Commentary - John 20:1-10

Bird's-eye view

This passage marks the hinge of all human history. The resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead is not simply one astonishing miracle among many; it is the central, foundational, and determinative event of our faith and of reality itself. If Christ is not raised, our faith is futile, and we are still in our sins. But because He is risen, everything has changed. John's account of that first resurrection morning is a masterpiece of understated, eyewitness testimony. We are not given a scene of thunderous angelic proclamations or a terrified Roman guard. Instead, we are shown a series of confused, grieving, and then dawningly hopeful human reactions. The narrative unfolds through the eyes of Mary Magdalene, Peter, and John himself, moving from the despair of a stolen body to the first glimmers of belief. The evidence is not a direct encounter with the risen Lord, not yet, but rather the profound and orderly emptiness of the tomb. The stone is rolled away, the body is gone, but the grave clothes are left behind, neatly arranged. This is the evidence that confronts the disciples, forcing them to grapple with a reality that their sorrow had not yet allowed them to comprehend, a reality foretold in the Scriptures: the Prince of Life could not be held by death.

The passage is a study in the anatomy of emergent faith. We see Mary's grief-stricken assumption, Peter's bewildered observation, and John's intuitive leap of belief. It highlights the disciples' slowness to grasp the scriptural necessity of the resurrection, reminding us that this was not something they were primed to invent. The empty tomb was not what they expected, but it was precisely what God had planned. The scene is quiet, but the implications are world-altering. The neatly folded face-cloth is a sign, not of a hasty grave robbery, but of a calm and deliberate victory over death. The King has risen, and He has left the linens behind as a quiet testament to His triumph.

Outline

Context In John

John 20 is the triumphant climax of the entire Gospel. The book began by identifying Jesus as the eternal Word, the source of all life (John 1:1-4). Throughout His ministry, Jesus repeatedly demonstrated His authority over death, culminating in the raising of Lazarus in chapter 11, which directly precipitated the plot to kill Him. The "hour" for which He had come, the hour of His glorification, arrived in His crucifixion (John 19), which John portrays not as a defeat but as the enthronement of the King. The resurrection, therefore, is the necessary and logical vindication of everything Jesus claimed and did. It is the ultimate "sign" that proves He is who He said He was: the resurrection and the life. This chapter immediately follows the burial of Jesus by Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus, a scene of honorable but definitive death. The transition from the sealed tomb of chapter 19 to the empty tomb of chapter 20 is the pivot upon which the entire gospel, and indeed all of creation, turns. The events of this chapter fulfill Jesus' own prophecies (e.g., John 2:19-22) and set the stage for the commissioning of the disciples and the sending of the Holy Spirit, which will carry this resurrection reality to the ends of the earth.

Key Issues

The New Genesis

It is no accident that John tells us these events took place on "the first day of the week." This is resurrection language, but it is also creation language. The first day of the original creation week was the day God said, "Let there be light." On this new first day, the true Light of the World, having passed through the darkness of death, emerges from the tomb to begin the new creation. The old world, the world of sin and death that began with Adam's fall, is now being superseded. The resurrection is not just a resuscitation of a corpse; it is the inauguration of a new order.

Everything in this scene points to this new beginning. It happens early, while it was still dark, just before the dawn. A woman is the first to the tomb, just as a woman was first at the tree in the first garden. But where the first woman's action led to death, this woman becomes the first messenger of life. A stone is rolled away, not to let Jesus out, but to let the witnesses in. The tomb, a place of decay and despair, becomes the womb of the new creation. This is the day the Lord has made, and it redefines every day that follows. The rest of human history is now lived in the light of this empty tomb.

Verse by Verse Commentary

1 Now on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene came early to the tomb, while it was still dark, and saw the stone already taken away from the tomb.

John begins with a precise time stamp: the first day of the week. This is the Christian Sabbath, the Lord's Day, established not by Mosaic law but by the foundational event of the new covenant. Mary Magdalene, a woman from whom Jesus had cast out seven demons, a recipient of immense grace, shows her devotion by coming to the tomb. She comes "early," a word that emphasizes her eagerness and love. It is still dark, a detail that reflects the spiritual darkness of her own grief and the world's unbelief, but it is a darkness that is about to be shattered. Her first discovery is not the risen Lord, but an anomaly: the stone is gone. The heavy stone, meant to seal the tomb and secure the dead, has been removed. Her immediate assumption, as we will see, is not resurrection but desecration.

2 So she ran and came to Simon Peter and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken away the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid Him.”

Mary's reaction is one of panic and distress. She runs, a detail that communicates urgency and alarm. She seeks out the leaders among the disciples, Peter and John. John, the author, refers to himself here with his characteristic humility as "the other disciple whom Jesus loved." Mary's report is born of grief, not faith. "They have taken away the Lord." Who "they" are, she doesn't know. Grave robbers? The authorities? Her conclusion is the most logical one for a world where dead men stay dead. Notice the personal anguish in her words: "the Lord." Her Lord is missing. Her plural "we do not know" likely refers to the other women who were with her or on their way. Her world has just gone from tragic to worse; not only is her Master dead, but now His body has been stolen.

