The Reverend Barbara K. Briggs
April 12,2009
Easter Day, Year B

"I shall not die, but live, and declare the works of the Lord."

Happy Easter!  Alleluia, Christ is risen!  There's nothing like a good resurrection to get your blood flowing... literally.

Have you ever actually been to a resurrection?  If someone were to ask you if you have ever been to a funeral, you might answer by telling a story of the funeral you remember best.  But how would you answer if someone asked you if you had ever been to a resurrection?  No one has ever asked me that.  We could argue that the resurrection happened only once.  No one was at it except Jesus.  And the disciples only arrived at the empty tomb after the fact.  But, is resurrection just something that happened to Jesus three days after he was killed?  Or can we still experience its power today?

For thousands of years people have debated, discussed, argued and told the story of the resurrection.  It's easier to believe that Jesus lived and died, but that he lived again after his death is either a reason to believe that Christianity has everyday value for our lives, or that it is a silly belief system based on outrageous fabrications.

We are gathered here this morning for as many reasons as there are people in this place.  Somewhere in each of us is a deeply-felt hope or secret yearning.  We come together to hear the words of life:  to feel them, taste them, see them, and experience them.  We want to experience the resurrection, and we do not want to go away disappointed.  We want the music to be uplifting and we want the sermon to be excellent.  We want our hearts to be warmed and our souls to be fed.  We want to experience the joy Jesus and his disciples felt when he rose from the dead.  We have high expectations, and we will not accept anything less than excellence and truth.  We do not want suffering, death, grief, loss and despair to have the last word in our lives.  Lord Have mercy.  Come, Lord Jesus!

It is spring.  Listen to the trees and flowers.  Listen to the seas and mountains.  Even with pollution and the threat of global warming, there is the power of the resurrection – that creative and life-giving power that not only pushes us to work for justice for our earth, for ourselves, and for our neighbors, but which when unleashed brings new life, new hope, and new resolve to choose the path that leads to life rather than the path in which we give up as if we were defeated before we have even begun.

In the depths of depression, American poet Sylvia Plath wrote:

I have no wit, I have no words, no tears;
My heart within me like a stone
Is numbed too much for hopes or fears;
Look right, look left, I dwell alone;
I lift mine eyes, but dimmed with grief
No everlasting hills I see;
My life is like the falling leaf;
O Jesus, quicken me.

We don't have to enter the tomb to taste death.  Likewise, we don't have to wait until death to experience the power of resurrection.  When hope flickers deep down beyond the reach of feeling, when all is black with death and grief, we stand disoriented, alone, bereft.  And from the very grip of the nothingness that threatens to smother us, we call to life to save us.

That is Easter.  That is the life force for which we yearn.  Not life that goes back to the way things were before death, or sorrow or fear interrupted it,  but life that is completely new and different.

When a risk is taken for the sake of another, resurrection.  When we leave behind the safety of old habits, resurrection.  When we do the hard work of hope rather than sinking into despair, resurrection.  While in the darkness we yearn for light, resurrection.  When we let ourselves be moved, resurrection.  When we approach each day with an attitude of openness, resurrection.  When we embrace one another in our difference, resurrection.  When we listen without judging, resurrection.  When we reach out to someone in need, resurrection.  When we dare to follow our heart, resurrection.

Bishop N. T. Wright says, "To preach the Resurrection is to announce the fact that the world is a different place, and that we have to live in that ‘different-ness.’  The Resurrection is not just God doing a wacky miracle at one time.  Human beings who once thought the message of someone rising from the dead is ridiculous, actually find that the message of resurrection can transform their lives."

How does the resurrection change our lives?  It is the power to discern and to choose what is truly life-giving, no matter what the risk.  It is the power to hope when all we feel is discouragement.  It means that even in the darkest despair or the deepest anxiety we can wait for life to bloom in us again.  And it will.  It is the courage to know that no matter how deep the winter of our soul may be, spring will one day come.  New life will spring forth within us – not like some magician who waves a wand, but because Jesus comes to find us even at the bottom of the pit.  Resurrection means that our grief and despair, no matter what its source, will be changed, though not forgotten. The marks of the cross are still visible, but a new joy distracts our attention away from the experience of death, and draws us into the experience of life in its new form.  Even in the turmoil and fatigue of coping with illness or an imminent death, Christ stands close by us to give us strength for the journey.  It is the strength of peace and joy deep down that no thing or person on earth can take away from us.

While it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the tomb.

While she was still weeping, Jesus found her in the garden.

It was while she was in her grief and anguish that Jesus came to her.  He didn't wait for her to dry her tears before he called her name.  She didn't recognize him at first.  How could she?  She was looking for his lifeless body.  She expected to find a corpse, so it took a while for her to realize the person in the garden with her was Jesus.  And suddenly her grief was changed into joy.  She wanted to hold him there in the moment, but he sends her out to tell the story.  He doesn't tell her to go convince the disciples or anyone else that the resurrection is real and true.  He simply tells her to tell the story – to share her experience of resurrection with the others.

Christians do not base the belief that Jesus died and rose from the dead on historical artifacts from an archeological dig or on the uniqueness of the idea or because we can’t imagine anyone making the story up.  We believe it because of the testimony of those who saw him and gave their lives for the sake of that message and because of the evidence of Jesus’ resurrection life demonstrated in and through his disciples down through history and into our own time and our own lives.  The story survives, not as some fantastic creation designed to titillate our imaginations, but because we experience its import and impact still today.  Though we are marked by the cross we live as a resurrection people.

Bishop Desmond Tutu tells the story of a youth who took a Bible Exam.  When he came to the question about what John the Baptist said to Jesus when Jesus came to him to be baptized, he didn't know the answer but decided to make a stab at answering the question anyway.  He wrote: "You're the Son of God, behave like it."  I suppose Jesus could say to us, "You are a resurrection people, behave like it.

So I ask you, have you ever been to a resurrection?  Look closely before you say "no."  Look for signs of new life and new hope.  Look for signs that your heart is telling you to follow it.  Look for signs that any grief and pain you have experienced have left behind a hunger for life and love.  Those are surely signs of the resurrection in you – even if all you can see in the moment are your own tears.  Look through your tears until whatever gives you life comes into focus.  Look closely and then tell your story to anyone who will listen.  Tell it everywhere you go – by your life, by your words, by your actions.  Say to the world, "It is good to be alive!"  ALLELUIA, CHRIST IS RISEN.  The world may just look at you and respond, “It is very good indeed.”  THE LORD IS RISEN INDEED, ALLELUIA.

Copyright © 2009 by The Reverend Barbara K. Briggs