in another point in the story of Matthew.

Matthew 12, it gets very specific here. It doesn't leave you dangling in any place here. People in the Protestant world reading something like this would say, "Well, what is the sign of Jonah? What was it? What was the sign to the Ninevites?" Incredible.

Matthew 12:38—Then some of the Scribes and the Pharisees answered, saying, Master, we wish to see a sign from you. And what was it again? The reason they're asking this of who he is, “Are you the Son of God? Are you the Messiah? Are you the descendant of David? Are you the one who is going to lead us away from the Roman rule and government that's over us now?"

Verse 39—But he answered and said unto them, An evil and an adulterous generation seeks after a sign; and there shall no sign be given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the whale's stomach… And I love the way Mr. Armstrong wrote this, making it very clear and talking about this, when you look at the story and the account in Hebrew, in the Hebrew language, when it says three days and three nights it has to be a three full days and a three full nights. You have to have a full 24-hour period, three of them, 72 hours total to fulfill what that means in Hebrew, but people try to make it a different time period. A lot of the scholars and teachers know full well what they're doing and what they're saying and they know what Christ had to say. Christ said three days and three nights in the whale's stomach; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights… So specific! Incredibly specific! But the world of traditional Christianity doesn't believe that. The Protestant world doesn't believe that. The Catholic Church doesn't believe that. What do they believe? They believe something totally different that would actually disprove the sign. By their beliefs, it would mean that the sign he left proves that he's not the Messiah. Surprise, surprise, that they would believe such a stupid thing.

So he will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth, not that he would be dead that long, but that he'd be in the heart of the earth. He'd be in that tomb three days and three nights.

So what's the real timing? What timing comes from Friday, at the end of that day? Because if you follow the story it talks about from noon to about three o'clock then in the afternoon there was darkness all over all the land, and then at three o'clock, right at that moment in time, there was a period when the soldier came up, rammed that spear in his side, out came water and blood. It talks about how the curtain in the temple ripped from top to bottom showing something on a spiritual plane that the way into the Holiest of Holies was now being made possible for mankind, because to this point in time it hadn't been revealed, but because of his death, because of Christ's death for the sins of mankind, mankind was now going to be able to have access in a greater way than ever before, obviously, to God's very throne through prayer, through communication to the Great God of the universe.

So they believe then that after three o'clock, later on as the day went on here, that Joseph of Arimathea went and secured the body of Christ from Pilate, him and Nicodemus then went and wrapped the body, prepared the body, put spices with it, a certain amount already and put it in the tomb and rolled the stone over in front of it to close the tomb. So they believed that this was happening just at the end of Friday and that Christ was put in the tomb, because it had to be done before the Sabbath began, so their belief is just before sunset the tomb is sealed. So again, what comes from Friday at the end of that day to a Sunday morning around the sunrise period – because that's what they think; they think that at sunrise is when he was resurrected. They think that when they came to the tomb that that's when he was being resurrected. Basically, when Mary was there it's like this was when it was happening, at sunrise. Yet the angels made it very clear he's already gone. He's already resurrected, but people read the story and they think, well that's when it happened, when the sun was rising and he was resurrected at that moment in time. Amazing.

So what does that give you? Well, I think it's good that people go through this because it's a bit of a no-brainer when you start going through and counting this up because Christ was very specific about three days and three nights. So what comes from Friday, the end of that day to Sunday morning? Well, Friday night and Saturday night. It's only two nights. You can only have Friday night and Saturday night in there, because Sunday morning, well, you can only squeeze two nights in there. So two nights only. So already the world of traditional Christianity disproves the very thing that Jesus Christ said, "I'm going to leave you a sign, the sign of the prophet Jonah, that as he was three days and three nights in the heart of the great fish, so will I be in the heart of the earth three days and three nights… so will the son of man be in the heart of the earth."

So some could say, perhaps, speaking of daylight period here, maybe they could stretch it and say maybe an hour of daylight before the sun set on Friday, maybe one full day of light period on Saturday, because that's what we're talking about , one full day on Saturday. So one full day, maybe an hour on Friday, and again perhaps, if you didn't think it happened really at sunrise, just a little bit after sunrise, maybe they squeeze an hour or fifteen minutes? I don't know what they do. I do know what they do, but again here, just making it very clear here that the most that you're going to get from all this is one full daytime period and maybe a couple of hours of other daylight. So one day of daylight and two hours all together. Incredible.

