Easter Jogging
Sermon
Which Way to Jesus?
Sermons For Lent and Easter, Cycle B
He is Risen. "He is Risen, indeed," we respond. We sound the trumpet. We decorate the altar in gold. We sound the bells. We sing out the alleluia's in the loudest crescendo we can. We turn out in larger numbers than any other time of the church year to celebrate this Queen of Feasts. And well we should. No matter how large the observance and how great the celebration we cannot make it grand enough to capture the fullness of its meaning for us. We are always going to have trouble with Easter because, no matter how hard we try, the full import and the full impact of what God does for us at Easter eludes us.
However, if we think we have trouble with Easter, think of the poor dear people in the city of Jerusalem that first Easter. The townspeople must have been troubled by the rumors that were flying around. We know that the enemies of Jesus were completely unnerved by the presence of the empty tomb. Yet the people who had the most trouble with Easter were none other than the disciples of our Lord. It is a most striking feature of all the Easter Gospels that not one of them portrays a hero who claims to know that this is what the disciples should have expected. Not one of them says, "We should have known this was going to happen." It did not dawn on a single member of our Lord's company to say, "After all of the surprises, the wonderful things that we have heard our Lord say, and the miraculous things we have seen him do, we should have anticipated this greatest of all miracles."
It's A Race
If you and I were writing a script about the way Easter should have been, we probably would have made believers out of thousands of people that first Easter Day. At least we would have made believers out of the disciples. The evangelists are honest. They tell us how it really was. The disciples are stunned. They are surprised. They are filled with fear. We have no evidence that they believed. They were filled with emotion and acted with a great deal of commotion.
The Holy Gospel appointed for this Easter Day reports some of the confusion of that first Easter. There was much running. If you were one of the neighbors along the way taking your dog out on a morning stroll, imagine what would go through your mind as you witness the traffic going to and from that tomb! Mary is in a hurry to get there the first thing in the morning. It is still dark when she sets out to complete the embalmment procedures for Jesus. She sees the stone rolled away from the door, so she runs back to see the disciples. She tells Peter and John, who immediately run to the tomb. Old Peter, who probably could not have run across the street to catch a good sale, runs all the way. And young John gets there first.
More Running
Mary must have run back again, too, because when the disciples return to the others, also probably on the run, Mary remains in the garden. We can imagine that a neighbor on the road that morning would have suspected that something was up. Something important was happening. If we saw that much running today we might think that our neighbors were out holiday jogging. If something of this importance would happen in our neighborhood we would hear cars racing, tires screeching, and sirens screaming. All this running, however, was not out of joy and happiness. These disciples were running scared. They were filled with fear. The second Holy Gospel listed for this day is from Matthew, who mentions several times how fear seized the people. In this case, Mary was filled with fear, because she was sure that someone had taken the body of Jesus away.
What else could Mary think when she saw the stone had been rolled away? The stone had been put in place and the tomb had been sealed, because the enemies had thought that the disciples would come and steal the body and say that Jesus had risen from the dead. But now that the stone is rolled away, Mary does not even consider the possibility that Jesus would be risen from the dead. She is sure that the enemies have come and taken the body of Jesus away. That was a natural deduction. Charlie Chaplin was stolen from his grave. When that happened did anyone propose that he was risen from the dead? Did his family come forward to suggest that Charlie had talked about rising from the dead or about the notion that he was immortal? Even those who suggest that the character that Charlie played in the silent movies is immortal did not suggest that his tomb is empty because he is still alive.
Death Is Death
Death is death. None was prepared for the event of the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth from the dead. He had been sealed in the tomb. The process of decomposing should have begun. The dehydration of cells, the return to dust, should have started. Mary makes the logical deduction that if Jesus had moved from the tomb someone had to carry him out feet first. The disciples who come to see the tomb make the same deduction. They do not yet believe that Jesus is risen, but they believe with Mary that he had been carried away.
