A Promise as Universal as the Stars

Coded in Resurrection Language: Hope

By Rev. Marcia Moret Sietstra

March 23, 2008 Spirit of Peace UCC

John 20:1-18

There is an old custom of beginning a Easter sermon with a funny little story as a way to signal the end of the somber period of Lent. This custom is called “Risus Pascalis,” in Latin, which means “Easter Smile.” So here is a little something to bring you an Easter smile.[i]

“A drycleaner’s business was so successful that the owner had to move to a larger building. On opening day, a close friend sent flowers to celebrate the occasion. The flowers arrived at the new business site and the owner read the card which said ‘Rest in Peace.’

Realizing that somebody had made a mistake, the owner called the florist to register his complaint. The florist listened and then replied, “Sir, I am very sorry this has happened. But rather than getting upset and angry, you should imagine that somewhere in our city there is a funeral being conducted today and they have just received flowers with a note that says, ‘Congratulations on your new location!’”

I told Jean this story and she said, “Well, we’ve lived that!” and proceeded to tell me what happened when her father-in-law, Rick’s dad, died. Rick’s parents had been divorced for years, but when Rick’s father died, Rick’s mother was gracious enough to send a big bouquet of flowers to the rest of the family, including her ex-husband’s widow. When the bouquet arrived at the funeral home, it had a lovely card that said, “Happy Birthday!” In a sense, both cards were appropriate if you believe in life after death.

For many people, Easter represents the hope of a new life beyond this life. What happened to cause early Christians to dare hope for such a thing? Well, it has something to do with resurrection, but just exactly what resurrection means has never been entirely clear.

Three of the four gospels speak of Jesus’ re-appearances after he died. But the fascinating thing is, they give widely varying descriptions of what this “resurrected” Jesus was like, which has always made it hard for the church to know exactly what it all meant. John says the resurrected Jesus could appear and disappear behind locked doors, suggesting a ghost-like form. But Luke says he was no ghost; you could touch him and he ate a fish right in front of his friends. On the other hand, Luke also tells a story about two of Jesus’ followers walking for miles down the Emmaus Road with Jesus without recognizing him. What kind of body did a resurrected Jesus have if his friends sometimes could not recognize him but he could eat fish? Luke says it was only when they sat down to eat supper and Jesus broke bread, blessed it and gave it to them that they recognized him in their midst. Before that, they were described as “slow of heart.” So this resurrected Jesus—is it someone you see with the heart, not the eyes? John says Mary Magdalene, one of his dearest friends, didn’t recognize the resurrected Jesus at first either, until she “heard” him call her name. So perhaps one recognizes Jesus by a voice—could it be an inner voice or do you think it was audible?

There have always been scholars who wondered whether the 1st century writers of these gospels meant for us to take their accounts literally or metaphorically. Could it be that the 1^st century writers were using symbolic language to describe an intense experience they had, an amazing perception that the same spirit that animated Jesus was still present with them, particularly at times when they remembered him or reenacted his actions?

We don’t know exactly what happened that first Easter. The accounts are varied, and scholars are quite certain none of these gospels were written until 40-80 years after the events they describe. But I think something real happened to transform discouraged, frightened disciples into courageous ones who continued Jesus’ work. And whether the stories are literally true or metaphorically true is, perhaps, not a question we need to answer. Perhaps the meaning is the same either way.

Let me explain…If the gospel stories of Jesus’ appearances are literally true, it means that Jesus was alive again, somehow, and still present with them. And that gave them hope and empowered them to continue Jesus’ ministry—which was to help bring about the kingdom of God on earth. The kingdom of God is what life would look like if God were in charge; people would care for one another.

Now, on the other hand, if the gospel stories of Jesus’ appearances are metaphor, what does that mean? It means that Jesus, though not necessarily resuscitated, was still present with the disciples in a way which they found nearly impossible to explain, so they used resurrection language typical of the 1^st century to point to the power that they felt still in their midst. This gave them hope and empowered them to continue Jesus’ ministry—which was to bring about the kingdom of God on earth, that is, what life would look like if God were in charge. Notice I have used much of the same language to describe what these stories mean whether you read them literally or metaphorically.

I can see why the gospel writers had such a hard time explaining what happened in the years between Jesus’ death and their writing the stories down. Brilliant NT scholar Walter Wink suggests that the gospel writers were doing their best to put into words something they had no words for: “they experienced the most essential aspect of Jesus as remaining with them after his death—it was the power he had given them to live out the program he left behind. [ii] How do you explain the kind of power that comes from being in community and doing good in God’s name? You give it spiritual language.

