1 Early on Sunday morning, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and found that the stone had been rolled away from the entrance.
11 Mary was standing outside the tomb crying, and as she wept, she stooped and looked in. 12 She saw two white-robed angels, one sitting at the head and the other at the foot of the place where the body of Jesus had been lying. 13“Dearwoman, why are you crying?” the angels asked her. “Because they have taken away my Lord,” she replied,“andI don’t know where they have put him.”
John 20:1 & 11-13 NLT
Mary was weeping and distraught because she assumed someone had stolen her Jesus. She let her circumstances define her reality and she was crushed by what she thought was true when, in fact, it was not true.
She let her experience define Jesus instead of letting Jesus define her experience. The truth was that Jesus had risen from the dead, exactly as He said He would. If she had believed this, she would have been filled with joy and happiness instead of being overcome by sadness and hopelessness.
O how often I have allowed my feelings to‘runwild’ based on how I perceived a situation and I needlessly stressed and suffered over things I thought were true but were not. I assumed Jesus was not present, when in fact He was always present.
I am slowly learning to let Jesus define my reality and determine my feelings, based on what He says is true instead of letting my circumstances and feelings determine what is true. When I see Jesus with me in the midst of trying situations, everything changes in a moment.
Faith is how we travel from the natural world into the spiritual world and bring God’s reality to bear on our lives. Faith is how we submit our circumstances and feelings to what is always true in Christ.
- He will never leave us or forsake us. -Hebrews 13:5
- He gives us Himself as the peace we need. – John 14:27
- He gives us Himself as the rest we need. -Matthew 11:28
- He is the way, the truth and the Life in all our circumstances. -John 14:6
- Do not worry for He is with us, for He will never leave us or forsake us. -Isaiah 41:10
The next time you are overcome with fear, grief and stress, look to Jesus and be saved. He wants to be your Savior every day and He never fails to rescue those who look to Him.