There is a very popular television show on the air right now called the "Antique Road
Show, and it has both a US and international version. The basic premise behind the show, for those of you who have
not seen it, is that a group of appraisers with various specialties are brought to a given location, and people
are encouraged to bring items to be evaluated. Occasionally, will turn up with some item that has been stored in
their basement or attic for year, or perhaps tossed almost forgotten in the back of a drawer. They assume it has
little value, and it turns out to be priceless. More often than not, they will bring items that they have lavished
care upon which have been in their family for years and which they assumed had great worth…but it turns out that
it has worth only to them.
I share this with you at the start of our Easter meditation because much of this can also be said about the things
we have carried with us from our reading of these scriptures over the years, and the things we take away from our
celebration of this very holy day.
William Willimon, the chaplain at Duke University, where they do a bang up job of celebrating the Feast of the
Resurrection, decided several years ago that he would like some feedback about their Easter worship. So he asked
a sample of about 85 Easter worshipers one question: "What was it that left the greatest impression on you
in the Easter celebration that you experienced in Duke Chapel?" I wonder how would you answer that question
if, during the next week, someone called and asked "What was it that left the greatest impression on you in
the Easter service at the United Methodist Church of Red Bank"?
Dr. Willimon reported that the overwhelming number of people were most impressed with the glory of the hymns and
other Easter music. So I want to take this opportunity to thank our Choir, the Bell Choir, and the Navesink Brass
for doing double duty this morning and providing such a wonderful enhancement to our experience of Easter.
Next in line were the beautiful decorations and flowers. So I also want to take the opportunity to thank our Upreach
Committee, and specifically the Lively Arts portion of that group who have transformed our sanctuary into the beautiful
space you encountered this morning. Thank you Bruce, Tom and Vivian.
Coming in third was the tremendous sense of the Presence of the Spirit in the Easter congregation. So again, let
me thank all of you for your presence here this morning.
Coming in last, voted for by only four of the 85 people, was the sermon. Now I could feel really bad about that
if it wasn't for the fact that absolutely no one mentioned the remembrance of the resurrection.
By contrast, in John Irving's novel A Prayer for Owen Meany, Irving has a character by the name of Johnny illustrate
the primacy of this day. Johnny, the friend of Owen Meany, says:
I find that Holy Week is draining; no matter how many times I have lived through his crucifixion, my anxiety about
his resurrection is undiminished; I am terrified that, this year, it won't happen that, this year, I won't feel
it. Anyone can be sentimental about the Nativity; any fool can feel like a Christian at Christmas. But Easter is
the main event; if you don't believe in the resurrection, you're not a believer.
The resurrection…what does it really mean to us anyway? Does it have any real value to you? Marcus Borg has suggested
that we have missed most of the true
value of what God has done for us in "raising Jesus" if we see the resurrection as something that will
happen to us some day if we do the right thing now, rather than as something that is happening to us everyday despite
anything we may do or not do.
So I want us to think about some of the perhaps less obvious "treasures" that are being revealed to us
today in this very familiar and much loved portion of the gospel of John.
First, there is the gift of hearing again the voice of the Lord. Mary Magdalene is portrayed as someone who had
a deep love for Jesus of Nazareth. Someone who had intentionally chosen to follow him, listen to his every word,
and believe strongly in his character if not his theology. His tenderness had soothed some ancient pain in her,
and his gentle words had called her to a new level of hope. But having witnessed his final hours, her mind still
reeling from the horrors inflicted upon him, Mary truly believes she will never hear that gentle voice again.
As Mary "hears" Jesus call to her there is this nice allusion to an earlier chapter in John, chapter
10, where Jesus is portrayed as the Good Shepherd who know his sheep and whose sheep know his voice. The gatekeeper
we are told opens the gate for the sheep and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads
them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because again, they
know his voice. Jesus says, "I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as God knows me
and I know God. And I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must
bring them also, and they will listen to my voice as well. So there will be one flock, and one shepherd. My sheep
hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me." When we believe we will never hear the voice of God again,
and God speaks, something dead has been resurrected within us.
A second, and even more personal aspect of the resurrection is to hear the risen Christ calling you by your own
name - This naming is a re-membering, a re-creation, a re-storing of Mary to herself. It is not that she "recognizes"
Jesus, as much as she is utterly and gloriously known by the Risen Lord. It is her resurrection that is being proclaimed
through the Paschal Mystery. To focus on Jesus alone is to be blind to the new life that sprouts everywhere through
this wonderful mystery of Christ's intimate knowledge of us. Mary couldn't find Jesus or recognize him until He
spoke to her because Mary was looking for a dead Jesus. Yet with one word, "Mary" her eyes are opened.
