Easter: A Time For Higher Things
Sermon
Love Is Your Disguise
Second Lesson Sermons For Lent/Easter
Object:
Christ the Lord is risen today, Alleluia!
"If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things that are above ..." (Colossians 3:1-2a). And we, today, come to set our minds on things that are above. We come to hear the Hallelujah Chorus, and to worship in the aroma of lilies. We come to hear life proclaimed victorious over death and that Christ our Lord will live forevermore. We have come seeking higher things, putting behind us, at least for the moment, things which are not life-enhancing, life-sustaining, life-generating. We leave behind the grays and dark things which grab, consume, destroy, and diminish. At least for this shining moment we come to witness the dawning of God's promised kingdom and to hear words which ring with a beautiful resonance in the cathedral of the soul.
We come because we want to climb the mountain; we want to breathe the clear air and to see with the long view which reaches to the threshold of eternity. We come again to experience the adventure of having held the hand of God and to allow our vision to be directed to higher things which only those who know God can see.
It is like when John Glenn, that ancient astronaut, announced that he would again return to space. He said 36 years after his first orbital flight, "I see this as another adventure into the unknown."1 We come today because we seek another adventure -- not into the unknown but into the known; into that which has been made known to us as truer than true, as God's revelation to all of humankind who will seek to hear and understand it. We come this day wanting to hear the Alleluias, wanting to smell the lilies, wanting to climb the mountain once again, wanting to have another adventure, not into the unknown but into the known which has been revealed to us as truer than true, as life over death, as victory proclaimed, as the realm of God made manifest even in this time and in this place.
Yet if we are to understand the higher things which God has in store for us, we must take again the journey to the garden tomb with Mary. We must walk with her in the shadows, as she did in the early morning, while it was still dark, and discovered that the stone had been rolled away. It was still in the black of night when she barely saw that the stone had been disturbed, and she was disturbed by it. So she went running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, reporting through her tears, "They have taken the Lord out of the tomb and we do not know where they have laid him." Who knows whether or not Peter and the disciple had even awakened from sleep. But shaken to maximum attention they came running to the tomb. When they arrived where the stone had been disturbed, they were disturbed by it and stooped to look in.
If we are to understand the higher things which God has in store for us today, then we must also stoop to look into the place where the body had lain. We must travel with Mary and Peter and the other unnamed disciple to the place where the stone has been disturbed and be disturbed ourselves by it. We must go to the place of shadow, darkness, and death, not only in this story but also in our own story, where light has yet to conquer the darkness, where shadows still roam, where stone doorways have yet to be opened, and where it would be disturbing to us if they were opened. And we know that God will disturb those stone doorways as well; the doorways which, if opened, will reveal much about ourselves. And if we go there, we are uncertain we will even be able to love ourselves, and we might wonder if, in those dark places, God will be able to love us. But we must go to those places to understand that the ones who placed Christ in the tomb, those who sought to lock him up there, were convinced that the news he did bring, the gospel he did preach, was simply more good than this world can stand. We must go to those places because it is only by going there that we will understand the higher things God is calling us to understand today: that God's love and God's light is greater than any darkness we fear in our world or even in ourselves. We must go to those places because, by going to the place of shadow, we can understand the coming of the light, by going to the valley we find comfort as we stand with Jesus on the hillside. So if on this day we are to come with God to the heights and to ponder higher things pleasantly, then we must also walk with Mary in the garden of darkness where the stone has been disturbed and where she has been disturbed by it.
Early in this century there was one who knew more than a little about the heights. Auguste Piccard, a Swiss-born physicist, became best known for his design of a pressurized balloon gondola, and its successful use in high altitude operation. The aluminum spherical gondola in the years 1931 and 1932 made two record-setting high altitude flights, the second carrying Piccard to the altitude of nearly ten miles above sea level. His achievements were spectacular and contributed greatly to the international body of knowledge, which eventually led to putting humans safely in space. But reaching the heights was not enough for Auguste Piccard. A decade passed and he was again at work on a new project, a new feat of exploration -- physics and engineering. Auguste Piccard was creating a bathyscaphe -- a diving bell designed to support human passengers in the extreme depths of the ocean. In 1953, when Piccard was aged 69 years, he piloted his bathyscaphe to 10,330 feet below the ocean's surface, the greatest depth humans had ever attained. His son, Jacques, less than a year after his father's death in 1963, piloted a similar craft to the deepest point on earth -- 35,800 feet, nearly seven miles beneath the waves.2
To understand the heights we must know the depths. If we meet God on the mountain we will also meet him in the valley.
