Jessica Fick
Jessica Leep Fick is the Pastor of Outreach at Hillcrest Covenant Church in Prairie Village, Kansas. She is married to Dave and is mom to two teenage sons, who indulge her frequent requests for family hikes and kayak outings. She is the author of Beautiful Feet, Unleashing Women to Everyday Witness.
Commentary
The Women Were Watching
Reading through the passion narratives in the four Gospels, I am especially drawn to the responses and actions of the women. In the most painful, confusing, and horrifying moments of their lives, they choose not to turn away. Instead, they bear witness. They continue to serve Jesus and live out their faith even though it seems everything they have invested their lives in to follow him is a lie. Rather than retreat in isolation, they follow Jesus’s invitation to form a new community as he breathes his dying breath. Watching, waiting, welcoming. Perhaps this is Jesus’s invitation to us as well this Holy Week.
“Many women were there, watching from a distance. They had followed Jesus from Galilee to care for his needs. Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of Zebedee’s sons” (Matthew 27:55-56, NIV).
“Some women were watching from a distance. Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James the Younger and of Joseph, and Salome. In Galilee, these women had followed him and cared for his needs. Many other women who had come up with him to Jerusalem were also there” (Mark 15:40-41).
Luke’s Gospel doesn’t name the women, but he writes that they had been with Jesus since Galilee. “The women who had come with Jesus from Galilee followed Joseph and saw the tomb and how his body was laid in it. Then they went home and prepared spices and perfumes. But they rested on the Sabbath in obedience to the commandment” (Luke 23:55-56).
John draws our attention to Jesus’s care for his friends right before his death. “Near the cross of Jesus stood his mother, his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to her, ‘Woman, here is your son,’ and to the disciple, ‘Here is your mother.’ From that time on, this disciple took her into his home” (John 19:25-27).
Watching
These passages are potent with the life-altering, community-redefining power of Jesus, especially for women. The Gospel authors intentionally name and include their presence at the crucifixion. Though women’s testimony wouldn’t have been accepted in a Jewish court of law, their presence takes center stage as witnesses of Jesus’s death, burial, and resurrection. This is a significant contrast to the other disciples who have fallen asleep in the Garden of Gethsemane even though Jesus asked them to stay up with him. None of the 12 disciples is named at the crucifixion. There is power in observation and witness. We are changed by what we see and experience and what we choose to turn away from.
Waiting
The women named in the Gospels had cared for Jesus’s needs since the inauguration of his ministry in Galilee. They used their wealth to support the work of Jesus and his disciples as part of an essential community. After his crucifixion, they see the tomb where Jesus’s body was laid and continue to use their resources to care for his needs even in death, purchasing spices and perfumes for his burial. They are grieving, confused, and scared. They don’t know if God will come through. Yet they still choose to serve in love. They also rest.
Grief takes a toll on us. The disciples fell asleep in the garden because they were “exhausted from sorrow” (Luke 22:45). The women practiced Sabbath in accordance with the law, but it’s also likely they needed to physically rest from the grief and trauma of seeing Jesus crucified. When we are confused or grieving that things didn’t turn out the way we hoped or prayed, spiritual rhythms such as Sabbath and rest are God’s tools of restoration in waiting.
Welcoming
Finally, Jesus redefines family. In a bookend to his first miracle in Galilee, he addresses his mother, “woman,” as he is dying on the cross. He addresses her the same way in John 2:4 at the wedding in Cana where he turns water into wine, his first miracle. “Woman, why do you involve me?… My hour has not yet come.” Now his hour has come. The prophecy of his death is unfolding before her eyes. In his final moments, Jesus highlights the new community that his life, death, and resurrection are creating. He addresses his mother: “Woman, here is your son,” and to the disciple whom he loved, “Here is your mother” (John 19:26-27). Sorrow is an opportunity to build community with one another and bear each other’s burdens. Beyond that, Jesus presenting his mother and beloved disciple to one another as family foreshadows what we see in the Book of Acts. Jesus’s resurrection and gift of the Holy Spirit compel us to create a new community. New things are often birthed from death. Jesus desires to see his people become a new kind of community.
As we prepare our hearts during Holy Week, perhaps Jesus is inviting you to watch and see what he is doing in your life or community. Like the women at the tomb, he might be inviting you to wait, to set your to-do list down, to practice Sabbath as you grieve or are weary with sorrow. The community Jesus invites us to create turns our eyes to see others differently—to invite them into our homes, lives, and families. Welcome and hospitality often come at a cost—relationally, time-wise, and with our pride. In his darkest moment before death, Jesus affirms that we belong to each other.
Jessica Fick
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