Given the lowly status of women in Jesus' day, it is surely ironic that the first Christian preachers of the Resurrection were not men, but women! It was to the women who had come to the tomb early on that historic first day of the week that the angels first appeared. it was these women who first heard the good news, "Do not be afraid; I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified. He is not here; for he has been raised, as he said" (
Matthew 28:5-6). It was to these same women that the first expression of the Great Commission was given: "Go quickly and tell His disciples that He has risen from the dead: "Go quickly and tell His disciples that He has risen from the dead" (28:7, NASB). The disciples responded with disbelief at first and wrote the Resurrection Proclamation off as "an idle tale" (
Luke 24:11). Not so the women: they no only believed without doubting but immediately began to broadcast the good news of Christ alive (
Matthew 28:8). Three of the Gospels specifically mention that Jesus appeared, first of all, to women.
Since it would have been just as easy for the divine messengers to announce Christ's resurrection to the male disciples, huddled behind locked doors. We can only conclude that these post-Resurrection events, which focus so pointedly upon women, were by divine ordination
(a woman's place)
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