By Charryse Nichelle

Scripture: Luke 24:1–6 (primary), with echoes of Jonah 2 and Romans 6
On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had
prepared and went to the tomb. 2They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, 3 but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. 4While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them. 5 In their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? 6He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while hewas still with you in Galilee: – Luke 24: 1-6

Opening
Good morning, Healing Room.
Not the church. Not the building.
The room.
Because healing doesn’t start in crowds.
It starts in rooms.
Private rooms.
Quiet rooms.
Hidden rooms.
Rooms where God meets you before He ever presents you.
And it feels fitting… that our first time gathering in this space lands on Resurrection Sunday.
Because if we’re honest, most of us celebrate that He got up…
without ever asking if we did.

Luke 24 says:
“On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb…
They found the stone rolled away…
but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus…
Why do you look for the living among the dead?
He is not here; He has risen.”
Here’s what strikes me.
They came prepared to tend to a dead body, even though Jesus told them He would be raised from
the dead.

They loved Jesus.
They followed Jesus.
They believed in Jesus.
…but they still showed up expecting death.
And before we judge them, we do the same thing.
We love God…
but still expect disappointment.
We pray…
but brace for silence.
We show up to life…
already grieving outcomes that haven’t even happened yet.

Point 1: You Can Be Devoted and Still Expect Dead Things
The women were not faithless.
They were faithful.
They got up early.
They brought what they had prepared.
They showed up when others didn’t.
But their expectation was shaped by trauma.
They saw Him beaten.
They saw Him crucified.
They saw Him buried.
And trauma has a way of teaching your body:
“Don’t hope too hard.”
So they came with spices…
because resurrection was not what their nervous system was trained to expect.
And if we’re honest,
some of us are still carrying spices.
Spices for dead relationships.
Spices for dead dreams.
Spices for versions of ourselves that didn’t make it.
We’ve learned how to tend to what died…
but we have not learned how to expect what lives again.

Point 2: God Will Disrupt the Version of You That Only Knows Survival
The text says:
“They found the stone rolled away…”
Let’s pause right there.
God moved the stone…
without their help.
They didn’t organize it.
They didn’t strategize it.
They didn’t even believe for it.
God disrupted death…
without their permission.
And that’s hard for people like us.
Because we are builders.
We are thinkers.
We are doers.
We like to participate in what God is doing.
But resurrection?
You don’t assist resurrection.
You encounter it.
Some of you have been trying to manage what God is trying to transform.
You’ve been organizing your grief…
instead of surrendering it.
You’ve been mastering survival…
but resisting healing.
And God says:
“I didn’t come to make you better at carrying dead things.
I came to call you out of the tomb.”

There’s something about being in the dark…
Jonah 1:17 says Jonah was in the belly of the fish
three days and three nights.
A place of darkness.
A place of confinement.
A place where you can’t control anything.
But it was also a place of preservation.
What felt like punishment…
was actually protection.
And Jesus echoes this, three days in the earth.
Because sometimes God will allow you to sit in what feels like death, just long enough for you to
realize:
“This is not where I end.”

Point 3: Resurrection Requires a New Walk, Not Just a New Belief
Here’s where I want to challenge us.
Because we shout about resurrection, but we rarely talk about responsibility.
Romans 6 says:
“Just as Christ was raised from the dead…we too may live a new life.”
Not admire it.
Not quote it.
Live it.
Resurrection is not just proof of God’s power.
It is an invitation to your transformation.
Which means:
You don’t get to celebrate an empty tomb
and still live like you’re buried.

Some of us have been raised…
but still walking like we’re bound.

Still thinking like we’re unworthy.
Still choosing what harms us.
Still shrinking in rooms God told us to stand in.
And hear me clearly, this is not condemnation.
This is invitation.
Because healing is not God forcing you out of the grave.
It is God asking:
“Do you want to come out?”

Point 4: Why Do You Keep Visiting What God Already Freed You From?
The angels ask one of the most powerful questions in scripture:
“Why do you look for the living among the dead?”
Let me say it the way we might hear it today:
Why are you still going back to that?
Why are you still rehearsing that story?
Why are you still defining yourself by that season?
Why are you searching for life in places God already declared empty?
Some of us keep revisiting tombs:
Old identities
Old wounds
Old relationships
Old versions of ourselves that God has already outgrown
And every time we go back, we reinforce a lie:
“That life is still there.”
But hear me:
If God rolled the stone away,
it’s not because He needed to get out.
It’s because you needed to see in.
And what you saw…
was that what held Him
could not keep Him.

Point 5: Healing Is Not the Absence of Wounds, It’s the Refusal to Stay There
Jesus got up…but He still had scars.
He wasn’t erased.
He was revealed.
And I think this is where healing gets misunderstood.
Healing is not pretending it didn’t happen.
Healing is not minimizing your story.
Healing is saying:
“It happened…but it doesn’t hold me.”
And for some of us, especially those of us who carry others, who lead, who pour out,
we have learned how to function with wounds instead of allowing God to transform them.
But resurrection says:
“You don’t have to stay where it hurt.”
Closing: The Real Question
So today…we celebrate that He got up.
Yes.
Absolutely.
But the real question of The Healing Room is this:
What in you is still in the tomb?
What belief?
What fear?
What grief?
What version of yourself?
Because resurrection is not just an event.
It is a decision.
A decision to walk differently.
A decision to think differently.
A decision to release what God has already defeated.

And I hear the Spirit asking, gently but firmly:
“Will you keep visiting the tomb…or will you finally walk in resurrection?”
Final Charge
You don’t have to have it all figured out.
The women didn’t.
You don’t have to be perfect.
The disciples weren’t.
But you do have to be willing to let go of what died…so you can fully live in what God raised.