When the disciples confirm Mary's fears, she remains there in tears. Later on when she suspects that it is a friendly person who speaks to her, it had to be the gardener who had moved Jesus for some reason. If it was not the enemy, it was some friend who had moved Jesus for a good reason. Death still controlled the thoughts of the disciples this first Easter morn. The empty tomb is not proof for them that Jesus is risen. So entrenched were they in their grief, so locked were they in the grip of their mourning, that they could not even guess that Jesus might possibly be risen from the dead. There is not one shred of evidence that the disciples even remotely suspected that Jesus was risen from the dead.
Death Is The Spoiler
We do not find it difficult to understand why the disciples did not recognize the significance of the empty tomb. All of us are so oriented to the world of death we are all caught in its cold grip. Mary wanted to hold on to a corpse. The Hebrews considered it a great tragedy if a person's remains were disturbed in any way. To have the grave robbed was a dreadful violation of one's person who should rest in peace with one's fathers. Mary considered all that, to be sure. But she wanted to be able to attend to his corpse: to give it a good scent, to apply some cosmetics perhaps, to hide death, and to hold on to Jesus. She had all the same pain and hurt we have when we find it so difficult to say good-bye to our dear ones. We hold them even when rigor mortis has stiffened the bodies for days. We have a hard time pushing off from the caskets. Death is the spoiler for us.
Even on Easter itself, we are liable to say, "How much better it would be if our dear one were still here." We permit death to rule our emotions and our hearts and to deaden our sensitivity to the possibility that death may not be the final word. There is a reason for that. What lies beneath this easy capitulation to death is not simply our fear that death is so final, but our deeper fear that it is a judgment. No matter how brave we may be, or even if we entertain death wishes, or we are convinced that death is natural to the creation, we have to face the fact that death cuts us off from everything. All of the fears that haunt us are related to the specter that death is judgment.
According To The Word
No wonder then that our Easter evangelists spend so much time explaining to us how frightened and how confused the disciples were. Mary's word is right. "They have taken him away." The disciples believed her. Then John adds, "For as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead." They believed he was stolen from the empty tomb, because they did not believe the Word. And Matthew tells us in his Gospel that the Easter angel told the women, "He is not here; for He has risen as He said." Jesus had given them the Word. They did not believe the Word. That is why there was all this confusion, this disbelief, the unbelief, the fear that Easter morning. They could have believed the Word, and they would have known. They could have believed the Word and they would have been spared all this grief and heartache. They could have believed the Word, and they would have known exactly what to do Easter morning. The scriptures had said it. Jesus had said it, and everything that he did and all that he had taught pointed in this direction. But they did not believe because they themselves were still the children of death and they had to live out their fears. Had they been children of the Word, they would have been able to set their own watch at the tomb to await his Easter appearance.
The Witness
However, we cannot fault the disciples too much because we would have acted exactly the same way and still do. That is why the evangelists are so honest about their own confusions that day. They tell us how they identify with our fears and doubts. Now, however, they have left us abundant witness to the fact that Jesus is indeed risen from the dead and that we have no reason to fear. Looking back on it, John says the disciples should have known from the Word. Matthew says they should have remembered that he said he would rise again. John says when they looked into the tomb they should have seen the witness. "He saw the linen wrapping lying there, and the cloth that had been on Jesus' head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself."
People who would rob a grave would not take the time to do all this neat folding of the napkin on his head. They might have dropped it in their haste to get out of there. Nor would they leave the linen cloths. They would have simply run out with him. So John gives the evidence that the rumor about stealing the body of Christ just does not make sense in face of the facts. The empty tomb together with the neatly arranged burial linens with the Word are the evidences that Jesus is truly risen. It is through the Word that the Risen Christ still comes to us. He is that lively Word by which He still comes to give us life and hope. In the sacrament today Jesus comes as the victorious and living Christ who says, "Here I am living that in me you might have life and hope. Here I am living that in me you might have the resurrection hope. Here I am that in me you have the seeds of eternal life."
What all this means for us is that we are now able to live in a world in which we see signs of life, and we are able to live as those oriented to heaven and not to the signs of death. All of life as the world lives it is shaped by death. We can live in contradiction of the signs of the tomb and death. We are able to bring the message of today's Epistle to anyone who lies at death's door. "You have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above." The families caught up in the grief of mourning the death of family members know their loved ones live with the Risen Christ. We can get on the phone to offer condolences to neighbors who suffer the sudden losses in the light of the resurrection. We can be cheered by confident joy that enables an Easter celebration. It is the power and joy of Easter that we do not simply live in the hope of the resurrection but that the resurrection itself is the source of how we live in defiance of the world of death and sin. Jesus lives. Because he lives, we too shall live.
