Lent through the Eyes of John: Alive Forevermore

April 15, 1990

Download Sermon

Sermon: John 20:1-18

What in the world is going on here? It’s the greatest story in the world, and he tells it almost as if it were a travelogue.... It’s the biggest event that ever happened, the highest point on the human horizon, and he describes it almost as if he were reporting on a Sunday afternoon outing. THIS IS BIG STUFF WE’RE TALKING ABOUT HERE, cataclysmic stuff, revolutionary, earthshaking stuff...it was big enough to break history in half...and yet when he talks about it, you’re hardly aware of a change of inflection.

What strikes you, and surprises you about John’s version of the Resurrection story is how matter-of-factly he presents it. With a story of this magnitude, you’d expect more fanfare, more marching bands more hoopla....

You’d expect multitudes of the heavenly host, and peals of thunder, and cascading fireworks...wouldn’t you at least expect some bass drums and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir?

Instead, what do you get? A couple of off duty angels, who don’t even hang around very long, two perspiring disciples, and a woman so distraught she can’t see straight.

Would you have told it that way, that plainly, that mundanely, if you had been telling about the greatest event that ever happened in all of human time?

Make no mistake about it, this IS big stuff.... This is the heart and core of our faith, this event.... It’s the bedrock of our belief, the foundation of our hope and confidence, and we believe it’s the central, hinge fact of the history of the world.... NOW THAT’S NO SMALL CLAIM, but that’s what it comes down to. Christianity is built on a belief in an EVENT, on a belief in a HAPPENING, historically dateable, on a belief in SOMETHING GOD HAS DONE...the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, and it’s this cosmic event that infuses meaning into everything else.

Bethlehem, Nazareth, Bethany, The Mount of Transfiguration, Gethsemane, even Calvary...all of these have their place, they’re all important, they all inspire and lifts us, but not a one of them would even be remembered today if it hadn’t been for the empty tomb.

And do I need to remind you? We sometimes forget it, but the central figure of the New Testament, the Star of the volume, is the Risen Christ; not the earthly Jesus, but the already risen and glorious Christ of Eternal Life. In technical language, if you’ll permit me, the Gospels are “kerygmatic” documents, not just historical documents. That is, they were written, frankly, and on purpose, from the point of view of faith, by believers who were gripped by the truth of what they were proclaiming. Those writers presuppose that a miracle has happened, something breathtaking, and they tell the story in that light.

Nothing in the New Testament was written, not one line, not one sentence, not one word apart from the conviction, passionately believed, that the One about whom these things were being told had conquered death and was alive forevermore. Old Emil Brunner put it this way: “It is the Jesus who proved, Himself to be the Christ in the Resurrection, whose earthly life and words are to be narrated.”

Easter is where you START if you want to read the New Testament on its own terms. The resurrection is not just an epilogue...nothing could be further from the truth. It’s NOT just an appendix, tacked on for good measure. It’s NOT just a “happy ending”, pasted there in retrospect, to mitigate the harshness of the story.... IT IS THE STORY...all the way down the line, the awesome, unexpected, undeserved miracle around which everything else revolves. Can you imagine trying to preach a message of hope, and comfort, and new life to people if the last thing you had to point to was the figure of a broken, crushed idealist, hanging limp from a Roman Cross? Suppose that’s all there was, nothing more? How much power do you think there would be in the New Testament if it had been written “in memoriam”?

And nobody is more aware of, and more impressed with the power and splendor of the risen, transcendent Christ than the author of the 4^th Gospel. When John writes about Him, when John writes about His earthly life, His pre-resurrection life, he writes about Him in post-resurrection terms...consistently. He makes no attempt to present Him as He was, cloaked in historical facticity.... HE PRESENTS HIM AS CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE HAS FOUND HIM TO BE, as John himself has found Him to be...radiant and glorious, majestic and lustrous.

Even in His carpenter’s tunic, even walking the dusty trails of Galilee, even hanging from the cruel cross, in John He’s already the Christ of the ages.... The Resurrection is the prism through which we see Him. AND YET...when he gets to the part of the story which IS the prism, which IS the key, the hinge, the perspective which gives the rest its meaning, that part is probably where he is at his most subdued. Where you would most expect flourish, there is reticence.... Where you would most anticipate hyperbole, there is reserve.

