Christ Episcopal Church
Cleveland, NC
RCL Year B (Easter) - April 12, 2009
Acts 10:34-43
Psalm 118:1-2, 14-24
1 Corinthians 15:1-11
John 20:1-18
(transcribed from a recording of the Easter sermon - no manuscript / no notes)
Alleluia, Christ is risen!
Congregation: The Lord has risen indeed, Alleluia…
(no, no, no… there’s no energy in that)
ALLELUIA, CHRIST IS RISEN!
Congregation: The Lord has risen indeed, Alleluia!
One more time…
ALLELUIA, CHIRST IS RISEN!
Congregation: THE LORD HAS RISEN INDEED, ALLELUIA!
The vestry should have to meet to decided if they should replace the nails in the roof after that! This is something to get excited about! This is why we are Christian! The stone has been rolled away, the tomb is empty! He has risen like he said it would happen.
We get the story this morning from John’s Gospel. John’s Gospel story is interlaced with all kinds of intricate meaning, but the message is the same, “Christ is risen, he is not here! Why do you seek the living among the dead?” Think about it.
The story opens up with the two disciples running to the tomb, trying to outrun each other. There’s Peter, and the unnamed disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, who is never really named in the scriptures. Who is that disciple? The disciple that Jesus loved… The disciple that outruns Peter on the way to the tomb. You can see them in your head, running together, trying to get there… Who is that disciple? The unnamed disciple… The beloved disciple? I want to suggest for a minute that Heather is that disciple, or Shaun, or Mildred, or Sallie, or Jane, or Laura or Any of us… Any of us in this room is that beloved disciple. That beloved disciple that outruns Peter to the tomb… He gets there first, but is scared. So scared that he just peaks in, to see only the darkness of the tomb. And Peter gets there, and Peter goes in first. And we believe today, because Peter believed, and saw that the tomb was empty. We have the message today, because Peter and the Church passed down that message in the scriptures.
Alleluia, Christ is Risen!
Congregation: The Lord has risen indeed, Alleluia…
(y’all are taking all the energy out of this…)
ALLELUIA, CHRIST IS RISEN!
Congregation: THE LORD HAS RISEN INDEED, ALLELUIA!!!
Put yourself in the story! That’s what we all need to do. We need to take ourselves out of our mundane lives, out of our day to day, 9 to 5, 7 to 3, whatever it is, out of our lives and put ourselves in the story. Live the Gospel message of the resurrection. Be the first one to the tomb that dared to go in. Be the first one to the tomb, beat Peter there, beat Peter there.
We live out this life day to day, week to week, hour to hour, minute to minute, and we can only cope with what’s going on out there in the world… we can only cope with that, because we do what we do in here. This makes that livable.
It is something to be excited about. It is something to share with our friends, our neighbors, and our families. It is something that supercharges us from the inside out. The expressions of the resurrection that we live in our day to day lives, not just on Sunday… not just from 10:30 to 11:30 on Sunday (or 11:45 depending on how long this goes). Not just on Sunday, but day to day in our everyday lives… How do you live out the resurrection in your life? How do you show others the Christ-light that is in you?
Last night we renewed our baptismal vows. That’s why there’s holy water in the font, and that’s why the Christ-light burns before you, and it will burn the whole 50 days of the season of Easter. We kindled a new fire, and lit the paschal candle from the new fire, and heard the Old Testament stories of salvation, as God redeemed God’s people over and over, and over again. We got a foretaste of that story, and coming in here, and renewing our baptismal vows, we attached ourselves to the story… we become part of the story… we become that beloved disciple that is unnamed in the Gospel according to John. That disciple that outruns Peter to the tomb.
But that’s not the end of the story… The story goes on. It says that Mary Magdalene was crying outside of the tomb, after the other disciples left and had gone away. She was crying outside the tomb, because she didn’t know where they had taken Jesus’ body. She was upset and in mourning. She wanted to know where they had taken him.
Jesus appears to her, but she doesn’t know who he is. She doesn’t know who he is until Jesus calls her by name, Mary! And she turns and acknowledges him, Rabbi! We do not know Jesus because we are not looking for him in the right places. We look for him in success of our day to day lives measured by a man’s measuring stick. Some sort of scorecard we call a paycheck. We measure success by what kind of car we drive, or how big our house is. All these ways fail!
The primary way we can see Jesus is by connecting ourselves to the body of Christ, Christian to Christian, looking each other in the eye, and seeing that Christ-light in each other. Seeing the light of Christ that was given to us at baptism, lived out in our resurrection experiences with each other in Christian community.
It’s a communal thing. When we gather together as a community of faith. When we fellowship, when we worship together, when we are ingrained and involved with one another, then we have a chance to experience the risen Christ right here, right in this community.
There is a Christ-light that burns in each and every one of us. Our challenge is do we run away from the tomb? Are we scared to death that someone is going to call us foolish? Or that someone is going to make fun of us – or call us a Jesus freak? Or something silly like that? Or do we live out the resurrection in our lives? Do we show forth the love for our neighbors that Jesus commanded us to have? Do we love God more than anything else than this world could ever show us? God loved us that much! He loved us so much that He became one of us. He became one of us to live a life like we live, yet without sin. He lived the life that we live, day to day, week by week, hour by hour… And when he was here he spoke the truth. But we convicted him unjustly and hung him on a cross to die. But God uses that, and raises Jesus from death, defeating death by resurrection life. Resurrection life is not resuscitated life… It is life after life after death. That is hard to get your head around, but that’s what it is. It is not some bodily resuscitation, but it is resurrection!
The tomb is empty, Jesus has risen! It is our job to go forward from this place and live into that resurrection life, doing the work in the world that God has given us to do!
