“Folded the Grave Clothes”
“Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen cloths lying there, and the face cloth, which had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen cloths but folded up in a place by itself.” (John 20:6–7, ESV)
John is careful to tell his readers that the face cloth was folded up and set to one side. Why does he do that? Matthew and Mark omit this detail, and Luke notices the linen cloths “by themselves,” but John goes so far as to tell us that the face cloth was set aside and folded.
It will help us to remember that this isn’t the first time in John’s gospel we encounter face cloths. After Jesus commanded Lazarus to leave his tomb, John narrates Lazarus’ resurrection this way:
“The man who had died [Lazarus] came out, his hands and feet bound with linen strips, and his face wrapped with a cloth. Jesus said to them, ‘Unbind him, and let him go.’” (John 11:44, ESV)
Lazarus rose but was still bound in death’s strong bands. Lazarus left the grave with linens about his body and a cloth on his face. Lazarus needed someone to unwrap him. But Jesus rose through His grave clothes. Just like a resurrected Jesus could appear in a locked room (John 20:26), He could pass through the burial spices and leave them exactly where He had been laid. There could be no doubt, friends - a dead man was laid to rest underneath those strips of linen. What a sign to leave behind! It’s as if Jesus got up from the chalk lines about His corpse at the crime scene and walked away without smudging them.
Now, lest anybody think the Lord took Him, as with Enoch or Elijah, or that grave robbers snatched Him, Jesus also left a plain sign that He awoke to resurrection life fully aware of Himself. He opened His eyes on the third day in confident victory over death and neatly removed the burial cloth from His face - folding it up in a place by itself. There’s no haste in your Lord’s resurrection! He’s not sneaking out after curfew. Still less, no robber would have bothered to unwrap the body, far less neatly fold the face cloth. Jesus rose from the dead as simply as rising from rest (John 11:11), for the great victory He wrought was a simple matter for the Incarnate Word.
This is a resurrection entirely unlike Lazarus or any other; this is the resurrection of the firstborn from the dead (Col 1:18), that in everything, Jesus might be the Preeminent One! And so He is! For He offers us a foretaste of the life that awaits all who, like Peter and John, “see and believe.”
Hymns of Faith #268 captures the picture and our response well. Look with eyes of faith, see with the inner person, and believe that on that morning, glorious bright - hope dawned in the folded grave cloths of Jesus Christ.
See What a Morning (Hymn #268)
See, what a morning gloriously bright,
With the dawning of hope in Jerusalem;
Folded the grave-clothes, tomb filled with light
As the angels announce, “Christ is risen!”
See God's salvation plan, wrought in love,
Borne in pain, paid in sacrifice,
Fulfilled in Christ the Man, for He lives —
Christ is risen from the dead!