Instead of letting it all loose, he almost holds it in. Instead of shouting, he whispers. Instead of pouring it on with all the bombast at his command---and don’t think John didn’t have plenty when he wanted to use it---he simply relates in plain narrative form what happened to the principals, and doesn’t even try to adorn it. HE JUST TELLS THE STORY.

Now, I think I know why he took that approach. I felt the same way when I started to work on this sermon. THE RESURRECTION OF JESUS CHRIST...MY GOD! It’s too big, that’s all. It’s TOO BIG!... You stand before it, and look up at it...and anything you say, anything you try to think of to say, simply pales. I think John must have felt that way, too. It’s too enormous to get your hands around, or to get words around....

You’ll never explain it, you’ll never even understand it, entirely. Marching bands or exaggeration won’t help... better just tell it, just tell what happened.... Let the story itself do the job, and hope some get it, as those first witnesses did.

It comes from his pen in essentially 3 scenes.

1) Scene ONE begins in the morning, he says, early Sunday morning, even before  daybreak. It was as soon after the ending of the Sabbath as they could get there. Mary wanted to anoint His body, wanted to perfume the corpse...it was all she had left, and it was the least she could do. He had blessed her in life...maybe she could at least do this for Him in death.

She had no idea, of course, how she was going to get into the tomb...it was sealed, she knew. She’d worry about that when she got there.

BUT IT WASN’T SEALED. IT WASN’T CLOSED AT ALL. The stone, the heavy, circular stone

used to cover the entrance into the tomb had been rolled away, and there was an opening big enough to walk into...or to walk out of.

Mary wasn’t sure what it meant, so she ran for help. Peter and John, who else? She found them, probably woke them up. While they yawned and rubbed their eyes, she blurted out her discovery. “Something’s not right.... Something’s happened. It’s not like we left it. I think they’ve stolen the Lord’s body and moved it somewhere.”

Quick as a flash, the 2 take off. At this point, they don’t know what it means. It’s not an Easter run yet. It’s not a race of exhilaration, it’s a race of consternation. They’ve been robbed of their leader...they saw Him die...and now they don’t even have His remains to mourn over.... WHO DID THIS TO US? Pilate? Caiaphas? Some penny ante grave robbers?

The younger disciple, and we presume it’s John---the disciple Jesus loved, he’s called---arrives first at the tomb, but doesn’t enter right away. Peter, always the leader, especially in a crisis, goes in first and sees...NOTHING. He finds only the grave clothes, the death shrouds, lying in place. Then John goes inside, and notices something else... THE NAPKIN. It’s the burial napkin, used quickly on Friday to swaddle the head.

There had been so little time that day. The sun was going down. They had to finish the job before the Sabbath began. The Sabbath began when you could see the third star. They did all they could, as fast as they could, wrapping the body with the grave wrappings, but applying that linen cloth with special care and tenderness. They placed it over the face and around the brow where the thorns had left their mark.

Here now was that cloth, maybe blood stained, but neatly, even meticulously folded and set aside, in a place apart from the other garments, as if place there on purpose for someone to find.

John says that’s what did it. It was when the disciple saw that cloth that he believed. That’s when the scope of what was happening first hit him.

Remember the cloth. We’ll come back to it before we’re through.

2) Scene TWO. Same location, a short while later. By the time Mary Magdalene got back to the tomb, the others had left. She hadn’t passed them, she hadn’t heard, she still didn’t know any more than before. As she waits, alone, broken with grief, and now wracked by uncertainty, she can no longer hold back her tears.

John says angels minister to her.... “Why are you weeping?” “Because they have taken away my Lord”, she snaps. By that time the anger and frustration had pushed the grief from the forefront.

BUT SUDDENLY, ANOTHER VOICE, a different voice…totally unexpected, but with the same question... “Why are you weeping?” And then, “Whom do you seek?”

Wow! Someone has called this moment the greatest recognition scene in all literature.

There’ve been some other memorable ones.... Joseph, confronting his estranged brothers in Egypt, when the tables were turned.... Ulysses, coming home from the sea to his faithful Penelope.... Stanley, going down into Africa to meet Dr. Livingston... NONE OF THOSE CAN TOP THIS For an instant, she looked right at Him, and didn’t know who He was.

