resurrection

Because He Lives

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Sabbath Day Thoughts — “Because He Lives” Luke 20:27-38

A very zealous, soul-winning, young preacher came upon a farmer working in his field. Being concerned about the farmer’s soul, the preacher asked, “Are you laboring in the vineyard of the Lord, my good man?”

Continuing his work, not even looking at the preacher, the farmer replied, “Naw, these are soybeans.”

“No, no, no. You don’t understand,” said the young man. “I’m asking are you a Christian?”

With the same amount of interest as his previous answer the farmer said, “Nope my name is Jones. You must be lookin’ for Jim Christian. He lives a mile south of here.”

The determined young preacher tried again, asking the farmer, “Are you lost?”

“Naw! I’ve lived here all my life,” answered the farmer.

Finally, the frustrated preacher threw up his hands, “Are you prepared for the resurrection?”

Now this caught the farmer’s attention, and he asked, “When’s it gonna’ be?”

Thinking he was finally making some headway, the young preacher replied, “It could be today, tomorrow, or the next day.”

The farmer stopped. He took a handkerchief from his back pocket and wiped his brow. “Well, don’t mention it to my wife. She don’t get out much, and she’ll wanna’ go all three days.”

The resurrection is a strange subject for a joke, but that’s exactly what the Sadducees were up to. As they challenged Jesus, he was teaching in the courts of the Temple. Earlier that week, Jesus made a triumphal entry to the city, surrounded by jubilant crowds who were captivated by his dynamic teaching. Jesus cleansed the Temple, turning the tables on money changers and driving out the animal vendors. Then, Jesus settled into a residency on the teaching steps, where his opponents tried their best to discredit him.

The Sadducees were the ruling elite of the temple, having controlled the religious practice of Israel for hundreds of years. The first century Jewish historian Josephus wrote that the Sadducees were filthy rich. They were little-loved by the people, but they preserved their power through wealth and collaboration with the Roman Empire. The Sadducees didn’t like Jesus. They questioned his lowly origins, they feared his appeal to the crowds, and they really didn’t like his disruption of the money changing and animal sales that enriched the Temple’s coffers. They needed to discredit Jesus quickly and embarrass him in front of his adoring crowds.

The question that the Sadducees posed for Rabbi Jesus sounds puzzling and archaic. Unlike Jesus, the Sadducees didn’t believe in the resurrection. They said it wasn’t mentioned in the Torah, thus it couldn’t be part of God’s plan for humanity.  So, the Sadducees turned to the traditional practice of levirate marriage to make a mockery of the very notion of the resurrection. In levirate marriage, a childless widow would be married to her late husband’s brother. The children, who were born of the levirate marriage, were considered the offspring of the late husband. This preserved the husband’s name and the right of inheritance for a future generation. Levirate marriage was also a protection for widows. It stopped the practice of discarding a childless widow, returning her to her father’s house or turning her out into the streets to fend for herself. According to the levirate tradition, the husband’s family must provide for childless widows, ensuring their safety and well-being. The Sadducees’ question imagines a woman who is widowed, time and time again, passed from brother to brother to brother to brother to brother to brother to brother. If there is, indeed a life eternal, the Sadducees ask, whose wife will she be? It’s a bawdy, lewd joke that imagines an infinitely grieving woman passed from brother to brother for all eternity.

Rabbi Jesus dismantled their rude joke in two simple moves. First, he pointed to the practice of levirate marriage. According to Jesus, in the resurrection (in the Kingdom to come), the entire patriarchal structure, which makes the possessing of women as property possible, would be set aside. Girl children won’t be the property of fathers to be traded away in an economic transaction. Women won’t be the sexual property of husbands. Childless widows won’t be at risk for homelessness and exploitation. In God’s Kingdom, our kinship, worth, and life is found in God. We are all God’s children, children of the resurrection, children of a Kingdom where there will no longer be the power of patriarchy. Then, to close his argument, Jesus referenced one of the most foundational stories of the Torah, Moses’ encounter with God at the burning bush. Quoting Exodus 3:6, Jesus noted that God Almighty “is” the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God’s relationship with those patriarchs is living and eternal. Indeed, although we are mortal, we find eternal life in our infinite God. It was a microphone-drop-moment. The Sadducees left, bested on their home field. The questions stopped, but the plot to end Jesus’ life found new urgency.

The clash with the Sadducees might have gone undocumented if God hadn’t added a big exclamation point to Jesus’ argument. On Friday of that week, Jesus was arrested by the Temple guards—those minions of the Sadducees. The Chief Priests Annas and Caiaphas, both Sadducees, argued before the Sanhedrin that Jesus was a heretic, and it would be better for one man to die—putting an end to the Messianic rising that followed him—than for the nation to endure the wrath of Rome that was surely coming. We all know what happened next: torture, humiliation, the agony of the cross, and death. On Friday, it felt like the Sadducees had won the argument, after all. But on Sunday, there was a second microphone-drop-moment. God had the last word. God’s resurrection overcame the sin and death of this world. Jesus rose. Because he lives, we trust that we, too, shall live. Thanks be to God.

In light of that Easter morning resurrection miracle, today’s arcane reading from scripture finds deep meaning and powerful relevance for today’s world. It begins with the hope that we find in the resurrection. We choose to love and live in God. And there is nothing in this world that can separate us from the love of God that was made known to us in Jesus. Because God chose to send a son into the world to live and die and rise, we can trust that we are children of the resurrection. Because Jesus lives, we also shall live in that resurrection realm, the Kingdom to come.

Jesus also helps us to see that the Kingdom to come is good news for anyone who has ever been left out, made to feel “less than,” or suffered because of who they are. The sinful practices and oppressive traditions of this world will come to an end and have no place in God’s plans for our future. In the resurrection, there is no place for patriarchy. In the resurrection, there is no place for gender oppression. In the resurrection, there is no place for racial hate. In the resurrection, there is no fear of the foreigner. In the resurrection, there is no poverty or injustice. In the resurrection world to come, we will all be precious, beloved, children of the resurrection. And we will rejoice!

If we accept the promise of the resurrection and the vision that Jesus cast for the Kingdom to come, then today’s reading becomes a call to action. It’s a call to stand against the forces of this world that control, mock, and delight in the suffering of others. It’s a call to live in ways that begin to shape communities that feel like an anticipation of that coming Kingdom. We have hope. We love without limits. We seek justice. We serve our at-risk neighbors.  We follow in the footsteps of the risen Lord.