The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want; he makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters; he restores my soul. He leads me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil; For thou art with me....
-- Psalm 23:1-4
If we are to meet God in the mystery of the mountain, to be held by Him in the heights, then we must also marvel with Mary that the stone has been disturbed, and with the disciples, stoop to look in the place of shadow and darkness, a place we fear we will find only death.
In 1841 an ordained medical missionary began his work along the Zambezi River in Africa. In that time the geography of Africa was unknown to westerners. Maps showed the edges of the continent but the interior was left blank. Dr. David Livingstone began his thirty-year exploration and service of God and humankind in this unknown region. He traveled the continent, suffering illness and injury, becoming acquainted with indigenous people and winning their welcome, charting new courses, encountering slave traders, buying slaves and setting them free, all in the name of God and of God's church. If the fruit of his work was measured in souls saved, it would have been insignificant. But measured by the intensity of his service, the magnitude of his sacrifice, and the enormity of what he added to world knowledge and understanding of an unknown wilderness, it is not hard to understand why, when Livingstone at age sixty succumbed to illness deep in the African forest, it is said that all Britain wept when his body was returned home for burial. His tombstone reads: BROUGHT BY FAITHFUL HAND OVER LAND AND SEA, DAVID LIVINGSTONE: MISSIONARY, TRAVELER, PHILANTHROPIST. FOR THIRTY YEARS HIS LIFE WAS SPENT IN AN UNWEARIED EFFORT TO EVANGELIZE THE NATIVE RACES, TO EXPLORE THE UNDISCOVERED SECRETS AND ABOLISH THE SLAVE TRADE.
On one 1,700-mile journey along the Zambezi River, David Livingstone traveled from the equatorial jungle of Angola and the Republic of the Congo through the middle of the continent, through the Rift Valley as it thunders and falls down canyons deeper than our Grand Canyon until it reaches its opening at the Indian Ocean. It was on this trip that David Livingstone became the first European to reach Victoria Falls. The spectacular waterfall is twice as deep and twice as wide as Niagra Falls. Because of the tremendous roar and the ever-present veil of mist, the indigenous Kalolo-Lozi people dubbed the falls Mosi-oa-tunya ("The Smoke that Thunders").3 Of his most awe-inspiring discovery he later wrote: "Victoria Falls must have been gazed upon by angels in their flight." David Livingstone knew that to experience higher things for him meant to spend his life in the darkness and shadows of the jungle.4
And so, dear friends, as we come here today seeking to hear the Hallelujah Chorus and worship in the aroma of lilies, as we seek to place our hand in God¹s hand and to consider higher things, let us, as this moment concludes and as we move on to other responsibilities, tasks, and turmoil, even into the valley -- let us remember what we have seen here, what we have heard in this place, the claim which has been made. What we have seen here together reminds us of the truth of God which is over all that is. On that day long ago, God came to a place of death and disturbed the stone. And God today and every day comes to the garden of shadow and darkness and death and disturbs the stone. He calls us forth to life. Let us remember what we have seen here, what we have heard here, what we have sung here, what we have spoken here -- that God disturbs the stone, does not leave that stone unturned. Then unspectacularly, and with the regularity of tomorrow, let us with Georgia Harkness recite:
The vision fades; the Easter joy is past.
Again in dull drab paths our lot is cast.
The heavens no longer sing, the war clouds lower.
O Lord, where art thou in thy risen power?
The calm voice speaks -- it answers all I ask.
"I am beside you in the daily task."5
Easter is a time for higher things and may God Easter in us in all of our days and in all of our places, in the valley and on the hillside. And as we go forth we should expect that in the high places and in the valleys, even if we come to a canyon of calamity, on the mountain and in the really rough places, we will find, in one as in the other, surprisingly and powerfully, a Victoria Falls of Grace raining down upon us, washing over us, bathing us with a sense of having been saved, of having been claimed, of having been blessed; bathing us with a sense of the One who makes us whole and who we proclaim this day victorious. Thanks be to God for Easter -- a time for higher and deeper things.
____________
1. Jeffrey Kluger, "The Right Stuff, 36 Years Later," Time, Vol. 151 No. 3, Jan. 26, 1998, p. 58.
2. "Piccard, Auguste," Encyclopedia Britanica, 1993 edition, Vol. 9, p. 422.
3. "Victoria Falls," Encyclopedia Britanica, 1993 edition, Vol. 12, p. 352.
4. Alvin Austin, "Discovering Livingstone: the Man, the Missionary, the Explorer, the Legend," Christian History, Vol. XVI, No. 4, Fall 1997, p. 10.
