Easter
Jn
20:1-18
4/1/18
I have to admit that I was a little
slow on this one. I kept seeing cars that
had an oval sticker with the number “13.1”.
Since we do live in southern Illinois, I initially thought it must be
some kind of Christian sticker. There
was no reference to a specific book of the Bible, but I wondered, “Is there
some verse in the Bible that is chapter thirteen verse one that should be so
obvious you don’t even need to provide the book?” For the life of me, I couldn’t think of one,
and it made me a little nervous because maybe I – a pastor – was failing in
Bible 101.
Eventually it did dawn on me that
13.1 is half of 26.2, the distance for a marathon. These stickers are declarations by people
that they run half marathons. Running is
tremendously popular these days, and in particular many people focus on running
marathons and half marathons. There are
numerous organized events of this kind and people travel some distance to take
part. People train hard, doing a lot of
mileage to be ready. It’s a big
undertaking, and so people are excited to have completed a race and they like
to share pictures on social media. In
fact, I have seen the joke that if a person runs in an event and doesn’t post a
picture … did it really happen?
Apart from a handful of individuals
who took part in athletic contests like the Olympics in Athens and the Isthmian
games in Corinth, nobody in the first century world ran. Daily life itself provided all the physical
exercise a person could want. The
majority of people worked in what involved physical, manual labor. When people went somewhere, it invariably meant
walking. They weren’t looking to exercise in their
free time. When they weren’t working,
they wanted to rest.
And so one of the striking things
about our Gospel lesson for Easter is that people are running everywhere. First,
when Mary Magdalene finds that the stone had been removed from Jesus’ tomb, she
runs to Peter and the disciple whom
we assume to be John the Gospel writer. Then Peter and John run to the tomb. In fact they don’t just run, but John
describes it as a kind of race. First we
are told, “So Peter went
out with the other disciple, and they were going toward the tomb.” Then we
hear, “Both of them were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter
and reached the tomb first.” Then
finally we learn, “Then Simon Peter came,
following him, and went into the tomb.”
This running in our text should
convey to us that the first Easter was a time of surprise, shock, and
anxiety. The disciples were not
expecting it. They struggled to understand what had happened. But when they did it changed everything for
them. For all who believe in Jesus Christ, it still does.
John’s Gospel gives us a sense that
the burial of Jesus was a rushed affair.
The Jewish leaders didn’t want the bodies of Jesus and the two criminals
hanging on the cross during the Sabbath that began at sundown on Friday. They asked Pilate to break the legs of the
men to hasten death, so that they could then be taken down. Jesus was, of course, already dead and so a
soldier only pierced his side with a spear to confirm this.
Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus
showed great courage and devotion to Jesus when they claimed Jesus’ body and
prepared it for burial. The time of day
played a key role in choosing the location for burial and John tells us, “Now in the place where he was
crucified there was a garden, and in the garden a new tomb in which no one had
yet been laid. So because of the Jewish day of Preparation, since the tomb was
close at hand, they laid Jesus there.”
The death
of Jesus had been a shattering experience. Having entered Jerusalem to
adulation at the beginning of the week, on Friday afternoon he was dead on a
cross. All of the hopes about Jesus were
dashed. How could this have happened?
When others had left Jesus, the disciples had stayed because as Peter said,
“Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life,
and
we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of
God.” They had seen his miracles – his
signs – and they believed in Jesus. And they
loved him – how could you not love someone who embodied what love was meant
to be?
The death
had been shocking. The burial had been
rushed. Now, after the Sabbath had
passed it’s not surprising that some wanted to go to the tomb. John tells us, “Now on the first day of the
week Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early, while it was still dark, and saw
that the stone had been taken away from the tomb.” At the earliest possible opportunity, Mary
made her way there.
What she
saw was heartbreaking. The stone that
sealed the tomb had been removed. Mary
knew of the hatred of Jesus’ opponents. She assumed that someone had committed
one last indignity against Jesus by stealing his body. So she
ran and went to Peter and John and said to them, “They have taken the Lord out
of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.”
The Gospels don’t pull any punches
when they describe the events of Easter.