3-4 So Peter and the other disciple went forth, and they were going to the tomb. And the two were running together; and the other disciple ran ahead faster than Peter and came to the tomb first;

Spurred by Mary's alarming news, the two lead disciples immediately act. They don't dismiss her as a hysterical woman; they take her report seriously enough to investigate. They set out for the tomb, and their walk quickly becomes a run. John includes the vivid, personal detail that he, being younger, outran Peter. This is not a boast, but rather the kind of specific, irrelevant detail that rings with the authenticity of an eyewitness account. It paints a picture of two men, hearts pounding, racing toward the scene of a potential crisis, each processing the news in his own way.

5 and stooping and looking in, he saw the linen wrappings lying there; but he did not go in.

John arrives first, but he hesitates at the entrance. He stoops down to peer into the low doorway of the rock-hewn tomb. His first sight is not an empty space, but evidence. He sees the "linen wrappings lying there." The body is gone, but the grave clothes remain. This should have been his first clue that this was no ordinary grave robbery. Thieves would have taken the valuable linen or, if they were in a hurry, would have unwrapped the body messily, leaving the strips in a heap. But John simply observes and waits. His restraint contrasts with Peter's impending action.

6-7 And so Simon Peter also came, following him, and entered the tomb; and he saw the linen wrappings lying there, and the face-cloth which had been on His head, not lying with the linen wrappings, but folded up in a place by itself.

Peter, characteristically impetuous and bold, arrives and doesn't hesitate. He goes right into the tomb. He sees what John saw, the linen wrappings, but he sees something more. He observes the state of the face-cloth, the soudarion that had been wrapped around Jesus' head. It was not tossed aside with the other linens. It was separate, and it was "folded up." Some translations say "rolled up," but the sense is one of deliberate order. This is the central clue. A thief in a hurry does not stop to neatly fold a used burial cloth. An enemy stealing the body would have no reason to do so. This small detail speaks volumes. It is a sign of a calm, unhurried, and purposeful departure. The Lord of life was not rescued or stolen; He simply got up, unwrapped Himself, and folded the napkin. The work was finished.

8 So the other disciple who had first come to the tomb then also entered, and he saw and believed.

Emboldened by Peter's entry, John now follows him into the tomb. He sees the full picture: the empty space, the discarded body wrappings, and the neatly folded face-cloth. And for John, seeing is believing. The sight of this evidence clicks into place for him. This was not a robbery. This was not the work of men. This was something else entirely. He "believed." What did he believe? Not just that the body was gone, but that Jesus was risen. The orderly scene in the tomb was incompatible with any other explanation. It was the physical evidence that sparked the first flicker of resurrection faith in the heart of a disciple.

9 For as yet they did not understand the Scripture, that He must rise again from the dead.

John adds a crucial parenthetical note, a theological explanation for their prior confusion and slowness. Up to this point, neither he nor Peter had truly understood the Old Testament prophecies about the Messiah's resurrection (e.g., Psalm 16:10; Isaiah 53:10-11). Jesus Himself had told them plainly that He would rise on the third day, but the category of a crucified and risen Messiah was so foreign to their expectations that the teaching had not sunk in. Their faith was not born from a pre-existing theological expectation that they were trying to fulfill. It was born from the hard, undeniable evidence of the empty tomb, which then drove them back to the Scriptures with new eyes. First came the fact, then came the full understanding of the prophecy.

10 So the disciples went away again to where they were staying.

The immediate scene concludes with a quiet, almost anticlimactic note. Peter and John return home, or to the place they were lodging. They are not yet running through the streets proclaiming the resurrection. John believes, but he is likely still processing the monumental implications. Peter is probably just bewildered. They have been confronted with a world-changing reality, and they retreat to ponder it. The stage is now cleared for the risen Lord to appear first to Mary, the grieving woman who remains at the tomb, weeping.

Application

The account of the empty tomb is the bedrock of our hope. It teaches us, first, that our faith is not based on a myth or a feeling, but on a historical event testified to by eyewitnesses. The details are gritty and real: the pre-dawn darkness, the panicked run, the smell of spices and stone, the puzzling sight of folded linen. Christianity makes a falsifiable claim right at its center. If the bones of Jesus were ever found, the whole thing would unravel. But they never have been, because He is not there. He is risen.

Second, this passage shows us how God honors humble devotion. It was not the high priest or the Roman governor who first discovered the resurrection, but Mary Magdalene, a faithful woman who came simply to perform a final act of love. God reveals His greatest triumphs to those who seek Him, even in their grief and confusion.

Finally, we must see the folded face-cloth as a sign for us. Christ's work is finished. He did not leave the tomb in a frantic hurry. He left it as a conqueror who had decisively and finally defeated sin, death, and the grave. The orderliness of the tomb signifies the completeness of His victory. Because He left those grave clothes behind, we do not have to fear the grave. Because He folded the napkin, we know that our justification is not a messy, haphazard affair, but a settled and accomplished fact. The tomb is empty, the stone is rolled away, and the linens are folded. Therefore, we can face anything this life throws at us, because we serve a risen King who has already won the only battle that ultimately matters.