Luke 24:1-12 - see scripture text here »,
Acts 10:34-43: see scripture text here »
In 1993, a group of FBI agents investigated a psychiatric hospital in San Diego, California, for medical insurance fraud. While working there, they called a nearby pizza delivery place to order a quick dinner for the group. The conversation was recorded and here is how it went:
Agent: “Hello. I would like to order 19 large pizzas and 67 cans of soda.”
Pizza Place: “And where would you like them delivered?”
Agent: “We're over at the psychiatric hospital.”
Pizza Place: “The psychiatric hospital?”
Agent: “That's right. I'm an FBI agent.”
Pizza Place: “You're an FBI agent?”
Agent: “That's correct. Just about everybody here is.”
Pizza Place: “And you're at the psychiatric hospital?”
Agent: “That's correct. And make sure you don't go through the front doors. We have them locked. You will have to go around to the back to the service entrance to deliver the pizzas.”
Pizza Place: “And you say you're all FBI agents?”
Agent: “That's right. How soon can you have them here?”
Pizza Place: “And everyone at the psychiatric hospital is an FBI agent?”
Agent: “That's right. We've been here all day and we're starving.”
Pizza Place: “How are you going to pay for all of this?”
Agent: “I have my cheque book right here.”
Pizza Place: “And you're all FBI agents?”
Agent: “That's right. Everyone here is an FBI agent. Can you remember to bring the pizzas and sodas to the service entrance in the rear? We have the front doors locked.”
Pizza Place: “I don't think so.” (Click)
This is one of those seemingly far-fetched stories you want to check to determine if it is true -- or not. You want to be sure it is not merely a fabricated urban legend. When I read a story like this, I look it up on an Internet site called snopes.com. This is a website dedicated to finding if such stories are true or false. According to snopes.com, this telephone conversation between an FBI agent investigating a psychiatric hospital and a Pizza parlour actually took place!
Remember the Scripture from Luke’s Gospel this morning. Here is a possible conversation that could have taken place in that story:
Mary Magdalene: “Peter! John! The tomb is empty! Jesus’ body isn’t in the tomb!”
Peter: “What did you say?”
Joanna: “It’s true! It’s true! The tomb is empty! The stone was rolled away! Jesus is no longer in the tomb!”
James: “Look, I’m not up to your far-fetched story. That’s too unbelievable. We know Jesus died and he was buried.”
Mary the mother of James: “James, don’t you believe me? I’m your mother! We just told you that we found the tomb empty!”
All the women together: “Please believe us! We wouldn’t lie to you. It is true! We didn’t know what to make of it either until . . . .”
Andrew: “Until what?”
Mary Magdalene: “Until, out of nowhere, two men – in shining clothes – said to us: ‘Why are you looking for the Living One in a cemetery? He is not here! He is alive! Remember how he told us he had to be handed over to sinners, be killed on a cross, and in three days rise up?’ Peter, John, James, Andrew – all of you – don’t you remember Jesus telling us that in Galilee?”
The Apostles: “Nonsense. What kind of an idle tale are you trying to spin? Unbelievable.”
The website snopes.com exists, it says, “to remind us that no matter how bizarre, far-fetched or incredible a story may seem at first glance, it should never be entirely discounted without at least some effort being made to verify it” (www.snopes.com). Let me suggest that snopes.com has it right. Such a “preposterous” event as the physical resurrection of Jesus requires some personal effort at verifying the possibility of it being true. And I think Jesus’ resurrection is worth thinking about seriously rather than being quick to write it off as many do in this skeptical age. In Luke’s version of events, Peter at least made the effort to run to the tomb to see for himself if it was empty. And he came away from the empty tomb perplexed, as the women had been, but also amazed – and wondering and open to learning more. And there was more to discover as we will see.
Our story in Luke 24 begins with the obvious: Jesus was dead. And it is significant that his followers assumed he was dead and would stay dead (24:1-3). The women knew they had come to the right tomb because the final verses in Luke 23 (55-56) tell us they were watching when Jesus’ body was placed inside the tomb after his crucifixion. So early Sunday morning, they went to that tomb with the necessary spices to anoint the body of Jesus – an action that showed proper respect for the dead. You might think the empty tomb would be an exhilarating experience for the women. Jesus was not in the grave! Therefore, he was alive! Hallelujah! But the meaning of the empty tomb was not at all clear to them. It was confusing and mystifying. Dead bodies were supposed to remain dead.
I don’t think we are much different today. We, too, assume that death is death. A dead body stays dead. William Shakespeare is dead. Michelangelo is dead. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is dead. All the great artists and writers of great literature from the past are dead. We still read their writings. We still listen to their music. We still look at their magnificent works of art. We are still inspired by them but they are still dead.
And Jesus died too. Only he never drew a picture, composed a piece of music or wrote anything that was left for posterity -- as far as we know. But most historians and theologians agree we do have a reasonably reliable historical record (at the very least!) of some of Jesus’ teachings and actions. And they still do inspire many of us who hear or read them to follow his teachings. But as one commentator noted, we tend “to enshrine the dead Jesus in the tomb of memory.” And we do that quite well today. We recall that Jesus was an insightful teacher. He was a fiery preacher at times. He was a compassionate healer. But he died. So we hallow his memory and revere some of his teachings – much as the women wanted to honour Jesus’ dead body with spices and ointments. One might think that this would be all that is necessary.
But then the women heard a message that ran counter to what they knew to be true. They knew Jesus had died and was buried in a tomb blocked by a large heavy rock. But then they saw the rock had been rolled to one side and the tomb was empty. Then they heard the message: “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here! He has risen!” (24:5). What strikes me the most here is that the women encountered the resurrection through a message. They were told that Jesus had risen but they did not see the risen Jesus himself -- at least, not at this point. What they had was a message – reminding them of what Jesus had taught them in Galilee about his death and resurrection.
