Mary, Mary

There was something about Mary, something very wrong. The very best medical care available seemed useless to help her, as she went from place to place to no avail. In the end, she found someone who was able to cure her. She was so grateful that she went to work for him, learning everything she could from him.
 
Then, in a strange and rapid turn of events, he came to be arrested on trumped-up charges, found guilty, and executed. Mary watched him die, one of the very few of his family and friends who stayed by him to the end.
 
A couple of days later, still overcome with grief, she went to visit where he had been laid to rest. Grave robbers appeared to have come during the night, because the body was gone, adding cruel heartbreak upon heartbreak. She panicked and ran to get her coworkers, but they just came to look and left. Grief now overwhelmed her and she sobbed uncontrollably. Through her tears, she saw people around her and heard them ask why she was crying. One of them seemed to be a landscaper. She hardly knew what to say. Then the "landscaper" responded by calling her by name, “Mary.”
 
Now she saw clearly. It was him. It was Jesus. It was the Lord. He was risen as he had said.
 
Mary Magdalene was thus the first to see the risen Lord. She was the one who would bring the news to the Apostles. Much later, many strange stories came to be told about Mary, but what remains always clear is that she was faithful to the Lord even in the most horrible of circumstances and that she was the first to tell the news of Christ’s resurrection.

May none of us have to endure the grief Mary suffered, but may all of us be as resolute as she was in remaining close to the Lord and witnessing to the power of his resurrection.