The Easter events—what Elder Jeffrey R. Holland calls “atoning Friday with its cross” and “Resurrection Sunday with its empty tomb”[1]—have always played an important part of my life. In 1987 one of my friends and I backpacked around the world. One of our first stops was Israel, where we spent about a week exploring in Jerusalem with a Bible in one hand and a Let’s Go: Europe in the other. One day we went to the Garden Tomb, just north of the Old City. My spiritual world was forever impacted that day.

A photo of the Garden Tomb in Jerusalem. Courtesy of Intellectual Reserve, Inc.

The Garden Tomb is owned and operated by The Garden Tomb (Jerusalem) Association based in the United Kingdom and Israel.[2] Although the tomb there is probably not the actual tomb of Jesus,[3] it is nevertheless for me a spiritual oasis in both Jerusalem and in my mind and heart. On that first visit I felt the Spirit so strongly as our volunteer guide from England sat us down and declared his personal witness. To the best of my memory, he said to us something like, “Each year thousands of people come to this site to find the place where Jesus was buried, but I am here to witness to you, along with the angel who spoke so long ago to the women [present at the tomb], ‘Why seek ye the living among the dead? He is not here, but is risen’” (Luke 24:5–6).

I don’t think that I can adequately convey with words how deeply that testimony has settled into my heart. I have since returned to that site many times, and each occasion has brought its own spiritual impressions, but every time that first experience once again reverberates in my heart.

But the events of the Resurrection are only one part of Easter. In the King James Version of the New Testament, the word Easter is found in only one verse: Acts 12:4. Here it translates the Aramaic word pascha, which refers to the Passover, either the meal or the sacrificed Passover lamb. Thus, our only apparent New Testament reference to Easter is misleading in the King James Version. Only later in Christian usage did pascha also become the word for Easter (from the King James Version). Thus, the original concept of Easter was connected to Jesus’s Crucifixion rather than his Resurrection.

The Crucifixion and Resurrection were the centerpiece of the early Apostles’ teachings as they began to think about life after Jesus’s mortal ministry. Paul taught the Corinthians that they were the most important things that he had taught to them. “For I delivered unto you the most important things [Greek en prōtois] which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures” (1 Corinthians 15:3–4, author’s translation).[4] In Peter’s first public discourse in Acts he testified that Jesus who “by wicked hands [was] crucified and slain: whom God hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death” (Acts 2:23–24).[5]

Over the years since that initial experience at the Garden Tomb, my testimony of the Easter events has been deepened by further studying what Christ’s female disciples experienced during his Crucifixion and Resurrection. All four Gospels mention that women were witnesses of both the Crucifixion and the Resurrection, but they do so with slightly different emphases. Mark, Matthew, and Luke all identify these women as being followers of Jesus from Galilee (Mark 15:40–41; Matthew 27:55–56; Luke 23:49). John, however, makes no reference to their connection with Galilee[6] but instead focuses on Jesus’s directions from the cross to his mother, Mary, and John. In addition, John focuses the Sunday morning events on the experience of Mary Magdalene. I will focus mainly on the accounts in Luke and John’s Gospels.

Luke’s Gospel is particularly poignant because it ties the female witnesses of the Crucifixion and Resurrection back to the women in Luke 8: “And it came to pass afterward, that he went throughout every city and village, preaching and shewing the glad tidings of the kingdom of God: and the twelve were with him. And certain women, which had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities, Mary called Magdalene, out of whom went seven devils, And Joanna the wife of Chuza Herod’s steward, and Susanna, and many others, which ministered unto him of their substance” (Luke 8:1–3).

Certain Women. Courtesy of Intellectual Reserve, Inc.

These verses describing the twelve and the women being with Jesus during his Galilean ministry embody Luke’s ideal of discipleship: they accompany Jesus “as companions and witnesses of Jesus’s ministry.” Through their ministrations to Jesus, Luke portrays the women as examples of those who both hear and act on the word of Jesus (see Luke 8:21).[7]

These women, however, were not just with Jesus in Galilee. Luke says that they “accompanied (Greek sunakoloutheō) him from Jerusalem” (Luke 23:49).[8] This connection suggests that these women were part of the group included in Luke’s travel narrative, which depicts Jesus’s journey from Galilee to Jerusalem, culminating in his triumphal entry (Luke 9:51–19:47). This narrative is a major theme in Luke’s Gospel and provides the context for much of the important teachings and miracles during Jesus’s ministry, many of which are unique to this Gospel.[9]

Thus, Luke’s mention of the women in chapter 8 has several important purposes in Luke’s Gospel. It implies a significant sacrifice on the women’s part, including being uprooted from domestic life for a significant period. Later Peter will say to Jesus, “Lo, we have left all, and followed thee” (Luke 18:28), something that these women had also done. In addition, Luke’s mention of the women in chapter 8 prepares his readers for their upcoming witness of Jesus’s Crucifixion and Resurrection—and I believe we have much to learn from these women.

