Easter

Easter Morning Meditation

Shalom Mennonite Church

Sunday, April 24, 2011

Text: John 20:1-18

“testimony”

The resurrection of Jesus -

this death-bending, life-altering moment -

happens in relative obscurity.

It unfolds in the twilight hours before sunrise,

out beyond the city.

It happens away from the crowds

who had gathered just a few days earlier

to welcome Jesus into Jerusalem with

joyful expectation,

and who later denounced him with

bitter condemnation.

There is no fanfare,

there are no angel choirs,

or miraculous stars shining overhead,

or visitors from the East bearing gifts.

There is simply this rising of new life

from the tomb of death.

Its witnesses are, at first, very few.

In fact, it is only one person

who first encounters the risen Christ:

Mary Magdalene.

According to John’s gospel

Mary is the first one commissioned by Christ

to go and give testimony to his rising.

And what we have of Mary’s testimony

are these words:

I have seen the Lord.

The first thing I notice is the simplicity

and the directness of the message.

I have seen the Lord.

Now we have libraries full of books

proposing theories and meanings,

explanations and refutations,

for the resurrection of Jesus.

Mary offered her testimony before

any of these words were written.

I have seen the Lord.

Now we have complex theologies

that lay things out like well-balanced arithmetic:

“Christ needed to die

and then be raised so that . . .”

A+B=C

For Mary there was no such logic

or rationale for this upheaving moment.

She could only bear witness by saying:

I have seen the Lord.

Her testimony is not figurative or metaphorical.

She is not saying:

“As I stood at the tomb

I really felt Jesus’ presence there

and it seemed like he was calling

to me in my heart.”

Or,

“I met the gardener at the tombs and he had this

really gentle way about him;

he reminded me a lot of our teacher.”

The proclamation of Mary and the gospel story is, literally:

The Lord is risen and I have seen him!

Her bold testimony stands in contrast to

Peter’s earlier denials and the other disciples

who are hiding out in the upper room “for fear of the Jews.”

What we learn from Mary Magdalene is that

to witness the resurrection is to be compelled to speak,

simply and boldly.

The Good News must be shared.

This is the first thing I notice in Mary’s testimony.

The second thing I notice about Mary’s testimony

is the way it unfolds through the channels of relationship.

At the tomb, it is when Jesus speaks her name

that Mary recognizes him for who he is.

Their friendship is the channel for the revelation.

And perhaps recognizing her desire

to reclaim the intimacy of the earthly relationship

they shared before his death,

Jesus says to Mary:

Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’

Jesus’ words affirm the bond

that he shares with her and the other disciples

in the Love of God.

There are echoes here of the prayer

Jesus offered in the garden before his death:

All mine are yours and yours are mine; and I have been glorified in them. And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one . . . as you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us . . . I in them and you in me, so that they may be completely one. (John 17:10-11,21, 23)

At the tomb, this oneness we share with Jesus in God

is fully disclosed to Mary Magdalene.

She becomes a part of it.

And because the very nature of this oneness is love,

she is compelled to go and share it with her friends.

Mary becomes a model for us

as to what it means to witness and testify

to the risen Christ.

And it means much more than retelling a story once a year.

There was a time when I wondered what it would have been like

to be among those first disciples, to be there at the empty tomb,

or to be in the upper room,

when the risen one appeared.

There have been other moments in life

when I have doubted whether these events

really occurred at all.

From certain points of view,

there is little in this world

to confirm for our limited minds

that resurrection ever happened - or ever will.

There have been times when I have found

all of the speculations and theories

about Christ’s resurrection that have been written

by learned women and men over the centuries

quite fascinating and inspiring.

And there have been times I have found them

overwhelming and distracting -

always one step removed from the reality

of which they struggle to speak.

Now, in this stage of my journey, I must testify

that when it comes to the resurrection of Christ,

I am inclined to follow the example of Mary Magdalene,

more than that of any jaded skeptic,

or any learned theologian

or any well-formulated confession of faith.

Because some days I find myself weeping at the tomb,

witnessing the pain of this world,

seeing the brokenness of the church,

feeling the falsehoods in my own being,

and, like Mary, I wonder where the body of Christ has been laid.

Then there are those moments

when I hear my own true name being spoken -

sometimes from a deep-within place,

sometimes from the mouth of a loved one,

occasionally by a stranger,

and once in a startling while by one

whom I thought to be an adversary.

And to hear your true name called is a gift.

I, too, have often mistaken other people

standing right beside me

to be just that, “other people” -

just gardeners standing there - ordinary and unremarkable.

Then something lifts a veil that has blinded me

and I see that this is no ordinary person,

that Christ dwells there and rises there, too.

And I read and listen to the scripture of the Earth,

with its symphonic cycle of

birthing-living-dying-rising

and I understand what the psalmist meant

when he said:

“I believe I shall see the goodness

of the Lord in the land of the living.”

And standing here this morning,

as so often happens when we gather here,

I feel wonder and gratitude

for the body we become,

the way we are made one,

by him who rises in us.

And I am compelled to testify:

I have seen the Lord!

I see the Lord!

Christ is risen!

Christ is rising

right here

right now.

AMEN