Behold Your King: The Resurrection | John 20:11-29
Brian Hedges | April 5, 2026
I want to invite you to turn in Scripture to John 20. For this Holy Week, we’ve been doing a short little series from the Gospel of John. We looked at the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, last week, from John 12. Then on Friday night, Good Friday, we looked at John 19 and the crucified king. And today we consider the risen king from John 20.
This is a passage that I think speaks right to the heart of our struggles. If I had to describe what many of us this morning are carrying, I would probably use words like this: Grief. Doubt. Fear. Some of you have experienced great losses in recent weeks or months that have just left you numb with grief. Some of you have experienced that disturbance of heart, that deep unsettledness that comes with hard questions, that you have not yet been able to resolve. And some of you are stressed and anxious and fearful about the future—maybe because of health struggles that you’re facing, struggles in your family, or maybe more generally, concerns about the very unstable world in which we live.
But I want you to know these are not just contemporary emotions. These are exactly the states of heart that God’s word speaks to. These are the very same feelings that the original disciples felt after Jesus was crucified. In fact, what John 20 does is give us a series of case studies, and these case studies show us people wrestling with just these kinds of emotions and how meeting Jesus risen from the dead completely changed their lives.
So I want to begin by reading the passage. We’re going to read John 20:11-29. This is a lengthy passage of Scripture, but it’s available for you on the screen, or if you’re using one of the Bibles provided there in the chair in front of you, it’s page 906. John 20, beginning in verse 11. Let’s hear God’s word.
“But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb, and as she wept she stooped to look into the tomb. And she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet. They said to her, ’Woman, why are you weeping?’ She said to them, ’They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.’ Having said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, ’Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?’ Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, ’Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.’ Jesus said to her, ’Mary.’ She turned and said to him in Aramaic, ’Rabboni!’ (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, ’Do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brothers and say to them, “I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.”’ Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, ’I have seen the Lord’—and that he had said these things to her.
“On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, ’Peace be with you.’ When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, ’Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.’ And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, ’Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.’
“Now Thomas, one of the twelve, called the Twin, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, ’We have seen the Lord.’ But he said to them, ’Unless I see in his hands the mark of the nails, and place my finger into the mark of the nails, and place my hand into his side, I will never believe.’
“Eight days later, his disciples were inside again, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, ’Peace be with you.’ Then he said to Thomas, ’Put your finger here, and see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe.’ Thomas answered him, ’My Lord and my God!’ Jesus said to him, ’Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.’”
This is God’s word.
So John 20, the passage we’ve just read, gives us three case studies: the case of Mary, the case of the disciples, and the case of Thomas. And it shows us how the resurrection changes us, transforms us. It shows us that:
1. The Resurrection Turns Sorrow into Joy: The Case of Mary
2. The Resurrection Changes Fear into Mission: The Case of the Disciples
3. The Resurrection Transforms Doubt into Faith and Worship: The Case of Thomas
Let’s just work through each one of those together.
1. The Resurrection Turns Sorrow into Joy: The Case of Mary
First of all, the resurrection turns our sorrow into joy, and you see it in the case of Mary.
The passage really begins with sorrow. In verse 11, Mary stood weeping outside the tomb, and as she wept, she stooped to look into the tomb. And then the angel says to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?”
Now just note this. Note that the story begins with grief. It begins with sorrow. This shows us that Mary—and this would be true of all the disciples—was not expecting resurrection. They weren’t expecting Jesus to be alive. Instead, she was weeping because she thought the body had been taken away. She was consumed with these emotions of grief and sorrow.
Even when Jesus is right there with her—the risen king, standing right in front of her—at first she doesn’t recognize him. Now, there may be several reasons for this. It may be that this was still very early in the morning and it wasn’t yet very bright, and she couldn’t quite make out his face. It’s also quite possible that there was something about the resurrected body of Christ, the glorified body of Christ, that was just different enough that the disciples would not immediately recognize him, because you have a similar case in Luke 24. But it may also be that Mary doesn’t recognize Jesus because she’s not looking for him and because her grief has narrowed her vision. She’s looking at even the risen Christ through tears, and it’s narrowed her focus.
Grief has a way of doing that. Grief can distort our vision. It can narrow our field of vision so that hope feels out of reach. Grief doesn’t leave any room to feel hope. And that’s where Mary is.
