A sermon preached at Trinity-Mount Rainier on the Feast of the Resurrection of Our Lord, Easter Day, April 12, 2020. The service was livestreamed owing to the current pandemic.
The Most Different Easter Ever?
Matthew 28:1-10
(Other Readings Appointed: Acts 10:34-43; Colossians 3:1-4)
You’ve probably heard this before. You may have even said it yourself. I know that I have. It seems to be the often-repeated phrase that many of us Christian believers have used to describe what we are all thinking and feeling at this time. And that thought is simply this: “You know, this Easter is the most different Easter that I’ve ever known.”
And let’s honestly face it, this Easter is different. We are missing each other. We are yearning for the fellowship that we are unable to have because we cannot gather together as we would wish. Our church home is empty except for those of us working here so we can still virtually worship together. And even though this way of worshipping does allow us to still “be together” to hear God’s Word, to sing His praise, and to offer our prayers, it’s just not the same. To be honest, as your Pastor, I would much rather be seeing you all here in these pews than talking to you through a camera. I would much rather be singing and shouting our “Alleluias” together live and in person rather than wondering how they sound in your homes. And I most certainly would rather be gathered with you around the Lord’s Table today to celebrate the Feast of Christ’s victory which gives us life now and life forever.
Yes, this is what I would rather be doing, and I’m pretty sure that you share many of these feelings with me. But what we would rather be doing is met right now by what we have to be doing, even as frustrating as it is for us. While our nation and world continues to face the serious problem of the current pandemic, we are all doing what we can to try to help bring this time of illness to, we hope, a sooner end. We do what we can to keep ourselves and one another safe. So we wash our hands and cover our coughs. We stay at home and when we go out we keep our distance. And yes, we even keep ourselves away from those we love and care about—family, friends, and church family—all in hopes of keeping each other safe and well. All of it is the perfect recipe for “the most different Easter ever.”
With all of this that we find ourselves doing, we discover that a lot of it is because of fear. We find ourselves in a “war” against something that we cannot see and which there is really no protection from. Because of it we have seen the world and our lives turned upside down, where there is no longer a sense of normalcy, just as seemingly constant changing “new normal”. And even when we try to settle back into something that should seem comfortably familiar, like even the celebration of Easter, all we see is something else to adjust to.
Thinking on all these things which make up this “most different Easter”, I began to think, “Is this Easter really all that different? Has there been an Easter where we have had struggle to adjust to something new?” I guess how you answer these questions may well depend on how long you have lived. Certainly some of those who have lived longer have seen Easter celebrated in the midst of challenging days, while for those of us of “fewer” years have not. But we will not argue that this is indeed a unique Easter celebration none the less.
It’s this idea of this Easter’s uniqueness which then made me think that, while this pandemic has brought to Easter its changes and challenges, it has not changed what the celebration of Easter is all about. In fact, if we allow ourselves to think on the Gospel which proclaims to us the message of the events of that very first Easter, we will see that what happened on that day almost 2,000 years ago is really the only Easter that was truly unique and that it speaks both then and now to our deepest needs.
We say we are living in a moment of fear and change. Wasn’t it the same on that first Easter? Jesus had been taken away from His followers; arrested, tried, convicted, executed, and buried. For His disciples and friends, their world had been changed and turned upside down in an instant. And now, they wondered what their future held. Questions filled their minds. What do we do? Where do we go? If they did this to Jesus, what might they do to us? On that first Easter, they found themselves behind closed and locked doors, trying to hold outside what they feared, hoping and waiting and trying to figure out just what the future held for them.
Interestingly enough, there were some who, even in the midst of the change and fear, tried their best to “keep things going”. Two women, Mary Magdalene and “the other Mary”—took on the role of “essential workers” on the dawn of that first day of the week. They were essential because there was the body of a dead man that had to be tended to. So they went to the tomb, carrying ointments, spices, and linen to finish the work religious custom required and which could not be completed because of the Sabbath which caused this man to be laid to rest in haste. These women went to see the tomb, even with their fear, even with their sadness, even with their uncertainties about the future because the man who they followed, Jesus of Nazareth, lay dead. And that fact was just about the only thing that they could be pretty certain of.
All of that changed when they came to the tomb. They see an angel, who makes a great and amazing announcement to them: “Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. He is not here, for He has risen, just as He said. Come, see the place where He lay. Then go quickly and tell His disciples that He has risen from the dead.” Now think on that message. The women went to the tomb already unsure of so many things, but not about the certainty of death. They knew Jesus was dead because they say Him die and how and where He was buried. And now, even though they may have remembered that Jesus said He would rise again, who ever thought that it might be true. Sure, Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead; but whoever heard of someone raising themselves from the dead?
These women left the tomb having entered into a world where nothing seemed sure and certain anymore, that the world they knew was turned upside down by the death of their Master and Teacher, and who could even believe hearing that He was now alive what direction that world was facing now. Matthew tells us that as they left the tomb, the women went away quickly “with fear and with great joy.” They left in fear because of what they knew and had now heard and seen, and not knowing how to understand it all. But they were also filled with great joy because, even as amazing and unbelievable as all of this may have been to them, they were able to see that Jesus had indeed kept His promise and was now risen, “just as He said.”
What happened next is perhaps what spoke most to those women. As they went away from the tomb, “Behold, Jesus met them and said, ‘Greetings!’ And they came up and took hold of His feet and worshipped. Then Jesus said to them, ‘Do not be afraid.’” It was quite one thing to be faced with the scene that met them at the empty tomb. To have heard that Jesus was alive and risen was a message that they could receive as one to give them hope because it reminded them that Jesus said all of this would indeed happen, even as unbelievable as it may have seemed. But now, it is the Risen Lord Himself who meets them, who shows Himself to them alive, and that what their eyes saw was real as their hands took hold of Him, confirming all of these words as not just words but certain and real fact.
And this is what we need to take with us on this “most different Easter”. Jesus is indeed risen from the dead, His grave is empty, and He is here, right now, meeting us where we find ourselves, right in the midst of our uncertain and fearful times. And the word He speaks to each of us is the same as that first Easter: “Do not be afraid.” And isn’t that the very word we need to hear today? Yes, our Lord Jesus, our Redeemer lives, the One who lives to silence our fears, wipe away our tears, calm our troubled hearts, and grant us every blessing. He is alive to meet us now with His living presence that fills us with confidence that nothing will separate us from His love, that His forgiveness assures us of the salvation and life by which we live with Him now and forever, and that as long as we live in Him, He will never leave us or forsake us, even in the midst of the times of greatest uncertainty, trial, and fear. Because He is risen, and is still risen, even on this “most different Easter”, He is our Certainty, our Hope, our Peace, our Joy, and our very Life. And this is why today, and all of our days, we will still always say: Alleluia! Christ is risen! The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia! Amen!
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