So traditional Christianity believes that Jesus Christ was dead in the tomb for a maximum period of two full nights and perhaps two hours of daylight and then that one full day of Saturday. So, I have to shake my head how they do this, because they do actually, they do actually get into arguments. You don't have to have a full daytime period; it just has to be a little bit on that day. They still can't squeeze any more than two nights in there no matter what they do, even if they have a little bit of daylight on Friday, all day Saturday, and that little bit of daylight on Sunday. They count that as three days believe it or not! That beats Ripley's all to pieces.

Anyway, let's take a little bit of time here and look at Passover (we've already gone through this), the first period of observance that God gave to His people, and for everyone in the Church, we know this inside and out. But again, for people who come along and see it for the first time, this is an incredible story. And you know it. You in God's Church, you know these things, but if you're not careful you can begin to take for granted the things that God has given to you. Think of the hundreds of thousands and millions and millions of people who profess to understand this book, some who study it and read it faithfully, weekly, and yet they don't grasp and comprehend what you clearly see. Awesome! It truly is awesome!

So Passover on the fourteenth day of the first month was on a Tuesday night. That's the night that Jesus Christ was together with the disciples. They kept a particular period of time here as far as that dinner was concerned that we read about, and they observed the physical Passover for the last time as far as the eating of the lamb. Then Jesus Christ went through the process there of the washing of the feet, the taking of the wine and the bread like he did, the new symbols for a Passover observance and they sang the song, he taught certain things that are recorded in John 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, in through there, then they left and went to a garden. It talks about where they went and spent more time, he went to pray three different periods of time, and then they came and got him. This all happened on Passover night, on the fourteenth, which was a Tuesday night.

Then Wednesday day was when they took him and did most of the beating that they did, put him up on a pole, nailed him to a pole, and set it in the ground. As we read the story from 12-3:00, again here, darkness was over the land. Then by 3 o'clock, around that period of time, he died. Then again here, the story of Joseph who went to Pilate just before Passover was over, because Passover was during the night and the daytime period then of Wednesday, during the daytime period of Wednesday, and they had to go and get the body before and bury it as their belief was before a holy day began. So that Wednesday at sundown was going to start the first day, the first annual Sabbath of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, a holy day, an annual Sabbath, something that the Protestant world doesn't grasp because they're not told what was taking place. They don't know what happens after Passover, which really disgusts me because there are a lot of scholars out there and a lot of people who study the Bible who know full well what followed Passover and why they were striving and wanting to get this done. Even the Jews wanting Pilate to go by and give the command to the soldiers to kill all those on the poles, the three of them, because they wanted them taken care of, down from the poles and in the ground before the sun set, because of their holy day that was going to begin. They know full well it wasn't the weekly Sabbath. They know full well that it was the 1st day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, but they don't teach it to the world. They don't dare teach it to the world because then they'll come to learn and understand that Jesus Christ and this little, sweet story that they tell isn’t true. He wasn't resurrected on Sunday morning as the sun was rising, and all their sunrise services that they've been holding for hundreds and hundreds of years, when they go out early in the morning and want to be there at sunrise on Easter morning, is a lie, because it disproves Easter and the observance of Easter—and it does more than that—it disproves the only thing they have to hold on to of a Sunday worship because that's what gives them their grounds for a Sunday worship. "He was resurrected Sunday morning. We keep Sunday as our Sabbath." That's how far they go – the Catholic Church does, and then others have followed off with a lot of that as well.

Anyway, the timing. So here we are, Wednesday at sunset begins a high day. So again, it's important to go through some of this and just jot it down, make a graph, whatever. Wednesday, after that daytime period is over (Christ had to die on the Passover day), by the time it's sunset, just before sunset, he's put in the tomb, and the stone is rolled over just before sunset on Wednesday. It's not hard to count three days and three nights after that. It's not hard to count it at all, to know exactly the moment in time that he was resurrected to fulfil the sign that he was the Messiah. Any other thing that people believe disproves that and disproves that he was the Christ. How could people believe such things? It blows the mind!

