Through Stained Glass: An Easter Sunday Sermon--Choosing Joy!

Grammatical Caveat: Because sermons are meant to be preached and are therefore prepared with the emphasis on verbal presentation (i.e., are written for the ear), the written accounts occasionally deviate from proper and generally accepted principles of grammar and punctuation. Most often, these deviations are not mistakes per se but are indicative of an attempt to aid the listener in the delivery of the sermon.

“Choosing Great Joy”

Matthew 28.1-10

Easter Sunday

4/12/2020

Today is an extraordinary day, even in the midst of these uncertain days. In the life of the church, today is the highest of Holy Days, the day we celebrate Christ's resurrection. With new life bursting forth all around us outside our windows, new life is born within us as Christ's death and resurrection give us victory over the powers that enslave us, ushering in a new reign of peace and love. Indeed, my friends, today celebrates the best and boldest news ever told: "The tomb is empty! Death is undone! Christ is risen! He is risen, indeed!"

Despite the great joy we proclaim, this year it feels different. Instead of being packed tightly in our favorite pews, we are celebrating the good news safe at home, sheltering-in-place. Instead of singing the great 'Hallelujah' chorus while the organ leads us in our resurrection worship, we gather in the simplicity this day has to offer safe at home. While I wish we were together declaring in word and song Christ's victory over death, the irony of an empty church on the Sunday that we celebrate an empty tomb does not escape me. No matter how different today feels, the message remains the same as it did back then, resurrection happens and Love triumphs over death.

The irony runs deep in Matthew's account of the resurrection. Not only the details of the story itself but the way the feelings and energy of the story are present today. The numbness, fear, despair, and sorrow are all things I have felt during these unprecedented pandemic days. Up to this point in the story, and dare I say our lives today, so much has been upended. I think of what the Marys must have felt approaching the tomb that morning, particularly their sadness and grief over what was seemingly lost—the life of their friend and the dreams they shared. I think about the fear that startled them when an angel who looked like lighting, dressed in attire white as snow, moved the stone in front of the tomb and then sat down on top of it. Imagine the shock they felt when they saw the powerful Roman guards shaking and becoming like dead men, but also when they received the news that Christ wasn’t there.

Let’s take a moment to sit with irony in that, right. It was the guards who represented the mighty empire that crucified Christ that "shook and became like dead men." But it was the women, who at that time had little to no power and yet they were not afraid to enter into the fear. In Matthew's story, there is no moment of desperate pleading from Mary to the angel. Instead, as the angel did to Joseph at the beginning of Matthew’s story, the angel tells them not to be afraid because Jesus has been raised. The angel invites them to see for themselves. So, they look, and then they go as the angel instructs to tell the others what they saw…or didn't see, for that matter. Unlike the other Gospel lesson, there is no white cloth neatly folded in the corner. They saw nothing. The angel tells them to go and as they went, verse 7 says they left the tomb with fear and great joy. If there is ever a line that adequately captures the human response to the beautiful tragedy that is life, verse 7 is it. How comforting it is to know that despite the angel's assurance that the Crucified One is now the Risen One, the Marys still felt fear. But also joy, proof that faith is a paradox.

The surprises keep coming for the Marys. As they go, "suddenly Jesus met them and said, 'Greetings!' And they came to him, took hold of his feet, and worshipped him." Perhaps this moment is unanticipated, or maybe it shows what can happen when you anticipate based on what you have seen and heard and believed -- or at least seek further understanding. Regardless, the women fall down and worship Jesus -- like the magi (and not like Herod, who said he wanted to worship Jesus only as an excuse to seek him out to kill him). The Marys experienced the Risen Christ. In them, we see what not only awaits us but what we have right now. In the early morning, the hour darkest before the dawn, transformation happens to a pair of women that would forever change the world. The Marys knew the fear of the darkness but also believed the great joy of the light.

So much darkness and so much light in this story. But it is fitting, right? Jesus has always been about reconciling darkness and light. The entirety of his ministry was bringing the light of God's love to the world. Light shined when Jesus brought the shunned, the seedy, the sick, the shameful, all those who had been driven from the community into a life he called heaven, where light and shadows mingle. The restored brought their darkness with them, for it had been their home and was now part of their light. The Resurrection story isn't about the absence of night, but instead, it is about the triumphant of Light over it.

The story of Christ's resurrection, the story of God, and the story of our lives is one full of tension between darkness and light, despair and hope, death, and life. In Christ's resurrection, we are freed from fear, and we experience the power of God to overcome hatred, injustice, and even death. The good news we proclaim on Easter and every Sunday—not even death separates us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.

Friends, I need Easter this year, unlike I've ever needed it before. I resonate with the Marys—their fear, their sorrow, but also their hope in a dark time. I find comfort in the way the Marys fall to worship Jesus and took hold of his feet, and that he welcomes it.  I find hope knowing that even in the presence of fear in their darkest hour, the joy of Light greeted them in the morning. In choosing their great joy, they met the Living One, who commissioned them as the first Apostles—witnesses to the resurrected Christ.

The Marys went and told the disciples, and the world has never been the same.

Friends, Jesus' resurrection gives us the grace, the power, we need to be to live with God forever. Faith in the resurrection means we believe in life beyond this life, and that eternal life begins not when we die, but in our baptisms. The resurrection affirms all that is good and beautiful and holy right now. God has given us life and promises to give us life forever. I love what Jesuit theologian Karl Rahner says about resurrection. It isn't like a change of horses where we ride off into a far distant sunset on another stallion. Instead, it means we become all we could ever have been. All the limits of this life are lifted, and we are all we could ever hope and desire to be.

Resurrection Sunday reminds us that we are moving towards resurrection always. That when all is said and done, God will have the last word, as God did in Christ's resurrection. No matter how many deaths we die, God will raise us to new life. The final act of the most excellent show on earth, our lives, will end with resurrection. In the end, just as it was back then and is right now, Love is stronger than death.

Indeed, when we choose the great joy of the resurrection, we are choosing a life lived in the light of God's love. When we choose to live life in light of the resurrection, no feeling is final, no depression is too deep, and no darkness is too dense.

As a people who walk in the light of the resurrection, we know the good news of Easter: that God in Christ is saying, "This is what will last—my life and my love will always and forever have the final word."

Church, Easter feels different this year. However, as God accompanied the Marys in their darkest hour, so God is with us in ours. As the Risen Christ called out to them, so Christ calls out to us. We are a people of faith, hope, and love--the greatest, of course, is love.  The good news today, and every day, is that the God who destroyed death is ever able to turn our tears into joy. All is not lost. Remember: we have seen the Lord.

Church, Happy Easter!

Christ is risen! Christ is risen, indeed!