That’s what Jesus did before he died. He told his disciples he would soon die, but he also told them about a source of power they would have. He said, “Don’t be afraid; I won’t leave you alone. I am sending my spirit, the spirit of truth to guide you in all things!”

Coded in all of this spiritual resurrection language is the message of hope, hope that Jesus was right when he said God can be trusted and there is a spirit of truth active in the world, empowering us to the good God wants us to do. Call that spirit Jesus or call it the Holy Spirit or call it the Spirit of Truth or simply call it God. The point is, Jesus knew this spiritual force; perhaps he unleashed it in a unique way or accessed it in his life. But coded in all this resurrection language is a message about the presence of something much bigger than all of us, present when we care for one another, which is the program Jesus taught.

The lesson of the resurrection stories is not some dogma about exactly what happened to Jesus’ body. The lesson of the resurrection stories is that there is spirit that empowers us. In today’s language we might say it this way: we have a creative God and while things may not be as we imagined, God co-creates through us a better world when we live the way Jesus demonstrated. Resurrection happens to us even in this life, in a real sense. I have seen resurrection, and so have you…

I have seen lives changed by forgiveness, and relationships healed—that’s resurrection. I have seen a school built for desperately poor children by people who cared enough thousands of miles away, to contribute to it. I have seen an abused person learn to trust God and learn to love, through the patient love of another person—that’s resurrection. I have seen a young person survive a serious injury, but through trust in God and the caring of friends and family, not give up, and she is finding a new way of being in the world every bit as meaningful and purposeful as before—that’s resurrection.

It happens exactly as Jesus said it would. He said to bring in the kingdom of God we need to forgive, to share, to practice compassion, and to trust God with all of life. Can you imagine a world in which Christians practiced these things on a wide scale? Such a feeling of new life, and hope, would cover the world, it would be like Easter every day!

Here’s the thing: The reason this resurrection story resonates with generation after generation is because we have seen just enough resurrection in life to dare to hope for more…indeed we have seen enough resurrection in life to dare hope that there might even be life for us after this one ends!

Harvey Cox, a popular professor at Harvard for decades, taught a course for many years called Jesus and the Moral Life. He said he found it tough to talk to Harvard students about Easter and resurrection at first, because they are trained to be detached, critical observers. But eventually he did. He told the students that his own resurrection hope was not based on understanding it, but on something much deeper in his bones….and that he was surest about it when he was locked in a southern jail during the civil rights movement and heard the young black people with whom he had been arrested singing “We Shall Overcome” in the next cell.[iii] That’s hope and power that refused to stay buried.

It is hard to trust that there is a spirit at work in the world, giving us reason to hope. There is so much devastation in the world today; the planet itself is in peril. We are fighting what our administration calls a “global war on terror,” the cost of which is estimated to be between one and three trillion dollars. As a result, our economy is in deep trouble. Thousands of families have lost their homes. America’s reputation and credibility have never been as damaged as they are now. For the first time in American history, an American administration has publicly condoned the torture of our prisoners in this war. It is hard to be hopeful for humanity when we see so much that is wrong.

But this year, as we have done for 2000 years, we will sing “alleluia” because there is a spirit—call it Jesus if you prefer that language---there is a spirit which could not be defeated. Even when they killed the person who was full of this spirit, they could not defeat its power. This spirit connects us to God, and to each other, and to every generation of people who do their best to live the way Jesus showed us, and who remain hopeful.

After decades of teaching about Jesus, Harvey Cox said—and he is speaking not literally but metaphorically here—he said, “I still think of Jesus as a friend, but I find him ever more elusive. Jesus is just as hard to pin down in death as he was in life...Every so often he takes me by surprise. I catch a glimpse of him sometimes on wintry afternoons strolling through Harvard Yard; chatting with sophomores…; dunking doughnuts in coffee with the janitors; helping the students who run the homeless shelters in the church basements…sometimes I see him as one of the shivering homeless men who wander into those shelters. But why should I be surprised? He is where he always was, doing what he was always doing: teaching, chatting, eating and drinking without regard to rank. Today, like then, he meets the same mixture of welcome and hesitation, skepticism and rejection. He runs the constant risk of real trouble with both the religious and the political establishments. But he gently forces people to look at life differently and maybe even to live it differently.”[iv]

May you and I live differently, and live with great hope, because Jesus lived and died and proved that the Spirit is loose in the world, filling us with the power to do good, and the will to be hopeful. Amen.