That’s where Mary is until Jesus speaks her name in verse 16, says to her, “Mary,” and then she recognizes him and says to him, “Rabboni,” or teacher.
Now, before we move on, I just want us to linger here for a moment, because this is not just Mary’s story. The story of the world is written in tears. Many of you are facing this right now or have faced it in recent days, recent months, recent years. We’re carrying grief and sorrow in our hearts in this room. Some of us have experienced the loss of a parent. We know the grief and the sorrow that comes from burying a loved one. Some experience the quiet grief of miscarriage, hopes that never come to full term. There are the dull aches that some of us carry for family members, maybe children or siblings who are estranged from the Lord, who are not walking with God, who are maybe distant from us, wandering and hurting. Some of us have experienced the loss of mentors or friends or people who have shaped our lives. There’s just the confusion of suffering that does not make sense in the world, in the weight of living in a world that feels increasingly fragile.
Some of you, if you’re honest, would say, “I don’t know where to find hope right now.” That’s exactly where Mary is when she says, “We do not know where they have laid him.”
But the turning point in the passage is not Mary finding her way out of grief; it is the risen Christ coming to her. And when he comes, he changes everything.
I think John wants us to see that this is more than just a personal reunion. The theologians and commentaries draw out the nuances of this passage and many others in the Gospel of John, where there is a running theme of creation and new creation. Even the way the Gospel of John begins—“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God—” is an echo of Genesis 1. And just as the creation story unfolds in seven days, so the story of the Gospel of John unfolds in seven signs, with the climactic sign being the resurrection.
Here, in this resurrection story, in this resurrection narrative, it’s not an accident that Jesus meets Mary in the garden—in a garden—because it had been in a garden that the first Adam had fallen and had brought death into the world. And now here Jesus is the second Adam who is bringing life into the world. He is reversing the curse of Genesis 3, the curse of sin and sorrow and death. It’s all being undone, as Jesus, the new man, the second man, the last Adam, as Paul calls him in 1 Corinthians 15, is bringing a world of new creation. And Mary is the first eyewitness to that.
This gives us great hope, great hope in the face of our sorrows and our griefs. The resurrection tells us that death is not the end, that sorrow does not have the final word, that Jesus has done something to bring renewal and healing into this broken world.
To feel the weight of that, I want you to follow with me this image, this illustration that comes from C.S. Lewis’ book Miracles. He says,
“In the Christian story, God descends to reascend. He comes down, down from the heights of absolute being into time and space, down into humanity, down into the very roots and seabed of the nature he has created. But he goes down to come up again and bring the whole ruined world up with him.
“One may think of a diver, first reducing himself to nakedness, then glancing in midair, then gone with a splash—vanished—rushing down through the green and warm water into black and cold water—down through increasing pressure into the death-like region of ooze and slime and old decay—then, back up again, back to color and light, his lungs bursting, until suddenly he breaks surface again, holding in his hand the dripping, precious thing that he went down to recover.”
That dripping, precious thing is human nature. It’s humanity. It is the world that’s corrupted by death that Christ has now rescued through his death and resurrection. That’s what the risen king has done. He’s gone all the way down—down into humanity, down into death, down into the grave—and he’s come up again, out of suffering and death—not empty-handed; he has come up again having rescued the good creation that had fallen. He has restored humanity in himself and now brings that redemptive, resurrection power into our lives.
Friends, this means that we have hope as well. In the face of our sorrows, our griefs. Because a new world has broken in, in the person and the work of Jesus Christ.
And it means that he meets us in our grief as well. In the face of our sorrows, our griefs, because a new world has broken in, in the person and the work of Jesus Christ. It means that he meets us in our grief as well. Many of you as believers know this. Even as you have walked through difficult times, times of sadness and sorrow, you know what it is for Christ to whisper your name through his Spirit and to bring hope back into your hearts. That’s why we can sing words like this:
“Mine are tears in times of sorrow,
Darkness not yet understood.
Through the valley I must travel
Where I see no earthly good.
But mine is peace that flows from heaven
And the strength in times of need.
I know my pain will not be wasted;
Christ completes his work in me.”
The resurrection changes grief into joy, but it does more.