So Jesus, again, said he'd be in the heart of the earth for three days and specifically stated it'd be three days and three nights. So from the end of Passover as the sun was going down on the daytime period of Wednesday through the annual Sabbath, the annual Sabbath of the 1st day of Unleavened Bread, was the first night and the first day. So if you go through all of Wednesday night, which is the 1st day of Unleavened Bread, an annual Sabbath, and all day then Thursday right before sunset, you have one day. Then you go past that from Thursday night and then all the way to the point in time just before the sun went down on Friday and we have two full days. So that's the preparation day for the weekly Sabbath. So all night Thursday and all day Friday, you have two days. So simple to count, and that was the preparation day. That's when they went and got the spices, the women did, because they couldn't get it on the 1st day of Unleavened Bread, which was on Thursday, they had to wait until Friday, on the regular preparation day when business was taking place and people could buy and they could do work.

So now after Friday sunset we enter into the weekly Sabbath. So from Friday night through most of the daytime portion of the Sabbath, right before the Sabbath is over, right before the weekly Sabbath is over, the seventh day, right before sunset, right before the 1st day of the week begins, it is three days and three nights. Simple. And most in the scattered Church don't even grasp and comprehend that Jesus Christ was resurrected on the weekly Sabbath at the end of the Sabbath day. Go back and read your old literature. Go back and see. Again here, some of it's made clear, but as a whole the Church didn't grasp a hold of that even though Mr. Armstrong made it very clear when he died and when things took place. Most of the Church never really grasped what the timing was.

So again here, going through all of this – three days, three full days and three full nights – it's a bit of a "no brainer." It's very easy to picture, very easy to prove. So it’s an awesome thing to go back and read some of these things.

Let's go back and read something else in John. Let's go back to John 3 when I mentioned that Christ spoke to Nicodemus and talked about certain things to him.

So again here, it's important to understand that no one came to Christ's tomb at the end of the weekly Sabbath day. They didn't bring the spices then because it had to do with their concept of work, their idea of work and certain things you don't do, and in getting the stone rolled back and carrying these things over there. It was a lot of weight in all this, and all the women who were carrying various amounts of weight for the distance they had to travel to do it. So they prepared everything Friday and they waited through the Sabbath day; they couldn't do the work on the Sabbath, bring it to the tomb, so they waited. That's why they came Sunday morning. They'd prepared all these things and by the time they got there the angel said he's already risen. He's risen. He's not here. Well, obviously, because he'd been resurrected at the end of the Sabbath day.

Now we're going to look at a couple of "types" of what was done on two occasions through the prophets in the past, because again here, incredible stories and good to review this. The first concerned Moses. We read about Jonah, and we're going to talk a little bit about that, but the first one that Christ gave, or the first thing that he revealed here that had to do about his death, had to do with something that happened through Moses.

And in John 3:12 it says, If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you heavenly things? In other words, spiritual things. So here Christ is talking to Nicodemus, a leader, a teacher of the Jewish people, and he's telling him, "If I tell you of certain things concerning God's plan," concerning physical things and things that he was himself fulfilling, he said, "If I tell you about these physical things that are taking place and you're not able to believe them, how are you going to be able to believe me if I tell you about spiritual things?" In other words, he had a conversation with him, "You aren't going to be able to grasp it."

Verse 13, he went on to say, No man has ascended up to heaven. Now, there were conflicting beliefs here at that time about what happens after death, between the Sadducees and the Pharisees. There are different beliefs that they had. So he makes a statement here, No man has ascended up to heaven. I think of that verse alone. I look at a verse like this and I think, "Why don't people quote this verse here?" "No man has ascended into heaven." And yet the very basic belief of traditional Christianity is that when you die you ascend up into heaven, you go to heaven….or the bad place, wherever that is. Incredible! "No man has ascended up into heaven." So that means that Moses didn't ascend up there. At this point in time, David wasn't there. No one in scripture to this point in time had ever gone to heaven. He's saying, "No man." And basically, it's really saying here in the Greek language, "No one ascends into heaven." But no one has ascended unto heaven, but he who came down from… Again here, people read things into this and it's like, then he was up there so he's lived for all eternity. He's lived for all time. No, that's not what its saying. It's saying what his origin is. The Greek literally means, "from out of." He's from out of heaven. That's right. How? Because his Father's in heaven because God Almighty gave of power, of spirit, into the womb of Mary to create a child to be born, to impregnate a physical human being in the womb. Awesome! His own son.