In 1971, Gloria and Bill Gaither wrote one of the most treasured gospel hymns, “Because He Lives.” The Gaithers were going through tough times. They had left their jobs as public school teachers to become music ministers. But Bill had been sick and depressed. Gloria was expecting their third child. The Vietnam War was underway. Assassination had taken the lives of Martin Luther King and Robert F. Kennedy. Drug abuse was on the rise. Racial injustice persisted. Riots had devastated vulnerable inner-city communities. The world felt chaotic. Gloria Gaither says that she struggled with bringing a third child into a world that felt far from God’s Kingdom. On New Years Eve in the darkness and quiet of their living room, Gloria suddenly felt released from it all as she sensed the reassuring presence of the risen Lord. Fear left. Joy returned. Gloria knew she could have that baby and face the future with trust because Jesus lives, and God can conquer the chaos that touches our days. In response, Gloria wrote the words of what would become the Gospel Song of the Year for 1974.

“Because He lives, I can face tomorrow,

Because He lives, all fear is gone;

Because I know, He holds the future.

And life is worth the living just

Because He lives.”

Gloria’s words and the promise of the resurrection still minister to people everywhere. Live in hope, my friends. Because he lives, we too shall live.

Resources:

David Lose. “Commentary on Luke 20:27-38” in Preaching This Week, Nov. 7, 2010. Accessed online at Commentary on Luke 20:27-38 – Working Preacher from Luther Seminary

Kendra A. Mohn. “Commentary on Luke 20:27-38” in Preaching This Week, Nov. 9, 2025. Accessed online at Commentary on Luke 20:27-38 – Working Preacher from Luther Seminary

Richard Swanson. “Commentary on Luke 20:27-38” in Preaching This Week, Nov. 10, 2013. Accessed online at Commentary on Luke 20:27-38 – Working Preacher from Luther Seminary

Nancy Lynne Westfield. “Pastoral Perspective on Luke 20:27-38” in Feasting on the Word, Year C, vol. 4. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2020.

Patrick J. Wilson. “Homiletical Perspective on Luke 20:27-38” in Feasting on the Word, Year C, vol. 4. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2020.

C. Michael Hawn. “History of Hymns: ‘Because He Lives.’” Discipleship Ministries, The United Methodist Church, June 20, 2013. Accessed online at Discipleship Ministries | History of Hymns: “Because He Lives”

Bill and Gloria Gaither. “Because He Lives.” Bing Videos

The opening joke about the resurrection is from Upjoke: Jokes for Every Topic. ↑UPJOKE↑ – Jokes For Every Topic

Luke 20:27-38

27 Some Sadducees, those who say there is no resurrection, came to him 28 and asked him a question: “Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies leaving a wife but no children, the man shall marry the widow and raise up children for his brother. 29 Now there were seven brothers; the first married a woman and died childless; 30 then the second 31 and the third married her, and so in the same way all seven died childless. 32 Finally the woman also died. 33 In the resurrection, therefore, whose wife will the woman be? For the seven had married her.”

34 Jesus said to them, “Those who belong to this age marry and are given in marriage, 35 but those who are considered worthy of a place in that age and in the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage. 36 Indeed, they cannot die anymore, because they are like angels and are children of God, being children of the resurrection. 37 And the fact that the dead are raised Moses himself showed, in the story about the bush, where he speaks of the Lord as the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. 38 Now he is God not of the dead but of the living, for to him all of them are alive.”

Image source: https://medium.com/@kipakcho/jesus-examined-29691938b718

Meeting the Gardener

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Sabbath Day Thoughts — “Meeting the Gardener” John 20:1-18

The world is filled with weeping places this morning. In northern Nigeria, vulnerable people are hungry. They live with lingering violence of the terrorist organization Boko Haram, which has made international headlines for abductions, murders, and other criminal activity. They’ve been hit by natural and manmade disasters, too. Flooding has caused crops to fail. Corruption and poor governance exploit the poor, serve the rich, and sell justice to the highest bidder. According to Nigerian Peacemaker Peter Egwudah, life in northern Nigeria is a long-running struggle with food insecurity. Hardest hit are women, children, the elderly, and those with disabilities.

The world is filled with weeping places this morning. The family of Kilmar Abrego Garcia is weeping. Kilmar came to the United States illegally from El Salvador in 2011, sent north by his family to escape gang violence there. Here, he has worked construction, married Jennifer Vasquez Sura­—a US citizen, and supported his family. His five-year-old child has autism, is deaf in one ear, and cannot communicate verbally. Kilmar was mistakenly accused of being an MS-13 gang member by a paid informant, who had never met him or even been in the same state. Last month, he was deported to the Terrorism Confinement Center in Tecoluca, El Salvador. Although the courts have called for his release and return, the Abrego Garcia family waits and weeps, unsure if they will ever see their husband and father again.

The world is filled with weeping places this morning. We know those who weep: the neighbor who struggles with a bleak diagnosis, the friend who has lost a job, the parent who laments the untimely death of a child, the family member who wrestles with addiction, the person on a fixed income whose retirement savings have been hard hit by volatile markets. We know those who weep; sometimes we are the ones who weep.

It is hard to see the Lord when we are in our weeping places. Just ask Mary Magdalene. Mary walked to the tomb in the pre-dawn darkness. Her footsteps echoed through the streets of the sleeping city. Her heart was heavy with memories of recent days. A week ago, Jesus had made a triumphal entry to Jerusalem, but things had gone terribly and unthinkably wrong. Powerful opponents had conspired to bring about his arrest through the betrayal of a trusted friend. Injustice had been served by both the Temple court and Pontius Pilate. On Friday, Mary’s world had descended into violence and chaos as her teacher was brutally beaten and scourged, taunted with insults and mockery, reviled in hate, and crucified. Mary wept at the tomb, thinking that the world’s evil had outmatched God’s goodness, and now her Lord was nowhere to be found. Mary wept.

It is hard to see the Lord when we are in our weeping places. When the doctor breaks the bad news or the boss hands us the pink slip, we wonder “Why me, God?” When we are bowed down with grief and cannot see tomorrow, we ask, “Why this, Lord?” When addiction controls our lives and wreaks havoc within our families we ask, “Where are you, God?” When we are gripped by fear and worried about the future, we lament “Lord, why would you let this happen?” In our weeping places, we feel powerless and overwhelmed. In our weeping places, we fear that God is distant and we are alone.

As she raised her voice in lamentation outside the empty tomb, Mary learned that Christ was with her in her weeping place. Eyes blurred by tears and ears closed with grief, Mary first mistook Jesus for the gardener, come to clean up any mess left behind by Friday’s hasty burial. But then her tears came to an end as she heard her name, “Mary,” spoken by that most beloved of voices.

On Easter morning, we remember Mary’s tears, and we proclaim again the beautiful, terrible truth of the incarnation and the cross. God loved us so much that God would become flesh and live among us with mercy, healing, and infinite compassion. God’s love would stop at nothing to be reconciled to us and to reconcile us to one another—willing even suffering death upon a cross. But God’s love wins the victory over sin and death. God shows up in our weeping places with our name upon God’s lips and a purpose for our lives.

