“What are you looking for?”
The answer to this question varies a lot depending on where you find yourself in life.
If you are on a quest for better health, it could be a specific diet plan your doctor ordered.
If your body needs some shoring up, you may be searching for a good workout routine to help you.
A dedicated teacher looks for projects and resources to aid her students in conquering a learning curve.
A weary nurse can be found staring at a computer screen, looking for doctors’ orders or lab results.
If you are a young mother, it will probably be a lost shoe or the baby’s pacifier.
A mother of teenagers is likely looking for her sanity!
You get the picture! We all look for things with a varied amount of frustration and hope.
Thousands of years ago, the people of Jerusalem were searching for redemption in Jerusalem. Mary Magdalene found that redemption… and then lost it.
Or so she thought.
As she stood crying near the empty tomb, she heard someone say, “Why are you crying? Who are you looking for?”
Our souls look for things too. Things like purpose, fulfillment, and, like Mary, the One who offers redemption from sins and mistakes.
What Mary sought was right in front of her. She just didn’t recognize it.
She thought He was the gardener. “Sir,” she said, “if you have taken Him away, tell me where you have put Him, and I will go and get Him.”
“Mary!” Jesus said.
In her distress, she didn’t realize that her Redeemer was standing next to her.
Sometimes we search frantically for what we think we lost. We look under the bed for fulfillment, or behind the couch for our purpose. We swipe a hand across the end table in the process, hoping to wipe off our sins along with the dust.
In all the shoving and pushing of the furniture, we miss the fact that our Redeemer is standing patiently by.
Waiting to be noticed.
He calls to us and our searching comes to a halt.
She turned to him and cried out, “Rabboni!” (which is Hebrew for “Teacher”). John 20
In that moment, upon hearing her name, Mary found what she was looking for.
Her Teacher.
Her Deliverer.
And her Redeemer.
Jesus was not gone after all. He was very much alive and able to restore what she thought she had lost.
Jesus lives to offer us the same.
We can stop looking for the elusive fulfillment of dreams.
We can quit searching for a lost purpose.
We no longer need to wonder how our mistakes, sins, and failures can ever be used for good.
Because with Jesus, there is redemption. And not just a little bit!
Out of His death and resurrection comes an abundance of redemption.
More than enough to turn every failure, every sin or mistake, into something useful for His kingdom’s purposes.
For Mary.
For me.
And for you.
“Hope in the Lord; for with the Lord there is lovingkindness, and with Him is abundant redemption. And He will redeem Israel from all his sins.” Psalm 130:7-8 AMP