gleaming in the sun

you're the one, you're the one, you're the one

A sermon on the Great Easter Resurrection Interruption 

Of all the reports of that first great Easter, this one is my favorite. I love how John refuses to tamp down the downright chaos of it all! Everybody, from the serene Beloved Disciple to loyal Mary Magdalen, are all running around like a bunch of chickens with their heads cut off! That first Easter, like a first date, is full of drama and high suspense!

And that means if you just barely made it here today. If you got frustrated and barked at a loved one while you were getting ready. If you had to sit in a back pew, or more likely, a front one. If your kids didn’t cooperate. If your partner didn’t cooperate! If you’re frazzled in any way whatsoever, that just means you’re right where you need to be for Easter to really happen for you today!

If it’s not a perfect Easter yet, that just means you’re finally ready for a real one! If things haven’t come together as planned, that just means you’re right where Mary, Peter, and the Beloved Disciple found themselves that first Easter morn! Bedlam and stress don’t wreck Easter. No, they’re what this day is made of!

…But it’s not just today. Is it? Much of our life is spent running from one thing to the next. And these past couple years, navigating life with this rotten virus hasn’t made it any easier. For many of us, all these protocols and mandates have put our already hectic lives into overdrive. 

Crisis has a way of doing that. Doesn’t it? Just look at Mary. She’s the first witness to the resurrection. Properly speaking, she’s the very first Christian preacher, too! But, oh, what a way to come about it.

Mary went to the tomb to pay her respect before the crack of dawn that day. She’s a go-getter. Early as she arrived, though, something had already gone wrong. The stone that sealed Jesus’ tomb had been removed! And with that, all Mary’s well-laid plans to go right out the window! 

Mary had been doing everything she could to hold it together after Jesus’ death rocked her world. But this missing body is too much! Mary just wants to locate Jesus’ corpse so she can lay it to rest. That way, hopefully, she can go back home and get a little rest herself.

And this longing of Mary’s is so intense that when she dares to look into the tomb and sees, of all things, angels(!), all she can do is repeat her grievance! Jesus’ body is missing. Why, not even seeing Jesus himself can break this spell Mary’s under! She’s so preoccupied with finding that corpse, she can’t see Jesus himself, resurrected and in the flesh, standing right in front of her!

Exasperation has a way of doing that. Doesn’t it? The harder you look for that thingamajig, the less likely you are to see it right under your nose. In fact, that may be the very reason you were running behind this morning!

But it’s not just the thingamajig. Is it? Our focus on trying to make sure everything is just so blinds us to all the ways Jesus himself gets to work when it all goes sideways. As Easter reminds us, Jesus does his best work in cemeteries of all places! Not the first place any of us would choose to look to find God at work. It is?

And it’s no different for Mary. Is it? She can’t see past her own objectives, either. Until, that is, Jesus bursts her bubble by saying her name! And hearing her savior speaking her name rattles Mary free of her obsession. With that, Mary’s world is opened as wide as Jesus’ empty tomb! Overjoyed, she says, in English, “My dear teacher!” And rushes over to Jesus. 

Strangely, though, the bliss of this moment is cut short when Jesus tells Mary to cut it out.

This exchange has long confounded Christians. Why is it that Jesus tells Mary not to hold on to him? The truth is, and the language is very clear here, Jesus is telling Mary not to hold him. Mary can touch Jesus if she likes. But what won’t do, is trying to keep Jesus under her thumb!

What’s happened is that Mary’s compulsion to lay hold of Jesus’ body is so gripping that when Christ shows up to her in all his resurrection glory, Mary can’t help herself! She persists in trying to secure the body! Habeas corpus! Jesus, though, for his part, won’t leave Mary in such a bind.

As will be made clear later, Jesus is now present to his followers in the power of his holy Spirit. Not the flesh which availeth nothing. But it’s not just a correction Jesus is offering Mary! No, he’s giving her so much more! When Jesus tells Mary not to hold him, he’s imparting something to her she could never receive with her hands clutched around him! 

Here, try this, open your hands and look down at them. Now imagine all sorts of good gifts falling into them. Vacations on sunny beaches. Commendations at school. Promotions on the job. Winning friends and influencing others. Easter brunch with all the fixings. And whatever else your little heart can dream of, too…

Now consider this, the moment you grab any one of those gifts, you effectively close yourself off to all other possible ones! 

It’s only the hand that has nothing of its own to hold on to that’s open enough to receive everything Christ has won! The hand of faith is the one that’s open. At rest. And Mary trying to hold on to Jesus, is shutting herself off from all that! Jesus, though, has come to free Mary from that grim fate.

On holy Saturday, Jesus defeated Death. But now, on this Easter Sunday of a whole new epoch, Jesus comes to bring the rest of Death’s minions under his heel, too! Jesus saves from capital “d” Death, yes. But that’s not all! Jesus also saves from another death. A spiritual one. 

A death where you are alive but not really living. A cheap imitation of life. A life with no Higher Power than your own flagging willpower. A life consigned to nothing more than clawing, climbing, and clinging until you would become that very corpse Mary’s been running hither and yon trying to hunt down!

Today, though, Jesus rolls aside that stone that would seal you to such a sad outcome! And he does so by coming to you from the other side of that tomb we’re all running scared from. And saying to you what he said to Mary, too: “Do not hold on…” Or, “let go.”

“Let go.” Let go and find your life held safe and secure in Christ’s pierced hands! Let go and receive everything Jesus won by the wounds in his palms! Let go and receive your life back to you. Only now, not as something to manage, but as a gift to receive!

It’s the hands with nothing to lose that are ready to receive everything Christ has come to give! And the truth is, that’s all of us today. We’re just too busy trying to scrape together what we can to see it. Now, though, Jesus comes to bring an end to that rat race. And he does so, so that you might really begin to live at long last! Jesus speaks your name, too! And he bids you out of that living-death to have life in his name!

Go ahead, take a look in the tomb! It’s empty! Jesus has hallowed it out! It holds nothing over you anymore! It’s powerless! Christ has removed that stone! You are no longer doomed to a life lived merely trying to forestall the grave but never really living!

No, for Jesus has freely given you what all your grasping has never been able to lay hold of, life! And the life that truly is life, too! Life lived with the power to let go. Which is the word for forgiveness, by the way. “Aphiemi.” Let go.

The power to let go of your pride and ask forgiveness. From God, yes, but also from anyone you’ve ever wronged. The power to let go of being right and forgive anyone whose ever wronged you, too! Ultimately, the power to just let go of trying to control every square inch of your life and just stand back for once and receive it all as the great gift that it is from the God whose love knows no end!!

All that lays before you is everything Christ has won for you! And what’s more, it’s nothing but your empty hands, your running late, and your imperfect Easter, too, that makes you such an ideal candidate for Jesus’ to hand all this over to!

Go! Let go! You are free!