On Easter morning, we can face our tears head on, because we see that we are not alone. When the test results arrive and the doctor shakes her head, the risen Lord is with us. When the pink slip is in and the job possibilities are out, the risen Christ is with us. When untimely loss sends us into the valley of the shadow of death, we are not alone for God is with us. When we feel brought low by addiction or hardship, economic chaos or uncertain times, we trust that Jesus is in our midst with a love that is stronger than all the tears our world can serve up.

Bible scholars like to call our attention to the placement of Jesus’ tomb within a garden. They say it recalls God’s amazing work of creation, described in the first chapters of Genesis. They say that in breaking the power of sin and death upon the cross, God made a new creation. The separation between humanity and God came to an end, our alienation from one another is over. As new creations, we can go forth in holy, healed, and unexpected ways. It was true for Mary Magdalene. There in the garden, outside the empty tomb, Jesus the gardener gave Mary a new vocation. She became an evangelist. He sent her forth to a weeping world with a message of resurrection hope, “I have seen the Lord.”

On this Easter Sunday, may we, too, know that we are a new creation. May we, like Mary, see that we have a new vocation. We are sent into the world with the hopeful message that we have seen the Lord. Yes, the world abounds with weeping places, and yet God’s love is stronger than our tears, stronger than the hurt and harm that cause our eyes to fill and our hearts to tremble. As we go forth into the world’s weeping places, we point to the presence of Jesus, who continues to walk among the hurting and broken people of our world who fear they are alone.

Today, we will share the good news of Christ’s presence with the vulnerable people of northern Nigeria through One Great Hour of Sharing. Since 2017, our contributions have supported the work of the Civil Society Coalition for Poverty Eradication (CISCOPE). CISCOPE is at work in northern Nigeria, Sudan, Somalia, and Yemen, places where 20% families experience a severe lack of food. Beyond meeting emergency needs, CISCOPE helps families to find long-range food sufficiency through vegetable seed, agricultural machinery, teaching farming practices, and training for disaster preparedness. 70% of those helped by CISCOPE are women, children, and vulnerable people who have traditionally been ignored.

How do we bear witness to Jesus for families like that of Kilmar Abrego Garcia? It’s challenging in this highly-politicized partisan climate, where one faction characterizes Kilmar as a violent criminal while the other side champions him as a local hero. We can begin by remembering that there are families at the heart of the immigration crisis. Kilmar is the public face of an international tragedy in a world where violence, disaster, and extreme poverty have forced people from homes in places like Central America, Africa, Syria, Afghanistan, and Haiti. They flee in search of safety and opportunity. They come to lands that welcome their undocumented, underpaid labor but prefer that they remain strangers to us, subsisting in the shadows on the scraps of the land of plenty. For Kilmar and those like him around the world, we remember that Jesus, too, was a migrant. We point to the infant messiah, whose parents were forced by threat of political violence to flee their homeland and sojourn in the land of Egypt. What might our policies and actions look like, if we envisioned the infant Jesus caught in the crossfire?

What does pointing to the presence of Jesus look like for the hurting people whom we know, those who fear and mourn, despair and weep? We can begin by going to the tomb, showing up and being present for folks who weep with shared tears and abounding compassion. When the time is right, we can try, like Mary, to share how we have “seen the Lord” in our own times of hardship, loss, and pain. We can bear witness to our hurting friends and neighbors with more than words: with hot meals, honey-dos, and practical support; with abounding prayer, phone calls, and cards; with generous encouragement and lots of listening.

On Easter morning, the world is filled with weeping places, my friends, but it is also filled with the presence of Christ. The Lord has risen; he has risen indeed. We have seen the Lord. Let us go forth to those who weep with the good news of God’s amazing love.

Resources

Ben Finley. “Who is Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the man ICE mistakenly deported to an El Salvador prison?” in The Associated Press, April 18, 2025.

Rich Copley. “How your One Great Hour of Sharing gifts are used” in Presbyterian News Service, April 6, 2022. Accessed online at https://pcusa.org/news-storytelling/news/2022/4/6/how-your-one-great-hour-sharing-gifts-are-used

Joy J. Moore. “Commentary on John 20:1-18” in Preaching This Week, April 21, 2019. Accessed online at https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/resurrection-of-our-lord-3/commentary-on-john-201-18-10

Alicia D. Myers. “Commentary on John 20:1-18” in Preaching This Week, April 12, 2020. Accessed online at https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/resurrection-of-our-lord/commentary-on-john-201-18-11

Jason Ripley. “Commentary on John 20:1-18” in Preaching This Week, April 20, 2025. Accessed online at https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/resurrection-of-our-lord-3/commentary-on-john-201-18-19

Rolf Jacobson. “For Such a Time as This” in Dear Working Preacher, April 5, 2020. Accessed online at https://www.workingpreacher.org/dear-working-preacher/for-a-time-such-as-this

Paul Simpson Duke. “Homiletical Perspective on John 20:11-18” in Feasting on the Gospels, John, vol. 2. Westminster John Knox Press, 2015.

John 20:1-18

20 Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the tomb. 2 So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.” 3 Then Peter and the other disciple set out and went toward the tomb. 4 The two were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. 5 He bent down to look in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he did not go in. 6 Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen wrappings lying there, 7 and the cloth that had been on Jesus’s head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself. 8 Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed, 9 for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead. 10 Then the disciples returned to their homes. 11 But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. As she wept, she bent over to look[a] into the tomb, 12 and she saw two angels in white sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet. 13 They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” 14 When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus. 15 Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir,[b] if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” 16 Jesus said to her, “Mary!” She turned and said to him in Hebrew,[c] “Rabbouni!” (which means Teacher). 17 Jesus said to her, “Do not touch me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’ ” 18 Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord,” and she told them that he had said these things to her.

Start Where You Are At

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Sabbath Day Thoughts — “Start Where You Are At” Luke 24:36b-48

Krista comes to church on Sunday mornings feeling worn out. She works full-time. She and her husband are raising three very busy school-age children. Last year, Krista’s Mom died unexpectedly. Krista has been helping her father prepare to sell their family home. Krista is constantly on the move. Working, grocery shopping, cooking, and taxying children to extra-curricular activities. Cleaning out the attic at her Dad’s place, running a yard sale, and making many runs to the dump. She misses her Mom.

Charlie comes to church on Sunday mornings feeling stressed out. It’s his only day off from a job that gets bigger every year. So many people depend upon him. His boss expects him to work miracles of productivity and profit, even when he is desperately short-staffed. His colleagues count on him to cast the vision and manage the team. With a big mortgage and kids soon headed to college, his family needs the substantial paycheck. At some point, a job that once felt interesting and fulfilling began to feel like a recipe for burnout, and there doesn’t seem to be much that he can do about it.