He speaks her own name, a name no doubt incredibly familiar and important to him because of his own mother, yet
unique to her, just as all people are unique. The risen Christ remembers the individual and brings that intimacy
as a gift of the resurrection.
Thirdly, there is confrontation with the idea of having been wrong in your thinking about God -The difficult thing
for all who encounter the post-resurrection Jesus is that they don't recognize him because he is changed. He is
not resuscitated, like Lazarus apparently was. He doesn't just return to his former state. In John, Jesus is on
his way back to God, and therefore is surrounded by the glory of things yet to be revealed. For John, Easter and
Pentecost happen at once. There's no waiting around and meeting up later in Jerusalem as in the book of Acts. How
many experiences in our own lives - the death of a loved one, the death of a marriage, the death of a cherished
relationship, the death of some hope or dream - have begun in sadness and grief, hopelessness and helplessness,
then to turn to panic as we frantically search for something we know should be right where we left it - right here
- but it's not. How often do these emotions turn to fear because we have assumed the worst instead of the best?
How many times have we been confronted with what at first appeared to be a stupid question? A question like: Why
are you weeping? or Why are you afraid? or Where is your faith? A stupid question - only because we did not yet
see the miracle God had already begun on our behalf and for our benefit - in ways we had not yet seen or understood
- but one that God was about to reveal to us? How many times have we forgotten that God always saves the best for
last?
A fourth quality of the resurrection found here is the experience of being challenged to "let go" and
not cling to the past - The idea of Jesus saying "Do not hold me"….let go in order to embrace something
even greater….sometimes seen in the experience of evolving into one's own following the loss of a loved one or
career. He has asked please don't cling to the past, because he knows that all in all we would rather keep him
with us where we are than let him take us where he is going. Better we should let him hold on to us, and let him
take us into the white hot presence of God, than to try and confine him to some world of our own making.
Fifth, we are raised to share the "good news" with others - Easter was really a remarkable turn of events
for Mary - and eventually the rest of Jesus' disciples that day - and ultimately also for us. Easter is about the
gift of life that comes through the "ears" of faith - as we hear Jesus call us by name - call us by name
right in the midst of the fears, the questions, the confusions, the doubts and despair. And our sadness is turned
into joy, our despair is replaced by hope, our tears of grief are transformed into tears of joy. All of this is
supremely capped by the recognition that this joy is to be shared. The experience is meant to encourage others,
and takes on life of its own in the telling and re- telling. Mary was the first evangelist, she is certainly not
the last. We are all called to be evangelists for Christ. Not just hearers of the word, but doers, sharing the
revelation of what God has done for us through the power of the living Christ.
It was so intense. So deeply personal as to almost be embarrassing, but in the revelation to others our full humanity
is revealed. About twenty-five years ago the rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar shocked many traditionalists within
the church with the thought the Mary Magdalene might have had really romantic feelings for the former carpenter
from Nazareth. It is hardly startling anymore, but in the most beautiful ballad in that opera Mary speaks the fears
of all of us about the way a relationship with Jesus will change us completely:
"I don't know how to love him What to do how to move him I've been changed yes really changed In these past
few days when I've seen myself I seem like someone else. I don't know how to take this I don't see why he moves
me He's a man he's just a man and I've had some many men before In very many ways He's just one more. Should I
bring him down should I scream and shout Should I speak of love let my feelings out I never though I'd come to
this- What's it all about? Don't you think it's rather funny I should be in this position I'm the one who's always
been So calm so cool, no lover's fool running every show He scares me so. I never thought I'd come to this- What's
it all about yet? Yet, if he said he loved me I'd be lost I'd be frightened I couldn't cope just couldn't cope
I'd turn my head I'd back away I wouldn't want to know He scares me so,…I want him so,…I love him so."
Finally, I believe an important gift of the resurrection is what all the epistles are telling us about it. Namely
that resurrection changes everything. If Christ has been raised, and if we have been raised with him, there has
been a sea change! The present is, and the future will be, very, very different from the past. And this is what
Jesus is saying to Mary Magdalen there in that graveyard outside of Jerusalem on that early first Easter morning.
The former warm human relationship, something she has been used to, is over. Now, gently he brings her around to
realize that there is something different and something wonderful ahead. She must forge a new relationship with
him based on the new degree of spiritual growth which his resurrection has bestowed upon her and which his ascension
is about to complete. He is risen…and nothing will ever be the same again!
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