However, if we think we have trouble with Easter, think of the poor dear people in the city of Jerusalem that first Easter. The townspeople must have been troubled by the rumors that were flying around. We know that the enemies of Jesus were completely unnerved by the presence of the empty tomb. Yet the people who had the most trouble with Easter were none other than the disciples of our Lord. It is a most striking feature of all the Easter Gospels that not one of them portrays a hero who claims to know that this is what the disciples should have expected. Not one of them says, "We should have known this was going to happen." It did not dawn on a single member of our Lord's company to say, "After all of the surprises, the wonderful things that we have heard our Lord say, and the miraculous things we have seen him do, we should have anticipated this greatest of all miracles."
It's A Race
If you and I were writing a script about the way Easter should have been, we probably would have made believers out of thousands of people that first Easter Day. At least we would have made believers out of the disciples. The evangelists are honest. They tell us how it really was. The disciples are stunned. They are surprised. They are filled with fear. We have no evidence that they believed. They were filled with emotion and acted with a great deal of commotion.
The Holy Gospel appointed for this Easter Day reports some of the confusion of that first Easter. There was much running. If you were one of the neighbors along the way taking your dog out on a morning stroll, imagine what would go through your mind as you witness the traffic going to and from that tomb! Mary is in a hurry to get there the first thing in the morning. It is still dark when she sets out to complete the embalmment procedures for Jesus. She sees the stone rolled away from the door, so she runs back to see the disciples. She tells Peter and John, who immediately run to the tomb. Old Peter, who probably could not have run across the street to catch a good sale, runs all the way. And young John gets there first.
More Running
Mary must have run back again, too, because when the disciples return to the others, also probably on the run, Mary remains in the garden. We can imagine that a neighbor on the road that morning would have suspected that something was up. Something important was happening. If we saw that much running today we might think that our neighbors were out holiday jogging. If something of this importance would happen in our neighborhood we would hear cars racing, tires screeching, and sirens screaming. All this running, however, was not out of joy and happiness. These disciples were running scared. They were filled with fear. The second Holy Gospel listed for this day is from Matthew, who mentions several times how fear seized the people. In this case, Mary was filled with fear, because she was sure that someone had taken the body of Jesus away.
What else could Mary think when she saw the stone had been rolled away? The stone had been put in place and the tomb had been sealed, because the enemies had thought that the disciples would come and steal the body and say that Jesus had risen from the dead. But now that the stone is rolled away, Mary does not even consider the possibility that Jesus would be risen from the dead. She is sure that the enemies have come and taken the body of Jesus away. That was a natural deduction. Charlie Chaplin was stolen from his grave. When that happened did anyone propose that he was risen from the dead? Did his family come forward to suggest that Charlie had talked about rising from the dead or about the notion that he was immortal? Even those who suggest that the character that Charlie played in the silent movies is immortal did not suggest that his tomb is empty because he is still alive.
Death Is Death
Death is death. None was prepared for the event of the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth from the dead. He had been sealed in the tomb. The process of decomposing should have begun. The dehydration of cells, the return to dust, should have started. Mary makes the logical deduction that if Jesus had moved from the tomb someone had to carry him out feet first. The disciples who come to see the tomb make the same deduction. They do not yet believe that Jesus is risen, but they believe with Mary that he had been carried away.
When the disciples confirm Mary's fears, she remains there in tears. Later on when she suspects that it is a friendly person who speaks to her, it had to be the gardener who had moved Jesus for some reason. If it was not the enemy, it was some friend who had moved Jesus for a good reason. Death still controlled the thoughts of the disciples this first Easter morn. The empty tomb is not proof for them that Jesus is risen. So entrenched were they in their grief, so locked were they in the grip of their mourning, that they could not even guess that Jesus might possibly be risen from the dead. There is not one shred of evidence that the disciples even remotely suspected that Jesus was risen from the dead.