ALLELUIA, CHRIST IS RISEN!
Congregation: THE LORD HAS RISEN INDEED! ALLELUIA!
Alleluia, Christ is risen!
Congregation: The Lord has risen indeed, Alleluia…
(no, no, no… there’s no energy in that)
ALLELUIA, CHRIST IS RISEN!
Congregation: The Lord has risen indeed, Alleluia!
One more time…
ALLELUIA, CHIRST IS RISEN!
Congregation: THE LORD HAS RISEN INDEED, ALLELUIA!
The vestry should have to meet to decided if they should replace the nails in the roof after that! This is something to get excited about! This is why we are Christian! The stone has been rolled away, the tomb is empty! He has risen like he said it would happen.
We get the story this morning from John’s Gospel. John’s Gospel story is interlaced with all kinds of intricate meaning, but the message is the same, “Christ is risen, he is not here! Why do you seek the living among the dead?” Think about it.
The story opens up with the two disciples running to the tomb, trying to outrun each other. There’s Peter, and the unnamed disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, who is never really named in the scriptures. Who is that disciple? The disciple that Jesus loved… The disciple that outruns Peter on the way to the tomb. You can see them in your head, running together, trying to get there… Who is that disciple? The unnamed disciple… The beloved disciple? I want to suggest for a minute that Heather is that disciple, or Shaun, or Mildred, or Sallie, or Jane, or Laura or Any of us… Any of us in this room is that beloved disciple. That beloved disciple that outruns Peter to the tomb… He gets there first, but is scared. So scared that he just peaks in, to see only the darkness of the tomb. And Peter gets there, and Peter goes in first. And we believe today, because Peter believed, and saw that the tomb was empty. We have the message today, because Peter and the Church passed down that message in the scriptures.
Alleluia, Christ is Risen!
Congregation: The Lord has risen indeed, Alleluia…
(y’all are taking all the energy out of this…)
ALLELUIA, CHRIST IS RISEN!
Congregation: THE LORD HAS RISEN INDEED, ALLELUIA!!!
Put yourself in the story! That’s what we all need to do. We need to take ourselves out of our mundane lives, out of our day to day, 9 to 5, 7 to 3, whatever it is, out of our lives and put ourselves in the story. Live the Gospel message of the resurrection. Be the first one to the tomb that dared to go in. Be the first one to the tomb, beat Peter there, beat Peter there.
We live out this life day to day, week to week, hour to hour, minute to minute, and we can only cope with what’s going on out there in the world… we can only cope with that, because we do what we do in here. This makes that livable.
It is something to be excited about. It is something to share with our friends, our neighbors, and our families. It is something that supercharges us from the inside out. The expressions of the resurrection that we live in our day to day lives, not just on Sunday… not just from 10:30 to 11:30 on Sunday (or 11:45 depending on how long this goes). Not just on Sunday, but day to day in our everyday lives… How do you live out the resurrection in your life? How do you show others the Christ-light that is in you?
Last night we renewed our baptismal vows. That’s why there’s holy water in the font, and that’s why the Christ-light burns before you, and it will burn the whole 50 days of the season of Easter. We kindled a new fire, and lit the paschal candle from the new fire, and heard the Old Testament stories of salvation, as God redeemed God’s people over and over, and over again. We got a foretaste of that story, and coming in here, and renewing our baptismal vows, we attached ourselves to the story… we become part of the story… we become that beloved disciple that is unnamed in the Gospel according to John. That disciple that outruns Peter to the tomb.
But that’s not the end of the story… The story goes on. It says that Mary Magdalene was crying outside of the tomb, after the other disciples left and had gone away. She was crying outside the tomb, because she didn’t know where they had taken Jesus’ body. She was upset and in mourning. She wanted to know where they had taken him.
Jesus appears to her, but she doesn’t know who he is. She doesn’t know who he is until Jesus calls her by name, Mary! And she turns and acknowledges him, Rabbi! We do not know Jesus because we are not looking for him in the right places. We look for him in success of our day to day lives measured by a man’s measuring stick. Some sort of scorecard we call a paycheck. We measure success by what kind of car we drive, or how big our house is. All these ways fail!
The primary way we can see Jesus is by connecting ourselves to the body of Christ, Christian to Christian, looking each other in the eye, and seeing that Christ-light in each other. Seeing the light of Christ that was given to us at baptism, lived out in our resurrection experiences with each other in Christian community.
It’s a communal thing. When we gather together as a community of faith. When we fellowship, when we worship together, when we are ingrained and involved with one another, then we have a chance to experience the risen Christ right here, right in this community.
There is a Christ-light that burns in each and every one of us. Our challenge is do we run away from the tomb? Are we scared to death that someone is going to call us foolish? Or that someone is going to make fun of us – or call us a Jesus freak? Or something silly like that? Or do we live out the resurrection in our lives? Do we show forth the love for our neighbors that Jesus commanded us to have? Do we love God more than anything else than this world could ever show us? God loved us that much! He loved us so much that He became one of us. He became one of us to live a life like we live, yet without sin. He lived the life that we live, day to day, week by week, hour by hour… And when he was here he spoke the truth. But we convicted him unjustly and hung him on a cross to die. But God uses that, and raises Jesus from death, defeating death by resurrection life. Resurrection life is not resuscitated life… It is life after life after death. That is hard to get your head around, but that’s what it is. It is not some bodily resuscitation, but it is resurrection!
The tomb is empty, Jesus has risen! It is our job to go forward from this place and live into that resurrection life, doing the work in the world that God has given us to do!
ALLELUIA, CHRIST IS RISEN!
Congregation: THE LORD HAS RISEN INDEED! ALLELUIA!
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