2. The Resurrection Changes Fear into Mission: The Case of the Disciples
We have a second case study beginning in verse 19, the case study of the disciples, where we see that the resurrection changes fear into mission. Verse 19: “On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews…” They’ve heard the report. Mary Magdalene is the first evangelist, the first one to spread the good news of the gospel. “I have seen the Lord!” she said. They don’t believe her. They’ve locked themselves up, and they’re locked up because they’re afraid. These are not the mighty apostles of the church strategizing, planning, mobilizing, preparing for mission. Instead, they’re hiding.
And it makes sense. They do not yet believe the resurrection. Jesus the Messiah, Jesus their friend, their leader, their teacher, had been executed; and the authorities who killed Jesus might be coming for them next. So they’re afraid. This is what fear does. Fear closes doors. It reduces one’s world to whatever feels safe. So they are locked up in their fear.
Once again we see that Jesus changes everything when he comes into the room and he says, “Peace be with you.”
Now that phrase—you might have noticed this as we read the passage from John 20, “Peace be with you”—is repeated three times in this passage. It is an important word that shows us how Jesus brings peace. The resurrected Christ brings peace.
This peace is not simply a greeting, it’s not simply a sentiment. This calls to mind the Jewish Hebrew concept of shalom, a world that is woven together in joy and peace and harmony and delight, where there is flourishing and wellbeing as people live under the saving reign of God in his kingdom. Jesus comes bringing that peace.
Notice what he does next in verse 20. It says, “When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side.” He showed them his wounds. And I think even that detail is showing us a couple of things. It’s showing us the physicality of the resurrection of Christ. It’s the same body that had been crucified that is now raised. He shows them his wounds.
But it also shows us that it’s through his wounds that the peace comes. The way one theologian puts it, atonement brings shalom. Or the way Paul puts it—much more simply; theologians make things complicated—Paul put it very simply: “Christ secured peace through the blood of his cross.” Peace through his blood. Peace through his wounds. Peace with God because sin has been dealt with. Peace in our hearts and in our lives because death has been overcome. Peace because the work is finished and the resurrection pronounces God’s “amen” on the finished work of Jesus Christ.
When the disciples see this and experience this, their fear turns to joy. “Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord.”
But it doesn’t just end with joy for the disciples; there’s also mission. There is a commission that is given. You might even think of John 20 in some ways as John’s version of the Great Commission, as he sends his disciples into the world. You see it in verse 21. Jesus said to them, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.”
Isn’t that amazing? Here are these fearful disciples who have shut themselves into a room, hiding for their lives; and they meet Jesus, and this is the beginning of a real transformation where these fearful, cowardly disciples become the bold witnesses to the resurrection of Christ. And every single one of them, except for John, every single one of them will die a martyr’s death. The fear is gone. Now there is confidence because they know that Christ has defeated death.
Of course they don’t do this in their own strength. Verse 22 gives us another detail. “When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, ’Receive the Holy Spirit.’” This is our power for mission. The gift, the power of the Holy Spirit.
Once again, I think there are new creation themes here, because do you remember Genesis 2, when it says that God breathed into Adam the breath of life? And here is Jesus, who is breathing his Spirit into his disciples. It’s a symbolic action that shows that he is conveying to them the very same power that they had seen at work in his life. He is unleashing the resurrection power of the Spirit into his people, power that will be given in fullness on the day of Pentecost, as recorded in Acts 22. The resurrection turns fear into mission.
One more little detail here; in verse 23 we get an idea of what this mission involves. When Jesus says, “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them. If you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld,” I think that simply means that through the apostolic proclamation of the gospel, those who receive that gospel and believe it receive forgiveness; those who reject it are not forgiven.
But it’s showing us here what the message is. We have a mission, and the mission is to share Jesus with the world, in word and in deed. In word—it’s the word of the cross that brings peace. It’s the word of forgiveness. It’s the word of the cross and the resurrection of Christ through which salvation comes.
It doesn’t stop with words, of course. The mission of Jesus always included both words and deeds. As he proclaimed the kingdom of God, he also embodied it. The message came with his mercy and with all the good deeds he did to meet the needs of people. So the resurrection has those same implications for us in the realm of mission.
Listen to N.T. Wright, from one of his sermons, talk about the implications of the resurrection. He says,
“Easter means that in a world where injustice, violence, and degradation are endemic, God is not prepared to tolerate such things. Therefore, we work and plan with all the energy of God to implement the victory of Jesus over them all.”
Isn’t that close to what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15, that great resurrection chapter? At the end of the chapter, he says, “Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.”
