The Christian Appeal (August 2000)
Issue Theme: A Peculiar People

Moving the Stone
by Gene Shelburne

Shadows were lengthening quickly that evening when a  small band of Christ’s friends hurried into the burial garden and hastily laid their Master’s body in a borrowed tomb. They had to hurry because the laws of Jewish ritual forbade them to touch the dead after sundown that night.

But even in their haste, they were careful to close the cave-like grave securely by rolling a huge flat stone against the mouth of the tomb. No wild animal would desecrate that grave. No lone grave-robber would snatch their Lord’s body.

The big rock had been hewn especially for this purpose and installed in a rut or track chipped out of the rocky ground alongside the tomb. It would effectively keep out all intruders. Once they had rolled the stone into place, Christ’s friends were content.

But not his enemies! Early the next morning they told the Roman governor of their fears that Jesus’ body might vanish. They remembered Christ’s predictions that after three days he would rise again. So, with the help of Pilate, they made sure that the great stone would keep in the dead man.

The men who had killed Christ now sealed the stone at the door of his crypt, probably with great blobs of wax imprinted with the governmental seal. And they posted guards to watch the rock. Just in case. They did not intend for that boulder to budge one inch.

So it was that in the duskiness of dawn on that first day of the week, as the Marys and the other women disciples made their way to the grave, their biggest concern was how to move the stone that blocked their way to Jesus.

As though in answer to their anxiety, God suddenly shook the ground beneath their feet. The Gospels tell us that “an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone and sat upon it.”

For the women, the stone had been unmovable. For God it was no problem at all.

Most of us have stones in our lives that seem impossible to dislodge—stones of loneliness, weakness, guilt, and despair. Stones of unbelief, disobedience, ignorance, and fear. None of us are big enough to move these burdens and barriers by ourselves.

Hear the assurance of Easter that the boulders which block our lives are mere pebbles before the liberating power of the One who opened up the tomb of our Lord.