In Luke’s list of women in chapter 8, Mary Magdalene is mentioned first, which is usually the case in other New Testament scriptural lists of women. Her place in these lists suggests that she may have acted in a leadership role among the women disciples and prefigures her prominent place as a witness of Jesus’s Resurrection.[10] In addition to Mary Magdalene, Luke names Joanna the wife of Chuza Herod’s steward and then Susanna. He then notes that there were many other women who were also in attendance (Luke 8:3).[11] Joanna is also specifically mentioned in Luke’s list of women who witnessed the empty tomb on Resurrection morning (Luke 24:10), but unfortunately we have no further specific mention of Susanna in the Gospel accounts.

Luke further notes that these women “ministered unto [Jesus] of their substance” (Luke 8:3), suggesting that in some way they were benefactors for Jesus during the journey, and may in part explain Luke’s description of Joanna’s financial position by including that she was “the wife of Chuza Herod’s steward.” The women’s generosity seems to be, in part, their response to Jesus’s gift to them when he healed them from evil spirits and sicknesses (Greek astheneia; Luke 8:2). The word ministered in verse 3 is a translation of the Greek verb diakoneō, which can indicate that the women used their means to help support Jesus and the needs of his followers during this journey.[12]

Their contribution in this way prefigures the time when the early church members consecrated their personal means to the community as a whole: “And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul: neither said any of them that any ought of the things which [they] possessed [were their] own; but they had all things common” (Acts 4:32). Thus, as one scholar notes, the text in Luke portrays Mary Magdalene, Joanna, and Susanna “as persons who both hear and act on the word of God.”[13]

Luke’s mention of these Galilean women’s presence at the Crucifixion indicates that their journey with Jesus did not simply conclude when they arrived in Jerusalem. Rather, these women continued with him on his testing journey to Calvary—a journey that Elder Holland once described as “the loneliest journey ever made.”[14] Their ongoing loyalty at one of the most difficult times in the Savior’s ministry says something important to me about their discipleship and their commitment to stay with him even—and especially—in difficult times.

Although Jesus’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem was accompanied with a multitude of people rejoicing and praising God, saying, “Blessed be the King that cometh in the name of the Lord: peace in heaven, and glory in the highest” (Luke 19:37–38), the narrative in this final week quickly shifts to descriptions of betrayal (Luke 22:47–48), denial (Luke 22:54–62), and crowds crying out for his crucifixion (Luke 23:18–23). The women’s presence at Calvary[15] reminds me that discipleship is about loyalty to God and his Son in both word and deed—not just in times of spiritual prosperity but even when it requires standing up against the tide of worldly uproar and criticism.

As we now turn to the events of Easter Sunday in which the Resurrection of Jesus is rightly the focus of these accounts, we find that the women continued their journey with Jesus even after his death. All four Gospels describe women being at the tomb early on Sunday morning. Mark and Luke specifically mention that the women from Galilee came with spices to take care of Jesus’s body (Mark 16:1; Luke 23:56). Under normal circumstances the women would have taken care of the body soon after it was placed in the sepulchre, but they had postponed their ministrations until after the Sabbath (Mark 16:1). As important as it was for them to attend to Jesus’s body, these women remind us of how important the Sabbath was for Jesus and his followers. In Luke’s account, chapter 23 closes with a description of the women preparing the spices after the Crucifixion, and chapter 24 opens with the women bringing those spices to the sepulchre in the early Sunday morning (Luke 23:55–56; 24:1–2). In Luke’s context their coming to the tomb was the culmination of the journey that they had embarked on when they left Galilee.

