But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they came to the tomb, taking the spices that they had prepared. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in, they did not find the body. While they were perplexed about this, suddenly two men in dazzling clothes stood beside them. The women were terrified and bowed their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen. Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, that the Son of Man must be handed over to sinners, and be crucified, and on the third day rise again.” Then they remembered his words, and returning from the tomb, they told all this to the eleven and to all the rest. Now it was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other women with them who told this to the apostles. But these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them. But Peter got up and ran to the tomb; stooping and looking in, he saw the linen cloths by themselves; then he went home, amazed at what had happened.
Luke 24:1-12
My sermon from Easter Sunday (April 17, 2022) on Luke 24:1-12.
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Now for those who have a car or driven a car or taken a lyft or been around cars, I wonder: what do you do when a mysterious light suddenly appears on your dashboard? When that happens to me, I usually let out a sound that’s sort of a combination between a growl, a feeling of surprise, and the sheer anguish and anxiety about how much this mysterious light is going to cost me. Most dashboards today are always lit up, giving us all kinds of information about our speed, where we’re going, and how far we’ve traveled. But there are all those other symbols or error messages which appear like a thief-in-the-night telling us that something’s up. Some of these symbols I recognize on sight because they show up quite a bit. There’s the exclamation point surrounded by squiggly lines letting me know my tires are getting flat; the yellow colored gas pump telling me I’m about to run out of gas; and the “check engine light” which can be nothing or everything at once. My standard operating procedure for when a mysterious light turns on is, to first, ignore it. If the car seems fine, I’ll just keep driving and act like it’s not even there. But there comes a point when the light on our dash requires us to stop what we’re doing and go on a journey of discovery. We can either take the car to the mechanic, look up the symbol online, or call every car person we know and describe, in detail and with sound effects, what’s wrong with our car. Even if we ignore the mysterious light for days, weeks, or even months – there comes a time when we need to discover what’s up.
That spirit of discovery is something that can be exhilarating, shocking, joyful, or full of sadness. Usually when I use the language of discovery, I connect it to something positive – like learning a new skill or exploring a place I’ve never been to before. But the things we discover can also be all the stuff we never wanted to see in the first place. Over the last week, we’ve been with the disciples as they lived through the fullness of Jesus’ story. They arrived in the city of Jerusalem full of hope as they waved palm branches in the air to announce the arrival of the one who made the impossible possible. Jesus then taught and healed, refusing to respect the barriers we put up to say who is worthy of God’s love and who isn’t. As Jesus’ reputation grew, the disciples couldn’t wait to see what would come next. But then the soldiers came and after his arrest and trial, Jesus was led to a place known as the Skull. Those who followed him thought that, because of Jesus, everything would change. Yet the Roman Empire did its best to end Jesus’ story. The reality of the Cross was a crushing discovery to the disciples because they learned that they weren’t who they imagined themselves to be. Many of them lost hope, direction, and a sense of purpose. Yet the women chose to discover something new. They didn’t stay far away from what had happened. They went and discovered the tomb where Jesus’ body was laid. With that knowledge firmly in their mind, they returned to where they were staying, planning to come back in two days to bury Jesus with honor, dignity, and love.
Now Luke doesn’t tell us much about what happened between their discovery of the tomb and the break of dawn on the third day. We don’t know what the women did or said – only that they observed the sabbath. On the day set aside by God to interrupt our work, our schedules, our never ending to do lists, and the myriad of ways life refuses to let us rest, the women woke up and discovered that everything was still covered in shadow. Natalia Terfa, a pastor and an author, recently wrote a poem on what that day looked like and why it matters to us. She wrote: “It’s a day we’d rather rush through in order to get to Easter quickly. We don’t like to sit in the [dim] and sad places. But this day is important. Because we will feel this way again. The day after someone we love dies. The day after a diagnosis. The day after the worst day. The day before the resurrection. The in-between day. It’s not as hard as yesterday. It does not contain even a teeny bit of tomorrow’s joy. But here we are” – being with the women who discovered what it was like to live through the day after.
And so on the next day – the first day of the week – these followers of Jesus woke in the middle of night and gathered everything they had prepared. When it was still dark, they ventured into the city streets and out the city gate. They weren’t sure how they were going to open the tomb but they knew where Jesus was and they knew how to prepare a body for burial. They no longer wanted to discover something new; instead, they wanted to lean into what they already knew. As they neared the tomb, I imagine they talked about the ways they would care for Jesus since he had cared for them. But once they arrived, there was so much more to discover. The giant stone serving as a door was pushed to the side and Jesus’ body was gone. In an instant, the trauma of Friday and Saturday came roaring back as this new discovery brought so much confusion and grief. Again, for the third day in a row, it felt as if everything had fallen apart because they lost the one thing they thought they knew. But right when that moment of terror and confusion swept through them, two visitors appeared. Their clothes dazzled within the tomb, shining like a light that couldn’t be ignored. And they shared a message to the women that Jesus’ story would continue. For three over-the-top days, these women kept discovering new and conflicting and challenging experiences which turned everything upside down. And each time it happened, they were left on their own. But this time, under the guidance of the visitors, they told their friends what they had discovered. No one, at first, believed them and I wouldn’t be surprised if they didn’t really believe themselves. After all, the only thing they had at this point in the story was that Jesus would be found wherever our lives are lived. And that’s because, through the Cross and in God’s willingness to love us to the end, we can trust “that the worst thing is not the last thing.”
That Easter promise is not an easy one to cling to because there’s plenty of stuff trying to convince us it’s not true. What we need is an external reminder to cut through all the noise and grief and busyness and ways we chose to not love or welcome each other. We need a kind of light, shining bright, informing us that our present reality has now been changed. When that light appears, we’ll do our best to ignore it by pretending we don’t see it or that everything seems okay enough right now. But as beloved children of God, the light of Jesus shines is a light we can never turn off. Every Easter, every Sunday, every time we gather to pray and sing and take a seat at Jesus’ table, this check reality light of our Lord shines – showing that our worst day will not be the last. Now we don’t always know how long or soul crushing these inbetween kind of days will be. But because the tomb is empty; because the women preached first; and because you, as you are right now, have been claimed in love through baptism, faith, and the fact that you’re here right now – we know Easter has come. Jesus will always be found among those who live in love. And he will be with you forever.
Amen.