Easter morning (Mark 16:1-8)  4/8/2012

Listen to an audio recording <select here>

A few days ago I sat in my house looking out a window and reflecting on the Gospel reading we just heard from Mark’s Gospel account. As I stared out the window I noticed a truck towing three large trees pass by and stop at the center median just a few hundred feet down the street. There was a police car close behind and as they began to spread orange cones around their work site I was reminded of a conversation I had years ago. Shortly after I moved to the Chicago area I asked a friend of mine if she found the landscape of the Midwest to be monotonous. I asked her this question because I found the flat terrain and prairie vegetation to be lacking as compared to the rolling hills and beautiful trees of the Northeast. She dismissed my preferences for the Northeast, telling me that she not only loved the Midwest’s landscapes but she was glad to not have to worry about all those trees hanging over her head. “Give me open spaces and big sky any day!” she told me. I laughed at her suggestion that the beautiful trees that imitated natural covered bridges and flowered arches would fall from the sky. At least, I found her suggestion to be laughable until last October. The late fall snowstorm that unleashed unimaginable destruction and lasted for days (that turned into weeks) made something that always seemed unlikely become incredibly real.

Our Gospel lesson this morning captures the early morning events of that first Easter morning; events that were so unlikely in the minds of the women who were at the tomb that the angel of the Lord needed to reassure them, “Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here.” (Mark 16:6) These faithful and loving women, who believed so deeply in Christ; who followed him to the very end, the very horrible end on the cross, struggled to imagine the mystery and miracle of Easter morning. The mystery of this miraculous event, the resurrection of Jesus Christ, was so overwhelming that the women “went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.” (Mark 16:8) The power and mystery of this first Easter morning can easily elude our rational, modern minds. We live in a culture where the mysteries of the world are neatly explained and science has come to the forefront of our understandings, but this was not the world of the first century. The followers of Christ who gathered on that first Easter morning lived in a world that recognized that there were mysteries and powers beyond their understanding, rightly so I believe. The resurrection of Jesus Christ seized them with terror and amazement because they understood they were in the presence of the might and mystery of God, for only God had the power to redeem life by the destruction of death itself.

We gather together this morning to celebrate and give thanks for the mystery that is the miracle of Christ’s death and resurrection; the gift that gives us redemption and the hope of being in God’s presence forevermore. Perhaps we would benefit by taking a holiday from our rational lives and allow ourselves some time to live in the world of God’s mysteries. Martin Smith, an author and retreat leader, quotes the words of poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge, as he describes the unknown mysteries of God’s promise in our lives: Coleridge writes, “If a man should pass through Paradise in a dream and have a flower presented to him as a pledge that his soul had really been there, and if he found the flower in his hand when he awoke – Ay, and what then?”[i] On this Easter morning as we stand at the empty tomb we must say, “And what then?”; Christ has risen from the dead, defeated death at death’s own game, and redeemed us in to a loving relationship with God, forever.

I walk through Elizabeth Park with my dogs every morning. Throughout these past few days I have noticed the bursting forth of spring and I have also noticed the natural signs that recall that horrible storm last October. The scars of the past and the beauty of spring live side-by-side, but after three seasons of waiting we know that spring will win the day; the flowers will grow over the fallen trees and resurrect the splendor that was once there. On this Easter morning, we recognize that the scars of the sins and selfishness of the world and the grace of God’s love for us live side-by-side, but after three days of waiting the mystery and miracle of Christ’s resurrection restore and redeem us beyond what we can ever hope or imagine. May you live today and every day renewed, refreshed and confident that you are recipients of the miracle of the risen Christ. Open your hearts and minds to the mystery of God’s grace in the world and may you discover the abundance of God’s love. Alleluia. Christ is risen! AMEN