Matthew 28:1-10

The late Kwame Ture, formally known as Stokely Carmichael, would always answer his phone by saying: “Ready for revolution!”  It was his way of keeping revolution/change on the forefront on the minds of his as well as the people he interacted.

Before a person could get in a word, brother Ture was letting folk know he was ready for revolution, ready for change, ready for transformation.  It is in that spirit that I hear God asking us this Easter Sunday morning: Are you ready for resurrection?”

I know you’re ready for heartache, but are you ready for resurrection? I know you’re ready for despair, but are you ready for resurrection? I know you’re ready for tragedy, but are you ready for resurrection?  I know you’re ready for setbacks, but are you ready for resurrection? I know you’re ready for disappointment, but are you ready for resurrection?

Because if you are then, like brother Toure, you’ve got to keep resurrection on your mind—can’t just let it be an annual affair.

Each year we come to this moment, early in the morning while it is still dark, the most important day in the church calendar celebrating resurrection. But what are we really celebrating?

Are we celebrating because of tradition?  Are we celebrating the fact that women were present at pivotal moments in Jesus’ life—his birth, his death on the cross, and now here at the resurrection?  Are we celebrating the actual resurrection because it gives us the blessed assurance of eternal life? 

Are we celebrating the official end of lent because the 40 days of hell we’ve put ourselves through proving we could give up something dear to us means that as soon as this sermon is over we can go back to doing whatever it was we gave up?

Perhaps we are celebrating just how much the resurrection narrative concludes a week that serves as a commentary on the human condition?

Text says that after the Sabbath, before the sun invaded the darkness with its thin pencil line of dawn on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. It was just two days prior that the exclamation point was placed on a week that goes down as the greatest miscarriage of justice known to human history.

Was it not a week ago that Jesus was showered with palm branches and shouts of Hosanna? Just a few days prior to this early morning scene one of Jesus’ trusted allies became a government informant, reminding us how long those in power have infiltrated subversive organizations that was a threat to that power.

Was it not a few days prior that the people were offered a choice for change?  When they could have said, “Yes we can or si se puede,” they said, “Give us Barrabas!”  Was it not just a few days prior that Jesus was allegedly provided a hearing, but in reality his fate was sealed the moment he was arrested in Gethsemane? And then there was the brutality of an innocent man receiving a death sentence with the multitude believing that justice had been served.

So while we want to commemorate resurrection it matters little if our celebration is not linked to the events prior because the failure to do so robs us of the power of resurrection in our lives today.

All of us want resurrection, but do we want it without the prerequisites that make resurrection necessary?  Few of us, and rightfully so, want the pain, the humiliation, the betrayal, the injustice, or the suffering that makes resurrection necessary. But if we didn’t have those inconvenient moments not only would resurrection be unnecessary so too would any need for faith.  There would be no need to read the book of Job.

No need to find comfort in, “I know my redeemer liveth.” No need to be reminded when times get tough, because times would never get tough, that “Thou he slay me yet shall I trust him.”  No need ask if a man dies shall he live again?  No need to proclaim “naked I came into the world, naked shall I leave, the lord gives and the lord takes away blessed be the name of the lord.”

In this context, David also becomes irrelevant, “Yea, thou I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil for thou art with me.”

“The Lord is my light and my salvation, who shall I fear the Lord is the strength of my life of whom shall I be afraid?”

“Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning,” are useless if we have no need for resurrection.

To have a faith that has no room for pain is to have a faith that has no use for resurrection and is ill equipped to deal with the complexities of the human condition. The pain of the human condition must accompany the good news of resurrection lest Easter would indeed be an empty, meaningless day that is as relevant to our lives as a rabbit laying eggs.

Don’t you find it ironic that resurrection changed the world and yet, the world has subsequently done a better job in changing the church?  The church ought to be on the vanguard of what is possible—asking the tough question, demanding the hard answers.  And with all the power of resurrection, backed by the full, faith, and credit of the triune God, it does more to make the status quo comfortable than preaching good news to the oppressed.  

Over the years, much has been made of Karl Marx’s statement that religion was the opiate of the masses, but like the recent Jeremiah Wright controversy, few want to examine why Marx said what he did? Marx saw a world whereby the ruling class had its foot firmly on the neck of the poor, while the church week after week produced homilies to the poor justifying the dominant cultures actions.

Too often, throughout the landscape of history, a portion of the church has been on the wrong side of human suffering—siding with those that cause the suffering. How can resurrection happen if the church is too willing to turn its back on justice? 

To do so is to turn away from the direction that Jesus was marching—it is to walk in the opposite direction of a resurrection that is inextricably linked to the pain and suffering of the cross.  Dietrich Bonhoeffer calls this cheap grace—grace that has no room for the cross.  It is a domesticated gospel, perfected by T.V. preachers, that bends over backwards not to upset Cesar. It offers only a pain free resurrection.

  

But that’s not how resurrection came on the scene—it did not come politely, it came uninvited.

We are told beginning in verse 2, there was a great earthquake; for an angel of the Lord, descending from heaven, came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow. There was upheaval on this day. The stress on the fault line that held both the law and grace and mercy had become too great for the foundation of humankind to sustain.  But we should not to lose site on the fact the resurrection occurred while the world was still dark, just as it is dark in too many places today.

