Mark 16:1-8 "What If.....?

You are welcome to use parts of this sermon, but if you do, please attribute them properly!

         A taxi passenger tapped the driver on the shoulder to ask him a question.  The driver screamed, lost control of the car, nearly hit a bus, went up on the sidewalk, and stopped inches from a shop window.

         For a second, everything went quiet in the cab.  Then the driver turned around and said, "Look, don't ever do that again. You scared the living daylights out of me!"

         The passenger apologized profusely and said he did not realize that a little tap could scare him so much.

         The driver replied, "Sorry, it is not really your fault. Today is my first day as a cab driver.  I have been driving a hearse for the past 25 years."

         Death:  We can joke about.  We can cry about it.  We can fear it.  We can deny it.  But on Easter….well, on Easter, we really do not know what to do about it anymore.  It seems that, because of the emptiness of that tomb in the garden outside of the Holy City of Jerusalem over 2000 years ago, all bets are off.

        Even though it competes with Christmas as the biggest annual church celebration (at least in terms of worship attendance), Easter is not at all like its December counterpart.  As theologian and Presbyterian pastor Frederick Buechner wrote:  “Christmas has a large and colorful cast of characters, including not only the three principals themselves, but the angel Gabriel, the innkeeper, the shepherds, the heavenly host, the three Wise Men, Herod, the star of Bethlehem, and even the animals kneeling in the straw…..We have made a major production of it, and as minor attractions we have added the carols, the tree, the presents, the cards. Santa Claus, Ebenezer Scrooge, and so on. With Easter it is entirely different.”

         Maybe because the Gospels are not at all clear about exactly what happened that first Easter morning, especially the account in the Gospel of Mark, which we just read.  All we really know is that Easter begins in the dark.  It begins in silence – and emptiness.  It begins in a Good Friday world with memories of a death considered brutal even by the standards of the Roman Empire, itself the most brutal and oppressive domination system in the ancient world.

        Easter begins with three women knowing exactly what to expect as they tiptoed through the dewy grass of the garden on their way to the tomb early in the morning. They knew the drill by heart – pay your respects, mumble a prayer or two. 

         The corpse would stink.  They knew that also, so they bought sweet spices for anointing it and clearing the air while they worked. 

         They expected to be sad and weep for the dear brave man and for the horrific way that he had died. They expected to be deeply disappointed too - and for a good long time: Disappointed that Jesus was just another failed Messianic hope. They expected to be angry – angry with his male friends for abandoning him, angry at the oppression they endured every day under Roman rule that they had hoped would be lifted – because of him, now lying in state in a cold rock tomb. 

         They expected to find the tomb sealed shut with a boulder and were not at all sure how they would move the rock, but they figured they would cross that bridge when they came to it.  And most of all, they expected, as Lutheran pastor Richard Luckey wrote, to “walk away, knowing what they’d always known: You’re born; you die. You try to do the right thing like this man did, and look what it gets you.”  The story was over – painfully and obviously over.

         What the three women did not expect, of course, was that the boulder would have been shoved out of the way somehow and that the cavernous mouth of the grave would be open, inviting them to enter with all their nascent curiosity.  What they did not expect either was that the tomb would be empty – save for the young man dressed in a white robe sitting on the right side, another surprise.

         What they also did not expect was that they would be the very first to hear the great proclamation of Easter:  “Don’t be alarmed  (Don’t be afraid.  Fear not, for behold…). You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. (Here it comes!)  He has risen! He is not here. See the place where they laid him. But go, tell his disciples - and Peter, ‘He is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.’”

         However, so bewildered, so alarmed, so fearful were the women at beholding the unexpected that they fled from the tomb and (according to our Gospel writer) said nothing to anyone.  And no small wonder! 

        Sometimes we, operating out of a 21^st century arrogance, think that, for those ancient and simple-minded first century folk, resurrection was an easy concept to grasp and believe – right up there with leprechauns and mermaids.  Of course, because you and I are so much more intellectually sophisticated, we find resurrection illogical and suspect and highly unlikely.  However, it was just as illogical, just as suspect, and just as highly unlikely for the three women to believe that Jesus would be raised from the dead. 

         You see, in their theological framework, resurrection happened only at the end of time.  No wonder our Gospel writer tells us that they ran off and told no one after the news they received!  Bam!  That is the end of the story in Mark – no appearances by Jesus on the road to Emmaus, on the beach, or even in that upper room in Jerusalem that smelled of fear and of men being cooped up for too long.

         Oh, I know, if you get out your Bible, you will see a few more verses tacked on to the end of Mark’s Gospel.  However, virtually all Biblical scholars agree that they were attached a couple of centuries later by some unknown monk transcribing the narrative who thought the original ending did not do the story justice and so took the liberty of creating a “better” finale.

         However, obviously the women told someone – who told someone – who told someone - because here we are over 2000 years later sitting in a church on Easter morning, remembering the story of the empty tomb, still as bewildered as the three women who did not believe in resurrection before the end of time, who did not know what resurrection really meant, but who in the deepest recesses of their hearts, hoped against hope that because of what the young man in white said, their lives would be transformed forever.

         And so we too – here, today – are left wondering how we are to believe that what is dead can be alive once more, wondering what this resurrection business is anyway – and maybe even hoping against hope that because of what the young man in white said to those three bewildered and trembling women long ago (“He is risen! You’ll find him in Galilee where it all began.”), our lives will be transformed forever as well.

