Today on the Third Sunday of Pascha we commemorate the Holy Myrrh - Bearing Women along with the secret disciples of the Lord Joseph and Nicodemus. Father Gregory shares with us that these figures in the Gospel were tranformed through their encounters with Jesus Christ. Saint Luke records in his Gospel that Jesus went through the villages healing and preaching with the twelve Apostles and some women. These women whose lives had been transformed followed Our Lord and gave to Him from their hearts and means. The eight women mentioned are The Theotokos, Mary Magdalene, Mary the wife of Clopas, Joanna the wife of Chouza, Salome the mother of the sons of Zebedee, Mary and Martha the sisters of Lazarus and Susanna. Joseph of Arimathea took courage or became bold and dared to ask Pilate for the beaten and bloodied corpse of Christ. He and Nicodemus prepared Jesus for burial in haste with one hundred pounds of myrrh oils and an aromatic mixture of aloes and spices out of love and reverence for Christ. The women were witnesses to the place and preparation of Jesus' burial and were led by their hearts in love for Chist to properly finish what Jospeh and Nicodemus had begun. The Myrhh - Bearing women bought more spices and sought out very early in the morning on the first day of the week to annoint Jesus' Body without regard to reason. They began to say to one another, "Who will roll away the stone for us from the door of the tomb". Looking up they saw that the stone had been rolled away and entering the tomb they saw a young man sitting on the right side who told them not to be amazed, that Jesus is not here but to go and tell the disciples and Peter that He is going before you into Galilee. The Myrrh - Bearing who women ran to the disciples without stopping and are often called the Apostles to the Apostles. These women along with Joseph and Nicodemus were led by their hearts and out of love to do what was right. We too as Orthodox Christians should be led from our hearts and dedicated with boldness our lives to Jesus Christ no matter the cost.