So indeed, Jesus Christ, the only one who is going to ascend into heaven is the very one who came out from heaven. The word isn't "down from." It's like, heaven is up there, this concept of, or idea, and people have no idea where heaven is. But they think they do. "It's up there." It's like hell: "It's down there." But now we have so much knowledge of certain things about the earth its like, "I don't know. Maybe there is a big hollow place down there that gets really close to the center and it gets hot. I don't know." Sad.

No man has ascended into heaven except he who came from out of heaven, even the Son of man who is in, and again here, the word is mostly translated as "among," or "with," heaven. He is the Son of God. God the Father, he talks about. This is all it's talking about. God the Father dwelt in him. He dwelt in God, like he talks about in John 14 and 15, and in through there. There is that connection of life that's in him that comes from God Almighty, that exists in him, that lives in him with heaven, in heaven, if you will, from heaven. It's about a relationship with God Almighty. …the Son of man who is among/with heaven. Even as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, he goes on to say, even so must the Son of man be lifted up, in a specific way, on a pole because when you go back and read this story about the serpent in the wilderness, he's giving this analogy here, this "type" to be fulfilled. He gave two "types," one with Jonah and one with this one here about his death and his resurrection. He's very specific here. There is this example in the Old Testament with Moses, "and as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up." One was for a physical salvation; one is for a spiritual one. Awesome, the "types," one physical, one spiritual.

All of you know the story inside and out, but for anyone new? To me it's always awesome and exciting to learn something new like this. I'll be real candid with you it's always exciting for me when I go back and speak on it again and again and again, as with anything in God's word. And if you ever lose that excitement for what God has revealed to you and what God has given to you, things you see and that you know that others can't see and know, that's not good. So it's good to always test yourself and ask yourself the question, "How exciting and inspiring are these stories, these things that God has revealed to us to see and understand these "types."

So Numbers 21. I'm going to read part of the story of what happened back here with Moses. Numbers 21:5—And the people spoke against God, and against Moses saying, Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? So here it is the Israelites, very common, even just right after they got across the Red Sea, it doesn't take long, they started murmuring and complaining, "Things aren't going well. Things aren't going the way we thought," whatever that means, "the way we want it." So here they were complaining against God Almighty, but they're directing it toward Moses and they're directing it toward Aaron and speaking out against them and not understanding how God works, that if God works through someone like that and people speak out against them they don't know the condemnation they bring upon themselves.

Again here, it says, Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no bread, neither is there any water; and our soul loathes this light bread, this manna they were eating. How long did they eat it? A long time. They ate bread, white bread. They had to go out and pick manna for a long time – year after year after year. It was their main sustenance. Incredible! Incredible! For nearly forty years they were going out and picking this off of branches, off of things on the ground, and wherever there's a twig, a blade of grass they'd have to go out and pick a certain amount, save it up, put it in a jar, put it in a container. They probably had all kinds of recipes of how to bake manna, of how to cook manna just like we do today. We have a lot of things we make out of flour and bread and yeast. It probably came from them. They had to learn how to do this. Anyway, but they said "our soul so loathes this." "We're so tired of this." Human beings, it's amazing how human beings can be not realizing what they have, but complaining about what they don't have that would make their lives so much better, so much richer, so much more enjoyable. If only this could happen. If only I could have that. Amazing!

And our soul loathes this light bread. So God Almighty didn't take this well, obviously, when they were complaining after all He'd done for them – intervention after intervention after intervention, taking them out of Egypt in the first place, destroying Pharaoh and his army as they were after them, pursuing them, and again, providing for them over and over and over again. And the Eternal sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people; and many people of Israel died. Therefore, the people came to Moses, and said, We have sinned. Isn't that amazing how human nature can be? It's like, “Things aren't going well. I'm suffering.” And now we start looking inward a little bit. "What did I do?" "What did I say?" "What?" Anyway, We have sinned. We have spoken against the Eternal. See, there even on a very physical plane, not with God's spirit at all, they could get it. They spoke against Moses. They spoke against Aaron. They were speaking against what God had given to them and now there are all these poisonous snakes among them and people were being bitten by them and people were dying from that.