         However, if you came here today to see if some presumably learned preacher could, at best, convince you of the literal historical facts of that first Easter morning or, at the least, enter into a good debate with you over exactly what happened there in the cemetery garden sometime before the women showed up, then you will be deeply disappointed.  That is not what resurrection is all about.  The way I figure it: speculating on the science of what occurred behind the rock wall is a waste of intellectual energy.

         If you came here today to hear me reassure you that you will live forever - albeit in a dimension of time and space that you can not comprehend, then you will be deeply disappointed as well because that is not what resurrection is all about either.  The way I figure it:  What happens to us, after death, is pointless to speculate about and is best left up to God.

         And if you came here today to hear me ask in a preachy sort of way – don’t you believe in the resurrection? – and then rope you into listening half-heartedly to me (after all, you are a captive audience), listening to me telling you that, if you are a good religious Christian, you need to believe in resurrection because, well, because the Bible tells us so, then you will also be deeply disappointed – or perhaps deeply relieved.

         However, if you came here today to ponder with me what resurrection might be about if it is not about the literalness and historical accuracy of the Gospel narrative and if it is not about you and me living forever, if you came here today to ponder what it means for us to answer Jesus’ call to meet him as the disciples were directed to meet him in Galilee, if you came here today thinking that something happened in that tomb but you are not sure what except that it has something, something to do with us, with humankind, then you and I have common ground.

         A very zealous soul-winning young preacher recently came upon a farmer working in his field. Being concerned about the farmer’s soul, the preacher asked the man, “Are you laboring in the vineyard of the Lord, my good man?”

         Not even looking at the preacher and continuing his work the farmer replied, “Naw, these are soybeans.”

         “You don’t understand,” said the preacher. “Are you a Christian?”

         With the same amount of interest as his previous answer the farmer said, “Nope, my name is Jones. You must be looking for Jim Christian. He lives a mile south of here.”

         The young determined preacher tried again asking the farmer, “Are you lost?”

         “Naw! I’ve lived here all my life,” answered the farmer.

         “Are you prepared for the resurrection?” the frustrated preacher asked.

         This caught the farmer’s attention and he asked, “When’s it gonna be?”

         Thinking he had accomplished something, the young preacher replied, “It could be today, tomorrow, or the next day.”

         Taking a handkerchief from his back pocket and wiping his brow, the farmer remarked, “Well, don’t mention it to my wife. She don’t get out much and she’ll wanna go all three days.”

         Even 2000 years ago, there was speculation about exactly what resurrection was and exactly what happened on that first Easter morning  - and that is problematic.  I mean, how can you believe in something when you do not really know what it is except that so much of the conjecture is tied to some future hope?  Why, oh why couldn’t our Gospel writer be a bit more forthcoming – and not leave us dangling the way he did?

         But what if resurrection has to do with realizing that the gospel writer of Mark intentionally left the story dangling, with no apparent ending, because he knew that the story was not over, that people like us would be adding to it, beginning to finish it? What if resurrection has to do then, not with the future of our mortal souls, but with this life instead, with now?  Could you begin to believe that?

         What if resurrection has to do with trusting that there is such a power in love that it can be strong enough to overcome even death, that resurrection’s purpose was “to put (such) love in our hearts, decent thoughts in our heads, and a little more iron up our spines,” as Presbyterian pastor William Sloane Coffin speculated, that is, to bear witness to a different kind of life, the kind of life Christ brings?  Could you begin to believe in that?

         What if resurrection has to do with our understanding that the assumptions we make about our Good Friday world with all its shortcomings and abject failures may not be valid, but rather that our still speaking God, through us, is always doing the unexpected in the name of love, powerful love, love that can conquer even death?  Could you begin to believe in that?

         What if resurrection has to do with our own personal transformation, that is, dying to the old identity of a species that is greedy and fearful and instead has to do with our taking on a new identity,

one that is compassionate as God is compassionate and that shares in God’s dream for a just and peaceful world grounded in a love so powerful that it even conquers death.  Could you begin to believe in that?

         What if resurrection has to do with trusting that we do not put on this new identity of love alone, but that Jesus – alive and well – meets us in Galilee, in the food pantry, in the homeless shelter and shows us the Way – his Way – to a transformed world?  Just when we thought he was safe and sound inside the tomb, just when we were accommodating ourselves to the reality of death, there he is pointing out to us the reality of love, the kind of love so powerful that it even conquers death.  Could you begin in believe in that?

         Do you believe in the resurrection? OK – I asked the question, even though I said I would refrain.  However, here is an answer for you to ponder.

         If you believe in love, in the kind of love Jesus embodied, if you believe in the power of love that not only conquers death but also can transform you and me and has the potential to transform the world, then you believe in the resurrection. 

        If you believe in love, in the kind of love Jesus embodied, if you believe in the power of love that not only conquers death but also can transform you and me and has the potential to transform the world, then, when you leave this place, you will find the Resurrected One walking ahead of you wherever the path of compassion leads you – and you will find yourselves – sometimes loudly and sometimes just in the faintest whisper saying over and over - sometimes in bewilderment but, at other times, in wonder and amazement – “He is risen!  He is risen indeed!”  Alleluia – and amen.

by Rev. Nancy Foran, Raymond Village Community Church U.C.C., Raymond, Maine