God of life and love, just as you opened the tomb, open our hearts and minds to the joy of Easter. Amen.
Easter comes just in the nick of time. There’s been a lot of Good Friday sort of news in our personal and public lives. Easter delivers the jolt of beauty, joy, and Good News that we could all use an extra dose of these days. It’s always good to proclaim it, but there seems to be an extra bit of relief this year to hear the message that the Lord is risen indeed. Alleluia!
It is so good to be gathered this morning in beloved community with you all. I never take for granted what a blessing it is to be with you all, especially on Easter. The flowers, the music, the bowties and dresses – what a gift it is to be here. And if you’re our guest this morning – welcome to you. God has brought us together this morning and I’m so thankful that we’re all here.
When I say that Easter comes just in the nick of time, I really mean it. This won’t be a two-minute sermon, but I want to go ahead and give you the point right now so that it doesn’t get lost along the way: whatever is dead in your life, Jesus is bringing new life. And that’s a message we can cling onto.
Death and deadness were the world into which Jesus came. Jesus was born under the Roman occupation of the Jewish holy land. Life expectancy was about 35, which is an indicator of just how much infant mortality, violence, and disease were all around. The religious institutions of Jesus’ day were becoming corrupt and complacent as they cozied up to Rome. And God so loves the world, so loves us, that God entered into this mess to show us the most excellent way of love. Jesus healed the sick, gave dignity to the rejected, challenged oppression, fed the hungry, forgave the guilty, and raised the dead.
And while that might not sound like the most controversial agenda, Jesus was upending everything because he was bringing hope to the hopeless, welcome to the overlooked, life to the dead, and accountability to those with authority. And so those in power, both Roman and Temple leadership, got together and decided that the status quo was working for them, and that they were willing to protect it at all costs. And so they made up charges against Jesus, had a sham trial, and executed him in the most degrading and painful way they knew how: crucifixion.
If we had kept reading a few more verses in Luke, we would have heard one of his followers say, dejectedly, “But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel.” Jesus wasn’t the only thing that died on the Cross – so did their hopes for salvation. The message of mercy fell silent. The way of love was now sealed with a huge boulder.
And just in the nick of time, Easter comes. Easter is the absurdly Good News that Jesus Christ is risen today – that hope abounds and that love wins. This, though, is not how the world operates. We throw that word “Resurrection” around so much that we forget just how preposterous this is. Resurrection is not reanimation, not resuscitation, not restoration. No, Resurrection is a re-creation. Easter is not when God brought Jesus back to life, it’s when the powers of Death were robbed of their finality. Easter is what allows one poet to write, “I will die, but that is all I will do for death. I am not on death’s payroll.”
But for those of us surrounded by the forces of death – by cruelty, by sickness, by division, by pettiness, by greed, by violence – this news that death has been defeated seems like an idle tale. In fact, that’s exactly what Luke records as the disciples’ reaction to the women who shared this message. Two thousand years later and women are still routinely dismissed and have it mansplained to them that they don’t understand what Jesus was talking about. Well, thanks be to God that the message of the women persisted.
Friends, where have we closed ourselves off to the message of Easter? Where have we said, “Forgiveness, or generosity, might be a nice idea, but it won’t work in practice?” Who have we written off as “dead to me”? When do we find ourselves saying “Let’s not get our hopes up”? The message of Easter is utter nonsense, and that is the beautiful and blessed point.
When we encounter death, in all of its various forms, we generally have one of two reactions. Death is always a “No.” A no to joy; a no to relationship; a no to life; a no to love. In response to Death’s “no,” some go all-in on the Now. If Death is going to take all of this way, they figure, I’m going to enjoy life to the fullest. This is us when we give into the accumulation of more and more stuff; when we seek entertainment at all costs, even the exploitation of others; when we believe the charlatans who assure us that we are the winners and they are the losers. But to constantly live in this sort of Now is not freedom, but rather a prison cell.
The other response to Death’s “No” is the opposite. Instead of going all-in, sometimes we give up. Death can make us give us into cynicism and ask, “What’s the point?” We no longer find the beauty of life, but only the monotony. Similar to the other reaction, this apathy also traps us in an unceasing Now with no future hope.
And if we look around at our culture, or take an honest look into ourselves, we find ourselves staring back at Death’s “No” being trapped with one of these two responses of either denying death or never being fully alive. Easter introduces another option though – taunting death and laughing in its face as if to say, “Is that all you’ve got?” As St. Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “Where, O Death, is your victory? Where, O Death, is your sting.”
As followers of Jesus, we very much know that death is a daily possibility, we do not deny death; which is why we treat life as a sacred gift. It is why find such comfort in the wisdom that life is short, and so we are a people who are swift to love and make haste to be kind. And, at the same time, we know that the Death has been disarmed because of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. Easter assures us that, as real, and tragic, and disruptive as Death is, it does not get the final say. As one author has put it, “Love always bats last.” Just as surely as God opened the grave on Easter morning, God has opened a new way of being to us, and that is the message of Easter – that God is opening what Sin and Death have closed off. What possibilities do you see Easter opening?