Again here, this bit of remorse for a little while. We have sinned against the Eternal, so they understood that, and against you. Pray unto the Eternal, that He take away the serpents, in other words, the poisonous snakes from us. And Moses prayed for the people. And the Eternal said to Moses, Make a fiery serpent, and set it on a pole. Incredible, not on a cross. It’s very clear in Hebrew, "Put it on a pole." …and it shall come to pass, that everyone who is bitten, when they look upon it, shall live. "So if you want to be saved," physically, "from dying, go look on the pole." How hard do you think it would be to follow that instruction if you'd been bitten or your child's been bitten? Do you think they're going to take that child right away and look upon the pole? Absolutely. And when they did, they lived; they survived. Did they have some suffering? You bet. You bet. But they lived and they survived where others before them were dying.

It says, they shall live. And Moses made a serpent of brass, and put it on a pole, just as God said, and it came to pass, that if a serpent had bitten anyone, when they looked upon the serpent of brass, they lived. Awesome story! I love it.

I love what follows 720 years later, thereabouts, very close to that. Right at 720 years later in the book of 2 Kings, just jot it down, chapter 18. This was concerning a king of Judah, Hezekiah. And it says in verse 3—And he did that which was right in the sight of the Eternal. So he had a desire in himself. God stirred him up and he had a desire toward God to do what was right, to set things right in the nation. It says here, He did what was right according to all that David his father did. He had that kind of heart, that kind of mind, that kind of desire toward God. It says David, not his immediate father, but his lineage going way back was king David. He removed the high places, so the places of false worship that plagued the Israelites forever, that plagued them even after they came into the promised land, that plagued them all through time to this day because where the Israelites are they're still plagued with paganism that came from way back there, ideas and beliefs, just like Easter, Astarte, worship of Astarte, the Ashtoreth. On and on it goes in different languages. Sunday morning worship. Incredible!

He removed the high places and broke the images, and cut down the groves, so the things that people were worshiping in front of and things that they would make as their god. …and cut down the groves and broke in pieces the serpent in brass that Moses had made. Amazing! It had been with them for 720 years. All through the wilderness, all through the history of the kings of Judah up to the point of Hezekiah. They still had that crazy serpent on a pole and they were still worshipping it. I mean, they'd made it into worship by this time. They'd made it an object of worship, of healing. The human mind, incredible! It says, for unto those days the children of Israel were still burning incense. God never said to burn incense to it. He said when you're bitten by a serpent come and look upon the pole and you'll live. It didn't say anything else. It didn't say anything about any other kind of thing, but they got it in their minds that this was something to do with healing and something that God had given and so they took it many steps further. So people were, and as human beings are, they made replicas of it. They made copies of it, just like every kind of religion, all these little crosses. I don't know how many buildings have been built out of pieces of what they call the cross that Jesus Christ was supposed to have died on, and all these little splinters that the Catholic Church used to use. Anyway. Human beings.

He broke in pieces, and broken images and so forth, and the thing of brass that Moses had made. For unto those days the children of Israel were still burning incense to it. And he called it Nehushtan, which just means "the place of brass," piece of brass. So he called it after what it was, what he'd destroyed there. Awesome story! That's why I like to go on and say we still have it to this day. We still haven't gotten rid of it. We still have the serpent on the pole. Sometimes they've changed it a little bit and put a little "X" up there or even a little cross and kind of like a little bit of thing at the top, but different parts of it. Some of them just have the straight pole, just like then, with the serpent wrapped around it. People have no idea where those things come from. It came right out of here.

