The Lord is Missing!

JOHN AND PETER RUNNING TO THE TOMB.
Image from worshipingwithchildren.blogspot.com

"They have taken the Lord from the tomb 

and we don't know where they put him."

- John 20:2b

The Lord is missing!

This could be another way to break the news abut the empty tomb. Since they did not yet understand that the Lord has to rise from the dead [see John 20:9], the initial reaction of Mary Magdalene was to tell Peter and John, the beloved Apostle, about the missing body of the Lord.

Look at how the sentence was written: Mary tells the two Apostles that 

"They have taken the Lord from the tomb"

"They" would most probably refer to either the Romans who guarded the tomb, or the Jews helped by the Romans who guarded the tomb. It was impossible that Jesus's disciples would do the taking for the tomb was guarded by Roman soldiers upon the request of the Jewish leaders. Since the tomb was empty when Mary came to visit it, and most probably the guards were also nowhere to be found, she concluded that they have taken the body of the Lord. She didn't say, "They might have taken the body of the Lord." Instead she plainly told Peter and John, "They have taken the Lord from the tomb." 

We cannot blame her for telling the news about the missing body of Jesus our Lord in such manner for she was one of the very close friends of the Lord, together with her siblings, Lazarus, the one whom Jesus has risen from the dead [see John 11: 1-45], and Martha, and understandably, she would be worried about the missing body of the Lord. She probably wanted to anoint the Lord's body with costly perfume in the same manner that she anointed His feet just six days before in their home at Bethany [see John 12: 1-8].

But Mary would not have actually witnessed the taking of the body for the next half of the sentence states, 

"and we don't know where they put him."

The Lord is missing! 

Many times the Lord seems to be missing from our lives. At times, He seems to be so far away; so distant. But worse, sometimes He seems to be absent; nowhere to be found. Sounds like an occasion wherein one can say, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" Remember the fourth of the last words of the Lord upon the cross?

But then again, we should ask ourselves: do we seek properly? Last night during the vigil Mass our Gospel reading taken from that of St Luke we heard these words spoken by the angels to the women who came to visit the tomb: 

"Why do you seek for the living one among the dead?" 
[Luke 24:5]

It is useless to look for something where it could not be found in the first place. Of course, Mary and the other women, did not understand yet that Jesus our Lord has to rise from the dead. So they returned to the tomb and find it empty! 

We in turn keep on coming back to the empty tomb! We have been told about His resurrection but we continue to hold on to what we can only comprehend: that the dead could only be found inside the tomb, nowhere else. We have not fully embraced the resurrected Christ; have not yet truly welcomed Him [back] into our lives. If we already truly believed that He came back to life, that He has risen, then we would not be doing, saying and thinking in the same manner as pagans like worrying about what to eat, what to drink, what to wear, and how we shall look like in front of others!

The Lord is missing! Yes, He truly is - in our lives for we do not live yet in accordance with the resurrection! Until such time when we have already lived without the encumbrances of pagans, we will continue looking for the Lord among the dead and never find Him.