5. Georgia Harkness, The Living Pulpit, Vol. 7, No. 1, January/March 1998, p. 32.
"If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things that are above ..." (Colossians 3:1-2a). And we, today, come to set our minds on things that are above. We come to hear the Hallelujah Chorus, and to worship in the aroma of lilies. We come to hear life proclaimed victorious over death and that Christ our Lord will live forevermore. We have come seeking higher things, putting behind us, at least for the moment, things which are not life-enhancing, life-sustaining, life-generating. We leave behind the grays and dark things which grab, consume, destroy, and diminish. At least for this shining moment we come to witness the dawning of God's promised kingdom and to hear words which ring with a beautiful resonance in the cathedral of the soul.
We come because we want to climb the mountain; we want to breathe the clear air and to see with the long view which reaches to the threshold of eternity. We come again to experience the adventure of having held the hand of God and to allow our vision to be directed to higher things which only those who know God can see.
It is like when John Glenn, that ancient astronaut, announced that he would again return to space. He said 36 years after his first orbital flight, "I see this as another adventure into the unknown."1 We come today because we seek another adventure -- not into the unknown but into the known; into that which has been made known to us as truer than true, as God's revelation to all of humankind who will seek to hear and understand it. We come this day wanting to hear the Alleluias, wanting to smell the lilies, wanting to climb the mountain once again, wanting to have another adventure, not into the unknown but into the known which has been revealed to us as truer than true, as life over death, as victory proclaimed, as the realm of God made manifest even in this time and in this place.
Yet if we are to understand the higher things which God has in store for us, we must take again the journey to the garden tomb with Mary. We must walk with her in the shadows, as she did in the early morning, while it was still dark, and discovered that the stone had been rolled away. It was still in the black of night when she barely saw that the stone had been disturbed, and she was disturbed by it. So she went running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, reporting through her tears, "They have taken the Lord out of the tomb and we do not know where they have laid him." Who knows whether or not Peter and the disciple had even awakened from sleep. But shaken to maximum attention they came running to the tomb. When they arrived where the stone had been disturbed, they were disturbed by it and stooped to look in.
If we are to understand the higher things which God has in store for us today, then we must also stoop to look into the place where the body had lain. We must travel with Mary and Peter and the other unnamed disciple to the place where the stone has been disturbed and be disturbed ourselves by it. We must go to the place of shadow, darkness, and death, not only in this story but also in our own story, where light has yet to conquer the darkness, where shadows still roam, where stone doorways have yet to be opened, and where it would be disturbing to us if they were opened. And we know that God will disturb those stone doorways as well; the doorways which, if opened, will reveal much about ourselves. And if we go there, we are uncertain we will even be able to love ourselves, and we might wonder if, in those dark places, God will be able to love us. But we must go to those places to understand that the ones who placed Christ in the tomb, those who sought to lock him up there, were convinced that the news he did bring, the gospel he did preach, was simply more good than this world can stand. We must go to those places because it is only by going there that we will understand the higher things God is calling us to understand today: that God's love and God's light is greater than any darkness we fear in our world or even in ourselves. We must go to those places because, by going to the place of shadow, we can understand the coming of the light, by going to the valley we find comfort as we stand with Jesus on the hillside. So if on this day we are to come with God to the heights and to ponder higher things pleasantly, then we must also walk with Mary in the garden of darkness where the stone has been disturbed and where she has been disturbed by it.
Early in this century there was one who knew more than a little about the heights. Auguste Piccard, a Swiss-born physicist, became best known for his design of a pressurized balloon gondola, and its successful use in high altitude operation. The aluminum spherical gondola in the years 1931 and 1932 made two record-setting high altitude flights, the second carrying Piccard to the altitude of nearly ten miles above sea level. His achievements were spectacular and contributed greatly to the international body of knowledge, which eventually led to putting humans safely in space. But reaching the heights was not enough for Auguste Piccard. A decade passed and he was again at work on a new project, a new feat of exploration -- physics and engineering. Auguste Piccard was creating a bathyscaphe -- a diving bell designed to support human passengers in the extreme depths of the ocean. In 1953, when Piccard was aged 69 years, he piloted his bathyscaphe to 10,330 feet below the ocean's surface, the greatest depth humans had ever attained. His son, Jacques, less than a year after his father's death in 1963, piloted a similar craft to the deepest point on earth -- 35,800 feet, nearly seven miles beneath the waves.2
To understand the heights we must know the depths. If we meet God on the mountain we will also meet him in the valley.
The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want; he makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters; he restores my soul. He leads me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil; For thou art with me....