Their fear is turned into mission; and friends, the same can be true of us. Whatever fears you may be facing in your heart and in your life, whether it’s fears related to your health, fears related to your family, fears related to the world and the instability of the world—any of those things—if Jesus is alive, if the resurrection is true, then we do not have to be bound by fear. Death is the worst thing that can happen to you, and Jesus has defeated death. And therefore, we don’t have to pull into our rooms and hide; instead, we can boldly declare that Jesus is risen, that Jesus is king, we can share the message of forgiveness with others, and we can embody that in loving deeds and service to others.
3. The Resurrection Transforms Doubt into Faith and Worship: The Case of Thomas
The resurrection changes grief into joy, the resurrection turns fear into mission. Sadness to joy, fear to mission. And now one more: the resurrection transforms doubt into worship, faith and worship. You see this with the case of Thomas. Look at verses 24-25. It says,
“Now Thomas, one of the twelve, called the Twin, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, ’We have seen the Lord.’”
Again, this is a running theme through John 20. Mary says, “I have seen the Lord,” and they don’t believe. Then the disciples say, “We have seen the Lord,” and Thomas doesn’t believe. In fact, he says to them,
“’Unless I see in his hands the mark of the nails, and place my finger into the mark of the nails, and place my hand into his side, I will never believe.’
Here’s Thomas, described by one person as “a scientifically minded empiricist who requires reasonable evidence before adopting a position.” Thomas is the patron saint of the doubting believer, the skeptical person who just needs hard evidence. Now he’s not a hardened cynic, but I think Thomas understood the weight of what was being claimed. If Jesus is really risen from the dead, then everything changes; but if Jesus is still in the tomb, none of it holds. So he wants to know. He wants to know for sure. And so he presses for evidence.
He says, “I’ve got to see him! I’ve got to see him, and I’ve got to touch him for me to believe it.”
I want you to just note this: Thomas would not have been satisfied with a ghost of Jesus. He would not have been satisfied with a vision of Jesus’ spirit or a vague impression that Jesus was still somehow with him. Those are all misunderstandings people have of the resurrection. The resurrection means none of those things. It doesn’t just mean that the spirit of Jesus somehow lives on. It’s more than that. It’s more than that! It means that the body came out of the tomb. It means that the corpse woke up. It means that the same Jesus who was crucified is now alive and he has risen! And Thomas wanted to see that. He wanted to know that. He wanted to touch the flesh-and-blood, embodied Jesus, the same Jesus who had been crucified; the mark of the nail in his hands, the wound in his side. If it’s real, it has to be physical. It has to be historical. It has to be verifiable.
That is exactly what Jesus gives him in verses 26-27.
“Eight days later, his disciples were inside again, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, ’Peace be with you.’ [There it is again.] Then he said to Thomas, ’Put your finger here, and see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe.’
Thomas, in one of the greatest confessions of faith anywhere in Scripture, says, “My Lord and my God!” Doubt is transformed into faith and worship.
Then notice verse 29, that says something that I think is very important for us to hear this morning. Jesus says, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”
Now this shows us right from the text that there is an expectation here that there’s coming a day when Jesus the risen one will ascend to his Father and will not be seen physically. There’s not an expectation that from now on anyone who wants to is going to see the risen Christ. I’ve never seen the risen Christ. I’ve never had a vision of Jesus. I’ve not had the experience that Thomas has had, and neither have you. Paul was really the last eyewitness of Christ, a special appearance of Christ to Paul on the road to Damascus. Jesus is now in heaven, ascended in heaven.
But Jesus himself anticipates this, and he says, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” That’s us. We have not seen what Thomas saw, but we’re not left in the dark. We do have the testimony of those who saw him. We have the written record of the eyewitnesses. We have faith that is grounded in history, not imagination.
Listen—I’ve made this point here before, but let me just make it again—the basis upon which you believe in the risen Christ is the basis upon which you believe anything that you have not seen with your own eyes, anything in history. There’s probably not a person in this room that would dispute that George Washington was the first president of the United States. Did you see him? Did you meet him? How do you know? You know because there’s letters. You know because there’s documents. You know because there’s records. You know because of history. That’s how we know that Jesus was crucified and risen.
As John puts it in his first letter, “That which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, have touched with our hands,” that’s what we proclaim to you.
As Peter says in his second letter, “We did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.”
We believe because of the eyewitness testimony of those who saw him.