Even with the hindsight of two thousand years, it is hard for me to fully imagine what the women must have experienced as they entered the tomb and found it empty. It seems clear that even though Jesus had taught his disciples that he would rise again from the grave (Mark 8:31–33; Matthew 16:21–23; Luke 9:22), neither the women nor the eleven Apostles expected it. Luke says that the women were “much perplexed” (Luke 24:4) when they entered the tomb and saw that the body was gone—and rightly so. Nothing like this had ever happened before! What they found instead of Christ’s body were two angels who declared to them the same words I heard from my guide at the Garden Tomb: “Why seek ye the living among the dead? He is not here, but is risen” (Luke 24:5–6). Even though these women did not actually see the resurrected Savior, they were nevertheless witnesses of the empty tomb and they immediately went and reported their experiences to the eleven Apostles.

“And [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 other women that were with them, which told these things unto the apostles” (Luke 24:9–10). The imperfect tense of the verb in verse 10, “which told these things unto the apostles” (emphasis added) may suggest that the telling was repeated action: they “tried repeatedly to get their story across to the apostles.”[16] Unfortunately, “their words seemed to them as idle tales, and they believed them not,” although Luke records that Peter ran to the sepulchre, finding only the linen graveclothes in the tomb. Then he records that Peter “departed, wondering in himself at that which was come to pass” (Luke 24:11–12). Peter’s experience confirmed the women's witness of the empty tomb despite the Apostles’ initial skepticism.

John’s account of Resurrection morning has a different emphasis from that in the synoptic Gospels. It focuses particularly on the experience of Mary Magdalene, who is a type not just for women but for all disciples who seek for Jesus. In John’s account, only Mary Magdalene came early to the tomb. There is no record of her bringing spices with her, and we can assume only that, like Mary and Martha had done for Lazarus (John 11:31), she came to the tomb to mourn for Jesus.[17] It seems clear that she was expecting the stone still to be in place. Once she finds the stone taken away from the sepulchre, she immediately runs to tell Peter and the other disciple, presumably John. Both came and found the tomb empty, except for the graveclothes, and they then returned home (John 20:3–10).

We don’t know why Mary Magdalene chose to stay after Peter and John left, although we get a sense of her grief as we read of her standing outside the sepulchre weeping (John 20:11). It is in this time of her grief that she receives two magnificent revelations. We also don’t know why these revelations came after Peter and John had left the garden—they will eventually have their own experiences with the risen Jesus—but here John chooses to emphasize the experience of Mary.

Mary Magdalene seeks the body of Christ and is told by angels that "He is risen." Courtesy of Intellectual Reserve, Inc.

The first revelation serves as a precursor to the even greater one that would follow. While Peter had looked into the sepulchre and seen graveclothes, Mary saw two angels sitting where the body should have been (verse 12). These angels do not appear to have been there when Peter had entered the tomb. They recognize Mary’s grief and simply ask her, “Woman, why weepest thou?” Her response to them indicates that she thinks that someone has taken the dead body: “Because they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid him” (verse 13; compare verse 2). Although she does not immediately appreciate the implication of the angels’ presence, readers can recognize that their presence establishes that the empty tomb is the work of God rather than grave robbers.[18]

The second revelation comes as Mary then turns and sees a man whom she supposes to be the gardener. This man repeats the question posed by the two angels and then adds another: “Whom seekest thou?” (John 20:15). Again she responds in the same manner that she had to the angels’ question. It isn’t until he calls her by name—because he is eternally the Good Shepherd who knows his sheep and calls them by name (John 10:3, 14)—that she finally recognizes him.[19]

With that recognition, Mary clings[20] to Jesus, so much so that he asks her to stop. This incident reminds Mary that Jesus’s new life is not the same as his old life; in this new life, as he had taught the disciples earlier, he must ascend to the Father (John 14:12, 28; 16:5, 10, 17, 28; 17:11, 13). This is the witness that Mary eagerly brings to the other disciples (John 20:18).[21]

I love how Mary’s brief conversation with Jesus shows the depth of her role as a disciple: the question he asked of her, “Whom seekest thou?” (Greek tina zēteis), resembles the moment when he asked John and Andrew, “What seek ye?” (Greek ti zēteite) at the start of his ministry (John 1:35–38). These two questions at the beginning and end of the Gospel connect Mary with the first disciples. It also serves to highlight one of the major themes of John’s Gospel: that the revelation of Jesus’s divine identity and mission does not come to the spiritually passive but rather to those who actively seek for it.[22] I’ve learned that truth in my own life.

