But they aren’t the only ones who are afraid. The women who had come to anoint the body of the Lord with spices also see the angel and are told that the tomb is empty because “He is not here; he has risen.” Told to go and tell his disciples the news they “hurried away from the tomb, afraid yet filled with joy”.
We can easily understand the guards’ reaction but why are the women afraid? (It’s the very same word that Matthew uses) What is it about the resurrection that could make anyone fearful? Isn’t it just the biggest collation of every dream you could ever have had, all rolled up into one huge ball of wonder? We can understand the joy but the fear, the terror? It seems entirely out of place.
It’s the same instinct that leads us to think that “fear of the Lord” is passé. That reaction needs correcting - because without this fear the joy will remain confined and insubstantial.
What the Lord has done in tackling sin and death and overcoming all the forces of evil and chaos is the largest demonstration there can have been of his supreme power and authority, and of the absolute commitment of his love to fallen, sin-sick humanity. We are not dealing with points of trivia but the training of the whole mind and will of God on the forces arrayed against us. Who could stand before such majesty and not tremble with awe?
In responding in fear to the edges of that work in the vacant tomb and the report of the resurrection, albeit by an angel, these faithful women are modelling for us a godliness that can only lead to deeper reserves of joy, for they are honouring the incomparable Lord of glory. Their fear is a holy terror that is neither inappropriate nor primitive; it is embracing the truth about God (and ourselves) and quaking at its magnitude.
Eugene Peterson reflects with acute perception on the fears reported by Matthew and helpfully distinguishes them: “There is a fear that incapacitates us for dealing with God, and there is a fear that pulls us out of our preoccupation with ourselves, our feelings, or our circumstances into a world of wonder. It pulls us out of ourselves into the very action of God.” (Living the Resurrection, p.71)
A fear that can lead us out of ourselves and our circumstances and into wonder and amazement is not to be shunned. Such fear is the ballast our joy needs, anchoring it in the astonishing works of God and the supreme reality of his eternal being.
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My God, how wonderful Thou art,
Thy majesty how bright!
How beautiful Thy mercy seat,
In depths of burning light!
How dread are Thine eternal years,
O everlasting Lord,
By prostrate spirits day and night
Incessantly adored!
How wonderful, how beautiful,
The sight of Thee must be,
Thine endless wisdom, boundless power,
And aweful purity!
O how I fear Thee, living God,
With deepest, tenderest fears,
And worship Thee with trembling hope
And penitential tears!
Yet I may love Thee too, O Lord,
Almighty as Thou art;
For Thou hast stooped to ask of me
The love of my poor heart.
No earthly father loves like Thee;
No mother e'er so mild,
Bears and forbears as Thou hast done
With me, Thy sinful child.
Father of Jesus, love's reward,
What rapture will it be
Prostrate before Thy throne to lie,
And ever gaze on Thee!
(Frederick William Faber, 1814-63)
