Saint Matthew 27:57–28:10
It is really obvious that this Easter is unlike any Easter any of us have experienced in our lifetime. All over this land churches with wise leaders are empty.
The feeling of emptiness may have been underscored at the beginning out our time together when my “Christ is risen!” was not greeted with the usual rafters ringing shouted reply of, “He is risen indeed!” but with deafening silence. It was strange. It was strange indeed.
We are not used to empty churches at Easter. We usually save that for the Sunday after Easter when the crowds are so diminished that it only looks empty. Easter is the holiday that packs the place with people we haven’t seen for a year or perhaps only since last Christmas.
Some preachers take the opportunity to be snarky as if saying snide things to their biggest audience of the year is a good idea. I promise you that I won’t because if people pick one Sunday to be in church or listen to a video this is the one. Easter is the one Sunday when the church has something really important to say to the world about matters of life and death.
If you’re going to talk about important stuff like that you might as well do it up right and break out a brass choir; fill the place with lilies; put on your best outfit because what you are to be about is big, really big.
That is why it is also essential that we take this message in when we are with others. We need their voices to uplift ours and the presence with us to give us the confidence of the crowd to believe that what we are hearing is true.
On that first Easter they didn’t have that luxury for there were very, very, very few people who were not confused, uncertain and not sure if they would be up to the task ahead.
In Saint Mark’s gospel, the briefest we have, the women have one thing on their minds as they walked to the tomb. Jesus’ burial had been done hurriedly just as the sun was setting and now they were going to make sure that his lifeless body would be cared for properly. They were going to bring their last gift of love to poor, dead Jesus but as they got closer “They worried out loud to each other, ‘Who will roll back the stone from the tomb for us?’”`1
They had watched Joseph of Arimathea come out of nowhere to claim the body and place it lovingly in his tomb and roll a large stone across the entrance. There was a large barrier blocking their path to discovering the resurrection just as there is an impediment to our experiencing the resurrection in the usual way.
In their case it was a boulder in our case it is a virus.
When you look at pictures of it Covid-19 looks like it could have been designed by a child as an art-and-crafts project. To reproduce a model all you would have to do is take a soiled Styrofoam ball and stick red pins in it. There you would have a perfect replica of something so small it could be only seen through a very strong microscope.
It might as well be as big as a house because it is getting in the way of everything.
It is getting in the way of our being together but that pales in comparison to what others are going through. Some are isolated in the rooms or apartments in retirement communities. Others haven’t been outside in days locking themselves up and sheltering in place as if a murderer was lurking outside. Some families have not even been able to give their loved ones who have succumbed a proper burial. This tiny virus looks as immoveable as the rock that sealed Jesus’ tomb.
How I wish I could pivot now to tell you that there will be an earthquake and just like that this will all be over. I’m afraid I can’t do that.
That the churches are not packed but empty on this Easter is proof that all of our wishes won’t make things right instantaneously. In fact, that hope doesn’t even square with the events of that first Easter.
Jesus didn’t say “Do not be afraid” after his original greeting just to break the ice. He said it to break the tension and counter the fear “because on Easter morning the disciples were still in mourning, still lost and heartsick over devastating loss, still trying to grapple with a breathtaking new reality.” Jesus was dead.
Now he is alive and talking to them in a graveyard.
“And isn’t that the point? Jesus doesn’t wait for the moment of triumph. Instead, he meets us in the midnight hour, in the darkness before dawn, in the hopelessness of our lives and the brokenness of our world.”2
That may be the point that this Easter drives home to us like no other before.
Jesus doesn’t hang around waiting for us to get all dressed up and come to him he comes to us. In this troubled times he is not only with us, he is ahead of us. He is going into our Galilees wherever they may be.
While we need each other to gather and give a full-throated celebration of all he means to us he is still at work in the world and in us.
He is at work in healthcare professionals and first responders.
He is at work in the minds and labors of the researchers who search desperately for a vaccine.
He is at work in governors and local officials who are stepping in and taking charge.
He is at work in firefighters, and police, and paramedics who do their job even though they know that in going home they may bring a danger to their families.
He is at work in grocery story clerks and other essential workers who are called upon to do their jobs in the midst of crowds.
He is at work in the garbage collector, the janitor, and the cleaning staff that picks up our messes.
He’s at work in me standing in our church alone.
He is with you sitting in your pajamas listening to this over the crunch of your breakfast cereal.
He is with you who are listening to appease a loved one the same way you would have by coming to church on Easter.
He is even with those of you whose morning coffee hasn’t kicked in yet and you have had to replay parts of this sermon ten times because you dozed off.
Christ is with you! Christ is with us! Because Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia! Amen.
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1. St. Mark 1:3. (MESSAGE) [MESSAGE=The Message]
2. Leah Waldron Lyman. “Where We Need Him Most.” Modern Metanoia. Modern Metanoia.org, March 30, 2020.
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