Rita and Nate come to church on Sunday morning feeling worried and afraid. Retired now, they are committed to a legion of community concerns: volunteering at the soup kitchen, caring for pets at the animal shelter, helping out for Winter Carnival, and more. Being retired, they spend a LOT of time together, more than ever before in the course of their long marriage. Between annoying habits and differing opinions, it isn’t always easy. Now, one of them has a health crisis. They are on a long journey through the scary, inhospitable realm of healthcare. It feels overwhelming.

Luke tells us how the disciples felt on Easter evening: filled with fear and doubt. They had made a Passover journey to Jerusalem with their friend and rabbi Jesus, whom they believed to be the Messiah. They entered the city feeling hopeful, triumphant even. Yet, their week had taken a foreboding and sinister turn. Tension mounted, day by day.  Powerful opponents waited in the Temple courts to challenge Jesus’ authority, seeking to entrap and discredit him. When they could not best Jesus with deceitful words, they put a price on his head. For thirty pieces of silver, one of them had betrayed him. A kiss sent Jesus to the cross while everyone ran for their lives, all love and loyalty forgotten. Beyond fear and doubt, Jesus’ friends were filled with despair, grief, and the bitter self-recrimination that comes when we know that we have failed those whom we love most.

They were ready to give up and go home, slipping out of the city in anonymous pairs as soon as the time was right. But Easter morning brought confusion and anxiety. Some of the women returned from the gravesite, telling a curious tale of an empty tomb and heavenly messengers. “He is risen!” cried Mary Magdalene, trying to shake them from the stupor of grief, but they could not listen and did not believe. Later, Cleopas and his companion returned with an equally implausible story of Jesus on the road, opening the scriptures to them and sharing an evening meal. In our reading from Luke’s gospel, the disciples had their own terrifying encounter with the risen Lord. Despite the locked door and the secrecy of their location, Jesus found them and stood among them with the greeting of peace.

When Lucy Lind Hogan, who taught at Wesley Seminary in Washington for many years, teaches about today’s scripture reading, she likes to use five “e” words: encounter, explanation, eating, enlightenment, and exit. It begins with encounter, that sudden appearance and shocking greeting of peace in the upper room. Then there is an explanation: visible wounds are shown and touched to assuage fear and doubt. Next comes the eating; after all, Jesus loved to break bread with all kinds of people, even fearful, failed disciples. As Jesus patiently used the Hebrew scripture to reveal that his suffering, death, and resurrection were all part of God’s plan for the Messiah and the salvation of the world, the disciples found enlightenment. Their minds were opened and they understood. Lastly, Jesus vanished, making an exit, but not before giving his friends a mission that would bring meaning and purpose to their lives.

When we come to church on Sunday mornings, our experience is a lot like the disciples on that first Easter evening. We come filled with a weight of experience and feeling. Like Krista, we may be worn-out, stretched thin, and grieved. Like Charlie, we may be stressed-out, over-worked, and under-supported. Like Rita and Nate, we may feel worried and afraid, ill-equipped to face the crises that come, especially as we age. Take a look around. There’s a lot going on inside us on Sunday mornings. We come to church hoping for whatever it may be that we need to send us back out there into a new week.

Somehow on Sunday mornings at church, we find those five “e’s” of Easter evening. We encounter Jesus. He’s here in the smiles, handshakes, and hugs of those who worship alongside us. We feel his mercy and grace as we confess our sins and know that we are forgiven. Through scripture read, the word proclaimed, and the sharing or prayers, we find our explanation and grow in understanding. At least once a month, we eat with Jesus, breaking the bread and lifting the cup that are his body and blood for us. As worship ends, we go forth enlightened. Even though we arrive feeling worn-out, burned-out, or down and out, we trust that we are loved and we are not alone. As we make our exit, the risen Christ walks with us into a new week, and we find what is needed to begin again. Thanks be to God.

Jesus hoped that his friends would go forth from Easter evening with the willingness to do for others what he had done for them. There was a world of people out there who needed his mission, and the Lord trusted that the men and women who followed him would go forth in his purpose. There were outsiders who needed to be welcomed and children who could use a blessing. There were sick people longing for healing. There were sinners who dreamed of forgiveness, and everywhere so many people needed to know that God loved and accepted them in all their frailty. The disciples could handle that mission. They could simply start where they were at, right there in Jerusalem, extending to one another the mercy that Jesus had extended to them and trusting that Jesus would be known through their witness.

Perhaps we can follow in the footsteps of the disciples this morning. Redeemed and renewed by the risen Lord, we can start where we are at, simply carrying the love, grace, and peace that we find on Sunday mornings out there, to a world that is worn-out, stressed-out, and down and out. For us, taking the love of Christ and the good news of repentance and forgiveness to all nations might look like sharing the faith with Bible stories for our children and grandchildren or inviting a neighbor to come to church.  We can tell the story with more than words. We can share it with helping hands and caring thoughts, inviting someone who struggles to join us for a home-cooked meal or meet us for a cup of coffee.  We can sow the seeds of Christ’s love by choosing to love our hard to love neighbors with patience and compassion. We can bear witness that healing and forgiveness are always possible with God, when we dare to let go of old hurts and allow the past to be the past. We share the hope of new life and the life eternal as we help others begin again – whether that new beginning comes after divorce, or as a new career path is undertaken, or as the slow tide of grief that comes with loss ebbs and flows.  How will we start where we are at? How will we pursue Christ’s mission this week?

I trust that as we go forth in Jesus’s purpose, the world will begin to feel a little less burned-out, stressed-out, down and out — and so will we. People like Krista, who are stretched thin and weighed down by grief, will find helping hands and solace for sadness. People like Charlie, caught in big workplace commitments, will find conversation partners who listen, encourage, and help them to set healthier boundaries. Friends who are struggling, like Rita and Nate, will find caring presence, good advice, and timely help with healthcare and counseling resources. As we pray alongside others and remind them that God is powerful when we are not, we can trust that Christ’s mission continues. The world will know those five “e’s” of Easter evening and experience the blessing we find on Sunday mornings. May it be so.

Resources

Michael Joseph Brown. “Commentary on Luke 24:36b-48” in Preaching This Week, April 14, 2024. Accessed online at Commentary on Luke 24:36b-48 – Working Preacher from Luther Seminary

Lucy Lind Hogan. “Commentary on Luke 24:36b-48” in Preaching This Week, April 22, 2012. Accessed online at Commentary on Luke 24:36b-48 – Working Preacher from Luther Seminary

Jacob Myers. “Commentary on Luke 24:36b-48” in Preaching This Week, April 19, 2015. Accessed online at Commentary on Luke 24:36b-48 – Working Preacher from Luther Seminary

Luke 24:36b-48

36While they were talking about this, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you.” 37They were startled and terrified, and thought that they were seeing a ghost. 38He said to them, “Why are you frightened, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? 39Look at my hands and my feet; see that it is I myself. Touch me and see; for a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.” 40And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. 41While in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering, he said to them, “Have you anything here to eat?” 42They gave him a piece of broiled fish, 43and he took it and ate in their presence. 44Then he said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you—that everything written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms must be fulfilled.” 45Then he opened their minds to understand the scriptures, 46and he said to them, “Thus it is written, that the Messiah is to suffer and to rise from the dead on the third day, 47and that repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. 48You are witnesses of these things.

