Easter
Sermon: Weldon
D. Nisly
TITLE: Alarmed and afraid
THEME: Christ is risen
TEXTS: Isaiah 25: 6-9
Acts 10: 34-43
Mark 16: 1-8 An empty tomb and alarmed people
Mark 16: 1-8
The Resurrection
When the sabbath was over,
Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and
Salome bought spices,
so that they might go and anoint Jesus’ body.
Very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they
went to the tomb.
They had been saying to one another,
"Who will roll away the stone for us from the
entrance to the tomb?"
When they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large,
had already been rolled back.
As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man, dressed in a white
robe,
sitting on the right side;
and they were alarmed.
But 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.
But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going
ahead of you to
there you will see him, just as he
told you."
So 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.
This is the Easter Gospel of
Risen Jesus Christ.
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I confess that I don’t feel
very triumphant this high holy Easter Sunday.
I may have the lowest
Easter sensibility in memory
for me.
How is it for you? Really, how are you this Easter Sunday?
I haven’t really come to
terms with it yet but I am probably more in a Good Friday mood than
an Easter mood. Or maybe I am in a kind of Good Friday –
Easter schizophrenia. I feel like
two people vying for my
life.
One self wants to rejoice and celebrate Easter to the fullest. It is a self
that is grateful we are
celebrating Easter together
today. It is a self grateful to be alive and especially grateful for the
power of God to raise Jesus
from the dead and overcome sin and violence.
It is a self that
knows that the resurrection
is for real and for today.
Another self is still in a Good Friday spirit riddled with suffering and
sorrow and struggle,
not only my own but with and
for many others.
Before you start offering all
kinds of psycho-therapeutic advice – not that such advice
wouldn’t be warranted – I
want to remind us of one thing. Or
rather I want to take us to the
one place we must go on this
Easter Sunday. That place is The Holy
Bible. More than the
Bible, it is the story of
Jesus’ resurrection. To be yet more
specific, it is A Story of Jesus
resurrection. To be even more specific, it is the
experience of the first observers of the
good news of Jesus’
resurrection and their response in a specific Gospel.
Matthew, Luke, and John give
rather glamorous accounts of the response of the first observers
to Jesus’ resurrection. Mark, the first Gospel written, gives no such
account. It is a very
unglamorous story.
For the first time I feel
like I may identify a little bit with the clash of Good Friday and Easter
moods of the women who first
came to the tomb and found it empty.
Yet this is NOT about women
or women’s feelings or women’s fears.
Quit the contrary. In Mark’s
gospel, the men never get it
and only women hang around Jesus enough to keep getting glimpses
of Jesus and the reign of
God. Here early on Easter morn it is the
three women – Mary Magdalene,
Mary the mother of James, and
Salome who have the nerve to go to the tomb for one last anointing
good-bye to the body of Jesus
and with it their good-bye to their hopes and dreams for Jesus.
Mark paints a vivid
picture. The three women go to the tomb
with spices to anoint Jesus’ body.
They don’t really expect to
be able to anoint the body because they keep lamenting to each other,
“Who will roll away the stone
for us from the entrance to the tomb?”
We are also told in Mark’s
vivid language, that the
stone “was very large.” It was a
courageous attempt at a futile mission.
When the three women get to
the tomb, they find a most unexpected sight.
The very large stone
has already been rolled away
from the entrance of the tomb. Wonder of
wonders, they can anoint
the body after all.
They peak inside the tomb and
find a second unexpected sight. A young
man dressed
in white is sitting off to
the right and no body in sight.
You might expect that they
would fall over themselves with gratitude to this strong young
hero who saved the day and
opened the tomb for their anointing ritual.
But no, we are told
that they were alarmed.
They are immediately told,
“Don’t be alarmed.”
How could they not be
alarmed? Their beloved Jesus has been
crucified and buried in this
tomb. And their love and hope in this Jesus was
buried with the crucified body. Now they
just want a decent burial
rite, as much for closure in their grief as for honoring Jesus.
The strange messenger in the
tomb goes on to reassure them, “I know you are looking for
Jesus of Nazareth. I know he was crucified. And I am telling you Jesus has risen from the
dead. He is not here. Look!
Right there is where they laid his body.”
But the women weren’t looking
for Jesus of Nazareth or a Risen Jesus.
They were looking
for the body of a dead
Jesus.
The strange messenger doesn’t
invite them to come in and rejoice at the resurrection news.
Instead the strange messenger
tells them to call all grieved and hopeless disciples and head
back to Galilee to meet a
Risen Jesus Christ.
What could be more exciting
than that. Jesus is alive and in his
homeland again! But the
women -- the most faithful
and courageous of Jesus’ followers to the end – are still mired
deep in a Good Friday mood.
Mark’s stark Gospel ends in
this most stark of all Gospel accounts.
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.
That is the original ending
to the original Gospel.
Later writers and the church
domesticated that stark ending alongside the other three Gospels.
Perhaps some find hope in
altered endings. I am sure many today
revel in the glamour
of Easter and all kinds of
victory. But I don’t. At least not this Easter.
I find Mark’s Easter ending
most relevant and most hopeful for our times.
I find it amazing
and providential that the
Gospel of Mark is the Gospel we are compelled to hear this very year
and this very season when
wars and rumors of wars persist and permeate our lives even as we
celebrate Easter.
What we are left with this
Easter Sunday is our own realities perhaps most like the women’s
reality confronted as were
the women with the Easter revelation: “Christ is Risen.”
What more can we claim and
proclaim this very day then “Christ is Risen!”
And how can
we not respond with the great
Christian response: “Christ is Risen
indeed!
Perhaps all we can say this
Easter Sunday is “Christ is risen.” It
is enough.