11) Mary Magdalene stood crying outside the tomb. She was still weeping, when she stooped down 12) and saw two angels inside. They were dressed in white and were sitting where Jesus' body had been. One was at the head and the other was at the foot. 13) The angels asked Mary, "Why are you crying?"

She answered, "They have taken away my Lord's body! I don't know where they have put him."

14) As soon as Mary said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there. But she did not know who he was. 15) Jesus asked her, "Why are you crying? Who are you looking for?"

She thought he was the gardener and said, "Sir, if you have taken his body away, please tell me, so I can go and get him."

16) Then Jesus said to her, "Mary!"

She turned and said to him, "Rabboni." The Aramaic word "Rabboni" means "Teacher."

17) Jesus told her, "Don't hold on to me! I have not yet gone to the Father. But tell my disciples that I am going to the one who is my Father and my God, as well as your Father and your God." 18) Mary Magdalene then went and told the disciples that she had seen the Lord. She also told them what he had said to her.

Mary�s story begins with grief and a shocked sense of profound loss. She experienced the same emotions we experience when a loved one is taken from us. Those who work with grief have classically identified the stages of denial, anger, bargaining, depression and finally acceptance. More recent work has used other terms for the same feelings and processes: Shock and Numbness, Yearning and Searching, Disorganization and Despair, and Reorganization. We see a glimpse of these in Mary.

She has come to do what she can for the body of this man she called Rabboni, meaning Teacher. But the body is not there! As if the shock of his horrible death on the cross were not enough, now the body is missing! The shock level increases and so does the anger. As she pleads in search of his body, to do the honorable thing out of love and respect, perhaps she is also yearning for some sense in the midst of this chaos. If the person in whom she had placed her hope and her trust must die, there needs to be some reason, some purpose for his death. She is frantic in her search and bargains with the man she believes to be the gardener. Tell me where it is, so I can take care of him. She is already crying. You can hear the despair and depression lurking just behind her desperation. If she can�t get an answer out of this man it threatens to overwhelm her.

Then he says her name, and everything changes. This is no mere gardener. This voice is familiar in the most warm and friendly way. Perhaps it begins to sink in on some level that those glowing young men in the tomb really were angels, and this, this really is Jesus! Her voice cries out with all the longing and hope she is almost afraid to feel, �Rabboni!�

Perhaps you have gone through those same emotions and struggles when you have lost someone you love. You may have lost them to death as Mary lost Jesus to the cross and the grave, or you may have lost someone in other ways, through a break up, through a move, through a change in circumstance. Perhaps your loss wasn�t a person but a job or a home or your physical health. Loss comes to us in many forms and the emotional processes are similar even if the intensity of those emotions may vary.

Loss and death are natural parts of life�s ongoing journey, but they are parts we are often reluctant to face. Perhaps like Mary you feel all alone. She had run to get the disciples, but they handled their grief and shock in their own way. They could not comfort her. She heard the good news the angels spoke to her, but since she was human it took her awhile to grasp the truth and hope of their message. Sometimes we think no one else understands our pain, no one feels it as deeply as we do. But just as someone stood in the garden who could take all that Mary was feeling, so there is someone who fully understands us in our time of loss. That one is Jesus. He keeps his promise to be with us always. No matter how much we hurt, we are not completely alone. He hears and he cares.

The Bible story doesn�t show us a fully restored and healed Mary. It does, however give us a glimpse of Mary with a mission. In it we see a hint of the resolution stage in grief work, the reorganization or acceptance. Jesus has sent Mary back to the disciples, to tell them He is alive and what is planned for Him next. So Mary becomes an evangelist, one who tells others the good news about Jesus. On some level she has begun to experience that hope of the resurrection, the promise of life beyond the grave, though I am sure it was still a mystery to her.

Once in awhile you hear a story of someone who finds that sense of mission beyond their loss. Two deaths, a teenager and a baby, sparked a nationwide mission we know as Mothers Against Drunk Drivers. Christopher Reeve became a true super hero to many after losing use of his limbs. His courage and determination after his accident have inspired many, and the foundation he and his wife began offer hope to many other victims of paralysis. I remember a woman who began visiting in nursing homes after losing her husband. I know a children�s waiting room in a courthouse set up in memory of a child who was abducted and killed. Sometimes beginning to make peace with the loss in our own lives involves reaching out to others who are hurting or in need. I can see Jesus� loving nod of reassurance wherever this takes place.

I know that loss will come in each of our lives probably more than once in a lifetime. I believe that even when I can�t see any good, God can find it.

28) And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. (Romans 8:28)

I believe that even though it may take time, God can turn my sorrow to joy.

You have turned my mourning into joyful dancing. You have taken away my clothes of mourning and clothed me with joy. (Psalm 30:11)

I believe it takes great faith to say with Job,

The LORD gave me what I had, and the LORD has taken it away. Praise the name of the LORD!� (Job 1:21)

But I also believe the Lord can give us such faith if we ask for His help. To believe in the resurrection of Jesus is an act of faith. There are those in the world who might still try to claim it is a hoax. But there are many more of us who have experienced that hope of new life somewhere inside us. We stand with Mary ready to tell the world, �He�s alive! Jesus is alive!�

Let that message overcome whatever loss you have experienced in your life and let our risen Lord send you forth to do His work in the world where hope is so desperately needed.