Some thirty-six years have passed since my first trip to Jerusalem and the Garden Tomb. That visit, along with my subsequent visits, have helped me read more carefully and think more deeply both about the Savior’s Crucifixion and Resurrection and reflect on the women who witnessed the empty tomb as well as on Mary Magdalene, who personally witnessed the resurrected Jesus.

Christ at the Tomb, by Dale Kilbourn. Courtesy of Intellectual Reserve, Inc.

Like Mary Magdalene, Mary, Joanna, the mother of James, and others, I have also visited an empty tomb in a garden and have pondered the implications for me of Christ’s victory over death. I am so grateful that I shared one of my visits to the Garden Tomb with my sister, Cherie. As we sat there and talked about the importance of Christ’s Resurrection for us, little did we realize that within five years she would leave mortality and that two years later to the day, her youngest daughter would follow her. The pain of their passing is real and ongoing, but the hope that comes from the Resurrection is also very real for me. “He is not here, but is risen” (Luke 24:6).

I can’t even begin to imagine what Mary Magdalene must have felt in that garden as the Lord called her by name and she realized the supernal event that had taken place. But Mary wasn’t in the garden by accident. She was there because ever since the Savior had personally ministered to her, she had given her time and means to minister to him. I don’t think that she was at the tomb just because it was the women’s responsibility to prepare the body for burial. She came because she loved the Lord, knew of his divine mission, and longed to be with him—because even though she found that the tomb was empty, she chose to stay even after the others had left.

I frequently ponder how I too can minister to him of my substance. I can certainly further the work of the kingdom through tithing, fast offerings, and donations. I can consecrate my time and energy to building up the kingdom by serving and magnifying my stewardships in the Church. Perhaps even more importantly, I can, as Elder Neal A. Maxwell has so eloquently taught us, offer my will on the altar of sacrifice because that is truly the only unique thing that I have to offer that God hasn’t given to me in the first place.[23] This is an ongoing lesson that I am trying to learn.

It seems to me though, that there are times when I can do all these things to the very best of my ability, and still feel in times of trial that the tomb is empty—that the heavens are closed to me. Mary Magdalene’s experience, however, reminds me that the Savior will always come to me; the problem is that sometimes I think that he is just the gardener—someone who just happened to drop by at the right time or some other seeming coincidence. But her story teaches me that when he comes, in whatever form that may be, he will call my name, because he knows who I am and he cares about me. I may not be able to reach out and embrace him in a tangible way like Mary Magdalene did, but that does not negate the reality of his presence at my side nor the depth of his love for me.

I love the Easter season. I love the hope that comes from the Christ’s Resurrection, and I love pondering the women who became important witnesses of this eternally important event. What happened on that early Easter Sunday was not just that Jesus overcame the grave but, as Paul taught the Corinthians, “For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive” (1 Corinthians 15:22). I live from day to day with that hope.

Notes

[1] Jeffrey R. Holland, “None Were with Him,” Ensign or Liahona, May 2009, 88.

[2] “Join the Garden Tomb,” The Garden Tomb: Witness & Worship in Jerusalem, https://gardentomb.com/join-the-garden-tomb.

[3] The tomb is an Iron Age tomb that predates the time of Jesus by several centuries. Sometimes tombs were reused, but Matthew’s Gospel says that Joseph from Arimathea took Jesus’s body from Pilate, “wrapped it in a clean linen cloth, And laid it in his own new tomb, which he had hewn out in the rock” (Matthew 27:57–60; emphasis added; John 19:38–42). The parallel accounts in the other synoptic Gospel accounts do not mention that it was a new tomb (Mark 15:43–46; Luke 23:51–53). For a discussion of the archaeology of the Garden Tomb, see Jeffrey R. Chadwick, “Revisiting Golgotha and the Garden Tomb,” Religious Educator 4, no. 1 (2003): 13–48.

[4] The KJV translates the Greek phrase en prōtois as “first of all,” indicating a temporal sequence of events. The Greek phrase, however, can also indicate the “rank or degree: first, foremost, most important, most prominent.” See “πρῶτοϛ,” (prōtos) in Walter Bauer, William F. Arndt, F. Wilbur Gingrich and Frederick W. Danker, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, 3rd ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago, 2000), 892; hereafter abbreviated as BAGD.

[5] The KJV reads, “It was not possible that he should be holden of it.” My translation used above is consistent with the Greek word krateisthai. See “κρατέω” (krateō) in BADG, 564.

