Community Church Sermons
Year B
April 26, 2009
Third
Sunday of Easter
Psalm 4
Luke 24:38-48
Rev. Martin C. Singley, III
It would have been a lot easier if Jesus had just stayed dead!
The tomb in which he was laid would have made a nice shrine to which people could go to pay their respects to the dead Savior. The Church could probably even charge admission, and right next door to the tomb, there could be a nice little gift shop where you can buy WWJD bracelets, and Christian music CD’s, and all that sort of stuff.
It would have been a lot easier if Jesus had just stayed dead!
We wouldn’t need four different Gospels to tell the story of the resurrection either. On Easter Sunday, one of our Scripture readers told me that in preparation for reading the Easter text he had studied the accounts from all four gospels. What a thoughtful person to do that! He was surprised to discover they are all very different – and sometimes even contradictory! Someone has said that the Gospel stories of the resurrection are like the eyewitness reports gathered at the scene of a car wreck – everybody sees it just a little differently, and trying to get to what actually happened is hard!
It would have been a lot easier if Jesus had just stayed dead!
But he didn’t!
In story after story about what happened after the resurrection of Jesus, something interesting happens. While the disciples seem to know how to handle the death of Jesus, they haven’t got a clue as to what to do with the risen Jesus! And so, in story after story – like the story that was just read - when the no-longer-dead Jesus shows up, the disciples are thrown into a tizzy. I mean, how would YOU respond to a dead guy showing up at your house at suppertime and asking for a piece of fish to eat?
This is beyond our normal human experience.
We all know what it is like to encounter death. From the time we are little children we are trained in the art of grief. And we wrap our faith around the experience of death, and can even recite the words that are said at graveside. I like the story about the little girl whose house backed up to the cemetery. Day after day she watched as funeral processions arrived, caskets were placed on open graves, and robed ministers and priests read the words of committal. One day, she decided to give it a try herself. She dug a hole in the backyard, threw a towel around her neck for a stole, and ran upstairs to get her teddy bear. Then she returned to the grave she had dug and with great drama proclaimed, “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and in-the-hole-ya-goes!”
We just about know death by heart. We are all well trained in the experience of death!
But resurrection throws us into disarray.
“While they were still talking…Jesus came and stood among them and
said, ‘Peace be with you.’ But they were startled and frightened…”
In almost all the Easter stories, those who are encountered by the risen Jesus are gripped by fear, dismay, surprise, and confusion.
It would’ve been a lot easier if Jesus had just stayed dead.
And our faith would be a lot simpler, too.
If Jesus had just stayed dead, faith could be something we could just hold in our heart like the memories we cherish of our loved ones who have died. You could have your memories and I could have mine, and our faith could be something very personal and very private.
It would have been a lot easier if Jesus had just stayed dead!
But he didn’t.
And there at the dinner table that day with the disciples, their mouths hanging open in sheer dumfoundedness, Jesus enjoyed a little broiled fish, and then taught the disciples some things that shook up their little personalized experiences of faith and prepared them for living as true Christian disciples.
What Jesus taught them is that this resurrection faith is much bigger than ourselves.
All the time, I hear people tell me that their faith is very personal, that it is their own thing to do with as they will, that it is something that exists between them and God.
Well, that may be faith of a sort, but it is not Christian faith.
Listen to the story:
“He said to them, ‘This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the law of Moses, the Prophets, and the Psalms.’ Then he opened their minds so they could understand the scriptures. He told them, ‘This is what is written: “The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations…”’”
What Jesus did in saying these words was to take the personal experience of his disciples and connect that personal experience with two things – the past, and the future.
Every year on Easter Sunday, I include in our services the hymn, “Christ Arose!”
Low in the grave He lay – Jesus my Savior!
Waiting the coming day – Jesus, my Lord.
Up from the grave He arose, with a mighty triumph o’er His foes;
He arose a victor from the dark domain,
And He lives forever with his saints to reign.
He arose! He arose! Hallelujah! Christ arose!
Now, Episcopalians – and Presbyterians – and Congregationalists like me may be much too refined and sophisticated to enjoy hymns like this. I mean, it even has a beat! And sometimes, after we’ve sung that song on Easter Sunday, some of my friends from the refined and sophisticated traditions wonder why we have to do that? Why not the Easter portion of Handel’s Messiah or some other musical masterwork?
Well, I’ll tell you why.
Because MY MOTHER LOVED THAT SONG! That’s why!
As my mother faced the challenges of her life – with all its losses, all its bruises, all its illnesses, all its limitations – she found great comfort and strength in the faith expressed through that song, “UP FROM THE GRAVE HE AROSE, WITH A MIGHTY TRIUMPH O’ER HIS FOES!”
And my mother had learned that faith from her mother and father. It might have been expressed with different words and different melodies, but it was a faith that said, “No matter what the circumstances, God will bring you through!” And they had received it from those generations of people who came to this country from far away to start a new life in the face of wars and economic collapse. And they had received it from those who came before them.
Christian faith is connected to all those who have gone before us and in whose lives we see the faithfulness of God at work in every generation.
There is no such thing as “Me and Jesus.” There is only “We and Jesus.”
So Jesus taught the disciples to look back to Abraham and Sarah, and Isaac and Rebekkah, and all those in whose lives God had graciously worked to bring about salvation and wholeness.
And then Jesus taught them to look forward – to the future.
They were to bring this message of hope and resurrection to all people everywhere.
Our faith is not our own. It is the fruit of what others before us have planted. It is the seed we are to plant and from which will come the future.
And when you let Jesus take you back to Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms, and when you let Jesus point you out toward your neighbors and all the nations of the world, faith takes on a whole new meaning.
Its not about ME.
It’s about US – ALL of us – together.
This is why Christians seek understanding and relationships with people of other religions. Salvation is not about ME, it is about US.
This is why Christians seek justice for people who are unfairly treated and denied their rights as the children of God. Salvation is not about me, it is about US.
This is why Christians reach out to befriend and care for those on the fringes of life – whether by their own poor choices or by the uncontrollable circumstances of human existence. Salvation is not about me, it is about us.
This is why we welcome our new neighbors of Faith Lutheran Church, and share our parking spaces, and why we will serve Fair Trade coffee at the Tellico Joe Café, and why we more than tithe our budget for missions, and why we let the Art Guild and others use our Christian Life Center, and why we teach our members that you can’t just come here to GET, but we expect you to come here to GIVE to others.
Oh yes, it would’ve been a whole lot easier if Jesus had just stayed dead.
But he didn’t.
And that day when he connected us to those who have gone before us, and to those out before us to whom we are sent, Jesus gave us a new kind of faith.
A resurrection faith!
Christ is risen…and WE have a faith to share!