The second great "type" that Jesus Christ fulfilled, and what was just focused upon and said, was the sign about Jonah. Again, three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. So he gave two. He showed the very one about how he was going to die; the son of man has to be lifted up on a pole with hands up above his head, feet down below, a spike in through the hands, and a spike through the feet on a straight pole. That's how he was going to die. He said that was an example, a "type" of something that the Israelites had to look at in order to live after being bitten by a serpent, and now on a spiritual plane you have to come to understand and acknowledge and grasp that Jesus Christ was placed on a pole for you, that he died on that pole for you, that it's through that that you can have a spiritual relationship with God. It's not a physical thing, it's about a spiritual existence, and a time that can come through time where people can be born into God's very Kingdom, into God's very Family and have everlasting life. So he gave something here as a physical "type," of the serpent on the pole, and a spiritual "type" of himself, that he was going to fulfill by his death on that pole. Awesome story, but has spiritual depth and spiritual meaning to it.

Then there was the sign with Jonah, three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. That will be the sign that I am your Messiah, and there is not going to be any other sign left to you but that one. So to truly believe the truth about Christ's death and that he is your Messiah, that he is your High Priest, that he is your Passover, you have to believe the truth that he died, was put in a tomb, and was in that tomb for three days and three nights.

If you believe anything else, you better throw away the rest of the story (that came along with the Catholic Church) that you've been fed. All the swill and all the garbage about a trinity, that there is no such thing. All the stupidity about a mass of Christ they call Christmas and have observed and made it into a nice fairy tale, and a wonderful thing is this big, fat man in a big, red suit and white all around (which if he does it a few times is not going to be red very long, it's going to be black as black can be going down through chimneys), and he can go down through any size of chimney, it seems like. It doesn't matter what the size and the tube that must be there in some of these, if they knew how the chimney was made and how the smoke comes up through it, and yet he's able to land there up on top with this sleigh and all these reindeer. The children are supposed to believe it. If you're not naughty, if you're nice, if you're good, you're going to have some presents under the tree. Isn't that sweet? Sweet stories. Sick. All from the Catholic Church. That's where it got started.

Just like Easter, because they did away with Passover. They made it a crime to observe Passover. Isn't that amazing? The Catholic Church in 325 A.D., they made it a crime in the empire, the Roman Empire, to observe Passover. They said, "From henceforth we observe Easter." Then right after that it became a crime punishable by death if you kept the Sabbath because now the state religion of Rome, of the Roman Empire, is the observance of Sunday. Amazing! They called it of Christ. They called it of God. Incredible! And people are ignorant of it.

I am so grateful that very soon God is going to straighten this mess out and tell the lies for what they are and help people begin to see what is true and that they be stirred up and excited and moved and motivated to understand what is true, as we indeed are and should always be.

So let's read this again, going back here in the story in Matthew 28, putting some of the story together here of what took place and then pick it up and continue on. Matthew 28:9. We're going to be jumping around at different points here. But again, now speaking of Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of James: And as they were on their way to tell the disciples, behold, Jesus met them, saying, Greeting! So here we're jumping into a story now. We have the account of where they went first time to the tomb, and then they followed John and Peter back and they were there the second time. So this is talking about them at this point in time. It says, as they were on their way to tell the disciples, behold, Jesus met them saying… Now, he'd already saw them at the tomb and spoke to Mary at the tomb, spoke to the Mary's at the tomb. Primarily, it talks about Mary Magdalene. But it says as the women were going back now to tell the disciples they've seen Jesus, incredible what happens again. Jesus appears to them again on the way. So here they are walking, they're going back, and this is the account that's taking place. People read through these stories and they can't understand, "When did they do this?"

And as they were on their way to tell his disciples, behold, Jesus met them, saying, Greeting!  And they came and held him by the feet.  Now, generally we go to the example of Thomas, but this was fulfilled well before that. It means what it says in the Greek language about holding on to the feet. It means "to seize hold of; to hold fast to." It makes it very clear here what they did. They went in and grabbed him by the feet and they touched him. What was it just a little bit before this? Because they're not travelling very far to go back to where they were going, two miles, and I believe whole-heartedly that's exactly what it was. So here they are walking back and Christ appears to them again. He'd just told them, "Do not touch me."

I'll read that again to you, what it says, even though on the way here it says they grabbed him and worshipped him, grabbed him by the feet. They knew he was a Messiah. They knew he was a Son of God. They were strengthened in a powerful way. Awesome, what took place.