Actually, that is precisely what we have today -- the message of Jesus’ resurrection. We too are told: “He is not here! He has risen!” We have heard that message for years. We have heard it again this morning in so many ways. Sometimes I wish God had done things differently. Wouldn’t it have been so much easier back then to have the women and all the Apostles and maybe even his enemies come to the tomb and see Jesus walk out into the light of a new day? And wouldn’t it be much easier for us now to believe if Jesus were simply to appear in dazzling glory before us as we gather on an Easter morning generations after that first Easter morning? But our situation is like that of the women on the first Easter: we are all given a message of resurrection that flies in the face of what we know to be true – that dead is dead!
What is the only logical response to such a message of an empty tomb and of Jesus’ physical resurrection? Isn’t it unbelief? Experience teaches us that death wins. But the Easter message says Jesus is no longer dead but alive! When such contradictory claims collide, maybe it does seem to make sense to continue affirming what we already know – that dead means dead.
It was the women who brought the message to the others -- including those who were closest to Jesus. Not only a message about the empty tomb but also the message of the resurrection – that Jesus lives, that he is not in the tomb because he has risen! And the Apostles responded as people regularly respond even today: they thought the message was “an idle tale [or ‘nonsense’] and they did not believe the women” (24:11).
Someone has noted that unbelief does not mean people believe nothing. Rather, unbelief means they believe something else. People say “I don't believe it” because there is something else they believe more strongly. Yet the resurrection challenges our certainties. Can we be so sure? Experience teaches us that death wins every time and that even the strongest succumb to it. But then we hear that Jesus Christ is no longer dead. That he is alive. “Really?” -- we may find ourselves thinking. What do we make of all this? The Easter message of Jesus’ resurrection tells us at least this: That while death is real, it is not final. Death is real but it is not final. The Easter message tells us that, in Jesus Christ, life gets the last word!
The Easter message calls us from our old belief in death to a new belief in life. The claim that the tomb could not hold Jesus, the idea that the one who died by crucifixion rose from the dead, is so outrageous it might make us wonder whether it might -- just might -- be true! The Apostles initially thought the message was nonsense (24:11). Yet the message was so shocking Peter had to go and take a look for himself (24:12). And he had to wonder, “What if it is true?”
My friends, we too have heard the rumour that Jesus is alive. And we have come to hear it again this morning: "What if Jesus’ resurrection from the dead is true? What if death is real (and we know it is) but not final? What if Jesus is not merely in the past but in the present too? What if Jesus were to meet us here and now in some way? And what if Jesus will meet us after we die and we are raised to new life in his presence as we see taught in the Scripture? What if that human hope of life after death is actually real?
I’ll finish with a story about the brilliant British philosopher A. N. Wilson who was born in 1950. Early in his career, many had hoped he would become the next C. S. Lewis. But as a young man, Wilson began to wonder how much of the Easter story he accepted. By his 30s, he had lost all religious belief and publicly repudiated his Christian faith and became an atheist. He soon embraced the role of a harsh, cynical critic of Christianity and of any faith in God at all. In 1992 he wrote a book called Jesus: A Life claiming Jesus was merely a failed messianic prophet. But on the Saturday before Easter in 2009, he wrote an astonishing article for London's prestigious newspaper, the Daily Mail, in which he shared his experience of participating in a Palm Sunday service. He wrote:
“When I took part in the procession last Sunday and heard the Gospel being chanted, I assented to it with complete simplicity. My own return to faith has surprised no one more than myself. Why did I return to it? Partially, perhaps it is no more than the confidence I have gained with age. Rather than being cowed by all the liberal clever-clogs on the block, I relish the notion that, by asserting a belief in the risen Christ, I am defying them.…
“But there is more to it than that. My belief has come about in large measure because of the lives and examples of people I have known -- not the famous, not saints, but friends and relations who have lived, and faced death, in the light of the Resurrection story [and] in the quiet acceptance that they have a future after they die.…
“Sadly, [the atheists and secularists] have all but accepted that only stupid people actually believe in Christianity, and that the few intelligent people left in the churches are there only for the music or believe it all in some symbolic or contorted way which, when examined, turns out not to be belief after all. As a matter of fact, I am sure the opposite is the case and that materialist atheism is not merely an arid creed, but totally irrational.
“Materialist atheism says we are just a collection of chemicals. It has no answer whatsoever to the question of how we should be capable of love or heroism or poetry if we are simply animated pieces of meat. Resurrection, which proclaims that matter and spirit are mysteriously conjoined, is the ultimate key to who we are. It confronts us with an extraordinarily haunting story. J. S. Bach believed the story, and set it to music. Most of the greatest writers and thinkers of the past 1,500 years have believed it. But an even stronger argument is the way that Christian faith transforms individual lives [people we all know].”
[A. N. Wilson, "Religion of Hatred: Why We Should No Longer Be Cowed
by the Chattering Classes Ruling Britain Who Sneer at Christianity," U.N. Daily Mail (4-11-09)]
The reading in Luke’s Gospel this morning stops with Peter’s amazement at the empty tomb. But we know that is not the end of the story. The four Gospel records tell us more. As Peter said in Acts 10, he was an eyewitness along with others who followed Jesus from Galilee – they saw Jesus and they ate and drank with him after his resurrection.
He is risen, my friends! Death does not get the final word!
And God asks each of us as the women were asked at the empty tomb: “Why do you seek the living among the dead?”
Through the living resurrected Jesus, God gives us the gift of life.
May this be so for you and for me.
Rev. Chris Miller
OYM - Oriole-York Mills United Church,Toronto [website »]
Easter Sunday April 4, 2010
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