She stared at Him, and didn’t recognize Him---Maybe the tears blinded her. Love can blind you, they say.... So can grief, and anger, and frustration.... Maybe He was standing in the shadows...it was still early morning. OR MAYBE THERE ARE SOME THINGS ABOUT THE RESURRECTED BODY THAT TRANSCEND OUR PRESENT COMPREHENSION.

 At any rate, she thought He must be the gardener until He called her by name---- “Mary”, He spoke gently....and John says that’s what did it. It was when He called her by name that she believed. That’s when the scope of what was happening first hit her.

3) Scene THREE. From then on, it goes quickly. The word spreads, like wildfire. Mary, privileged to be the first to see Him, carried the word to the rest of them. “I have seen the Lord.”

How simple and direct..... how ANYTHING but flamboyant. Notice--- It’s not arguments she takes with her, not proof, not explanations, not analysis, It’s not even evidence...she really has none. IT’S SIMPLE WITNESS TO WHAT SHE HERSELF HAS EXPERIENCED. “I have seen the Lord.”

And that very night the evening of the same first day, John says, others saw Him too, when He came to where they were...still cringing in fear, still paralyzed with fright over the experience of the preceding Friday. Presumably it was in the Upper Room, behind closed and locked doors. Suddenly, somehow, He appeared, and stood among them, saying, “Peace be with you.”

Boy, what would you give to have been there?

BUT GO ON...DON’T STOP THERE. IT WAS A SHORT CELEBRATION, notice. IT WAS VERY MUCH AN ABRIGED ANNUAL CONFERENCE. They had barely finished the hymn of praise and taken up the offering, when He passed out the appointments. “As the Father has sent me, even so, I send you.”

Forgive me if I’m reading more into it than is there, but I think that’s what did it. I think that’s what confirmed it. It was exhilarating when they saw Him...you better believe it was. It was glorious when He suddenly appeared in their midst. Of course! It was beatific in nature when He said, “Peace be with you. BUT IT WAS WHEN HE GAVE THEM JOBS TO DO, it was when He gave them their assignments that they truly believed. That was when the scope of what was happening really came home to them.

Now, that’s how John tells the Resurrection story. Compared with the rest of John, it’s remarkably subdued in the telling. Oh, there’s drama in it, to be sure, and movement,

and shading...a few flourished that betray John’s unique styling, but on the whole there is very little here that exaggerates, or stretches, or seeks to add extra decoration to the event itself.

There is certainly no superfluous gilding of the Easter lily. That’s not John’s emphasis. The miracle, he seems to be saying, the true Easter miracle, is not represented by bombast or fanfare, not by spectacle or extravaganza, but by the change that takes place inside of people when the reality of resurrected faith gets hold of them.

What’s most important about Easter is the EFFECT of Easter. The Resurrection is an event all right----SOMETHING CERTAINLY HAPPENED---He who was dead became alive, but the real significance of that doesn’t occur until He becomes alive in ME.

So how can we know Christ lives today? How can we know we serve a risen Savior? Can we? Can we point to a proof, to a corroboration, to evidence that will convince people, will convince a fair-minded skeptic of the truth of this claim on which our Faith stands?

WE CANNOT. We really cannot. No such overt, tangible, irrefutable proof exists. In fact, I think we have to say there is probably at least as much empirical evidence available to support a position of NO faith as to support faith itself.

So what are we to say? Are we just left hanging at this critical point, mute and dry? WE SAY WHAT JOHN SAYS. We know the truth of the resurrection by the EFFECT of the resurrection.

We know its power by what we see it doing. We know He’s alive because we see the difference He makes in changed and transformed lives. John’s very reticence in reporting the event gives us our best clue. Look again at these brief scenes he paints for us with his inspired, divinely restrained pen. Here’s our best Easter message.

1) First, the linen napkin from Scene ONE. Remember? John says the disciple whom Jesus loved believed when he saw that napkin neatly folded and laid aside.

What a detail. Why would John want us to know that? Could we take it as a symbol? Was he saying that this was the first thing the resurrected Christ did when He awakened?... WAS THIS HIS FIRST ACT AS RISEN LORD? STRAIGHTENING UP.

