Matthew 28:1-10
After the Sabbath, as the first light of the new week dawned, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to keep vigil at the tomb. Suddenly the earth reeled and rocked under their feet as God’s angel came down from heaven, came right up to where they were standing. He rolled back the stone and then sat on it. Shafts of lightning blazed from him. His garments shimmered snow-white. The guards at the tomb were scared to death. They were so frightened, they couldn’t move.
The angel spoke to the women: “There is nothing to fear here. I know you’re looking for Jesus, the One they nailed to the cross. He is not here. He was raised, just as he said. Come and look at the place where he was placed.
“Now, get on your way quickly and tell his disciples, ‘He is risen from the dead. He is going on ahead of you to Galilee. You will see him there.’ That’s the message.”
The women, deep in wonder and full of joy, lost no time in leaving the tomb. They ran to tell the disciples. Then Jesus met them, stopping them in their tracks. “Good morning!” he said. They fell to their knees, embraced his feet, and worshiped him. Jesus said, “You’re holding on to me for dear life! Don’t be frightened like that. Go tell my brothers that they are to go to Galilee, and that I’ll meet them there.”
In many ways this started out as a horrible week. I left church last Sunday excited and happy after our wonderful discussion and when I got home, turned on the computer to check the news I hadn’t taken the time to read before church. That was my first mistake because I was met with the report of the neo-Nazi who had murdered three innocent people for the “crime” of being Jewish – all while shouting “Heil, Hitler!” For some reason, that just threw me over the edge. I mean, “Heil, Hitler” for Pete’s sake ... How long ... how long do we have to carry around the same old, ugly hatreds before we can ever put them to rest?
Then all week long there were the Ukrainians and the Syrians, happily bombing and gassing each other – and those despicable cowards who hide behind the name “Muslim” – when they have no more to do with Islam than Neo-Nazis do with Christianity – they’re still determined to kill off everyone who isn’t them – especially school girls – scary things, school girls. Hatred, it was all too obvious, is alive and well today on planet Earth. And all this while I am working on a “celebration” for today.
Hatred is alive and well, just as it was alive in Jesus’ day, and in all the days in-between. And yet ..... we are gathered here this morning not to mourn the presence of hatred, but to proclaim that – in spite of hatred’s best efforts -- love wins!
Jesus walked among us and taught and healed among us to show us that, in spite of what sometimes seems to be, it is love which always has and always will win. My friend Flora Wuellner has recently released her latest book – her 8th or 9th or so – titled Beyond Death: What Jesus Revealed about Eternal Life, and she sent Hilary and me a copy, which I am currently reading. In it she describes Jesus’s earthly mission as being “to bring heaven, the fullness of God’s realm, into our daily lives, relationships, choices.” I love that – Jesus’s mission, if I'm reading Flora correctly, was less to get us into heaven, as the church has taught for 2000 years, than to get heaven into us – to place the living love of God into us – God's living, breathing, acting love in us.
Jesus faced plenty that was ugly when he was here among us, but he never gave up his focus on the love of the one he called Father. He saw hatred and greed and hopelessness and selfishness and envy and fear aplenty, but still, the God he knew so deeply and personally was not, in his vision, about retribution or revenge or punishment — but always about love. Love is what he came to offer us ... to give, and to give, and to give – in spite of our deep clinging to our old fears and hatreds. And in spite of all that hatred had to throw at him, love is what Jesus did give us in return.
Love spoke in all his teaching and healing. Love hung on that hideous cross. And love it is that lives again in each and every one of us – loving and being through and in us.
Love is why we exist. Love – I believe – is what God is. And everything that comes from God is the result of that love. Love creates. All that is flows from the creativity of God’s love. Love supports, love nourishes, love builds – and love invites – invites us to live here and now in that heaven which is the ultimate expression of God’s love. Love is why Jesus exists. Love is why Easter is so important – more important, really, than Christmas. Love is why we are here .....
And so hatred – for all its nagging, petty ugliness – for all its persistence in the world – for all its seeming inevitable-ness – hatred loses. Always has, always will. Because the life-giving Creator who brought everything into being is determined to love us all into wholeness. And – as Easter proves again today -- love always wins.
I took the title for this message from Rob Bell’s book, titled “Love Wins” – because that book was and is a reminder to me that God’s love is stronger than death, stronger than hate. It’s easy to lose that in the midst of the world’s news, but it’s true. Love wins. It’s not some heavy, convoluted theological dogma – it’s two short words. Easy to carry around with you every day: Love wins. I want to end today with the blessing with which Bell ends the book:
Then all week long there were the Ukrainians and the Syrians, happily bombing and gassing each other – and those despicable cowards who hide behind the name “Muslim” – when they have no more to do with Islam than Neo-Nazis do with Christianity – they’re still determined to kill off everyone who isn’t them – especially school girls – scary things, school girls. Hatred, it was all too obvious, is alive and well today on planet Earth. And all this while I am working on a “celebration” for today.
Hatred is alive and well, just as it was alive in Jesus’ day, and in all the days in-between. And yet ..... we are gathered here this morning not to mourn the presence of hatred, but to proclaim that – in spite of hatred’s best efforts -- love wins!
Jesus walked among us and taught and healed among us to show us that, in spite of what sometimes seems to be, it is love which always has and always will win. My friend Flora Wuellner has recently released her latest book – her 8th or 9th or so – titled Beyond Death: What Jesus Revealed about Eternal Life, and she sent Hilary and me a copy, which I am currently reading. In it she describes Jesus’s earthly mission as being “to bring heaven, the fullness of God’s realm, into our daily lives, relationships, choices.” I love that – Jesus’s mission, if I'm reading Flora correctly, was less to get us into heaven, as the church has taught for 2000 years, than to get heaven into us – to place the living love of God into us – God's living, breathing, acting love in us.
Jesus faced plenty that was ugly when he was here among us, but he never gave up his focus on the love of the one he called Father. He saw hatred and greed and hopelessness and selfishness and envy and fear aplenty, but still, the God he knew so deeply and personally was not, in his vision, about retribution or revenge or punishment — but always about love. Love is what he came to offer us ... to give, and to give, and to give – in spite of our deep clinging to our old fears and hatreds. And in spite of all that hatred had to throw at him, love is what Jesus did give us in return.
Love spoke in all his teaching and healing. Love hung on that hideous cross. And love it is that lives again in each and every one of us – loving and being through and in us.
Love is why we exist. Love – I believe – is what God is. And everything that comes from God is the result of that love. Love creates. All that is flows from the creativity of God’s love. Love supports, love nourishes, love builds – and love invites – invites us to live here and now in that heaven which is the ultimate expression of God’s love. Love is why Jesus exists. Love is why Easter is so important – more important, really, than Christmas. Love is why we are here .....
And so hatred – for all its nagging, petty ugliness – for all its persistence in the world – for all its seeming inevitable-ness – hatred loses. Always has, always will. Because the life-giving Creator who brought everything into being is determined to love us all into wholeness. And – as Easter proves again today -- love always wins.
I took the title for this message from Rob Bell’s book, titled “Love Wins” – because that book was and is a reminder to me that God’s love is stronger than death, stronger than hate. It’s easy to lose that in the midst of the world’s news, but it’s true. Love wins. It’s not some heavy, convoluted theological dogma – it’s two short words. Easy to carry around with you every day: Love wins. I want to end today with the blessing with which Bell ends the book:
“May you experience this vast, expansive, infinite, indestructible love that has been yours all along. May you discover that this love is as wide as the sky and as small as the cracks in your heart no one else knows about. And may you know, deep in your bones, that love wins.”
Happy Easter!
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