Death Is The Spoiler
We do not find it difficult to understand why the disciples did not recognize the significance of the empty tomb. All of us are so oriented to the world of death we are all caught in its cold grip. Mary wanted to hold on to a corpse. The Hebrews considered it a great tragedy if a person's remains were disturbed in any way. To have the grave robbed was a dreadful violation of one's person who should rest in peace with one's fathers. Mary considered all that, to be sure. But she wanted to be able to attend to his corpse: to give it a good scent, to apply some cosmetics perhaps, to hide death, and to hold on to Jesus. She had all the same pain and hurt we have when we find it so difficult to say good-bye to our dear ones. We hold them even when rigor mortis has stiffened the bodies for days. We have a hard time pushing off from the caskets. Death is the spoiler for us.
Even on Easter itself, we are liable to say, "How much better it would be if our dear one were still here." We permit death to rule our emotions and our hearts and to deaden our sensitivity to the possibility that death may not be the final word. There is a reason for that. What lies beneath this easy capitulation to death is not simply our fear that death is so final, but our deeper fear that it is a judgment. No matter how brave we may be, or even if we entertain death wishes, or we are convinced that death is natural to the creation, we have to face the fact that death cuts us off from everything. All of the fears that haunt us are related to the specter that death is judgment.
According To The Word
No wonder then that our Easter evangelists spend so much time explaining to us how frightened and how confused the disciples were. Mary's word is right. "They have taken him away." The disciples believed her. Then John adds, "For as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead." They believed he was stolen from the empty tomb, because they did not believe the Word. And Matthew tells us in his Gospel that the Easter angel told the women, "He is not here; for He has risen as He said." Jesus had given them the Word. They did not believe the Word. That is why there was all this confusion, this disbelief, the unbelief, the fear that Easter morning. They could have believed the Word, and they would have known. They could have believed the Word and they would have been spared all this grief and heartache. They could have believed the Word, and they would have known exactly what to do Easter morning. The scriptures had said it. Jesus had said it, and everything that he did and all that he had taught pointed in this direction. But they did not believe because they themselves were still the children of death and they had to live out their fears. Had they been children of the Word, they would have been able to set their own watch at the tomb to await his Easter appearance.
The Witness
However, we cannot fault the disciples too much because we would have acted exactly the same way and still do. That is why the evangelists are so honest about their own confusions that day. They tell us how they identify with our fears and doubts. Now, however, they have left us abundant witness to the fact that Jesus is indeed risen from the dead and that we have no reason to fear. Looking back on it, John says the disciples should have known from the Word. Matthew says they should have remembered that he said he would rise again. John says when they looked into the tomb they should have seen the witness. "He saw the linen wrapping lying there, and the cloth that had been on Jesus' head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself."
People who would rob a grave would not take the time to do all this neat folding of the napkin on his head. They might have dropped it in their haste to get out of there. Nor would they leave the linen cloths. They would have simply run out with him. So John gives the evidence that the rumor about stealing the body of Christ just does not make sense in face of the facts. The empty tomb together with the neatly arranged burial linens with the Word are the evidences that Jesus is truly risen. It is through the Word that the Risen Christ still comes to us. He is that lively Word by which He still comes to give us life and hope. In the sacrament today Jesus comes as the victorious and living Christ who says, "Here I am living that in me you might have life and hope. Here I am living that in me you might have the resurrection hope. Here I am that in me you have the seeds of eternal life."
What all this means for us is that we are now able to live in a world in which we see signs of life, and we are able to live as those oriented to heaven and not to the signs of death. All of life as the world lives it is shaped by death. We can live in contradiction of the signs of the tomb and death. We are able to bring the message of today's Epistle to anyone who lies at death's door. "You have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above." The families caught up in the grief of mourning the death of family members know their loved ones live with the Risen Christ. We can get on the phone to offer condolences to neighbors who suffer the sudden losses in the light of the resurrection. We can be cheered by confident joy that enables an Easter celebration. It is the power and joy of Easter that we do not simply live in the hope of the resurrection but that the resurrection itself is the source of how we live in defiance of the world of death and sin. Jesus lives. Because he lives, we too shall live.