The battle is over, the victory is won, the day of eternal Jubilee has come...but before He appears in triumph, He takes time to perform that simple, mundane housekeeping act. He folds the burial napkin and neatly lays it in place.

Apparently it was that which grabbed the disciple. That’s when it hit him. He recognized the gesture. How typical and in character. The Master would do that.

And it spoke to him in rapid fashion of order and coherence, of meaning and harmony, of symmetry and wholeness.... the very qualities always associated with the Master’s presence.

And this is what John is saying. Where order and meaning and harmony exist, there Christ exists as well. This is the Easter message. HOW DO WE KNOW HE’S ALIVE? We know He’s alive when we look at people and see chaos transformed into coherence, hatred transformed into harmony, disorder and disarray transformed into disciplined devotion.

We know He’s alive when we see purposeful design in the lives of those who follow Him. They don’t have to wear a badge to identify themselves... They don’t have to scream for attention, or wave a flag to let it be clear He lives within. The surest evidence of the reality of the resurrected Christ is the whole and harmonious witness of a resurrected life.

WE KNOW HE’S ALIVE WHEN THE RESULTS OF HIS RESURRECTION ARE TOO OBVIOUS AND TOO WINSOME TO IGNORE.

2) Again, the naming from Scene TWO. Mary didn’t recognize Him in the garden for several moments. She was with Him, she saw Him, she spoke to Him, and didn’t know who He was. The reality was there...the event had taken place. The historical had occurred, but nothing was different for her. MAYBE IT’S SO WITH SOME OF US.

Then He singled her out. He focused on her, personally. He called her BY NAME...and she knew. AND THIS IS HOW IT IS, John is saying. This is the way Easter faith works.

Now, I know...we’re in the realm of the absolutely subjective here. AREN’T WE ALWAYS

WHEN IT COMES TO THE REALLY CRUCIAL ISSUES? To the person determined to keep the door shut between you and the Divine Invader... or to the person so insensitive, or so pre-occupied that you’ve never taken time to listen, you may never have heard that voice....

BUT IF YOU HAVE EVER, EVEN ONCE, FELT HIS EYES BEARING DOWN ON YOU, BURNING A HOLE THROUGH THE VERY CENTER OF YOUR HEART... if you have ever had your conscience wrenched until you thought you were going to die... AND THEN, IF YOU’VE EVER BEEN FORGIVEN, WHEN HE LIFTS THE UNBEARABLE BURDEN OF GUILT FROM YOUR SHOULDERS...lifts it up and throws it away...then you know, too, that resurrection of Jesus Christ is no fairy story.

“How do you know you were converted?”, someone once asked Dwight L. Moody. “How do I know?”, he replied. “Why, because I was there when it happened.” It’s hard to argue

with that. It’s not a matter of proof. It can’t be proven. But when it grabs you by the

throat, it’s too big and too real to deny.

It happened to Mary in the garden, and it’s what John wants everybody to experience.

This is how we know the truth of the Easter message. WE KNOW HE’S ALIVE WHEN HE CALLS US BY NAME.

3) And finally, the witness from Scene THREE. When did they know? When did it really hit them, those disciples, locked away in fear and trembling in the Upper Room? When did it get to them, the true scope of this thing that was so completely unprecedented and inexplicable?

When did the POWER of it, the transforming power of it begin to be expressed in their hands and in their feet and in their bones? WHEN COULD YOU SEE A DIFFERENCE IN THE BEFORE AND AFTER. Not just when He appeared...if there had been nothing more than that, they could have stayed on fire in the Upper Room until- Doomsday, and the world would never have known. Probably WE would never have known.

It was when He sent them OUT that Resurrection came alive. The power of the risen Christ is what He makes us DO...witness, serve, give, share…that’s what John wants us to see. The proof of Easter is not when we dress up and come together...not even in unusual numbers. The proof of Easter is when we go out, armed with basin and towel to wash and wipe the feet of the needy of the world.

How do we know He’s alive? WE KNOW HE’S ALIVE WHEN THE SPIRIT OF MISSION IS ALIVE AND BURNING IN OUR HEARTS.

So, that’s the story, according to John. That’s how it was that day. “He is risen.” Is it history? Yes, that’s part of it. It’s something rooted in an event. But, is there more? Well...is there?