And so again, I'm just going to read it again here, John 20:16-18—And Jesus said to her, Mary. And she turned herself and said unto him, Rabboni; which is to say, Master. And Jesus said unto her, Do not touch me. For I have not yet ascended to my Father. But go to my brethren and say to them, I ascend to my father, your Father; and to my God, and your God. And Mary Magdalene came and told the disciples that she had seen the Lord and that he had spoken these things to her.

Now, that's John's account of what was stated there, but Matthew adds the extra here, that yes, she went back and told, but on the way back Christ appeared to her again because he did something. He had accomplished something. He had fulfilled something by that time. It doesn't take long to wave the wave sheaf before God. And in a very powerful and a very quick way (and we don't understand it), Jesus Christ went through whatever ceremony it was, ascended up to God and was accepted by God as the wave sheaf for all mankind. And right away, not very long at all, he's right there again as they're walking back, at some point, maybe just before they got back, maybe half way, maybe they'd only gone a mile—we don't know—and he appears to them again. This time they touch him. They grab a hold of his feet. Awesome story!

So it happened a lot sooner than what we'd normally thought in the past when he actually allowed them to touch him. Because, again here, we'll see more of the story as it goes on here, of what we've normally thought it to be.

Matthew 28:10, continuing on with the story, Then Jesus said unto them, Do not be afraid. Go and tell my brethren that they go into Galilee, and there they shall see me. Now when they were going, again, the second time here to go tell the disciples. This isn't the first time because that's when John and Peter ran back. This is the second time now after Christ has appeared. …behold, some of the watch came into the city, and declared to the chief priests all the things that had happened. So those that had been watching the tomb, it talks about how that they were basically frozen there for a period of time, scared spit-less, and then now they're going to go tell their story of what happened here. Jesus Christ isn't there any longer.

And verse 12— And when they were assembled with the elders, and had taken counsel, they gave a large amount of money to the soldiers—Amazing!—saying, This is what you're to say: His disciples came by night and stole him away while we slept. That isn't what happened and they knew that didn't happen. They knew they didn't fall asleep. They knew that stone was there and what they experienced and what they saw when that stone was rolled back. They were scared spit-less when it talks about the earthquake that took place and the angel that was sitting on top of the stone (which they just saw as a man).

Verse 14—And if this come to the governor's ears, we will persuade him and free you. In other words, "You're not going to be held accountable because you fell asleep. We're going to go tell the governor and we're going to set this right with him. You don't have to worry. Take the money and run." That's what they did. So they took the money, and did as they were instructed. That's the story they told. They held to it. And this saying is commonly reported among the Jews until this day. And what day? Whenever John wrote this years and years and years later. Whenever it was that he sat down and put everything on paper, to this day this story is still out there, of what they're telling, of what they did and what they said, that the body was stolen and they came by night and took it away. They stuck to it and its still being told.

So again, it can be difficult to put this entire story together and keep everything straight, understandable. Even when you go through things like The Harmony of the Gospel they don't have it right. They don't grasp everything that took place. As you even try to piece all that together and see one section with another it's hard. It really is. Only by going through it in the way we've gone through it here can a person really tie everything together properly and put everything together because there's more to the accounts in the sense of being able to say, "This is what was happening here, and this is how he records it," and so forth, but they all fit together very well. Perfectly, frankly.

Again here, even the timing of all this very difficult. So we go through the story, we see how that they were afraid when they first saw him, they ran to tell the disciples, John and Peter ran back to the tomb and saw that Jesus wasn't there. The second time around here in the account of Luke records that the women had gone to the tomb and the two angels spoke to them and he was no longer there, he had risen. But they still didn't grasp it, did they? They didn't grasp it until they actually saw him. Then they went back and told the disciples. That's another part of the story, when they went back a second time.

Luke 24:9 it says, And they (the women) who had taken spices returned from the sepulchre, and told all these things unto the eleven, and to all the rest. Now, it's an interesting story here. There is a reason why we're going through some of this in the way that we are.

Luke 24:9—It's recounting some of the story. It's speaking of the women who had taken the spices. And they (the women) returned from the sepulchre and told all these things unto the eleven, and to all the rest. It was Mary Magdalene, and Joanna, and Mary the mother of James, and the others with them who told these things unto the apostles. And these words seemed to them as silly talk, nonsense. That's what the word means in the Greek, silly talk from the women, nonsense ...and they did not believe them. That's after Christ had spoken to Mary. This is after all that had taken place. This is after they'd come back here. This is talking about the first time. They didn't believe them then and they didn't believe them later. We'll get to those scriptures later. I'm getting ahead of myself.

