Sermon Easter Sunday 2014

Sermon:

Text:

Grace and Peace to you from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ who is Risen and holds onto us.

            Ah, Easter, it marks the beginning of my favorite time of year, springtime is finally here, despite all the snow in the last few weeks. Plants are starting to pop up, leaves are starting to bud on a few trees, it’s finally warming up. I’ll start looking for plants at greenhouses, my mom who is here this morning I’m sure has been stockpiling things for a few months already, and is just waiting to get out into the garden again. Life has begun the return to the dead ground of winter.

            The connection between Christ’ resurrection and Springtime seems obvious then, we see the new life coming up out of the ground, and we then connect that to Jesus’ resurrection, where there was death, now life springs forth.

            But, it’s not really obvious, because, yes, spring and plants sprouting and blooming is natural, but the resurrection is not. It is not what we expect when we bury someone. When we say goodbye, we place them in the ground, and we mark it with a stone to remember them, and we then attempt to move on. You say goodbye, you pay your respects, “knowing that the only place spring time happens in a cemetery is on the graves, not in them.”

            That’s where we find Mary Magdalene this day in our Gospel. She is suffering and grieving, the teacher she knew so well, and followed so closely is gone, and so soon, and so suddenly. She thinks, Wasn’t it just last Sunday when we rode triumphantly into Jerusalem, waving our palm branches and shouting hosanna? Did this week actually occur? Did the prayer in the garden after the supper really end with Judas’ betrayal? Did the trial take place? Did I watch as my Lord was beaten, flogged, and crucified? Was he really buried? Did that all happen?

            And so she goes to verify, she can’t deal with it, it can’t be true, and to the tomb she goes.

            And as she gets there, something is wrong, the stone is not covering the entrance, she doesn’t even look inside, but panics and runs to tell the disciples, They have taken the LORD!

            Peter and the other disciple run as fast as they can to the tomb, they look in and see nothing but linen wrappings, Jesus is indeed not there. They do not understand but return home. Leaving Mary still there by the tomb, alone in her grief and tears. She looks into the tomb, and sees the miraculous, two angels sit there, and they ask her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” “They have taken my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.”

            When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for? Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, "Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away." Jesus said to her, "Mary!" She turned and said to him in Hebrew, "Rabbouni!" (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, "Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father.”

            It’s a strange thing to say to someone who is grieving, Do not hold on to me. And especially to say that about holding on to Jesus. When we ourselves are in the midst of grief, the first thing we often do is hold onto Jesus. We often have nowhere else to turn, and so it’s Jesus that we cling to.

            And I think it goes beyond the grief of death, everywhere in life we try to find places to give us life, but those things let us down and hurt us, and so we cling to Christ.

            And so, when I first read this text I was confused, why should we not cling to Christ? You could say that he just means in that small moment between his resurrection and his ascension to the Father, but when I looked at Mary’s actions that prompted that statement from Jesus, I wonder if it is in fact something else entirely.

            In our text after Mary first answers the angels she turns around from the tomb, and sees Jesus as the gardener. But, when Jesus hears her fear, the reason for her weeping, and responds, Mary! She turns again. I do not think that she in the mean time turned away from Jesus, and is here turning back once again. I think that it was her very being turning to Jesus. She had been clinging to the Jesus she knew, the dead one. The one who suffered, died and was buried. But, here in front of her is the resurrected Jesus, who hears her concerns, why is she weeping? And calls her by name. And in saying her name, Jesus holds onto her.

And in so doing turns her to see him as he now is, alive, death has been destroyed, life is come again.

            It’s not that we shouldn't hold on to Jesus, that we shouldn’t cling to him when we have no where else to turn, but instead to realize that the resurrection means that Jesus holds onto us.

Jesus enters our lives and asks us, Why are you weeping? And then calls us by name, Erik, you are a beloved Child of God, and I will hold onto you in the midst of life.

            I want you to do that with your neighbor now, to the person on either side, say, name, you are a beloved Child of God, and Christ holds onto you.

This is Easter vision. We have been seen, known, held, and called by God through the crucified and risen Savior and, having received the Spirit through baptism, we all can now see. We can see Christ, and we can see Christ in our neighbor. No one is invisible to God, and no one is invisible to us. What wondrous love is this!

So beloved children of God, with newly opened eyes let us be bold to say, “Christ is risen. Christ is risen indeed. Hallelujah!” “Christ is risen. Christ is risen indeed. Hallelujah!”