Unlike me, grandma didn't wear gardening gloves. She didn't even take her wedding ring off. Instead she would kneel down in the grass with her little shovel, watering can, and the flats of plants and flowers and dig. As she played in the dirt, she would hum and sweat and smile. There were two places my grandma was happiest...her kitchen and the garden.
My grandma's hands were not soft; I don't know that she'd ever had a manicure. Her hands were cracked and worn and old. They were the hands of someone who worked hard out of necessity and love.
When Mary Magdalene goes to the garden tomb, the angels ask her "why are you weeping". She is alone and deeply grieved. She had stood at the foot of the cross and watched as her friend and teacher was crucified. She is scared and probably very overwhelmed. And when a voice calls out her name, she doesn't recognize it at first; she mistakenly thinks that Jesus is the gardener. Why this may be is a bit of a mystery and puzzle. But that's part of what Easter is all about--the glorious mystery of the
resurrection.
Just recently I finished reading the book "Pastrix" by the Lutheran pastor Nadia Bolz-Weber. In the chapter titled "Dirty Fingernails", Nadia writes about Easter as a story of "flesh and dirt and bodies and confusion". She writes that perhaps
the reason Mary doesn't recognize Jesus is because he "still had the dirt from his own tomb under his nails...that the God of Easter is a God with dirt under his nails".
This idea of Jesus with dirt under his nails changed the whole way I looked at this passage from John. Perhaps Jesus at the empty tomb is not how artists have depicted him--glowing white from head to toe with perfect hair illuminated by a
halo--perhaps he was humming, sweating and smiling, with cracked, worn hands that had worked out of necessity and love. And maybe Mary saw Jesus as a gardener because in many ways that's who he is...caring for our tender roots, nourishing us, loving us, and encouraging us to grow. Resurrection is after all about new life.
Resurrection living--new life--is messy. It requires that we forgive those who might not "deserve" forgiveness. It requires that we apologize when we have offended or hurt another. It requires letting go of unmet expectations, material desires, and past wounds. Resurrection living is also about sharing our hopes and dreams with others, and how God is merciful and faithful. Resurrection living is all about Jesus playing in the dirt in order to give us new life--again and again and again.
Amen.