Mark 16:1-8
When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices so they could embalm him. Very early on Sunday morning, as the sun rose, they went to the tomb. They worried out loud to each other, “Who will roll back the stone from the tomb for us?”
Then they looked up, saw that it had been rolled back—it was a huge stone—and walked right in. They saw a young man sitting on the right side, dressed all in white. They were completely taken aback, astonished.
He said, “Don’t be afraid. I know you’re looking for Jesus the Nazarene, the One they nailed on the cross. He’s been raised up; he’s here no longer. You can see for yourselves that the place is empty. Now—on your way. Tell his disciples and Peter that he is going on ahead of you to Galilee. You’ll see him there, exactly as he said.”
They got out as fast as they could, beside themselves, their heads swimming. Stunned, they said nothing to anyone.
Holy Week is a roller coaster ride. It starts up high with the fleeting euphoria of Palm Sunday, then begins a slow descent to the night-time betrayal of Maundy Thursday, then straight into an abrupt oh-my-God-I’m-going-to-throw-up drop into the viciousness and horror and failure of Good Friday. On Holy Saturday there is absence and silence and just enough time to begin to catch our breath and look around us and try to figure what just happened, when here we are on Easter Sunday – and against all expectation – we are actually starting to climb again.
I say “starting” to climb again because Easter is not the culmination of a story but simply another beginning. What was lost is found. What was dead lives again. What was hopeless is suddenly filled with new hope. Jesus is risen!.....now what?
When you have watched someone you love die – when you have cleaned and buried his lifeless body and walked away from the wreckage of all your dreams it has got to take a little time to figure out what to do with the idea that he is now living again. Easter morning is only a beginning. There will be a long process of wrapping their brains around an impossible reality. There will – finally – be eyes opened to actually see a truth that has been right in front of them all along. There will be a complete rearrangement of their ideas of who this Jesus actually is..... and, maybe even more importantly, there will be a coming to grips with just who this Jesus thinks they are.
The gospel accounts of the resurrection are each slightly different. There are brief, scattered appearances in Emmaus and Jerusalem, but most accounts have the disciples making this return to Galilee for their final meetings with the risen Lord – Galilee, where it all began. Galilee, out in the “boondocks” where only the “hicks” live – far from the cosmopolitan splendor and might of Jerusalem.
In Mark’s gospel account which we just read for this year’s cycle, the angel at the tomb sends the disciples straight back to Galilee, telling them they will meet Jesus there. Now, according to one source I checked, it is somewhere in the vicinity of 70 miles from Jerusalem to Galilee, depending on where you’re going. It’s going to take them a day or two – or four or five – to walk that distance through rough country. They are going to have a lot of time to think about it all on their journey back to where it all started for them, three short years ago – back to where they first met Jesus. Back to the place from which they are going to start all over again – but this time, hopefully, with their eyes wide open.
Easter morning invites each of us back to Galilee – wherever our own Galilee might be. Where was it that you first met Jesus? Where did this stranger call out to you and invite you to follow him? Maybe there have been many different Galilees for you. Places where you met Jesus again and again, but each time with a new and different understanding so that it was almost like meeting him for the first time. Is it possible to return to Galilee? Can we get there from here? Is it easy for us?
I likened Holy Week to a roller coaster ride, but there are times when it feels like the car I’m in has come to a complete stop somewhere in Holy Saturday. When our souls are mired down in all the ugliness of everyday’s newscast it can feel like we might be stalled out here forever and we have lost our way back to Galilee.
But Jesus calls us there, nonetheless – and that, I suspect – is the true miracle of Easter – that after all the betrayal and the horror and the lies and the pain and the failure – Jesus still calls each one of us to meet him again in Galilee. I love the way Mary Luti put it in today’s reflection in our meditation book: “Even if...you have nothing to bring to the meeting but stupidity and stubbornness, fear and self-protection, betrayals and cowardice...Even if you can’t imagine why anyone should love you...Jesus wants you to go to Galilee. He’ll meet you there.”
I think it is important that we pay attention to the fact that when Jesus leaves them a message it’s not a sermon on how faithless they had been, there’s no blame for abandoning him, no post-game review of where it all had gone wrong. Instead there’s just “Well that’s taken care of - now meet me in Galilee and we’ll talk about where you go from here.”