Despite all that Jesus had said and taught, the disciples were not expecting anything. When Jesus cried out “It is finished” and
died, they thought this summed up the situation. Jesus was dead and all was finished – all of
their hopes had come to nothing.
Peter and John were shocked by the
news – so much so that they ran to the tomb and John didn’t even wait up for
Peter. He left him in his dust. John got to the tomb first and stooped to
look in. When Peter arrived, they both
went into the tomb and saw that the clothes Jesus’ body had been wrapped in
were lying there. The cloth that covered
Jesus face was also in the tomb.
However, it was folded up and set in a different place by itself.
John tells us that when he went in
and saw this, he believed. He believed
Jesus had risen from the dead. But that
doesn’t mean he understood all that it meant.
John adds, “for
as yet they did not understand the Scripture, that he must rise from the dead.”
It’s a
recurring theme in John’s Gospel – that Jesus said and did things during his
ministry that the disciples didn’t understand until after the resurrection. We heard it last Sunday when Jesus entered
Jerusalem on a donkey and John tells us, “His
disciples did not understand these things at first, but when Jesus was
glorified, then they remembered that these things had been written about him
and had been done to him.”
The resurrection of Jesus Christ
changed everything for them. They woke
up on Sunday morning thinking that Jesus was dead and that all Jesus had said
and done meant nothing. They went to bed
that night realizing that Jesus was alive and that in him God had worked
salvation that fulfilled the promises of Scripture in remarkable ways they were
just beginning to understand.
Mary had followed the disciples back
to the tomb. She stood
weeping outside it, and as she wept she stooped to look into the tomb. She saw
two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head
and one at the feet. They asked 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.”
It was then
Mary realized someone was behind her.
Jesus was standing there, but Mary didn’t recognize him. He too asked, “Woman,
why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?” Mary assumed he was the gardener
and said, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him,
and I will take him away.”
The angels
and the risen Lord ask Mary the same question: “Why are you weeping?” They ask the question because Jesus has risen
from the dead and so there is no reason
to weep. God’s word addresses the same question to us: “Why are you
weeping?” It asks for the same reason:
“Why are you worried?”
Jesus
Christ has risen from the dead. The One
who was crucified for you lives. This
means that he has conquered sin, death and the devil. It means that you have life – eternal life –
now. Jesus said, “Truly, truly, I say to
you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.”
You believe
in Jesus who died on the cross and now lives.
This means that you have passed from death to life. The life of God’s love abides in you because
of Jesus. True you still live in a
fallen world and so there are circumstances that seem to call for weeping and
worry. But Jesus’ resurrection means that they only seem to.
You have
received the life and love that come from God. When you stop and look at things through Jesus the risen
Lord it becomes clear – he trumps the weeping and worry. They cannot compete
with what he has given you; what he has made you to be. Jesus lives, and so his love and care for you
continues today, tomorrow and forever.
Mary recognized this when Jesus
spoke her name. He said to her, “Mary,”
and she turned and said to him in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” – Teacher! At that moment Mary understood that there was
no reason to weep. Jesus was alive! And he had a message for his disciples: “I am
ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.”
Jesus accomplished what he had come
to do. He had come from the Father. But because of our Lord’s death and
resurrection, now God is our Father
too. According to his divine nature
Jesus is God. But according to his human
nature Jesus could describe the Father as his God. Yet because Jesus took on our human nature to
die and rise again, we can now call the Father our God.
The risen Lord Jesus spoke to Mary
about his ascension. And in this we are
reminded that because of Jesus we not only have life now, but we have hope for
the future. Jesus said, “For this is the
will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him
should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.” Because Jesus has risen from the dead we know
that occasions that cause us to weep and worry will end. In fact, their end
has already started in the
resurrection of Jesus Christ. And their end will reach its completion when the
Lord returns in glory on the Last Day.
On the
first Easter, Mary and the disciples learned that Jesus Christ had risen from
the dead. This changed everything for
them. For all who believe in Jesus Christ, it still does. It does because we know Jesus words are true:
“I am the resurrection and the life.
The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; and whoever lives
by believing in me will never die.”
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