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Rise Up!

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Sabbath Day Thoughts — “Rise Up!” Mark 16:1-8

In three weeks, when we traditionally celebrate Good Shepherd Sunday, our cousins in the Orthodox tradition will commemorate the Sunday of Myrrh-bearing Women. They have been doing so since the fifth century when John Chrysostom, the Bishop of Constantinople, first honored those women who went to the tomb, armed with burial spices and anointing oil. In Orthodox churches on the Sunday of Myrrh-bearing Women, censers will be filled with smoking incense, and the priest will swing them with a practiced arm, venerating all four sides of the altar, the congregation, the bread and wine of communion, and the church itself. Prayers will remember the faithful witness of the women. The sermon may even make the connection between the myrrh-bearers and the long history of women who have served the church. The hymn of the day will be introduced with the words, “The women disciples bring myrrh unto Christ. And I bring a hymn as [if] it were myrrh unto them.”

Our Orthodox cousins also remember the myrrh-bearing women with a long tradition of iconography, sacred art that is used as an invitation to prayer and reflection. Perhaps you have seen the icons. Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome are depicted at the tomb. The holy messenger in dazzling white points to the empty graveclothes, proclaiming that Jesus has risen. The women, with heads covered and flowing robes, carry ceramic flasks of oil. Their faces are wide-eyed with fear and lined with tears. One of the women is often painted with her back to the angel, as if poised to run. She looks back over her shoulder, torn between learning what has happened to Jesus and succumbing to holy terror.

After the sabbath, when the myrrh-bearers rose early, purchased spices, and walked to the tomb, they were well-acquainted with death. In first-century Israel, tending the dead was women’s work. It fell to women to prepare bodies for the grave: washing, anointing with oil, and wrapping in a simple linen shroud. For three days, women accompanied the body, walking to the tomb each morning, singing psalms, and sharing tears and cries of mourning. The myrrh-bearers had buried many people and tended many bodies: elderly parents, aged husbands, dear friends, solitary neighbors, and in a world where only one in five children lived to adulthood, they had buried children, many children.

Jesus warned the disciples that death waited in the Holy City. But the week before the women had rejoiced and danced into Jerusalem. Filled with hope, they sang and played their drums, waved palm branches and rejoiced to be in the company of the Messiah. That week the city turned hostile, even murderous.  On the night of the Passover, the women saw Jesus betrayed, abandoned, and led off like a lamb to the slaughter. On Friday, the women followed their bloody, broken Lord as he stumbled beneath the terrible burden of the cross. From a distance, they watched while soldiers gambled and the mob taunted and mocked. As the sun failed and darkness covered the land, they saw Jesus surrender his spirit. As the day grew late and the sabbath neared, two of the women followed Joseph of Arimathea.  They watched him claim the body, wrap it in linen, and hastily stow it in a rock-hewn tomb. All through the Sabbath, the women sat with their grief and loss. They weren’t sure who they were anymore, what their purpose was, or how they could go on. But as the rosy promise of a new week crept above the eastern horizon, they found the courage to do what women always did when a beloved one died. They purchased their burial spices and anointing oil and walked to the tomb.

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We are not myrrh-bearers in the traditional sense of the word. We leave it to the mortuary or the crematorium to tend to the bodies of our dead. Yet we are not strangers to death. We know what it is like to walk to the tomb, to face squarely our loss and pain, our disbelief and defeat. We know the untimely death of our beloved ones. We know the death of our endeavors: the marriage that flounders and fails; the business that goes under; the degree we never finish. We know the death of friendships and kinships: the forgiveness we never extend, the trust that is betrayed, the selfish interest that drives home the killing wedge. We know death writ large upon the world stage: our planet groaning beneath the burden of our abuse, the blood of Palestinians and Israelis crying from the ground of a broken land, the lament of refugees longing for welcome and home. In the dark hours before dawn, we know how the myrrh-bearers felt. We know the unbearable grief. We may even wonder who we are, what our purpose is, or how we can go on.

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When the women arrived at the tomb, the stone was rolled back. They hesitated in fear outside, each too frightened to go in alone, and so they decide to venture in together, a fearful little band bound by their love for Jesus and their common duty as myrrh-bearers. Mary Magdalene, Mary the Mother of James, and Salome entered the tomb, anticipating death. But there in the cold stone crypt, still smelling of blood and suffering, the women were shocked to find life. A holy messenger shared the good news that God could take all the evil of their world and work from it a miracle of life.

In the hours before dawn, as the earth rolled on to meet the morning and the last stars faded from the western sky, Jesus rose. He stretched and stood, testing his bruised body.  He stepped out of the tomb and into the garden, breathing deep the cool of the dying night. God’s amazing love had broken the power of sin and death. 

Mary Magdalene whispered, “Jesus is alive,”

Mary the mother of James gasped, “Jesus has been raised, just as he promised.”

Salome dared to hope, “Jesus has gone ahead to Galilee. We’ll see him there.”

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On Easter morning, we dare to imagine that if God can raise Jesus from dead, then surely there is hope for us and all the ways that we are well-acquainted with death. We can trust that, just as God was at work to overcome the world’s sin and hate to raise Jesus, God is at work even now to help and to heal, to raise up the promise of new life.

Yes, we know the grief that comes with the death of our beloved ones, but we also trust that we are raised with Christ. The promise of the life everlasting and the heavenly shore awaits. Rise up!

Yes, we are well-acquainted with failure, but God is faithful and a new day dawns. One day we may love again, or find fresh purpose, or hear the knock of opportunity. Rise up!

Yes, we know the death of friendship and kinship, but if God can win the victory over sin, then maybe with the Lord’s assistance we can pick up the phone or write that letter or ask for help. Rise up!

Yes, we know global death and destruction, but if Jesus is raised, then maybe there is hope for our world yet. We can learn to tread lightly on God’s good earth. Peace can break out in the midst of war. The homeless poor can find home at last. Rise up!

We are well-acquainted with death, but on Easter morning, we join the myrrh-bearers, with great hope and holy fear, for with God the last word is always life.

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Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome came to the tomb in the traditional women’s role of myrrh-bearer; yet, they soon had a new vocation. Commissioned by God to be the first gospel-bearers, they rose up. They dropped their flasks of oil, lifted their skirts, and fled back into Jerusalem. Somewhere along the way, they overcame their fear and found their voices. They shared their good news with Peter and the disciples, saying, “Death does not have the last word. God has won the victory! Jesus is risen!”