As several people have mentioned this week, Easter is proof that Love Wins. Political corruption and religious fanaticism and greed and ignorance and human weakness may seem to have free rein in this world we live in – but Easter is proof that God is not through with us. Jesus is still calling the world to meet him again in Galilee. Calling us to take lift our eyes from the darkness around us and look for the light of Easter.
The author Willa Cather, once said something to the effect of "Miracles rest not so much upon healing power coming suddenly near us from afar but upon our perceptions being made finer, so that, for a moment, our eyes can see and our ears can hear what is there around us always."
Love wins. Miracles happen. Christ is risen. Let us go to Galilee.
Amen.
I say “starting” to climb again because Easter is not the culmination of a story but simply another beginning. What was lost is found. What was dead lives again. What was hopeless is suddenly filled with new hope. Jesus is risen!.....now what?
When you have watched someone you love die – when you have cleaned and buried his lifeless body and walked away from the wreckage of all your dreams it has got to take a little time to figure out what to do with the idea that he is now living again. Easter morning is only a beginning. There will be a long process of wrapping their brains around an impossible reality. There will – finally – be eyes opened to actually see a truth that has been right in front of them all along. There will be a complete rearrangement of their ideas of who this Jesus actually is..... and, maybe even more importantly, there will be a coming to grips with just who this Jesus thinks they are.
The gospel accounts of the resurrection are each slightly different. There are brief, scattered appearances in Emmaus and Jerusalem, but most accounts have the disciples making this return to Galilee for their final meetings with the risen Lord – Galilee, where it all began. Galilee, out in the “boondocks” where only the “hicks” live – far from the cosmopolitan splendor and might of Jerusalem.
In Mark’s gospel account which we just read for this year’s cycle, the angel at the tomb sends the disciples straight back to Galilee, telling them they will meet Jesus there. Now, according to one source I checked, it is somewhere in the vicinity of 70 miles from Jerusalem to Galilee, depending on where you’re going. It’s going to take them a day or two – or four or five – to walk that distance through rough country. They are going to have a lot of time to think about it all on their journey back to where it all started for them, three short years ago – back to where they first met Jesus. Back to the place from which they are going to start all over again – but this time, hopefully, with their eyes wide open.
Easter morning invites each of us back to Galilee – wherever our own Galilee might be. Where was it that you first met Jesus? Where did this stranger call out to you and invite you to follow him? Maybe there have been many different Galilees for you. Places where you met Jesus again and again, but each time with a new and different understanding so that it was almost like meeting him for the first time. Is it possible to return to Galilee? Can we get there from here? Is it easy for us?
I likened Holy Week to a roller coaster ride, but there are times when it feels like the car I’m in has come to a complete stop somewhere in Holy Saturday. When our souls are mired down in all the ugliness of everyday’s newscast it can feel like we might be stalled out here forever and we have lost our way back to Galilee.
But Jesus calls us there, nonetheless – and that, I suspect – is the true miracle of Easter – that after all the betrayal and the horror and the lies and the pain and the failure – Jesus still calls each one of us to meet him again in Galilee. I love the way Mary Luti put it in today’s reflection in our meditation book: “Even if...you have nothing to bring to the meeting but stupidity and stubbornness, fear and self-protection, betrayals and cowardice...Even if you can’t imagine why anyone should love you...Jesus wants you to go to Galilee. He’ll meet you there.”
I think it is important that we pay attention to the fact that when Jesus leaves them a message it’s not a sermon on how faithless they had been, there’s no blame for abandoning him, no post-game review of where it all had gone wrong. Instead there’s just “Well that’s taken care of - now meet me in Galilee and we’ll talk about where you go from here.”
As several people have mentioned this week, Easter is proof that Love Wins. Political corruption and religious fanaticism and greed and ignorance and human weakness may seem to have free rein in this world we live in – but Easter is proof that God is not through with us. Jesus is still calling the world to meet him again in Galilee. Calling us to take lift our eyes from the darkness around us and look for the light of Easter.
The author Willa Cather, once said something to the effect of "Miracles rest not so much upon healing power coming suddenly near us from afar but upon our perceptions being made finer, so that, for a moment, our eyes can see and our ears can hear what is there around us always."
Love wins. Miracles happen. Christ is risen. Let us go to Galilee.
Amen.
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