Sermon for Easter

The reading

Matthew 28:1-10

1 After the sabbath, as the first day of the week was dawning, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. 2 And suddenly there was a great earthquake; for an angel of the Lord, descending from heaven, came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. 3 His appearance was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow. 4 For fear of him the guards shook and became like dead men. 5 But the angel said to the women, "Do not be afraid; I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified. 6 He is not here; for he has been raised, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. 7 Then go quickly and tell his disciples, "He has been raised from the dead,and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him.' This is my message for you." 8 So they left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples. Suddenly Jesus met them and said, "Greetings!" And they came to him, took hold of his feet, and worshiped him. 10 Then Jesus said to them, "Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me."

The Message  (Well sort of the message, I ended up not using this manuscript at all, I was going to talk about the guidance to come and see, then go and tell but ran out of time, felt like i said enough,  so the second part will have to wait till next week. I also didn't know about the attacks in Sri Lanka until Sunday afternoon, since I was too busy running around with less important stuff).   

The story of Jesus resurrection reported in Matthew’s Gospel starts with an Earthquake.  A great force that moves the stone away from the tomb. Without this the first witnesses of Easter would have just seen a large stone. Matthew writes a lot about earthquakes. He uses the Greek Root Seismos a lot. It means to shake.  For those of you here on Palm Sunday, we heard the same word, that Jerusalem shook or quaked when Jesus arrived there.  On Good Friday, we are told as Jesus took his last breathe from the cross, the earth shook.  Today, as the empty tomb is revealed, the earth shakes again. The events Matthew witnessed and wrote about are so important and serious, the very physical world reacts, the stones cry out in sadness and joy before they move, rock itself cannot contain God.

Jesus whole ministry was like an earthquake, powerful, disruptive, causing great change and being unstoppable. Having lived in or near NYC my entire life, I do not have any experiences with Earthquakes, other than the occasional movie or TV show. I imagine they are moments of great fear, danger and uncertainty.  There is the obvious physical damage, the loss of buildings, stores, work  homes, churches, even life itself.   There is also the emotional impact, to watch roads, streets, literal rock fall apart, the stuff we step on, walk on, trust will be solid is longer stable, things that felt certain moments before are now in doubt, things we perceived as indestructible are gone. 

I know that cities are built to withstand Earthquakes but that often does not work, I know there are earthquake survival plans,  things that people in high activity zones are taught to do. People are told to prepare by having some basic knowledge, plans and essential supplies ready.  The disciples should have a following Jesus survival kit prepared. They go from walking into Jerusalem with the king and shouts of Hosanna and praise to hiding in fear as Jesus is crucified. They go from being welcomed and beloved healers to the accused of all sorts of crime, they go from certain that Jesus can fix or do anything to figuring out how he could be dead and buried and then hearing he is risen.  I imagine all of the shaking, the ups and downs of following Jesus, has pushed his disciples to their limits, complaining, come on what could possibly be next, give us minute to get caught up, give us something to hold onto.   

This morning we hear the heavenly being at the empty tomb give the women an Easter Survival kit. The heavenly being tells them 2 instructions: First: Come and See where Jesus was buried, the empty tomb, he is not there, he is Risen. Be certain., second Go quickly and tell the others.  That is what they are given to hold onto.

A few months ago, I had a chance to come and see the place where Jesus was buried.  During a trip to the Holy Land, we made one of our last stops at the church of the Holy Sepchlure, an ancient church that covers the places of Jesus death on the cross, the spot where his body was prepared for burial and the cave of his burial and resurrection. Today the place where Jesus body was  is under the care of the Greek Orthodox church.  Visitors have a chance to go underneath a large marble structure (the cover of today's bulletin) and see the tomb. There is a long wait. Once inside the cave where Jesus was buried, there are 2 very large, seriously intimidating priests there who push people out once they have stayed inside too long (which was really not that long).  Even from those few moments, I can tell you, Jesus is not there.

This is not something you can do everyday (unless you happen to be a large, seriously intimidating Greek Orthodox priest). For many of us, this was a once or few times in a lifetime opportunity. It was a long, physically and spiritually intense and expensive trip. It was annoying to finally visit the place of Jesus resurrection and then to be so rushed, It made sense on a practical level. there were many other pilgrims there, patiently (or not so patiently) waiting, including some older people and others having difficulty standing around.  After sitting with today's reading, I realize it makes sense on a spiritual level as well. The 2 Mary's are rushed in this morning's gospel. They simply need to see Jesus is not there, Christ is Risen.  That is the only purpose of this stop. the burial cave is a small place, no corners to hide, things to move or peek under. Take a quick look and go, tell, live faith, keep the good news

That is what Easter is, a time to come and see Christ is Risen from the dead.  That is what church is. Our work is to be a place you can come and see Christ is Risen from the dead.

We do not only see Christ is Risen here, we hear it in many places.   That is what Scripture is for, a place you can go any minute of any day and see "Christ is Risen from the dead", our hymns and songs for worship,  our food pantries, our school, our care fore the community, our building,  all of this is to show God's promises are good and true, Christ is Risen from the dead.  

If you can get one dose  of the good news, that Christ is Risen. if you can come and see once a year and that's enough to last you, great.  If hearing it every year or two is enough to not worry about heaven, if its enough to go and tell the others, to care for the earth, push you to advocate for others, work in faith towards the world God wants for us, great.  I need to hear "Christ is Risen" way  more often. 

Jen and I wait till most major tv series are over so we can stream them and not have to wait weeks or months between episodes, to see what happened.  With that said, im sorry to do this to you but like Game of Thrones and so many of our favorite TV shows, your going to have to stay tuned, come back next week to hear about "go quickly and tell the others"