Easter Sunday, Year C
- Acts 10:34-43
- Psalm 118:1-2, 14-24
- 1 Corinthians 15:19-26
- Luke 24:1-12
“If for this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied. But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep.”
Twelve years ago we joined my parents for Easter Sunday in the Presbyterian church where I had grown up. It had been just four months since our son, Mack, had died. Needless to say, we were still deep in our grief. In that tradition, you do not have the lectionary with specific and assigned texts, as we do. Yet that Easter Sunday, the preacher, Rob Norris, choice this passage from Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians as the text to preach from. As I heard it read, I began to weep.
I have been a Christian, a committed, active, and prayerful Christian since I was a young boy. When Mack died, I did not lose my faith, I did not question whether or not God was still God, I did not suggest that God was cruel or unjust. I knew God was God and this world was cruel and unfair. This fallen and broken world is full of suffering and pain. Why should we be spared?
I had not lost my faith. Yet somehow, along the way, I had forgotten what I had faith in; I was so wrapped up in my grief, bundled as in a shroud, that I focused only on my loss that I could not remember that our loss is temporary, that what I believe and know to be true, is that Jesus rose from the dead and so shall we all.
The accounts of Jesus’ friends coming to the tomb are all so familiar to any of us who have grieved. We go to be near our beloved, even in death, to care for their body to express our faithfulness to them and their memory. And still, we cannot really believe they are gone. Whether standing by the graveside or twelve years later, we still can’t believe it. In our grief, we need to hear the angel say, “Remember he told you…that the Son of Man must be handed over to sinners, and be crucified, and on the third day rise again.”
Here is the summation of the Gospel. The Son of Man must be handed over and crucified. God came in human form to die as a sacrifice for our sins so that our relationship with God could be restored. Jesus was our Passover sacrifice who takes away all our sins. AND he rose on the third day. The Gospel story is not complete without the resurrection. Jesus did not come to provide us with good teachings, an example of moral life. Jesus did not come simply to die for us.
Jesus came to show us how to love God and one another. Jesus came to die for our sins. Jesus came to rise from the dead so that death no longer will have hold on us. That is the Gospel.
It is a remarkable and ridiculous claim, to say that anyone should come back from the dead. Our modern minds reel and push back at the thought, but it didn’t take the enlightenment for people to question the word of Mary and the women. People die all the time; they do not rise again, especially not three days later. Paul makes it clear what is at stake:
13 If there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised; 14 and if Christ has not been raised, then our proclamation has been in vain and your faith has been in vain.
Yet, Jesus did rise from the dead. The resurrection is the confirmation that Jesus is the Messiah, the anointed one of God who saves us from all sin and death. The resurrection is the triumph of life over death. In fact, says Paul, “Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep.”
Those of you paying close attention may have noticed that when I quoted our epistle from this morning, it sounds different that when was read by our lector. Rarely do I bring Greek or Hebrew into a sermon, but in this case it is important. In this verse, there are actually two different Greek words for what the NRSV translates with “dead” and “died.” In the first case, it is the word for “dead,” nekron. Paul is emphasizing the fact that Jesus was really dead and yet was raised to life again. “Those who have died” are actually described as “those who have fallen asleep” (kekoime menon). So, the verse is better rendered as “Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep.” Paul is making it clear that Jesus died, he was not in some stupor or catatonic state, he had died the death we all must follow, but that as he rose from the dead, he transformed our death into a mortal sleep that will be followed by life eternal.
Twelve years ago, I heard these words anew, through the heart of a parent in grief, and I wept. I wept in grief; I wept in relief, in joy. The resurrection of Jesus is Mack’s resurrection; it is my resurrection; it is your resurrection.
The resurrection of Jesus is our victory over death. Yes, these perishable bodies will crumble and fall. And if this world is all that we have, then we would, we should despair. But this world is not the end and this body shall someday be replaced, “for this perishable body must put on imperishability, and this mortal body must put on immortality” (1 Cor. 15.53). The resurrection of Jesus is but the first, just as he has overcome death so shall we as we, for we have died with Christ and so shall we live in Christ (Rom. 6.8).
Remember Christ’s words and go and tell the others.
Amen. ✠
