Centering reflection
Frederick Buechner (pronounced BEEK-ner) is an American writer and theologian. He is the author of more than thirty published books and has been an important source of inspiration and learning for many readers. He has a perspective on Easter I find unique and a great way to start.
The Gospels are far from clear as to just
what happened. It began in the dark. The stone had been rolled aside. Matthew
alone speaks of an earthquake. In the tomb there were two white-clad figures or
possibly just one. Mary Magdalen seems to have gotten there before anybody
else. There was a man she thought at first was the gardener. Perhaps Mary the
mother of James was with her and another woman named Joanna. One account says
Peter came too with one of the other disciples. Elsewhere the suggestion is that
there were only the women and that the disciples, who were somewhere else,
didn't believe the women's story when they heard it. There was the sound of
people running, of voices. Matthew speaks of "fear and great joy."
Confusion was everywhere. There is no agreement even as to the role of Jesus
himself. Did he appear at the tomb or only later? Where? To whom did he appear?
What did he say? What did he do?
It is not a major production at all, and the
minor attractions we have created around it—the bunnies and baskets and
bonnets, the dyed eggs—have so little to do with what it's all about that they
neither add much nor subtract much. It's not really even much of a story when
you come right down to it, and that is of course the power of it. It doesn't
have the ring of great drama. It has the ring of truth. I f the Gospel writers
had wanted to tell it in a way to convince the world that Jesus indeed rose
from the dead, they would presumably have done it with all the skill and
fanfare they could muster. Here there is no skill, no fanfare. They seem to be
telling it simply the way it was. The narrative is as fragmented, shadowy,
incomplete as life itself. When it comes to just what happened, there can be no
certainty. That something unimaginable happened, there can be no doubt.
The symbol of Easter is the empty tomb. You
can't depict or domesticate emptiness. You can't make it into pageants and
string it with lights. It doesn't move people to give presents to each other or
sing old songs. It ebbs and flows all around us, the Eastertide. Even the great
choruses of Handel's Messiah sound a little like a handful of crickets chirping
under the moon.
He rose. A few saw him briefly and talked to
him. If it is true, there is nothing left to say. If it is not true, there is
nothing left to say. For believers and unbelievers both, life has never been
the same again. For some, neither has death. What is left now is the emptiness.
There are those who, like Magdalen, will never stop searching it till they find
his face. [1]
Easter Sunday Morning Starts with this emptiness but leads us to a new place a new way of being in this world and relating to one another and that will be explored in the sermon...
WE ARE GODS’ FAMILY
Ok I admit when I
sat down to write this sermon I was not sure where it would go. I like having some quotes in mind, stories to
tell, other research at hand. This time
I am starting from the text and see where it leads me.
“Early in the
morning while it was still dark Mary Magdalene came to the tomb.” I am thinking that is brave. But after
researching I see there is some merit to this.
Yet some reversal as well.
We always have said
that Jesus came to turn the whole social order and the world upside down. He does away with tradition left and right while
he walked on this earth and even in death.
According to Bible
archeology website burial custom for the time of Jesus was that it was the;
“women’s task to prepare a dead body for
burial. The body was washed, and hair and nails were cut. Then it was gently
wiped with a mixture of spices and wrapped in linen strips of various sizes and
widths. While this was happening, prayers from the Scriptures were chanted.
The body was wrapped in a shroud, but was
otherwise uncovered.
Tombs were visited and watched for three days
by family members and friends. On the third day after death, the body was
examined. This was to make sure that the person was really dead, for accidental
burial of someone still alive could happen.
At this stage the body would be treated by
the women of the family with oils and perfumes.”[2]
Through this
description we can see where the burial of Jesus is still turning things the wrong
way out. First it is Joseph of Arimathea
along with Nicodemus who “took Jesus’ body and wrapped it, with spices, in
linen clothes.” (John 19:40) This was
women’s work according to the tradition of the time and yet we have the men doing
it.
Then tradition has
it that the romans stood guard over the tomb.
Not the Family but the Government, the ruling class has taken on the
role of what would have been for family and friends to do.
Then Mary, while it
is not yet light enough to see where one is going heads to the tomb alone. Women did not travel alone. Nobody went out before light except those who
had the lowest of jobs to sweep the streets, night watch or shepherds. Yet Mary
sets of alone with no concern on how she would roll the tombstone back.
Mary runs back to
the disciples and then we find Mary right behind the disciples back at the
garden. She is healthy no wonder she
thought she could move the tomb stone by herself.
John traditionally
holds the two disciples are Peter and the one who Jesus loved ran back to the
garden. The one out races Mary and Peter
and sticks his head in the tomb and see the linens lying there and then peter
walks in and sees the face cloth folded and then the other disciple walks in
sees all this and believes.
I often thought this
a great leap. The beloved disciple only
had but to look into the tomb and believe.
