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The Resurrection of Jesus
When the sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint him. And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb. They had been saying to one another, ‘Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?’ When they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had already been rolled back. As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man, dressed in a white robe, sitting on the right side; and they were alarmed. But he said to them, ‘Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here. Look, there is the place they laid him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you.’ So they went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.
SERMON
Good morning.
The Easter Story begins on Good Friday when Jesus, who was crucified, died. His Disciples, who apparently had thought that he was going to ride into Jerusalem, claim the crown as King of Israel and bring a new world into being immediately, were scattered, disappointed and defeated.
But then, some of the women went to the tomb, fund it empty and reported back to the Disciples that Jesus was reported to have risen from the dead.
This morning I read the end of the Book of Mark, believed by most scholars to be the earliest written of the four Canonical Gospels.
The earliest known texts of the Book of Mark have the end as I read it. The women go to the tomb which they find empty, a man there tells them that Jesus is risen and that they should tell Peter and the other Disciples that Jesus will meet him in Galilee. However, the women are afraid and so they tell no one. And there ends the book. Well that is a bit unsatisfactory. Note: there is no story of witnesses to resurrection; all we have is an empty tomb. And the Disciples are not told that Jesus will meet them in Galilee, so do they go there? Do they see him? The book doesn’t say.
In Mark 14, there is a reference to a resurrection when Jesus says to his disciples “after I am raised up, I will go before you to Galilee”, but the Gospel itself appears to have originally ended without any of the Disciples actually seeing the risen Jesus. Later versions of the book have added endings, the so called shorter ending and the longer ending, each of which makes reference to appearances by Jesus.
These “added” endings seem to have been written to fill the need for physical appearances by Jesus.
Let’s back up for a moment to the overarching story of the Gospels.
The Christian story is that God created human beings, Adam and Eve, placing them in the Garden of Eden. In that garden there was no labor, no sorrow and no death. Those human beings then disobeyed God, who gave them their just and due punishment, which included expulsion from the garden and the experience of death. From that time on, death entered into human existence, the death of our loved ones and the death of ourselves. Generation upon generation has been born and has died, suffering loss and sorrow. Worse than this, perhaps, is the fact that humanity lost its direct connection with God. The God who had strolled n the garden and spoken to Adam early as a friend now became a distant being.
But God in his mercy is not content that humanity should continue to suffer. It is his desire to restore humanity to eternal life, eternal bliss and eternal communion with God. The prophets of the Hebrew scriptures claim that the day of reckoning will come when God restores Israel and when evil will be punished and there are hints, especially in the apocryphal books of the so called Intertestamental period, but also in the prophets, that the good will be restored to life and will be rewarded by God.
Now here is an odd thing to me: If God is all-powerful then he should be able to simply forgive the failings of human beings, the disobedience in the Garden, and restore them to their original position. He should be able to simply declare humanity cleansed. However, in the Christian story the method he chooses is different; he chooses instead to send a deliverer, someone who takes upon himself the sins of humanity and suffers for those sins, redeeming humanity by being punished in their stead.
Different traditions within Christianity define this differently. For Trinitarians, Christ, the second person of the Trinity, the Son of God, comes to earth born as a human being to suffer and die, conquering death in the process. For traditional Unitarians, God selects a human being, Jesus, and through adoption makes him his son; the human Jesus then suffers death for others. In either case, Jesus the divine human or Jesus the human being, humanity is redeemed and restored.
While some hold that salvation comes through faith in God and in Jesus, the Universalist view is that this sacrifice redeems all of humanity, whether they believe in God or not.
In the Christian story, Jesus has conquered death by dying and returning to life. In doing so he frees us all from death. Now, we still go through the dying process, we still know the loss of this life, but we also know resurrection and eternal life. We will live again, our loved ones will live again. That is the Christian story.
Last week, in speaking of Passover, I spoke of one message of the story of wandering in the wilderness being that no matter how bleak things may seem, if we keep on striving and moving things will get better one day, even if it does not seem possible right now.
Where the message of Passover is promise and hope, one of the messages of Easter is of fulfillment, fulfillment of promise and fulfillment of hope. Easter says that redemption is already, that salvation is already. It is no longer a distant promise intimated by the prophets; it is a proven guarantee, proven by the empty tomb and the resurrection of Jesus and his appearances to the disciples.
For those of us who believe this story, or believe at least the meaning of the story, the claim of eternal life, this is a day of celebration and joy. Death is conquered and we will live forever. We will see our deceased loved ones again as we and they rise from the tomb. The joy of that knowledge, that this is the day of redemption, should change our perspective on all of life; the world is born fresh and new and we with it.
Some feel that the story of the death and resurrection must be literally true or it is false; that if Jesus did not rise from the tomb and live again, then the Bible and whole edifice of the Christian religion with all of its trappings should be tossed away.
But for me, it is irrelevant to an important underlying truth whether Jesus rose again or not. The underlying truth I refer to is that we can be reborn in this life, that we can be renewed and refreshed, our spirits can be cleansed and redeemed here and now.
Too often human beings are burdened down with fears or sorrows, angers or resentments. Too often we are burdened down with guilt or shame.
One message of Easter is that we can let go of all of these.
If you are you feeling guilt or shame, the message is that God or the universe has forgiven whatever you have done, and that therefore you may forgive yourself; you are cleansed and redeemed, you are reborn.
If you feel anger or resentment towards others or towards life, let go of these, feel within yourself the forgiveness towards others that you would wish God to grant you. If you hold anger towards others, set them free and set yourself free. If you wish to be, you can be reborn this day, reborn without old angers, reborn without old grudges. Let them go. They no longer need to be who you are.
If you feel fear, fear for life, fear for the future, fear for yourself or your loved ones, the message of the Bible, repeated over and over again, is “Do not be afraid”. Believe that Jesus or God or goodness will be with you to the end of days; have faith in the life that is for however long it lasts. And if you can, have faith in the life to come.
Look at this beautiful earth: look at the beauty of the trees and grasses, at the beauty of human love, friendship and companionship. Look at the new life springing up around us, baby animals--bunnies and chicks, fawns and lambs--new green shoots of flowers and bushes, and the opening up of the world that spring brings with it.
It is as if the world has been recreated and us with it. The world is cleansed by the spring rains, we can feel life stirring in the ground, smell freshness in the air and take pleasure in the warm breeze.
Let our spirits also be cleansed by spring; let us feel new life stirring within us; let us take pleasure in the renewal and newborn freshness and warmth that fills our hearts and souls.
Spring is come, life is risen from the hidden chambers of the earth, as life is risen from the hidden chambers of our being. Let us open the hearts and windows of our souls to the fresh air and breezes of renewal. So let it be.
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