Nicodemus in the Tomb

Oil on board, 16×20″, 2023
Part of my Easter Paintings series

Nicodemus ponders the next steps in his life as he lays the body of Christ to rest.

Light is the subject of any true work of art and the essential element of our lives, whether emanating from some orb in the sky or from within our hearts. Without light, we cannot see. Without Heavenly light, we cannot see truth and thus be humbled and inspired to change.

Paint daubs on any surface are illustrations of this revelatory conflict between light and dark.

This painting addresses that conflict. Nicodemus in the Tomb is an interpretation of a scene showing Nicodemus helping bury Christ’s body. At first glance, the title limits our thoughts to the enclosure itself, fashioning it as a final resting place that seals in the Lord’s deceased body, marking a final end: cold, decaying, sealed, hopeless. But a light shines from above, beckoning, revealing, hinting at an exit from this temporary shell. Like the final bell at the end of a school year, the light celebrates both our graduation from mortality, rising as we greet the Lord in perfect health and vitality, and our continuing path afterward toward joy and glory, if we will.

The sarcophagus that Nicodemus leans against seems solid but has already been robbed. It was breached from within and partly emptied as Christ’s spirit left to greet His Father and others of His family in the joyful reunion that celebrated resurrection’s doors being opened to all. Three days after Nicodemus sealed the vault, the looting was complete: Christ’s body joined His spirit in perfected union. Death had lost its sting; Christ had won the victory. All tombs would be emptied.

In this painting, two sources of light illuminate Nicodemus, who has collapsed against Christ’s sepulcher inside the carven tomb. The most prominent light is from above, perhaps coming from a hole in the hill it was chiseled from. A fanciful construct, I am sure, but it serves to symbolize at least two connections with Heaven. One is described above, a form of approval and promise. The other shows Heavenly approval of the path this very human being, now a disciple, has chosen. As a leader in Israel, Nicodemus had followed the Savior since early in His ministry, perhaps starting as a skeptical member of the Sanhedrin assigned to investigate the upstart Nazarene. The teachings Nicodemus heard from his target broke through his narrow and hard-won scholarly interpretation of tradition and law and opened his heart to Christ’s new and timeless gospel truths.

The second light comes from the entrance to the tomb. Nicodemus has had a very long week: the events of Christ’s trial; the lengthy behind-the-scenes legal wrangling with the Sanhedrin and other Jewish and Roman leaders; his probable efforts to comfort families and followers; his wrestling with the scriptures to reconcile his own ingrained interpretation of them with Christ’s new light; his perhaps unsuccessful unraveling of conflicting counsel from the confused and frightened apostles; his wonder and fear at the horrors of the cross; his begging the body from an unbelieving Pilate; and his enabling of the burial process. He is a stronger, more forthright and courageous follower of The Savior than he was at their first meeting but, as he helped lay his Lord to rest, he probably still grappled with his own fear, exhaustion and doubt.

He is strengthened and comforted by his faith in Jesus but, like most of us, is still unsure of the future. He faces the outside world, unsure of his path but fated to follow whatever comes.

I think we all are much like that. I pray we have the courage, like Nicodemus, to offer all we have to Him who gave His all and promised His all to us.