He Is Risen!

But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they went to the tomb, taking the spices they had prepared. And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel. And as they were frightened and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to them, “Why do you seek 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 delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified and on the third day rise.” And they remembered his words. (Luke 24:1-8 ESV).

I grew up in Galveston where it was not uncommon for me to be on the beach. I still remember some of those “first things” from those days. While not life changing, I still remember the first time I held a seashell to my ear and heard the ocean in it. I know you can explain it to me today scientifically, but there is a mystery in that seashell and every shell that holds the ocean inside of it. Over the years, I have grown to love the mysteries of this world. Trees go to sleep in the winter, and grow new leaves in the spring. How do they know to do that? Flowers, with some illusive knowledge, know when and how to grow from seeds. Caterpillars withdraw into a cocoon, and emerge as a butterfly. Babies, started from the meeting of two individual cells, know just how to divide into the individual parts and organs that make up a human body. At a specific point in development, a heartbeat begins in a still developing heart. How does it know to begin? And who knows what the signal is? But at a certain appointed time, labor begins, and a baby emerges into the world. Science can tell you how they happen, but for me, they are still mysteries.

Even though Easter has gone for this year, I thought it would be interesting to continue looking at that great mystery. Our Scripture today finds us at the graveside of Jesus. It is early on Sunday morning. Jesus had been laid to rest on Friday afternoon. Saturday was the Sabbath, and so it was not until this morning that the women who had followed Jesus and who also had prepared the necessary spices and ointments to embalm him were able to return to the tomb, in order to prepare his body. Imagine their surprise to find the tomb open. Imagine their reaction to find his body was not there. Imagine their response to the two men standing by the tomb. ‘Why look for the living where the dead are laid?’ they say. ‘Remember his teaching back in Galilee?’ The women do remember his teaching. Jesus would suffer at the hands of sinful men, be crucified, and on the third day, he would rise again. I find their almost instantaneous belief interesting. Do you think they saw the mystery in the resurrection? Did they ask or wonder how it could be? Did they stop to puzzle the impossibilities? No, they just rejoiced in this wonderful, mysterious moment. They ran back to tell the disciples and everyone else what had happened. It is there that they meet with skepticism and question. It is impossible and unexplainable. It simply cannot be. The disciples called it a tale of nonsense, and so they didn’t believe it. It is the condition of our world at large. So many people refuse to believe what is not tangible, what cannot be explained. For so many years, our ability to reason anything out has been so emphasized that we have no trust of anything without a reasonable, logical, scientific explanation. This is compounded by reason’s failure to explain everything for us. Logic and education has let us down. The mystery still remains. It is not logical. The resurrection cannot be explained.

Reading further we can see what Peter did. He falls neither with the women who come back with this marvelous tale, nor with the disciples who do not believe what the women tell them. He must see for himself. He goes to the tomb. He steps inside and sees the emptiness within. I imagine he touches and fondles the linen wrappings. And then he returns home, wondering at what had happened. Can you imagine his footsteps as he makes his way back to the upper room? I see the events of the last days and years replaying in his head. He is remembering as the women were called to do, what Jesus had told them concerning events that would happen in Jerusalem. His heart wants to believe in the impossible. His sensibilities make him fearful to do so. It is in Peter that I see most of us that would gather here in the garden early this Easter morning.

And it seems to be with hesitancy that we believe in the resurrection as well. Yet we seem to let Easter slip in and out so quietly in our world. It seems that we let it be just another day. We don’t seem to proclaim it as loudly. Our revelry in its meaning appears subdued. Are we, also, wanting to believe in the impossible, but fearful to really do so, fearful to make a big deal about it? Yes we believe in the resurrection, but we proclaim it in quiet voices. Can you ponder the wonder of it all, this Easter morning? Perhaps like Peter, does your heart beat faster as you begin to complicate the implication of the resurrection? Claim the grace of the resurrection as your own. Don’t try to explain it. Don’t even try to understand it. Just believe it, and be awash in it.