She thought He was the gardener. John 20:15. She, supposing him to be the gardener, saith unto him, Sir, if thou have borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away. Every sermon you've heard treats this as a mistake. Grief-blind woman, early morning, tears in her eyes, can't recognize the risen Lord standing three feet away. She wasn't wrong. She was early. Go back to where this happens, because John is the only gospel writer who tells you. John 19:41. Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden; and in the garden a new sepulchre, wherein was never man yet laid. A garden. And where was He arrested? John 18:1. Over the brook Cedron, where was a garden, into the which he entered. Another garden. John bookends the whole thing. Betrayed in a garden. Buried in a garden. Risen in a garden. And John opens his gospel with the first three words of the Bible. In the beginning. He wants you to read his book next to Genesis. So go to Genesis. Genesis 2:15. And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it. The first man God ever made was given one job. Gardener. He lost it. Took the fruit, hid in the trees, heard God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and ran from Him. And God drove him out and put an angel with a burning sword at the gate. And the curse that came with it - Genesis 3:18: Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee. Thorns. The first fruit of the curse. Four thousand years later, soldiers twisted those same thorns into a crown and pressed it into the head of the Son of God. He wore the curse of the first garden to His death. Then they laid Him in a garden. And on the first day of the week, the first day, the day creation started, He stood up in it. Paul calls Him the last Adam. 1 Corinthians 15:45. The first Adam was a gardener who lost the garden. The last Adam walked out of a tomb into a garden at dawn, and the first person who saw Him took one look and said: that's the gardener. She got His job right before she got His name. Now watch what He says to her. Woman, why weepest thou? Whom seekest thou? Whom seekest thou? Those are some of the most important words in John's gospel, and he uses them on purpose. The first words Jesus ever speaks in this book, in chapter 1, are a question to two men following Him: What seek ye? And in the garden on the night of the arrest, He walks up to the soldiers and asks them: Whom seek ye? They were seeking Him to kill Him. Now, in another garden, a woman is seeking Him to bury Him. And He asks the question again. Look at her answer. If thou have borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away. She's going to carry the body herself. One woman. A grown man's corpse wrapped in seventy-five pounds of spice. She doesn't care. She just wants to know where He is. This is Mary Magdalene. Luke tells us who she was before she met Him: out of whom went seven devils. A woman the town would have crossed the street to avoid. Seven demons, gone. And she followed Him the rest of the way. She was at the cross when the men had fled. She was at the burial. She was at the tomb before the sun came up. She was looking for a dead man. And He was standing behind her. Now the detail. John 20:14. And when she had thus said, she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing, and knew not that it was Jesus. She turns around. She sees Him. Doesn't know Him. Then. John 20:16. Jesus saith unto her, Mary. She turned herself, and saith unto him, Rabboni. She turned again. She was already facing Him. Why would she turn? Because after the gardener's question, she'd turned back to the tomb. Back to the hole in the rock. Back to the place where the dead are supposed to be. She was staring at the empty grave, crying, with the risen Christ standing behind her. And He didn't argue her out of it. He didn't explain the resurrection. He didn't show her the wounds. He said her name. That's all it took. One word. And she turned away from the tomb. John 10:3. He calleth his own sheep by name... and the sheep follow him: for they know his voice. She knew the voice. Not the face. The voice that had said her name before, the day the seven demons left. The voice that had cleaned her out. The first garden ended with a man and a woman driven out through a gate, in shame, with thorns coming up behind them. This garden ends with a woman running out of it with the best news the world has ever heard. Go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father. The first witness of the resurrection. Not Peter. Not John. Not a priest. A woman who used to be possessed. In a culture where a woman's testimony carried little weight in court, God chose her mouth to carry the announcement. He always picks the one nobody would have picked. Now you. Some of you are standing in the garden right now. Facing the wrong direction. Staring at the place where something died. The marriage. The child you lost. The version of your faith you had when you were younger. The person you used to be before what happened happened. You keep going back to the tomb because that's where you last saw Him. And you can't find Him there. You're looking for a dead Jesus. He's alive. He's behind you. And He doesn't need you to understand the resurrection to find you. He knows your name. Not your file. Not your history. Not the seven things that used to live in you. Your name. Listen for it. Then turn around.