Before she met Jesus, Mary of Magdala was a woman in torment. The Gospel of Luke tells us simply that Jesus had cast seven demons out of her—a phrase that speaks volumes about the depth of her suffering. Seven, in Jewish thought, signified completeness. Her bondage had been total.
We know nothing of her life before that deliverance—whether she was wealthy or poor, young or old, how long the demons had tormented her, or how they had manifested. What we know is the transformation: from complete oppression to complete freedom.
Wholehearted Devotion to the End
Mary's response to her liberation was wholehearted devotion. She became one of the women who traveled with Jesus and the Twelve, supporting His ministry "out of their own means" (Luke 8:2-3). While the male disciples fled at the cross, Mary Magdalene stood watching. While they hid behind locked doors, she went to the tomb at dawn.
The First Voice of the Resurrection
It was there, in a garden at first light on a Sunday morning, that the risen Christ chose to appear first—not to Peter or John, but to Mary Magdalene. She had come weeping, expecting to anoint a corpse. Instead, she heard her name spoken by a voice she knew: "Mary."
In that moment, she turned and recognized Him. "Rabboni!" she cried—Teacher!
Jesus gave her a commission: "Go to my brothers and tell them." And so Mary Magdalene became the first evangelist of the resurrection, the "apostle to the apostles" as the early church would call her. The woman from whom seven demons had been cast out became the first human voice to proclaim: "I have seen the Lord!"