For us, it’s a question of what sort of world we live in. Do we live in a world that has been opened by Easter, a world in which we are open to surprise, beauty, forgiveness, and love? Or do we live in a world of keeping score, counting debts, and sealed tombs? This is the question that the angels at the tomb ask the women and, beloved, it is the question before us on this Easter morning – “Why do you look for the living among the dead?”
That’s a good question – why do we look for the living among the dead? My college chaplain was fond of telling wisdom stories from the Middle Eastern wise-fool named Mullah Nasruddin. In one story, Nasruddin was standing around a lamp post searching frantically at night. A friend came by and asked, “What are you looking for?” “Oh, I’ve lost a key, can you please help me look for it.” So the two of them spend a considerable amount of time looking in all of the bushes around the lamp post. But no key. Eventually, the friend asked, “Are you sure this is where you lost your key?” Nasruddin responded “Not at all. I dropped it somewhere in my backyard.” “Then why have we wasted all of this time looking here?” Nasruddin replied, “Well, the light is better over here.”
Maybe that’s why we look for the living among the dead – we live in the valley of the shadow of death, and we don’t know where else to look. What is dead in your life? I know some of you are dealing with health struggles, others of you have a loved one who is nearing death, still others are struggling with addiction, some have either recently been laid off or fear you soon will be, some are afraid of being deported, others are anxious about your children, some are concerned about how you’ll pay the bills if groceries keep getting more expensive.
When it comes to Easter though, there’s an extremely important theological word. Not that I want to give you a bunch of jargon to explain Easter, but Easter really doesn’t make sense without it. This very important theological word is “but.” B-u-t. But. Five times in the passage from Luke we heard “but” and we heard it the first reading from Acts – “They put Jesus to death; but God raised him on the third day.” Easter reminds us that no matter how dead the situation, there is always a “but.” There are no dead ends when it comes to the love of God. There is no situation so bad that God’s love cannot make well.
Yes, Death puts up barriers and seals us in tombs of fear and despair, but on Easter, the stone has been rolled away, Alleluia! God will go to any length to open whatever tomb you find yourself in, even the tomb you’ve put yourself into. In fact, God has already opened the tomb for you. And this is the message of Grace – you don’t have to please God by coming to church more often, or putting a few images of Benjamin Franklin in the offering plate, or saying the right prayers, or even believing the right things. You are always loved and already forgiven. Your stone has already been rolled away. You don’t have to be strong enough to move it yourself. All we have to do is to walk through that doorway and follow Jesus in the way of love.
Now, what makes this a challenge is the same challenge of preaching on Easter. Preachers, if you can get one to be honest with you, will tell you that what we really want to do in an Easter sermon is to make the lightbulb turn on for everyone here, to have everyone exclaiming Alleluia, forgiving their enemies, signing up to volunteer at the church, and coming back next Sunday with just as much gusto and energy as today. In the 2,000 years of Church history, that sermon hasn’t been preached yet, but we preachers have the hope that we just might find the right words this year.
The challenge is that Easter, as grand as it is, is more subtle than we expect. When we pay attention the Biblical text, we see this, or rather, we don’t see it. There are no fireworks, no brass instruments, no seersucker, not even a Reese’s egg, which, to be clear, is the pinnacle of Easter candy. No, Luke records that it happened in the depths of dawn. There’s even one very obvious omission in the Gospel text that we heard – Jesus. He doesn’t even get a cameo. Easter is as subtle as an open door.
Which is why preachers and believers struggle so much on Easter – we’re left pointing at an opening, at something that isn’t there. I cannot prove to you that the tomb has been opened, but I can tell you what happens if we dare to walk through that open door. We’ll find that the open door tells us that God is open for business – that there is actually enough for us to be generous. That forgiveness really is possible. That love really is a better way than fear. That we are never alone. That we always belong.
And why this is true is because who we encounter on the other side of the open tomb is Jesus, our Good Shepherd. Ultimately, the message of Easter is not “the tomb is open,” but rather “Jesus is alive.” Easter is about a who; not a what, a when, or a how. Easter is the Good News that we did our worst to Jesus, and he gives his best to us; that Jesus, who was dead, is forever alive; that Death’s “No” is answered by God’s “Yes” to each of us; and that our Good Shepherd carries us across the threshold of all that is dead in us into his abundant and never-ending love.
The angels’ final words to the women are “Remember how he told you,” and that’s what I’ll leave you with as well. Remember how Jesus told you: you are made, in, for, and by love. You are cherished. You belong. You can be bold in faith. You are loved. You will die, but that is all you need to do for death, for the Risen Jesus has rolled the stone away and ushered you into eternal life. Remember, because love is stronger than death, all shall be well. Alleluia!
