MARY MAGDALENE With so many Mary’s mentioned in the Bible, it is sometimes hard to keep track of who is whom. For now, we are going to examine Mary Magdalene. Mary is derived from the name Miriam, which means bitter. It is not to say that if the parents named their daughter Mary that they thought she was going to be bitter, but it likely means that they went through bitter and hard times when she was born. Magdalene means ‘girl from Magdala’. Magdala was a Jewish city on the shore of the Sea of Galilee. So, Mary Magdalene means ‘Mary, a girl from Magdala’. We meet Mary Magdalene for the first time in Luke 8 where we learn that she had seven demons within her which Jesus drove out. After this, she together with the twelve disciples and some other woman followed Jesus around. We can gather that she was not poor, as “ These women were helping to support them out of their own means ”, (Luke 8:3). From the time where Jesus saved her, she followed Him around in His ministry until His crucifixion and resurrection. At the crucifixion of Jesus, “ 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). She did not only stay faithful to Jesus until the end but took it even a step further. After Jesus died, Joseph from Arimathea buried Jesus in a tomb and Mary Magdalene was present at the burial sitting opposite the tomb, (Matthew 27:61). Devoted as she was, she even returned to the tomb the following day. “Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the entrance”, (John 20:1). When she saw the stone was removed, she immediately went to two of the disciples to tell them what she saw and that the body of Jesus was taken from the tomb. Once Peter and John saw for themselves, they returned to the other disciples. Mary Magdalene however stayed at the tomb crying. She went into the tomb again and that is when she saw the two angels dressed in white. When the angels asked her why she was crying, she told them it was because somebody removed Jesus and that she did not know where He was. She was not scared, amazed or even intrigued that there were suddenly two angels in the tomb. Moments before when Peter and John were in the tomb, the angels were not there. When Mary Magdalene turned around, she saw a man whom she thought was the gardener. She asked him if he knew where they put the body of Jesus. She was actually speaking to Jesus but did not recognize Him. It was only when “Jesus said to her, “Mary”, that she immediately recognized Him, (John 20:16). She wanted to hold onto Jesus, but Jesus said: “Do not hold on to Me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go instead to My brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to My Father and Your Father, to My God and Your God”, (John 20:17). Mary Magdalene obeyed and immediately went to the disciples to tell them what happened. What an amazing moment this must have been! Being so extremely blessed to be the first person to whom the resurrected Jesus Christ appeared! There are other secular accounts of Mary Magdalene that suggest she was the prostitute referred to in Luke 7. Although Mary Magdalene came from Magdala, a town which was well known for prostitution, there is no Biblical evidence that the woman mentioned in Luke 7 was Mary Magdalene. The same with the adulterous woman mentioned in John 8. There are those who claim this was Mary Magdalene, but again there is no Biblical evidence supporting this theory. “The DaVinci Code”, a fictional novel even suggested that Mary Magdalene was married to Jesus, but again this is just a blasphemous story with no no substance of truth. What we do know about Mary Magdalene, supported by Biblical evidence, is that she was a faithful follower of Jesus. From the day she was saved until the end. She spent her wealth and all her time in supporting the ministry of Jesus. We as women should aspire to be like Mary Magdalene – following Jesus all the days of our lives and supporting the ministry of the Gospel with whatever means we have. Mary Magdalene is a picture of what believers in Christ are called to do ... To remain in service to our Saviour.