Sermon by Walter G. Edmonds
Damascus United Methodist Church
Acts 10:34-43; Psalm 118:1-2, 14-24; I Corinthians 15:1-11; John 20:1-18
Easter Sunday – April 12, 2009
He is risen! He is risen indeed.
St. John’s Gospel Resurrection story seeks to glorify the Word among us. In the opening verses of St. John’s Gospel, Chapter 1, we hear these familiar words. “He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in is name, he gave the right to become children of God- children born not of natural descent, not of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God. The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.” (St. John 1; 10 – 14)
Though we read these words at the birth of Jesus to confirm his incarnation, these words are really only valid and powerful after the resurrection. It is the singular act of the resurrection in the garden that throws these words before the whole world. Incarnation only becomes important after we see the work of the abba Father in the cross and the resurrection from the grave. Then we can say, “We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, (the one-of-a-kind glory that heralds the greatest revelation of God, “Death and resurrection become God’s gift in Jesus Christ.”
Let’s understand today what the writer of St. John was most interested in us getting from the three scenes in St. John 20, 1 – 18. First, Mary is coming to the tomb probably to anoint the body of Jesus with myrrh, which was the custom for women close to the deceased to do. Seeing the stone rolled away, sparks her interesting assumption. “They took the Master from the tomb. We don’t know where they’ve put him,” she blurts out to Peter and the beloved disciple, presumably John, two of the strongest leaders of the disciple band. Who’s “they?” is our first question. Is “they,” the Hebrew leaders from the Sanhedrin who are concerned about the followers of Jesus trumping up a resurrection story? Is “they,” the Roman guard who want further sport with the annoying Jews who irritate their daily life incessantly? Is it Joseph and Nicodemus who are making some physical adjustments since the corpse was laid in a borrowed tomb under pressures of haste? Mary seems to jump to a conclusion that the “they” are the worried Jews. But what of her inability to think of Jesus’ rising; it is, as we might put it, “not on her radar screen” in the least. The feeling is that Mary is coming to the two strongest disciples to get some suggestions for her failed comprehension.
Now we see Peter and John running to the tomb to see if they can figure out Mary’s problem and her apotheosis. John gets to the tomb first but does not go in. Why? He just takes a quick peek and notices the bands of linen that had been wrapped around Jesus’ body laying in a spot. Is John waiting for Peter, so that they can figure this out together? Peter arrives and steps fully inside the tomb. He sees the strips of bandage, but the scripture makes clear he also sees the burial cloth for the head, folded up and at some distance from the bands. What is running through his head? If the body was stolen why would the “they’s” bother to take off the bandage wraps? Wouldn’t it be easier to just carry the body away in the bands? Furthermore, even if they took off the bandages, why would the burial cloth for the head be somewhere way off, and be folded neatly in its place? John enters the tomb. Scripture says he now saw, assuming he saw it all as Peter had. But scripture further says, “he believed.” What did he believe? That someone had stolen the body, or moved it to another location. Scripture simply says, John believed, and there follows this remark, “They, probably meaning the disciples, still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.” So in this second episode we have the corroboration of Mary’s discovery. That is, there is the empty grave and linen bindings seemingly discarded in a garden with several tombs, this most typical tomb with several niches shows that Jesus’ corpse had been laid there, but was now gone. Then again John and Peter in their ignorance could only support Mary’s assumption. “We don’t know where he is.” John, the writer of this Gospel, wants us to understand that the two major disciples are still not getting the message, just as most all of the disciples in the stories of John’s Gospel did not perceive what Christ was doing in their midst. They saw, but they didn’t see. (Much of this reflection comes from Paul Minear’s article We don’t know where…” from Interpretation 30, 1976.)