Then Peter arose and ran to the sepulchre; and stooping down, so it's going back and recounting the story. They didn't believe them the first time because of what the angel said because they didn't believe this themselves. Mary didn't believe it yet, but she told them what the angels told them to say, "He's not here. He has risen." What does that mean? And she still believed somebody had taken the body. Even when she went back there and talked to Christ, who she thought was the gardener, "Where have you laid my Lord's body? I'll go get him." So they didn't believe him the first time and they didn't believe him the second time either. That's what we're coming up to.

Then Peter arose and ran to the sepulchre; and stooping down he beheld the linen clothes lying by themselves, and departed, wondering in himself at that which had come to pass. Because they still didn't know. The clothes were there. Christ wasn't, so they went back. Then it's the second time when they came. Let's turn over here now to Mark 16, a very condensed version of what's being stated here, but you have to put them all together.

Mark 16:9—Now when Jesus was risen, and all this from one Greek word just meaning, "having risen." It's already happened, in other words, early the first day, so it's giving a time sequence here, When Jesus had already risen, in other words, then early the first day, is what it's saying here, of the week, so it's just going through and telling a story, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had cast seven demons. Awesome! And she went and told them that had been with him, as they mourned and cried. So again here, she went and was telling them and different ones were still mourning his death and what had taken place and the fact that he wasn't there. And they, when they heard that he was alive, and had been seen of her, did not believe. So they didn't believe the first time, what the angels had told them what to say because they came back and reported that, but she still didn't get it. She still didn't understand, and the women didn't understand.

But now the second time around is what we're looking at here and what was told, because Jesus himself appeared to her, to Mary, and gave her a message to tell them, and appeared to her twice – once at the tomb and once on the way back, as we've already read the story. It says here, again they didn't believe.

I think I'm going to stop there today. This is kind of a difficult place here. I just want to take us up to this spot here because for what we're getting ready to go into, again here, it takes a little more time to go through some of this and explain it in full detail. But again here, this going back and forth, you just have to have in your mind the women went there first. They'd been told by the angel certain things to say. They ran back. Peter and John then came and they found that he wasn't there, but they didn't grasp what had taken place and they didn't yet believe what the women had said, what they were told to say by the angels, and neither did the women yet. They didn't really believe it yet. It wasn't until the second time, in other words when they followed John and Peter back to the tomb, that at this account now it gives the account then of Mary Magdalene when Jesus Christ spoke to her and said, "Don't touch me." Then they were going back and he appeared, it says, again. It shows that it happened again; he appeared to them. This time the women, it says, "grabbed him at the feet, seized hold of him, and worshipped him." Then they went and told that they had seen Christ and what he had said, and they didn't believe her. They didn't believe what the women had to say.

So here is twice now because they get reprimanded by this later on for what they did, that they didn't believe. They didn't believe the first time, what the angels had said, and they didn't believe the second time, when Jesus himself appeared to Mary and stated what she did to them about her experience, that she saw him and that she wasn't able to touch him and that "I go to my Father and your Father," he said, "to my God and your God." Because she told them that. It's recorded. Then they went on to tell them what took place as they grabbed him and were able to touch him and what he told them then. It's an awesome story, it truly is, but some interesting accounts here of what took place at that moment in time that, again, it takes a little bit of time to build a framework for. There’s no sense in adding it today just as long as we have that part of the story straight in our mind about the different times they went back and forth from the tomb, the different accounts of what was taking place here, and then both accounts as the women went to the tomb and came back. On both occasions they never believed that Jesus Christ had been resurrected from the dead even after they were told, "I have seen and talked to Jesus Christ." Incredible! They still didn't believe. Awesome!

We'll come back to that in Part 7, and possibly complete it, the whole story, at that particular moment in time. Awesome series to go through and talk about some of these things and just take a little piece at a time, to make sure it's straight in our minds even in God's Church, because sometimes by these reviews we go back through them and it's amazing how much is there and how much God continues to clarify and make it clearer and clearer as we go along.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1