For a contemporary example, consider a man named Frank Morrison. He was an English journalist in the twentieth century who did not believe, and he set out to disprove the resurrection. He was going to write a book exposing the belief of Christians as a myth. And you know what happened? He followed the evidence and it changed his mind, so that the book he intended to write was never written. In fact, the first chapter of his book, called Who Moved the Stone?, was called “The Book That Was Not Written.” He followed the evidence for himself, and it convinced him. Once again, doubt changed into faith and worship.
Thomas saw and believed, and we see not with physical eyes but with the eyes of faith as we listen to the evidence, and we can also believe.
My guess is this is where some of you are today. There are some of you in this room who are not sure about the resurrection of Christ, you’re not sure if you’re a Christian, you have doubts. Maybe you’re a student and you’re asking real questions about faith and science. Maybe you’re someone who has quietly wrestled with doubts for years and so you’ve never come all the way in, you’ve never confessed faith in Christ, you’ve never been baptized as a believer, committing yourself to Christ. Maybe you want to believe but you don’t know if you can believe. You want this to be true but you’re not sure if it’s true.
I want you to know this morning the invitation of the gospel is not to suppress your questions. Christianity can take every question you ever fire at it. The invitation is, rather, to pursue truth honestly. But listen, intellectual honesty cuts both ways. You should not try to talk yourself into believing something you do not believe, but you should not dismiss the evidence lightly.
That’s the problem sometimes I see when people deconstruct. People grow up in the church, they start having doubts, and then they just drift away. They drift away, and they’ve never looked at the evidence, they’ve never looked at it closely. They haven’t read a 500-page book or an 800-page book presenting the evidence for the resurrection, and those books exist. I’ve read them. One reason I believe that Jesus is alive is because history persuades me that Jesus is alive. Don’t dismiss the evidence if you haven’t looked at it carefully. Look at the witnesses, hear their claims, examine the evidence. Do the hard work before you dismiss it. Be honest with your doubts, be honest with your questions, but give it a fair hearing before you say that it’s all a hoax. I think what you will find is that you will encounter in the pages of history the risen Christ, and you’ll end up on your knees saying with Thomas, “My Lord and my God.”
The resurrection is the best news in the world, it is the hinge on which everything turns, it is the foundation of our faith, the foundation of Christianity. As Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15, “If Christ is not raised, our faith is vain,” it’s all futile, we’re still in our sins; but if Christ is raised, this changes everything.
I want to just end with one more quotation. This is from a wonderful little book by Rebecca Manley Pippert called Hope Has Its Reasons. You don’t have to read the 800-page book if you don’t want to. You can start with this one, it’s like 180 pages. It’s good. It’s a great book. Rebecca says,
“The same power that raised Jesus from the dead, that made the amino acids rekindle and the corpse sit up, that revitalized dead cells and restored breath to empty lungs is the power that is given to us when we receive Christ. Everything about the resurrection speaks of empowered newness.”
The power of the resurrection changes us, it transforms us. It changes everything.
Have you experienced that power in your life? Have you experienced that newness? Listen, wherever you are this morning—whatever griefs and sorrows, whatever fears and anxieties, whatever doubts you have—bring them to Jesus, bring them to the word of God, look at the evidence, and look to Christ, the risen king; and confess, “My Lord and my God.” Let’s pray.
Father, we thank you this morning that Jesus Christ, your Son, crucified for our sins, has been raised from the dead. We thank you, Lord, that we have the eyewitness accounts of the resurrection of Christ recorded for us in the pages of Scripture and that this is history that we can trust. But Lord, we recognize this morning that, just as the disciples themselves needed more than hearing, they needed your work in their hearts to give faith, to persuade, to bring them to settled, confident trust in Jesus, that we need that work as well. We need the work of your Holy Spirit. And so we pray now that your Spirit would be present among us to seal these things to our hearts, to make these truths alive and real to us in an existential way that changes us and that changes the way we live in the world.
As we come to the Lord’s table this morning, may we come with hearts humbled as we think of our sins and we think of the cross that was necessary for the forgiveness of our sins, but may we also come with hearts filled with joy and gratitude as we reflect on what Christ has done, his finished work, and his resurrection from the dead, the basis of our hope. We ask you to draw near to us in these moments as we continue in worship, and we pray this in Jesus’ name and for his sake, amen.
Brian G. Hedges