But what think this really says is he was paying attention and got what
Jesus was teaching all along. You see
with the linens lying there and the face clothe all folded up neatly says this
is no robbery. Who would steal a body
and take the time to unwrap it first? It
had to be something else.
Some think the next
verse is a little contradictory but I do not see it as such. It says they did not yet understand the
scripture that Jesus must rise from the dead.
Peter, I assume walked away understanding nothing, as usual. The beloved disciple believed, he may not
have made the scriptural reference as yet but he understood Jesus’ words and
sayings.
Of course the men
leave Mary standing there alone, in her grief, unaccompanied again!
Mary sticks her head
inside the tomb and there are two angels seated at the head and the foot of
where Jesus’ body should be. Jesus is
bracketed by angels. Angels at his
conception, birth and now at his resurrection.
This says that death is not that important. It is important to us because we identify
with human suffering – yet the resurrection, to me, points past the
suffering. I believe the narration
points to that as well. For the Angels ask her “Women why are you crying?” She answers; “They have taken my Lord away
and I don’t know where they have put him.”
Isn’t that the definition of grief?
I mean when a love one dies we try to rationalize we try to stand firm
in our faith but in that ultimate moment of extreme grief we are lost. Our
loved one is gone and we really do not know where they are. Mary is us at any moment of loss, confusion
fear…the tomb is empty. As empty as the
hole in our heart when we lose someone we cherish.
Then Jesus repeats
the question “Woman why are you crying.” I think this is made to emphasize this
is not a time of grief, “The life lived is not to be grieved”[3]
see my blog spot Sometimes Alleluia November 2015 for that sermon. Then Jesus
asks; “who are you looking for?” That is
a strange question to be asking at a grave side. I mean the question assumes you must be
seeking someone living for the dead are easy to find. But Mary, missing that it is Jesus is
speaking to her, says just tell me where he is and I’ll get him. So Mary is assuming this Gardener is somehow
part of this conspiracy to steal the body of Jesus. Then he says to her, in a
tone of voice that only she could recognize and it melts her heart and opens
her eyes…Mary. As Christ calls her by
name she recognizes him. How many times
in our own lives when we look back we can see God’s hand at play but when we
were in the moment we could not or refused to see God with us. I wonder how often Mary looked back on that
moment and wondered why she did not recognize Jesus Right away.
Jesus then says do
not hold onto me, or another translation would be do not cling to me. Jesus is saying to do not hold on to me as
you once believed for I am something new, something different, and something
beyond physical. One interpreter believes this is Jesus saying my Physical body
has died and I am now a spiritual being.[4] This is where Jesus moves form man to
Christ. There is a shift in his being
and how he is perceived from here on out.
Then he proclaims to Mary “Go to my Brothers and Sisters and tell them I
am going to my Abba and your Abba, to my God and your God!”(John 20:19) This is important again because not all of
Jesus followers, not all of his disciples were Jewish. We traditionally think of the disciples as
the twelve yet in the books of acts the numbers “range between 70 and 120 to a
‘growing Multitude’”.[5]
Like we teach here about the last supper it was women, children servants those
healed by Christ and those who will hear the 12 in their own tongue. Jesus proclaims one loving accepting parent
God for all and in that God we are all, every one of us, brothers and sisters.
The final
Proclamation Mary Makes is “I have seen the Lord”. Mary, a woman, who ventures out before
dawn. Mary who walks around independent
of any man or any other companions. Mary
who is assuming she can roll back the stone.
Mary who keeps pace running with the men. Mary is the first to see the
Lord and proclaim a resurrected Christ a new Jesus a new way of being in
relation to one another in this world. A world where we are called to care for
each other no matter who you are or where you are in life’s journey. A world
where we as Brothers and Sisters in Christ proudly proclaim for all to hear…You
are a part of God’s family! This is what
I hear in today’s Gospel and the message of the resurrection. May we always get past the empty tomb moment
and live in the experience of an all loving God, a true family of humanity, and
the blessings that a relationship with Christ can bring into our lives. Amen.
[1]. Frederick Buechner, Easter, October 13,
2009, accessed March 14, 2016, http://www.frederickbuechner.com/content/easter.
[2]. Elizabeth Fletcher, Tombs,
http://www.bible-archaeology.info/tombs.htm.
[3]. Joseph Shore-Goss, The life lived is not to
be grieved, November, 2015,
http://revjoeshore.blogspot.com/2015/11/the-life-lived-is-not-to-be-grieved.html.
[4]. anonymous, John 20:17, February, 2014,
accessed March 14, 2016,
http://www.whatjesusreallysaid.com/2014/02/do-not-hold-on-to-me-for-i-have-not-yet.html.
[5]. Nikhilesh Jasuja, Priya mMenon, and
Carolyn, Apostle vs Disciple, March 8, 2016, accessed March 14, 2016,
http://www.diffen.com/difference/Apostle_vs_Disciple.
No comments:
Post a Comment