-- Psalm 23:1-4
If we are to meet God in the mystery of the mountain, to be held by Him in the heights, then we must also marvel with Mary that the stone has been disturbed, and with the disciples, stoop to look in the place of shadow and darkness, a place we fear we will find only death.
In 1841 an ordained medical missionary began his work along the Zambezi River in Africa. In that time the geography of Africa was unknown to westerners. Maps showed the edges of the continent but the interior was left blank. Dr. David Livingstone began his thirty-year exploration and service of God and humankind in this unknown region. He traveled the continent, suffering illness and injury, becoming acquainted with indigenous people and winning their welcome, charting new courses, encountering slave traders, buying slaves and setting them free, all in the name of God and of God's church. If the fruit of his work was measured in souls saved, it would have been insignificant. But measured by the intensity of his service, the magnitude of his sacrifice, and the enormity of what he added to world knowledge and understanding of an unknown wilderness, it is not hard to understand why, when Livingstone at age sixty succumbed to illness deep in the African forest, it is said that all Britain wept when his body was returned home for burial. His tombstone reads: BROUGHT BY FAITHFUL HAND OVER LAND AND SEA, DAVID LIVINGSTONE: MISSIONARY, TRAVELER, PHILANTHROPIST. FOR THIRTY YEARS HIS LIFE WAS SPENT IN AN UNWEARIED EFFORT TO EVANGELIZE THE NATIVE RACES, TO EXPLORE THE UNDISCOVERED SECRETS AND ABOLISH THE SLAVE TRADE.
On one 1,700-mile journey along the Zambezi River, David Livingstone traveled from the equatorial jungle of Angola and the Republic of the Congo through the middle of the continent, through the Rift Valley as it thunders and falls down canyons deeper than our Grand Canyon until it reaches its opening at the Indian Ocean. It was on this trip that David Livingstone became the first European to reach Victoria Falls. The spectacular waterfall is twice as deep and twice as wide as Niagra Falls. Because of the tremendous roar and the ever-present veil of mist, the indigenous Kalolo-Lozi people dubbed the falls Mosi-oa-tunya ("The Smoke that Thunders").3 Of his most awe-inspiring discovery he later wrote: "Victoria Falls must have been gazed upon by angels in their flight." David Livingstone knew that to experience higher things for him meant to spend his life in the darkness and shadows of the jungle.4
And so, dear friends, as we come here today seeking to hear the Hallelujah Chorus and worship in the aroma of lilies, as we seek to place our hand in God¹s hand and to consider higher things, let us, as this moment concludes and as we move on to other responsibilities, tasks, and turmoil, even into the valley -- let us remember what we have seen here, what we have heard in this place, the claim which has been made. What we have seen here together reminds us of the truth of God which is over all that is. On that day long ago, God came to a place of death and disturbed the stone. And God today and every day comes to the garden of shadow and darkness and death and disturbs the stone. He calls us forth to life. Let us remember what we have seen here, what we have heard here, what we have sung here, what we have spoken here -- that God disturbs the stone, does not leave that stone unturned. Then unspectacularly, and with the regularity of tomorrow, let us with Georgia Harkness recite:
The vision fades; the Easter joy is past.
Again in dull drab paths our lot is cast.
The heavens no longer sing, the war clouds lower.
O Lord, where art thou in thy risen power?
The calm voice speaks -- it answers all I ask.
"I am beside you in the daily task."5
Easter is a time for higher things and may God Easter in us in all of our days and in all of our places, in the valley and on the hillside. And as we go forth we should expect that in the high places and in the valleys, even if we come to a canyon of calamity, on the mountain and in the really rough places, we will find, in one as in the other, surprisingly and powerfully, a Victoria Falls of Grace raining down upon us, washing over us, bathing us with a sense of having been saved, of having been claimed, of having been blessed; bathing us with a sense of the One who makes us whole and who we proclaim this day victorious. Thanks be to God for Easter -- a time for higher and deeper things.
____________
1. Jeffrey Kluger, "The Right Stuff, 36 Years Later," Time, Vol. 151 No. 3, Jan. 26, 1998, p. 58.
2. "Piccard, Auguste," Encyclopedia Britanica, 1993 edition, Vol. 9, p. 422.
3. "Victoria Falls," Encyclopedia Britanica, 1993 edition, Vol. 12, p. 352.
4. Alvin Austin, "Discovering Livingstone: the Man, the Missionary, the Explorer, the Legend," Christian History, Vol. XVI, No. 4, Fall 1997, p. 10.
5. Georgia Harkness, The Living Pulpit, Vol. 7, No. 1, January/March 1998, p. 32.
