 Rev. Matthew J. Hook |
Eternal
Life Made Real
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People who encountered Jesus could have no clue what Jesus' true ambition really was. They couldn't see the immense scope of what Jesus set out to do. Many of the Jews thought: "He'll help us overthrow the Romans." Many of the poor thought: "He'll help us get our piece of the pie." Many of the unsettled people thought: "He'll help us tell the 'establishment' what we really want." But no one thought his true ambition was to give his life away. And that has made all the difference. Remember, the resurrection of Jesus was never recorded as some mystic or mythical event. The resurrection happened in the real world. The power of the video is that it reminds us that Jesus and his followers were not just stained glass images; they were plain, real people. The Gospels record it: not to prove some deep insight into humanity, but simply as they would record any event. Paul reminds the Corinthians:
Do you see? It was the eyewitnesses who were changed, who changed the world. The New Testament was never written as a book of fables, or theological treatise, or in order to create a "new" religion. The books were simply written to record the events that these people had experienced. Luke records that a group of women were going to the tomb where Jesus' body had been laid. They took spices to embalm him. When they arrived at the tomb, they found the stone was rolled away. They went closer. They observed two figures and heard a voice which said: "Why seek the living among the dead? He is not here; he is risen." They were fearful and returned to Jerusalem to the eleven disciples. The disciples were skeptical. Peter raced out of the city to the tomb. There he found the facts like the women had said. At the same time, Luke says, two men were going from Jerusalem to Emmaus. The village was about six and a half miles from Jerusalem. As they walked, a third man joined them, just listening to them talk and asking questions. They talked of their broken dreams and hopes, because they were followers of Jesus, though they weren't of the twelve. They finally came to Emmaus and went to an upper room where a meal was served. The third man in the group lifted the food and asked for the blessing. In that moment, they were aware that this was Jesus, the Risen Lord. They raced back to Jerusalem and told the disciples. Still they didn't believe. Then, Jesus stood in their midst. He spoke to them. He knew them. Were we to ask Luke, were we to ask Paul, what is the message of Easter? They would shout back to us: "Christ is risen, Christ is alive!" This is the assurance that makes all the difference: Jesus is alive. This Easter assurance is for you and for all those who have come to know the glory of the resurrection. Jesus is alive. Sometimes I think because we celebrate it each year, we have forgotten how incredible that news is. Instead we choose to live our lives as if it didn't happen. We tend to live powerlessly, without assurance, without God's presence in tough times - the proverbial "lives of quiet desperation." Easter means many things, but I want to look at three things it means today. First, Easter means power for living in the midst of life's uncertainties. Eternal life made real. Look back at the disciples. In all accounts they were gripped with fear to the point of abandoning Jesus, the one they gave up everything to follow. On that first Good Friday, they weren't at the cross, only John was there that we know. They were so afraid, they went into hiding. Their hopes and dreams had been shattered on that first Good Friday. But then Easter came. They looked into the face of Jesus, their Risen Lord. They heard him speak. Where did they go? They went out across the world proclaiming in triumph the power of the Resurrection. They went into hostile places where they were threatened with execution. Every one of them but John died a martyr's death. What was their message? "Jesus is alive! Jesus is alive! Christ is risen!" They found power in the experience of the Resurrection. This has been the case throughout 20 centuries. Men and women who have known what it means that Jesus is alive have possessed power. Dr. Maxie Dunnam, head of the World Methodist Council, tells the story of the churches behind the Iron Curtain. Stalin proclaimed that "when the babushkas all died, Christianity would be dead." The babushkas were the grandmothers who would go to church and dust and clean the altar and pews. He prohibited by death any advertising or speaking of the Christian churches outside of the buildings themselves, and every sign was removed. Unauthorized Christian meetings were banned. Sunday schools could no longer gather. We had one Methodist church survive the USSR regime. It was in Estonia. The pastor there was even imprisoned and martyred during that time. What Stalin didn't know was that, because the young mothers couldn't have Sunday school, they would hold weekly "birthday parties." What he didn't know was that those babushkas were praying all along, and there was resurrection power in their prayers. What he didn't know was that young