Raised
Matthew 28:1-10
Video not available for April 16, 2017
Fans of wasting time on the internet and social media might be familiar with the meme, “you had one job.” It’s a collection of epic and not so epic fails captured for all the world to see. Like the remote control with arrow buttons labeled ‘left’ and ‘right’ pointing in the wrong direction. Or the t-shirt with a large picture of the continent of Africa and Madagascar on it with the the word ‘Asia’ printed below. There’s the store sign announcing “Back to School” on top of a display of kitchen knives. Or the fortune cookie in its wrapper and the fortune on the outside reading, “the job is well done.” And just a couple of months ago, the person responsible for handing the right envelope for Best Picture to the person presenting the Academy Award.
I’m sure the soldiers ordered to stand guard at the tomb of Jesus were less than thrilled to have pulled that duty. After all, the corpse inside the tomb had been a nobody from nowhere, some wandering Rabbi from the sticks up in Galilee. Where was he going to go? What would anyone want with someone like that? They probably stood there all night wondering those things. But the Governor, Pilate, had made it clear what they were to do when he sent them to the tomb, “make it as secure as you can.” They belonged to the strongest military superpower of the time, how hard could it be? They only had one job. But as Matthew tells it, when the ground shook and a dazzling messenger from heaven came down and rolled the stone back from the tomb, these soldiers started shaking in their shoes before they fainted in fear. They only had one job. Just one. Make it as secure as you can.
Of course the truth of this day is that there is no power in the world, no army, no nation, no leader, and no weapon that can secure itself against the one who knows his way out of the grave.
In other telling’s of this story, the women who came to the tomb that morning did so in order to anoint Jesus’ dead body for burial. There wasn’t time to do that on the day he died. It was late afternoon by the time he’d been taken down from the cross and with the setting of the sun would come the Sabbath. It was all they could do to wrap his body and get it into a tomb to keep it from being devoured by scavenging dogs and birds. According to the other gospel writers, the women came at the dawn of the first day of the week with one thing in mind, one job- to administer this final act for their teacher who was dead and gone. In Matthew’s telling it’s the same two Mary’s who were there to see his body placed inside and the stone rolled in place who return on that first Easter morning just to see.
Which raises a question in my mind. Because there are a whole lot more of us here than usual this morning. That’s not a judgment, more of an observation. I mean it’s what we’ve come to expect. We print extra bulletins. We bring in special music and flowers. Today is an important day, not just in the life of this particular church, it’s an important day for the Christian church around the world. Our most important day. And the question it raises isn’t something petty like, “where is everybody every other Sunday of the year?” That answer’s pretty simple, doing other things. I get that. No, the better question is, what are you doing here today? What are you here to see? Some of you no doubt were coerced, or maybe bribed with the promise of brunch afterward. All kinds of places that are usually open most Sundays are closed today in honor of the holiday, so you may not have the usual options. But my hope is that maybe like those women, something important in your life has gone missing, or something meaningful has died. And you’ve come this morning to see. We live in a world where the story of a dead man being resurrected is hard to believe. But don’t fool yourself. Such disbelief isn’t a modern phenomenon brought on by rationalism, science, or the new atheism. This has always been a story that is hard to believe. I mean, dead is dead, right? There’s no coming back from that. There’s no changing that, is there? Nonetheless, the women came to see. And so have you.
If you came for an explanation, if you came to hear some feeble attempt at proving that this story is true, I’m afraid I can’t do that for you. I think I’d be a fool to try. But the fact that you’re here suggests that the truth of it won’t be found in proofs, anymore than Jesus’ body was found when the stone was rolled away. The truth of it is found when the earth beneath you shifts and the one thing you thought you were supposed to do, whether it’s making things as secure as you can, or dealing with the post-mortem on a dream, or a marriage, or a job, gets disrupted by God, who knows the way out of the grave. God, who makes a way where there is no way. God, whose message to a world gripped by fearful threats around every corner is, “do not be afraid.” God, whose message to a world conditioned by death is, “Jesus who was crucified? He isn’t here, but has been raised. Come and see for yourselves.” God, who doesn’t linger on questions of how, but simply sends us out in awe and joy at the prospect that the world as it is has been shaken to its core and is being remade into something entirely new by the promise of resurrection.
It is a world being remade from a place where vengeance and retaliatory strikes are the order of the day to one where forgiveness is offered instead to the very friends who abandoned Jesus to his death. It is a world being remade from a place where the rugged individualism of going it alone is celebrated to one of welcome that brings people together from every walk of life and corner of the globe to a simple table set with some bread and a cup. It is a world being remade from a place that is resigned to giving death the last word to one where the life of him who has been raised from the dead is going ahead of us, and invites us to meet him there.
Tom Long has written that, “the wonderful new of Easter is that Jesus is alive, and the terrible news of Easter is also that Jesus is alive, because nothing is nailed down anymore.” It has all been shaken loose with one cosmic tectonic shift. If the message of the angel to the two Marys and echoed a few minutes later by Jesus himself is, “do not be afraid,” then the message to those guards and a world trying to make itself as secure as it can is, “be afraid,” because everything that world is built on is being shaken. Love has conquered death once and for all. The tomb is empty and there is no going back once you know the way out of the grave.
Alleluia, amen!