Resurrection 2009

Rev. Kristi Denham
Congregational Church of Belmont
April 12, 2009

Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Today we celebrate the most joyous event on our church calendar. We have walked through a remembering of the last week of Jesus’ life. He celebrated his final Passover meal with his friends and reminded them and us of the power of liberation from oppression and slavery that the escape from Egypt meant for their ancestors.

Easter is linked to Passover and it is also linked to the wonderful renewal of all life in the season of spring. Easter eggs and bunnies may seem frivolous and light-hearted but they remind us that this is really a joyful, playful, amazing day. Easter is all about life conquering death. We are an Easter people. We choose life!

In the Gospel According to Mark we read the oldest recorded version of this story. Written after the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem in 70 C.E., it tells of the time when Empire had destroyed any hope that a Davidic king could rule in Israel any time soon. Mark looks back at least forty years to describe events he probably did not witness.

He devotes half of his brief gospel to the last week of Jesus’ life. All the assumptions the people had held about a coming messiah were torn to shreds by Jesus’ death. He was expected to rule, not to die. And such a horrible death would not even allow him a proper burial. How could this happen? What did it mean?

Mark had some forty years to contemplate his answer. He wrote his gospel to challenge an early Christian community to learn from events and formulate their own answers. What does it mean to us today?

For Mark, the disciples were all mostly bumbling failures. They never understood what Jesus was trying to teach them. He ends his gospel where the work of Easter begins – at the empty tomb.

He offers no proofs, no encounters with the risen Christ, no fingers in the wounded hands, only terrified women running from an empty grave.

It is important to note that Matthew, Luke and John, all written at least ten to twenty years after Mark, based their telling on the version found in Mark. Only the first century Jewish historian, Josephus, can be accepted as an independent source. He mentions a trouble-maker and itinerant preacher named Jesus of Nazareth who was crucified under Pontius Pilate -- that much of the story is fact. Is the rest of it true?

Native American story tellers often end their tales by saying, “I cannot tell you it happened just this way, but I know that it is true.” Perhaps this is the best way to approach our own ancient stories. Whether fact or story, there is meaning here for us.

We are a resurrection people. Every Sunday the church remembers the risen Christ – his teachings and his healing power. Even during Lent, as we go inward and grow a bit more somber, the forty days of Lent don’t include the Sundays.

What must that first Easter have been like? Thomas Crosby shared with me a story of a new minister he knew who planned an Easter Sunday service something like that first Easter must have been – dark, lonely, confused, a scattering of people hiding away from the authorities they feared would soon be coming after them. No joyful music. No flowers. Only the mystery of the empty tomb. Needless to say, it didn’t go over very well.

Imagine yourself at that empty tomb on that first Easter. Would you have run? Would you have been confused? It really is an incredibly miracle that some 2000 years later we can celebrate with so much joy and abandon the wild assurance of our faith. Christ is risen! He is risen indeed!

What happened in those first days after the women ran from the messenger in the empty tomb is a mystery. But Jesus’ followers chose to find one another and to support one another through their grief. If they hadn’t, they would not have experienced the Christ Spirit coming to them and filling them with power. They would not have experienced the courage born of telling their stories and remembering all that Jesus had taught them. They would have remained frightened and alone. But they didn’t.

We don’t need to believe the Nicene Creed and its literal explanations of events to know that resurrection is true. Most of us here today probably question the literal versions of these events. That’s okay.

If you have ever known the power of love to transform your life, then you are one of the Easter people. You know about resurrection power.

If you have walked through dark, uncertain times without giving up, because you found support from others to keep going, then you are one of the Easter people and you know about resurrection power.

If you have lost loved ones, yet somehow found comfort and the courage to go on, then you are one of the Easter people and you know about resurrection power.

If you have faced your fears, faced a job loss, or homelessness, or sudden and total change and are here to tell about it, then you are one of the Easter people and you know about resurrection power.

If you have survived addiction to alcohol or drugs or an unhealthy relationship and have made it through to the other side, then you are an Easter person and know about resurrection power.

We are Easter people. We are resurrection people.

The Vietnamese Buddhist Monk, Thich Nhat Hanh, says that the most important need we have in the 21st century, is to find and maintain trusting communities. Too many of us are isolated and trying to live out meaningful lives on our own.

For most of my adult life I was one of them. I thought that churches were full of judgmental people who wouldn’t like me. I thought they would expect me to check my brain at the door since I questioned everything I read and could not take the Bible literally. I was shocked and amazed when I discovered the United Church of Christ and other progressive Christian churches where I could question and learn and be accepted just as I was. The Eight Points on the back of our bulletin are true for many more communities of faith than I ever realized.

These faith communities didn’t try to mold me into a carbon copy church lady. They loved me just as I am. And their love has been a resurrection story for me.

Most of you know Amanda, our wild prodigal daughter who started coming to church almost ten years ago. With her tattoos and piercings and purple hair she was not your typical church teen. (But then, what is a typical church teen?) We were the community that loved her when she had a hard time loving herself. We recognized her gifts and were patient with her struggles. Now she is a resurrection woman. She is a mother bear for her two children, strong and courageous. She is an Easter miracle in our midst – one of the more obvious ones.

But all of us are Easter miracles. We may just be more subtle in the way we have faced and overcome our challenges.

Some of us may still feel caught between the tomb and transformation. The confusion of our dark night may not be quite over. Please know that you are loved, that God’s love is unconditional. It lives in you and in each one of us.

Christ is risen. The Christ spirit incarnates in humanity making all life sacred. That spirit is risen in you and in me. We are Easter People! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed!  Happy Easter!