Jesus and Women - more thoughts on John 20

Back to that scripture from the previous post, I would like to point out a couple other things:

1) Mary was the first one at the tomb very early ("while it was still dark") the next morning; (verse 1).

2) After seeing the empty tomb, the disciples went home (verse 10) but she stayed (verse 11).

Clearly Mary Magdalene was devoted to Jesus. So were several other women.

Ann Spangler and Jean E. Syswerda's book Women of the Bible has a chapter on Mary Magdalene. In that chapter, p. 399 details "Women in Jesus' Life and Ministry."

This opened my eyes to something I, even as a feminist, had overlooked: women were invaluable in Jesus' ministry.

I have always heard of the 12 disciples and hoped I could be like them, dropping everything I had to go and follow Jesus, to help him. Well, they could not have done that without women.

As "Women in Jesus' Life and Ministry" pointed out:

"[S]everal women stepped outside the cultural expectations of their time to play a significant role in the ministry of Jesus. Only the twelve disciples are mentioned more often than certain women, Mary Magdalene being one of them. Mark tells us that a number of women 'followed him [Jesus] and cared for his needs ' (Mark 15:41).

"During the years of Jesus' ministry, when he and his disciples weren't earning an income, several women stepped in to care for them. They used their own financial resources to support Jesus and the disciples (Luke 8:3). While Jesus was teaching and healing, these women probably spent their time purchasing food, preparing it, and serving it. Perhaps they also found homes for Jesus and his disciples to stay in while on their travels...

"Two women in Bethany, Mary and Martha always generously opened their home to Jesus when he was in their town, providing meals and a place to rest (Luke 10:38). Jesus was close enough to these women... that he called them his friends (John 11:11)...

"Women watched Jesus suffer on the cross, remaining there until he had breathed his last and was buried. Women were the first to go to the tomb on Sunday morning and the first to witness the Resurrection. Luke's gospel in particular portrays Jesus as someone who both understood and respected women, conferring on them a stature that most of them had not previously enjoyed."

These women facilitated the works of Jesus and his disciples by caring for them. They did not even do anything radical to do it; they simply fulfilled their roles as women as fully and selflessly as possible. I have never seen or heard credit given to them for this service to Jesus and the early spread of Christianity but I think they deserve it.

So I point this out to you in hopes that it has opened your eyes and that you will share it with others. Open their eyes as well to the way women helped Jesus and how Jesus respected them.