the Empty Tomb
The most perplexing question for those who deny Christ's resurrection is, “What became of His body if He did not rise?” If foes stole it, they would have produced it in disproof of the allegations of the Apostles. If friends had taken it, they would certainly have borne it off wrapped in the cerements of death; but these were left behind and wrapped together in such an orderly fashion that evidently there had been neither violence nor haste.
Notice the stress that the angels laid on Christ as the living one. They had doubtless overheard that sentence of His spoken in Galilee and recorded in Luke 9:22. Too many seek the living Christ amid the wrappings of ceremony and creed. He is not there. He has gone forth, and we must follow Him where Easter is breaking.
Women were the first evangelist-messengers of the Resurrection. The very ardor of their belief seems to have prejudiced their message; the Apostles “ dis- believed,” Luke 24:11 (r.v.). But the orderly arrangement of the tomb proved to Peter that clearly it had not been rifled.