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I suspect that our cousins in the Orthodox tradition are right. Those myrrh-bearers are worthy of our gratitude and remembrance on at least one Sunday a year. They may even have something to teach us. If three women can overcome their fear to rise up and launch a tidal wave of hope and love that laps the shores of today, then think what we can do. We may be well-acquainted with death, but oh the life, sweet life! Let’s trade our myrrh for the gospel, my friends. There is good news to share. Rise up!

Resources

C. Clifton Black. “Commentary on Mark 16:1-8,” in Preaching This Week (Narrative Lectionary), March 27, 2016. Accessed online at Commentary on Mark 16:1-8 – Working Preacher from Luther Seminary

Greek Orthodox Diocese of America. “Learn: Sunday of The Myrrhbearers.” Accessed online at https://www.goarch.org/myrrhbearers-learn

Kaufman Kohler. “Burial” in Jewish Encyclopedia. Accessed online at https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/3842-burial#anchor6.

Nelson Rivera. “Theological Perspective on Mark 16:1-8” in Feasting on the Gospels: Mark. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2014.

John Sanidopolous. “Sunday of the Myrrhbearers Resource Page,” Orthodox Christianity: Then and Now, April 30, 2017. Accessed online at https://www.johnsanidopoulos.com/2017/04/sunday-of-myrrhbearing-women-resource.html

Oliver Yarbrough. “Homiletical Perspective on Mark 16:1-8” in Feasting on the Gospels: Mark. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2014.

Mark 16:1-8

16When the sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint him. 2And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb. 3They had been saying to one another, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?” 4When they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had already been rolled back. 5As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man, dressed in a white robe, sitting on the right side; and they were alarmed. 6But 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. 7But 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.” 8So 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.

“The Holy Myrrh-bearers.” Accessed online at https://www.allsaintstoronto.ca/services-events/soo-gdthh-2ptfc-lng35-c8gjx-xaf3p

The End Is the Beginning

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Sabbath Day Thoughts — “The End Is the Beginning” Mark 13:1-8, 24-37

Sometimes the end is the beginning.

Glenn was a young boy when he was terribly injured by a fire at school. Doctors warned his parents that Glenn would likely die, and even if he did survive, the burns to his lower body were so significant that he would be severely handicapped. When he was eventually discharged from the hospital, Glenn had no motor function in his lower body. He was confined to a wheelchair, his thin legs unable to walk.

Kris was a successful thirty-one-year-old actress and photographer, with a growing portfolio of film, advertising, and stage acting credits. She was living her dream when she woke up feeling like she had been hit by a truck. The doctor thought she was having gallbladder trouble—too much rich food and good wine, but tests said otherwise. On Valentine’s Day 2003, Kris was diagnosed with a rare, incurable sarcoma, stage four cancer that was attacking her liver and lungs.

Edward grew up loving the outdoors. His earliest memories were of hiking, rock climbing, and sailing with his father, who was an avid adventurer. By the time he was a teenager, Edward had learned to sky dive and earned a blackbelt in Shotokan karate. After college, he climbed big mountains in Nepal, before enlisting in the military as a paratrooper. In 1996, while on a training mission in Kenya, Edward’s parachute failed to fully open. He survived the fall by landing on the pack on his back, but three vertebrae were crushed by the impact, ending his career as a paratrooper.

Jesus knew his ministry was coming to an end. It was his final week in Jerusalem. The critics attacked him daily, seeking to discredit his teaching. The Romans, always concerned by the threat of insurrection at Passover, were looking for an excuse to set a public example of what happens to dissidents. The chief priests and scribes were plotting Jesus’ arrest and execution. Before the week was out, Jesus would be dead. His followers would scatter, mourning their dashed dreams and failed hopes.

The words that Jesus spoke in today’s lesson from Mark have long been called the little apocalypse. Those frightening images of war, earthquake, famine, the sun going dark, the stars falling from the sky, sound like the end of the world. They sound like the inner chaos and the outer tumult that would soon engulf Jesus’ friends. Their hopes and dreams and messianic expectations were coming to an end. But according to Jesus, God wasn’t finished with them yet. Amid the chaos, uncertainty, and fear, the Kingdom would come. The Son of Man drew near. Indeed, the fearful events of the coming days would be but the birth pangs of a new creation.

We’ve all had times when we felt we were at the end. A marriage begun with the greatest of love grows cold, distant, and dissolves in divorce. The workplace that brought us professional fulfillment and put food on the table hands us a pink slip. Our kid makes some bad choices and winds up alienated from us and in a world of trouble. The doctor gives us that difficult diagnosis, the one that makes our heart skip a beat. No one escapes those unexpected and unwanted “ends” that leave us mourning our dashed dreams and failed expectations. When we are at the end, it is hard to have hope for tomorrow. It’s hard to know what to do. With our plans for the future on permanent hold, we cannot return to the way things used to be, and we cannot imagine how we might move ahead.

Jesus knew that his followers would need words of encouragement to guide them through the days to come when his arrest and crucifixion would feel like the worst end imaginable to their beautiful dream of discipleship. So, he told them the parable of a man going on a journey, who left his slaves in charge of the household. Not knowing the date or time of their master’s homecoming, the servants were called to live with vigilance, as if their master were returning tomorrow. In the years to come, the disciples would need to keep hope alive by working together, encouraging and supporting one another, trusting that although the beautiful dream of Jesus’ earthly ministry had come to an end, God was up to something new and they could be a part of it, showing up each day and doing what was expected of them.

Fred Rogers was notorious for saving quips and quotes that he found inspiring. His wife Joanne said that he clipped them out of newspapers or magazines or copied them from books and kept them in his wallet, next to his neatly folded bills, or in the pages of his planner. After Fred’s death, Joanne and his friends at their production company Family Communications Incorporated were asked to compile a volume of their favorite quotes from Fred, the words that had made them sit up and pay attention or that had struck a chord with Fred’s viewers on “Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood.” The resulting book, The World According to Mr. Rogers, was an instant bestseller, filled with the sort of practical wisdom and kindness that Fred so embodied. One of my favorite quotes from Fred is “Often when you think you’re at the end of something, you’re at the beginning of something else. I’ve felt that many times. My hope for all of us is that the ‘miles we go before we sleep’ will be filled with all the feelings that come from deep caring—delight, sadness, joy, wisdom—and that in all the endings of our life, we will be able to see the new beginnings.” It reminds me of Jesus with his disciples on the Mount of Olives, knowing that his friends’ world was about to end, hoping that they would understand that God would make a new beginning.

The disciples did, indeed, learn that the end can be the beginning. On the far side of Good Friday, there was an Easter Sunday miracle. Jesus rose. He sent his friends forth into the world with the good news of a love that is stronger than death. Yes, life brings endings, but sometimes the end can be the beginning.