Furthermore, verse 10 tells us that the two disciples went back to their homes. Does that sound like the principal disciples got it, and just needed to go home for a cup of coffee with their families? Would not these disciples have run to their hiding brothers and told them the remarkable news? The account almost suggests indifference, or at least great scriptural ignorance. St. Luke 24: 12 is perhaps a gloss on this ignorance, “(Peter) saw the strips of linen lying by themselves, and he went away, wondering to himself what had happened.”
The third episode in the story occurs without Mary having any interchange with the other two disciples. They run off, and Mary still seems to be lamenting about who stole her Lord. Crying, she looks in the tomb and there are two angels now seated on the niche, one at the top and one at the bottom. Now we know that angels can look very much like people, but the account here says that these two men were wearing white. Surely Mary must have known these men were no ordinary beings in the tomb. What do they ask? “Woman, why are you crying?” Still hung up with her initial take on the rolled away stone, she says, “They have taken my Lord away, and I don’t know where they have put him.” It is as though Mary was used to seeing angels in white talking to her, or that she was in her own world with her own thinking and oblivious to the resurrection immediately before her. John makes it clear that so far, nobody can see the new reality, even those that had been the most in the “know” so to speak. Again, does this not remind us of St. John 1: 11? “He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.”
Finally, John tells us that Jesus approaches Mary. Still in her preoccupation and befuddlement, she cannot see the Master and guesses that the One before her is the Gardener. Yes, grief can be so great. Yes, we can have such a predisposition to what we think is happening, that we can miss the main event. For the third time, after the gardener observes her tears and makes inquiry, she puts her lament on the line, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.” This is both the height of dire desire, and the height of self absorption. The break through to Mary of the new reality comes with the voice of the One she has been most affected by in her life. The stopping of the redundant story of who stole the body is radically removed by the most human of elements- the voice of One who is like no other. All of us in this room know the show stopping that comes when someone we hold most dear or better still, most primal to our existence, says our name. And if that voice says our name in person or even in our dreams it breaks into our deepest essence of our soul. We are drawn into the person’s power and spirit. We are united with them and made one with them in a moment, and that moment may have long reaching effect- sometimes for good, and sometimes for the “not so good.”
Mary is transformed, better still, delivered from the death keeping agenda in her mind. As one theologian puts it, “Mary is at once abruptly terminated from both her grief and her quest for the grave.” (We don’t know where…; Paul Minear; Interpretation 30, 1976) What does Mary say? Rabboni. The word for teacher, which in this case is filled with the intimacy of a deep relationship and an at-one-ment, atonement with Jesus. This is the Gospeler’s goal of the entire book, to have every reader leave their world of tomb searching, and therefore death agenda keeping, whatever that involves, and hear the fresh voice of Jesus. Mary suddenly hears, and she is introduced to resurrection: that is, being delivered completely from all those things that only lead to the “niched” grave. Mary is given Jesus’ ascending spirit, and she begins the new “life after life” release that John himself knows and wants all his readers to share.
So, what does that mean for all of us on this Easter Sunday 2009? We can be right here in this room still asking the question, “Where is he? Where did he go? Where else do I need to seek Him that I haven’t searched for? What did they do with him? The “they’s” could be anyone from the conservatives to the liberals, theologians to Newsweek editors, pastors in this church to the people on the street. But sooner or later, if we can keep some part of our agenda free for the holy, (pray sing, and the rest), and not stuff it with our own perceptions, desires and demands, Jesus will speak our name. Jesus will speak our name and cut straight through all the stuff we keep erecting as we grow older and become obsessed with the niched tombs.
John in chapter 20 of his Gospel wants us to know that our risen Jesus is still in the garden of our souls waiting to say our name. John in this resurrection chapter 20 wants us to know that we can be better than Peter, the beloved disciple and Mary Magdalene, and see the signs and change our agenda, and hear His voice. John wants us to know that the news of the linen cloth and the calling of Mary’s name still carry the invitation to his resurrection and life eternal.
And he walk with me and he talks with me,
And he tells me I am his own,
And the voice I hear falling on my ear,
None other has ever known.