believers from other countries were smuggling in Bibles written in the various native languages there. The day after the Velvet Revolution in Prague, the old pastor of the Methodist church, who hadn't been able to post a sign for his congregation in over 40 years, wrote out a sign. On it were written these simple words: "The Lamb has won." Wherever there are men and women who really lay hold of this eternal truth of the immortality brought to birth in Jesus Christ, no matter how dire the circumstances, it means power, power for all our needs. Second, Easter means the assurance of immortality. Eternal life made real. I stood by a family last month who was mourning the loss of their mother. Death is real. Resurrection does not mean that death isn't real. C. S. Lewis, while grieving over the death of his wife, wrote: "It is hard to have patience with people who say, `There is no death' or `Death doesn't matter.' There is death. And anything that is, matters. And whatever happens has consequences, and it and they are irrevocable and irreversible. You might as well say that birth doesn't matter..." (A Grief Observed, p.16). While death is very real, Easter reminds us that it is only the body that is gone. Easter promises hope that because Jesus Christ lives, we too shall live. Death may have its day, but it will never have dominion. Death has lost the victory. Death has lost its sting. Easter is the assurance of eternal life for all those who come in faith to the experience of death. Life is triumphant in the presence of death when we know that Jesus is alive, that the Resurrection is a historical fact. Every sermon preached in the early church in the book of Acts centered around the Resurrection. The story in the Gospels was written later. First came the miracle of the Resurrection, then the theology of that miracle, then the biography of Jesus surrounding the Resurrection. The first fact of Christianity is a number of people who say they have seen the Resurrection. Those same people no longer feared death. Those of us facing death or the death of a loved one need to remember the words of Martin Luther's famous hymn: A mighty
fortress is our God, a bulwark never failing; We don't live as those who have no hope. "But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters, about those who have died, so that you may not grieve as those who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have died." (1 Thessalonians 4:13-14) This is the message of Easter. Hear it, because in the face of death, many people try to explain it, yet how hollow their words are compared to the truth of the Resurrection: Christ rose from the dead, and because he lives, we too shall live. Third, Easter means eternal life is made real, here and now. The day you trust in Jesus' death and resurrection is the first day of your eternal life. It doesn't just happen the day you die. Because Christ rose, we are promised abundant life. The problem many of us face is we are living on the wrong side of Easter. We are living on Saturday with the broken-hearted disciples whose dreams had faded into dust, a sense of hopelessness about the pressures of the world closing in, on the wrong side of Easter. We freak out as we look at the pressure of society, the direction of our world, and the gutter to which we seem to be headed. How many times we fall for what everyone else seems to hope for: that there may be a miracle brought about by some human effort, some huge achievement which could bring the salvation of the world and reverse the trend we face today. But we are not sure about it. What we need to do is move to the right side of Easter, to the right side where we recognize that God revealed himself in Jesus Christ and made righteousness win. God lifted the power of good over evil. God set people on the way to eternal life beginning here and now, stretching out to eternity. Christ conquered death. The Resurrection gives the promise of life. It makes us know that life is different every day, right now and tomorrow and all of life's tomorrows, because Jesus is alive. The number of Christians around the world who come to this realization and choose as a result to live their lives differently is proof for me of the Resurrection. In the past year I have met Christians from Kenya, Tanzania and Togo, Brazil and the Barbados, as well as from across our United States. I am amazed at how they have responded to God's miracle of the Resurrection by doing what God would have them do for the rest of their lives. They set out to make a difference in the world. They begin to sacrifice for others. They start telling others about the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. If this phenomenon is not of God, then there is something very strange going on in our world today! If Easter means anything, it must involve what it means to these people. Eternal life is made real each day, every day, simply by us claiming Christ's power in our lives. Because Jesus Christ lives in our lives today we find meaning, purpose, forgiveness, and a richness that doubts death, and even dictators can't destroy. Let us pray.
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