War, disease, famine, corporate greed, urban violence, materialism, the misuse of the world’s resources all conspire to make to make the world darker than it needs to be.

But in spite of the darkness, an angel bright and shining in appearance dressed in white sat on top of the stone to remind us that the light does shine in the darkness—that’s resurrection—and the darkness cannot understand the light.  It was a dark time then, as it is a dark time now, most were unaware that a change had taken place.

Immediately after the resurrection nothing had really changed substantively, the Romans were still an occupying force; stagnant religious hierarchy was as influential then as it is today.  But God had radically intervened God’s self into the affairs of humankind.  In a scene vividly portrayed by Matthew, free will had to momentarily take a back seat God’s will.

This also raises the question, why was the stone rolled away?  If Jesus has been resurrected from the dead why does it require an angel to move the stone?

I submit the removal of the stone was for our benefit.   Jesus was not the only one who required resurrection on that day.  The women who arrived at the tomb needed resurrection, the disciples who were in hiding needed resurrection, those who would record this narrative needed resurrection, because those who down through the centuries who would proclaim God’s word would need resurrection so that he or she could share with a congregation who also is in need of resurrection.

Given the events during the past week, without the messenger from God rolling the stone away it is possible that resurrection could have occurred without anyone recognizing it. Being in need of resurrection sometimes requires a messenger of God to show us that resurrection is possible.   This also suggest that fear is part of the resurrection experience.  Fear can blind us to what is possible.

In these 10 verses there are four references to fear.  There can be no resurrection without confronting our fears.  Fear is the gateway to stagnation.  We can coexist with our condition so long that it becomes easier to deal with the known pain than to seek the unknown possibility of Jesus’ love. 

Fear can cause us to embrace a closed fisted theology where we hold on to the pain so tightly that it keeps the pain in while simultaneously keeping the love of Jesus out.  In this condition, when resurrection presents itself our fear induced closed-fisted theology makes it impossible to let go of the pain in order to reach for the higher heights of Jesus’ love.

In the midst of their fear, the women at the tomb have to make a decision, “Will my belief transcend the facts of the last week or will I remain stuck in my same condition?”

Will we use resurrection as the springboard to grab hold of what is possible?  Or will we opt for the familiar path by slipping back into our old ways that produce the same nonproductive results? It’s so easy to stay stuck, to hide behind cheap claims of “that’s just how I am,” which is a euphemism for admitting you don’t trust Jesus enough to be resurrected. 

One of the cheap benefits of staying stuck is that you can do it and you never have to leave the church.  The church of Jesus the Christ is filled with folk who have resigned themselves to staying stuck. But that’s in conflict with the radical mission resurrection.

Resurrection is taking that which is old and making it new. It is not settling for the familiar.  It is taking sorrow and making it joy.  It is taking grudges and making it grace. It is taking chaos and making it peace. It is taking hate and making it love. It is about taking our hope and our faith along with our fears and our doubt on the long circuitous journey to transformation paved by Jesus’ love.

Here is Jesus saying to the women and to us, “You thought I was dead, but I’m alive!  You thought I was down, but now I’m up!  You came to the tomb thinking is was the end, but I’m here to tell you its just the beginning!”

Now, if God has that kind of power, backed up with that kind of promise, we should be trying to get in on it each and every day of our lives.   If pain is possible, then resurrection is possible.  If falling short is possible, then resurrection is possible. If misery is possible then I know resurrection is possible.  This is the open invitation to release the shackles that surround our hearts, to put down our burdens, to embrace something new, to cease and desist with the antiquated practice of trying to put old wine into new wineskins.

But what we are celebrating is found verse 8, “So they left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples.”  This is our path to resurrection.  It is a disservice to our faith to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus and not realize the transference for our weary souls.

Fear is a part of the faith journey, there’s no way around it, but if you read the text you’ll see there was no joy until the women left tomb. You can’t be resurrected, you can’t be lifted up, you can’t find that joy that world didn’t give and the world can’t take away until you leave the tomb with God’s promise, Jesus’ love, and the Holy Spirit’s assurance. If we have the courage to leave the tomb that has us stuck, that has us down, that has us dead to the world, we must do so with fear and great joy—fear of the unknown and joy because we have a resurrection faith.  If we wait until we no longer have any fear we won’t experience resurrection.  It is because of the fear that we have the faith to leave the tomb in spite of our fear.

We have a faith in which death has been swallowed up in victory.  We have a faith that is based on being more than a conqueror through him that loved us.  We have a faith that says: “Let not your heart be troubled.”  We have a faith that says for God so loved the world that God gave God’s only son and whoever believe in him shall not perish but have eternal life. We have a faith that has persuaded us that neither death nor life, nor angels, no principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor power, nor height or depth, nor anything else in all creation can separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

It’s time to consider the possible.  Is this not the day, when God can do something for your broken heart? Is this not the day when God can do something for your discouraged soul?  Is this not the day when you can be touched by a power that can revive your battered sense of self?

Every year God stops by asking us: Have you had enough languishing in the tombs, staying stuck in the status quo, has it kept you down long enough, are you weary and worn out from the way things are, are you sick and tired and of being sick and tired?

Are you ready for change?  Are you ready for spiritual renewal?  Are you ready for the stone to be rolled away?  Are you ready to leave the tombs with fear and great joy? Are you ready for resurrection?