I want to circle back to the people I mentioned at the beginning of this message, people who experienced lifechanging, unwanted endings. Glenn, who was terribly injured by a fire at school, decided that he didn’t want to live his life in a wheelchair. One day, left alone in the yard, he overturned his chair, dragged himself over to the fence, pulled himself up, and tried to walk. He did this every day, slowly regaining the ability to stand and walk haltingly. He began to walk to school and eventually to run. He went to college and made the track team. In February 1934, in Madison Square Garden, Glenn Cunningham ran the world’s fastest mile.

Kris Carr, who received that frightening cancer diagnosis, decided that even if her disease was incurable, she would learn to live with it to the best of her ability. She read up on the power of healthy nutrition, exercise, a good support network, clean living, meditation and prayer to help in treating cancer. In fact, she became an expert in the lifestyle that physicians now understand is essential in fighting cancer. Kris decided to share that learning with others. She has written nine NY Times bestselling books and been the subject of the documentary “Crazy Sexy Cancer.” Kris says that her most treasured accomplishment is being able to help people take back their health and feel more empowered. Two decades after her diagnosis, Kris is still going strong.

Edward, who crushed three vertebrae in a parachuting accident, spent eighteen months in intensive rehabilitation.  He recovered and went on to become one of the youngest climbers ever to reach the summit of Mount Everest. Better known by his family knick-name “Bear,” he went on to star in seven seasons of the Discovery Channel’s series “Man vs. Wild,” which became one of the most-watched shows on the planet, reaching an estimated 1.2 billion viewers. Bear Grylls describes his Christian faith as the “backbone” of his life, saying, “You can’t keep God out. He’s all around us, if we’re just still enough to listen.”

Just as the disciples—and Glenn, Kris, and Bear—learned, I trust that we, too, will see that our ends just may be beginnings. On the far side of our loss and chaos, on the far side of our dashed dreams and withered hopes, new life stirs. It may not be easy. It may feel slow in coming. But even now God is at work. God is always up to something new, and we can be a part of it. May it be so.

Resources

–. “He suffered severe leg burns as a kid but that didn’t stop Cunningham from winning an Olympic medal” in Scroll, June 15, 2020. Accessed online at https://scroll.in/field/964606/he-suffered-severe-leg-burns-as-a-kid-but-that-didnt-stop-cunningham-from-winning-an-olympic-medal

Glenn Cunningham, the child who was told would never walk again (youtube.com)

Kris Carr. “Celebrating a Decade Thriving with Cancer” in HuffPost, Feb. 21, 2013. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/living-with-cancer_b_2663548

https://kriscarr.com/about#

John Cole. “Pastoral Perspective on Mark 13:1-8” in Feasting on the Gospels: Mark. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2014.

Ira Brent Driggers. “Commentary on Mark 13:1-8, 24-37” in Preaching This Week (Narrative Lectionary), March 17, 2024. Accessed online at https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/narrative-lectionary/end-of-the-age-2/commentary-on-mark-131-8-24-37-3

Bear Grylls. Mud Sweat and Tears. London and New York: William Morrow, 2013.

About Bear Grylls

Fred Rogers. The World According to Mr. Rogers. New York: Hyperion, 2004.

Lisa Stein. “Living with Cancer: Kris Carr’s Story” in Scientific American, July 16, 2008. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/living-with-cancer-kris-carr/

Mark 13:1-8, 24-37

13As he came out of the temple, one of his disciples said to him, “Look, Teacher, what large stones and what large buildings!” 2Then Jesus asked him, “Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down.”

3When he was sitting on the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter, James, John, and Andrew asked him privately, 4“Tell us, when will this be, and what will be the sign that all these things are about to be accomplished?” 5Then Jesus began to say to them, “Beware that no one leads you astray. 6Many will come in my name and say, ‘I am he!’ and they will lead many astray. 7When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed; this must take place, but the end is still to come. 8For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; there will be earthquakes in various places; there will be famines. This is but the beginning of the birthpangs.

24“But in those days, after that suffering,

the sun will be darkened,and the moon will not give its light,
25and the stars will be falling from heaven,and the powers in the heavens will be shaken.

26Then they will see ‘the Son of Man coming in clouds’ with great power and glory. 27Then he will send out the angels, and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of heaven.

28“From the fig tree learn its lesson: as soon as its branch becomes tender and puts forth its leaves, you know that summer is near. 29So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that he is near, at the very gates. 30Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place. 31Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.

32“But about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. 33Beware, keep alert; for you do not know when the time will come. 34It is like a man going on a journey, when he leaves home and puts his slaves in charge, each with his work, and commands the doorkeeper to be on the watch. 35Therefore, keep awake—for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or at dawn, 36or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly. 37And what I say to you I say to all: Keep awake.”

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An Idle Tale

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Sabbath Day Thoughts — “An Idle Tale” Luke 24:1-12

I was warned when I first came to Saranac Lake that I should NOT expect a full church on Easter.  At the other three churches that I have served, Easter Sunday is a lot like Christmas Eve with people sitting shoulder-to-shoulder, belting out beloved hymns, and eagerly sharing “Alleluias!”  But Saranac Lake?  Not so much.  Snowbirds have flown south for the winter to stay until May for fear of the dreaded Easter-snow.  The two-week-long school break surrounds Easter, and families weary of winter and sick of mud season leave the North Country in stunning numbers to bask their alabaster flesh in the warm glow of Florida sun.  The past few years have been complicated by COVID, sending us online instead of into the pews to celebrate the resurrection.  On Easter Sunday, many of our friends are missing.

But this Easter, I’ve been thinking about those other people who are NOT in church—the unchurched.  They may be like Brittney, a twenty-something young adult raised in church who never made an adult connection to a local congregation in her new community.  On Easter morning, she is still in her jammies, reading a good book or facetiming with a college friend.  The unchurched may be like Tim and Cindy, once faithful attenders at a Catholic Church until the clergy sexual abuse scandal shattered their trust in the institutional church.  On Easter morning, they sleep in, read the New York Times, and have brunch.  The unchurched may be like Mitchell.  He has only been in church for weddings and funerals, occasions when he feels uncomfortable and out of place.  On Easter morning, he is up early to watch soccer on tv.  He wears the jersey of his favorite team, and from his man cave, his wife and children can hear the shouts of victory and the groans of defeat.  For people like Brittney, Tim and Cindy, and Mitchell, Easter sounds like an idle tale—fantastic, mysterious, and hard to believe.

