This is Our Story: A Sermon for Easter Year A

I find that the Easter Gospel text of the resurrection is the sermon. 

There's really not a whole lot else to say. 

But the expectation is there that I will, as a preacher, have to say something about it. And so I decided to just go headlong into the text and consider what that moment must have been like for Mary, Peter, and everyone else. 

Text: John 20:1-18

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Mind blown.

I think that’s the best way to describe the Easter moment.

I mean, how can this be anything but a really mind-blowing event?!

A man was killed… in a gruesome act of government violence.

All his friends saw it happen.

They saw the body removed from the cross.

They knew he was put in a tomb.

There was a large stone rolled in front of it.

End of story….right?

But then… as John tells us… while it was still dark… something incredible happened.

Mary goes to the tomb. Maybe to pay more respects…to continue grieving the loss of her teacher and friend.

And when she gets there…

What?!?!?

Where’s the stone?

What’s going on here?

And something of a pandemonium erupts.

Mary goes running to find Peter.

Peter and the “other disciple whom Jesus loved”… probably John… dash off to see what’s going on with Jesus’ tomb.

They get in a foot race with one another and then…

What?!?!

Where’s the body?

The wrappings… the cloth wrappings around his head and his body… they’re… they’re…they’re tossed aside?!

Who has unbound Jesus?!

Where is he?!

Mystified… Peter and what’s his name disciple… go home.

They just go home.

Mary Magdalene… on the other hand… can’t leave.

This whole thing makes no sense.

And it’s shocking.

She begins to cry.

“Woman…why are you weeping?”

Why is she weeping? Why WOULDN’T she be weeping?

And—whoa—who are you two? Angels?

“Woman…why are you weeping?”

Oh great: here comes another dude with the same question.

Good grief! Why wouldn’t she be crying?

We can hear her exasperation…something like…

Look buddy. I don’t know who you are but if you know who made off with….

“Mary!” he says.

Wait.

Wait a minute.

Is it?

Yes. It is.

Yes it is!

Mind blown!

This moment… this incredible moment… jolted everyone who had followed Jesus… believed in his teachings… and were in such a state of emotional distress at his death.

And now… vindication. Victory. Let the song of triumph be sung.

He really did it! He really has risen on the third day!

It’s not surprising that all of Jesus’ closest associates were having these moments of shock and awe!

 

I think we all can understand how stunning it can be when we think things are a certain way in the world… and then something totally unexpected flips the script.

It reminds me of a song by Sweet Honey in the Rock which starts “Don’t no one at sunrise how this day is going to end.”

It can be so easy for us to be so caught up in our own stuff… our own way of living and perceiving the world that we can easily miss those moments when God appears before us.

Perhaps that’s why this resurrection had to be so far over the top incredible.

Sometimes… God has to really shake up our reality to get our attention.

Nothing like raising someone from the dead to do that!

And it’s not as if Jesus was the first dead person to rise from the dead.

In John’s Gospel… Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead…commands Lazarus to come out of his tomb… and then Jesus has to look around and tell others to unbind Lazarus.

Get that man out of all those wrappings of death.

But now… in this resurrection…no one unbinds Jesus.

Jesus is unbound.

God the Son… the Word made flesh…is free.

God has liberated Jesus once and for all… and we declare in a loud voice: Alleluia!

(motion to them to repeat: Alleluia!)

By extension… and in that way in which laws of gravity, time, and space mean nothing to God… this resurrection is a sign that our Creator has liberated us as well.

Everyone who has a part in the Body of Christ… through our baptism… through partaking of the Eucharist… are just as much a part of this resurrection of Jesus.

 We…like Jesus… have gone down into the grave… figuratively speaking.

We experience our own sufferings in our lives.

Some have felt the sting of rejection… others find themselves locked in battles with bullies and tyrants.

We’ve suffered losses of friends and family members.

But just as God was never far from Jesus on the cross… the Holy One is never far from us.

And the promise fulfilled on this day is that for every Good Friday moment we’ve endured… Easter will happen.

God will be there to unbind us.

And Jesus stands as the Greatest Liberator from Oppression ever.

Now…there’s another interesting part of this Gospel message from John.

When Mary recognizes the voice of her shepherd… her teacher… the immediate response is not only her exclamation “Rabbouni!” but in her rapture she’s ready to hang on to Jesus.

Having lost him once… she wants to cling to him and never let him go.

But Jesus tells her “Don’t hold on to me because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say that I am ascending to my Father…”

Go on Mary! Go preach! Go tell the story of what you’ve seen… what you’ve experienced!

Tell the brothers how you’ve been blown away by all this!

Just like Mary Magdalene… we are called to share this phenomenally good news with others.

Not with bullhorns… or whacking people over the head with the Bible… in the words of the great theologian Rocky the Flying Squirrel of Bullwinkle fame: “That trick never works!”

God doesn’t need us to scream at or beat people up with this news.

But each of us does have a story to share.  

Consider these things:

·                 What have you learned about yourself through whatever Lenten practice you’ve had over the past several weeks?

·                 Or…In what ways has God’s love manifested for you during this Lent and Holy Week?

·                 Or even…what is it about this story of Easter and the resurrection that roused you out of bed this morning to come to church and listen to this wild ride of a story?

Whatever it is that has moved us to be here in the presence of God on this day of celebrating the resurrection of Jesus… that is our story…that is our song.

And it’s meant to be shared.

Sing that song to the person who has lost their voice…or have been made weary from a world that keeps trying to drown them out.

Tell it to the person who turns to you when they need a kind word from a friend…a word grounded in the Spirit that knows what it is to have their trusted companions deny and betray them.

Live it by knowing that God has loved all of us… every single one of us… without conditions or black-out dates… or asterisks… and has loved us back to life.

That is the wonderfully mind-blowing story of this day.

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!