[6] While the synoptic Gospels describe the women standing afar off after the crucifixion, John describes them standing by the cross before Jesus’s death (John 19:25). There is some debate among scholars over how many women are referred to in John 19:25, but four seems the most likely. For discussions, see J. Ramsey Michaels, The Gospel of John, The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2010), 953–54; Johannes Beutler, A Commentary on the Gospel of John, trans. Michael Tait (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2013), 486–87; and Raymond E. Brown, The Gospel According to John, XIII–XXI, A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary, Anchor Yale Bible 29A (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1970), 922.

[7] Joel B. Green, The Gospel of Luke, The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1997), 317–20.

[8] Mark and Matthew both use the Greek word ἀκολουθέω (akoloutheō), which can mean to move in the same direction as someone, or to be a disciple, although Mark uses the imperfect tense (repeated action), while Matthew uses the aorist tense (a single action in the past). Mark’s language “when he was in Galilee” makes it clear that the women followed Jesus while he was in Galilee. Matthew does not include that phrase and allows readers to understand that, like Luke, the women followed Jesus when he journeyed from Galilee to Jerusalem.

[9] These unique Lukan teachings and miracles include the account of Jesus’s rejection by the Samaritans (Luke 9:52–56), the story of the good Samaritan (Luke 10:29–37), the story of Martha and Mary (Luke 10:38–42), the story of the friend who comes at midnight (Luke 11:5–8), the warning against greed (Luke 12:13–15), the parable of the rich fool (Luke 12:16–21), the healing of the crippled woman on the Sabbath (Luke 13:10–17), the warning against Herod (Luke 13:31–33), the healing of the man with dropsy (Luke 14:1–6), teaching on humility (Luke 14:7–14), teachings on discipleship (Luke 14:28–33), the parables of the lost coin and the prodigal son (Luke 15:8–32), the parable of the unjust steward (Luke 16:1–9), the parable of the rich man and Lazarus (Luke 16:19–31), teachings on the unprofitable servants (Luke 17:7–10), the cleansing of the ten lepers (Luke 17:11–19), the parable of the unjust judge (Luke 18:1–8), the parable of the Pharisee and the publican (Luke 18:9–14), and Jesus’s encounter with Zacchaeus (Luke 19:1–10).

[10] I. Howard Marshall, The Gospel of Luke, The New International Greek Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1978), 316; Mark 15:47; 16:1, 9; Matthew 27:56, 61; 28:1; and Luke 8:2; 24:10. The one exception is John 19:25–27, where Jesus’s mother Mary is mentioned first and Jesus speaks directly to her from the cross. In this instance Mary Magdalene is mentioned after Mary, “and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Cleophas” (v. 25).

[11] The Greek form of the phrase “many others” is feminine heterai pollai, indicating that he was referring to “many other women.”

[12] “διακονέω” (diakoneō), in BDAG, 229–30 references Luke 8:3 as an example of diakoneō with a dative to indicate that the women were helping to support Jesus with their means.

[13] Green, The Gospel of Luke, 320; emphasis in original; see Luke 8:21; compare 6:46–49.

[14] Holland, “None Were with Him,” 86.

[15] Luke’s text does not name the women who witnessed the Crucifixion. He simply notes that “the women that accompanied him from Galilee, stood afar off, beholding [the Crucifixion]” (Luke 23:49; author’s translation). Mark and Matthew both include names for the women. In Mark they are Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James the less and of Joses (Greek Iōsēs), and Salome (Mark 15:40). In Matthew they are Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Joseph (KJV Joses; Greek: Iōsēph), and the mother of Zebedee’s children (Matthew 27:56).

[16] Marshall, The Gospel of Luke, 888; Herbert Weir Smyth, Greek Grammar, rev. Gordon M. Messing (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1984), 423–24.

[17] Marianne Meye Thompson, John: A Commentary, The New Testament Library (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2015), 411.

[18] Thompson, John, 414.

[19] This failure to initially recognize Jesus is a familiar response in other resurrection stories (John 21:7; Luke 24:16, 31).

[20] The Greek word translated as “touch” in the KJV is haptō and can mean to “cling to.” The imperfect tense of the verb suggests that it is an ongoing action.

[21] Thompson, John, 417.

[22] Jesus also asks the same question twice to Judas and those who come to arrest him in the garden, but in that case they are only thinking of the mortal Jesus, “Jesus of Nazareth” (see John 18:1–8).

[23] Neal A. Maxwell, “Swallowed Up in the Will of the Father,” Ensign, November 1995, 24.