The women on that first Easter morning were accused of telling an idle tale.  They traveled with Jesus from Galilee to Jerusalem for the Passover.  They hoped that Jesus was the Messiah, the Holy One of Israel.  Many of them had been helped and healed by his miraculous power.  But on Friday they witnessed their rabbi being beaten, abused, and crucified.  They heard his dying words.  They saw the blood and water pour from his side.  They watched while Joseph of Arimathea claimed the body, wrapped it in linen, and laid it in a newly cut tomb.  They retreated to the place where they were staying to prepare the spices and ointments.  They prayed and wept all through the sabbath day. Then, early in the deep dawn, when the sun was just a rosy hint lingering below the horizon, they gathered their precious oils and walked through the streets of the city to offer a final kindness to the man they loved, anointing his body for the grave.

At the tomb, the women expected death.  Afterall, they had seen it with their own eyes.  But something fantastic, mysterious, and hard to believe, awaited them.  The stone was rolled away. The body was gone. While they inspected the grave, bowed down with grief and confusion, holy messengers burst in upon them, reminding them of Jesus’ promise of resurrection and challenging them with the question “Why do you look for the one who lives among the dead?” 

Amid the women’s puzzlement and grief, a certainty began to glow like a spark rising from the ashes: Jesus is alive.  In the mixed joy and terror of that belief, they ran through the streets of the waking city and burst into the room where the disciples were still rubbing sleep from their eyes.  All of them began to speak their truth at once, voices rising and falling, alleluias ringing, tears flowing, “The Lord is risen!  He is risen indeed!”

Perhaps we can forgive the disciples for presuming that what the women had to say was an “idle tale,” stuff and nonsense, a fevered delirium.  After all, the men had just woken up.  And they lived in a world where what women had to say couldn’t be admitted as evidence in a court of law.  And according to Luke, there were a lot of women saying the same wild stuff: Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and all those other women who had loved Jesus, provided for him from their purses, and traveled with him throughout his ministry.  All that joy, excitement, and hope that flooded in upon the disciples’ grief and shame made no sense whatsoever.  So, the men failed to remember what Jesus had promised and they refused to believe.  They hushed the women and went back to their dark thoughts and bleak world.

Even if we think that the disciples were embarrassingly clueless on that first Easter morning, we get it.  We expect death.  We have buried our parents and our dear friends.  Sometimes on a day when the world turns black, we bury a child.  We know the death of relationships.  Marriages grow cold.  Friendships end in nonsensical arguments.  Neighbors disconnect over perceived slights or differences of political opinion.  We know the death of opportunity.  The promotion never comes.  The degree is never earned.  The pink slip arrives when we’re too old to start over.  We know death writ large on the world stage. Russia invades Ukraine. Our wild world fails with mass extinction. Hunger walks the land in Yemen, Sudan, and Afghanistan.  We expect death, preoccupied by our dark thoughts and bleak world.  On some days, we can be just as resistant as the disciples to the truth that the women spoke, all those years ago.

On Easter morning, an empty tomb, two holy messengers, and a group of faithful women dare to tell us that death does not have the final word. Don’t get me wrong.  Death is real.  Pain is fierce.  Loss can be overwhelming.  Some days, we are bowed down to the ground in grief.  Yet, God in a lonely tomb in the pre-dawn dark of Easter morning broke the power of sin and death. All the evil, grief, and sin of this world cannot keep Jesus down. Love wins the day.  Jesus rises.  The tomb is empty. God brings life out of death and reconciliation out of division.  New beginnings spring from impossible endings.   It is fantastic, mysterious, and on some days, hard to believe.  But that’s what God does. Alleluia!

That news is so good that it can be mistaken for an idle tale.  But the truth is proven in the living. When we join those women in saying “Yes!” to what God has done in Jesus, we find the possibility of new life.  We are changed, just as the women were changed.  We rise up with the courage to live with love and reconciliation in a broken and dying world.  We move beyond our grief.  We reach out a hand in forgiveness. We ask to be forgiven.  We make a fresh start.  We call for peace. We care for the planet.  We feed the hungry.  We become hope for the hopeless and food for the hungry of heart.  The world is waiting for an Easter transformation. That can only take shape if we dare to speak our truth to those who may dismiss us as bearers of idle tales.

So, let’s do it.  Let’s reach out to the Brittney’s we know, those twenty-somethings who haven’t been back to church since they left home. Let’s remind them of the love, connection, and encouragement that are such a special part of being a church family. 

Let’s reach out to friends like Tim and Cindy, alienated by the sexual misconduct of those who had been entrusted with their spiritual care.  Let’s remind them that God’s heart breaks along with theirs and there are other churches where the love of God is practiced sincerely in word and deed. 

Let’s reach out to the Mitchells of this world.  They may never feel comfortable coming to church, but they may see Jesus.  Every time we share the love of Christ with fresh produce for the Food Pantry, shallow wells for Africa, or a prayer shawl in a time of crisis, we bear a quiet and powerful witness to the transforming, unstoppable love of God and the truth of Easter.  Someday, people like Mitchell might even be a little like the disciple Peter.  They could turn off the Sunday morning sports and venture forth to see for themselves, to look at the evidence and be amazed, even if they aren’t yet willing to accept the truth.

We’ve got a tale to tell, my friends.  Some call it idle, but we know better.  What are we waiting for?  Next Easter, we might just have a few more people in the pews.  Alleluia!

Resources:

Lucy Lind Hogan. “Commentary on Luke 24:1-12” in Preaching This Week, April 17, 2022. Accessed online at https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/resurrection-of-our-lord-3/commentary-on-luke-241-12-9

Holly Hearon. “Commentary on Luke 24:1-12” in Preaching This Week, April 20, 2019. Accessed online at https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/resurrection-of-our-lord-3/commentary-on-luke-241-12-6

Michael Joseph Brown. “Commentary on Luke 24:1-12” in Preaching This Week, March 26, 2016. Accessed online at https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/vigil-of-easter-2/commentary-on-luke-241-12-4

Arland Hultgren. “Commentary on Luke 24:1-12” in Preaching This Week, March 31, 2013. Accessed online at https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/resurrection-of-our-lord-3/commentary-on-luke-241-12-3

Craig R. Koester. “Commentary on Luke 24:1-12” in Preaching This Week, April 4, 2010. Accessed online at https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/resurrection-of-our-lord-3/commentary-on-luke-241-12-2

Luke 24:1-12

But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they came to the tomb, taking the spices that they had prepared. 2 They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, 3 but when they went in, they did not find the body. 4 While they were perplexed about this, suddenly two men in dazzling clothes stood beside them. 5 The women were terrified and bowed their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen. 6 Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, 7 that the Son of Man must be handed over to sinners, and be crucified, and on the third day rise again.” 8 Then they remembered his words, 9 and returning from the tomb, they told all this to the eleven and to all the rest. 10 Now it was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other women with them who told this to the apostles. 11 But these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them. 12 But Peter got up and ran to the tomb; stooping and looking in, he saw the linen cloths by themselves; then he went home, amazed at what had happened.

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