Remembering the Past...
        Planning the Future

    Park Christian Church
                                                                    (Disciples of Christ)

April 12, 2009

Scripture:         1 Corinthians 15:1-11

Sermon:           “Easter People”

According to the Gospel as written by Mark:

            When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint him.  And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb.  They had been saying to one another, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?”  When they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had already been rolled back.  As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man, dressed in a white robe, sitting on the right side; and they were alarmed.  But he said to them, “Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified.  He has been raised; he is not here.  Look, there is the place they laid him.  But, go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you.”  So they went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.

            Christ is risen!

            He is risen indeed!

            Now, I must say that something happened.  Something happened on that morning after the Sabbath following the Passover.  Something happened on that morning after the Sabbath following the crucifixion of Jesus of Nazareth.

            It must have.

            He was not the only great teacher to be killed by the Roman authorities or the few powerful Jews that benefited from their rule.  John the Baptist, you know—he was beheaded by one of the Herods.  He was not the only healer to perform miracles in the name of God during those days.  And he was not the only charismatic figure to gain a following.

            The book of Acts recalls a couple of radical figures that rose up against the Romans.  Theudas was one of them.  Judas the Galilean was another.  And the Bible is not the only place to mention these two.  The ancient historian Josephus also took note of their movements.  In each case, John the Baptist, Theudas, Judas the Galilean, and several other holy men—when they were put to death, their movements disappeared.  Disappointment, disillusionment, fear all combined to scatter the followers of these leaders.

            With Jesus, something happened.

            That same chapter in Acts, chapter 5, which tells the story of the disciples after the life of Jesus, records that one wise Pharisee, Gamaliel, said to a council of elders, “if this plan or this undertaking is of human origin, it will fail.  But if it is of God, you will not be able to overthrow them.”

            The followers of Jesus did not cease to be a movement.  Something happened.

            That historian, Josephus, even took note of them.  He wrote some 60 years after Jesus was crucified that “the tribe of Christians, so named from him, are not extinct at this day.”

            Something happened, I tell you, because those incredibly faulty human beings that followed Jesus from Galilee to Jerusalem, and all points in between, became passionate about keeping the Jesus movement alive and growing.  Even under the threat of death, and often in experiencing death, these people did not disperse, did not get disillusioned, did not fear for their lives in making Jesus known to any who would listen and believe and experience for themselves.

            They, with the power of the Holy Spirit, gave birth to the church.

            Now, I invite you to turn to a writing of one of those first believers in the risen Christ, Paul.  He was one that founded communities of faith in Jesus throughout the eastern Roman Empire.  In particular, he founded a church in Corinth, and kept in touch with them by letters.  His first letter that we have in the Bible was written some 20 years after the resurrection.

            Read with me from chapter 15, verses 1 through 11.  You can find that easily on page   of the New Testament in the pew Bible.  This is the story of Easter as it was experienced by the first people who, like you and me, were only receiving their faith through others.

            Now I would remind you, brothers and sisters, of the good news that I proclaimed to you, which you in turn received, in which also you stand, through which also you are being saved, if you hold firmly to the message that I proclaimed to you—unless you have come to believe in vain.

            For I handed on to you as of first importance what I in turn received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.  Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers and sisters at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have died.  Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles.  Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me.  For I am the least of the apostles, unfit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God.  But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me has not been in vain.  On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them—though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.  Whether then it was I or they, so we proclaim and so you have come to believe.

            Where I come from, what Paul just did was give a bit of what you call a testimony.  It’s a personal story of faith.  This is what God has done for me in my life.  Let me tell you how I know God is real.  Just look at my life story.  That’s a testimony.

            Paul said, “I shouldn’t even be standing here telling you this.  To be honest, I shouldn’t be here.  My life?  Before God burst into it?  An awful mess.  I was just filled with this rage and this macho need to be right about everything.  And I took it out on people that couldn’t or wouldn’t so much as put up a fight.  I spent all my energy on trying to destroy this thing called the church, these people who said they were following the Prince of Peace.

            “But, I encountered the very thing that I was trying to destroy.  It was the very thing these people were talking about.  The risen Christ appeared to me and changed my life.”

            Now it so happens that I’ve got a testimony of my own.  There are days when I, too, feel like saying that I’m rather unfit to be doing this ministry of church.  Parts of the road I’ve traveled make up a crooked mile.  Yes, sir.  I could tell you a testimony of God’s grace and newness of life.

            I suspect we all could.

            But, that’s what Paul’s getting at here.  This resurrection business—not just that Jesus himself was raised from the dead, but that we all are—this resurrection business is what God has had in mind all along.  I’m going to take this whole world, which is defined by things like Good Friday, death, dying, falling apart—I’m going to take this whole world and break it free from all of that. 

            Easter is not just a remembrance of what some folks said happened.  Easter is who we are.  By God’s grace, we are becoming what we never could have been on our own.  We are Easter people.  Easter people.  Not defined by all the ways we are destroyed and all the ways we destroy ourselves.  Easter people are defined by all the ways God rescues us.

            A couple of years ago now my daughter was born.  And my wife’s pregnancy had some complications that meant we had to welcome little Madeleine about a month before she was ready to come all by herself.  It also meant that we spent seven or eight nights in the hospital instead of one or two.

            And I got to know the other new fathers on our floor.  We were all kind of in it together—wives, girlfriends, mothers of our kids recovering from c-sections; premature newborns sleeping in the nursery.   And we’d meet in the lounge long after midnight when everybody was sleeping so that we could watch Sports Center.

            One of these boys was really something.  Scared to death.  Young.  Looked like a deer in the headlights.  And he’d make it about 15 minutes at a time before saying, “’scuse me fellas. I’ll be right back.”  And he’d return from a trip to the smoking area with a look of temporary relaxation.  But, he’d be needing another one soon enough.

            I noticed something, by the way, in the gift shop of the hospital.  You know you can get all stocked up for your trip home with a newborn baby before you leave the place.  And I was sent to investigate the options for breast pumps.  It’s an awkward thing for a grown man to do.  But, my wife reminded me that nobody cut my stomach open recently.  Surely I can handle this.  And while I was perusing the various models, I saw that right there in the middle of all of this baby feeding display were stacks of books for Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous.

            But, all that made more sense to me when this new young father I was telling you about showed up on night number three with one of these books sticking out of his backpack.  And his hands were shaking that night.  He was tapping his feet and rubbing his hands on his knees.  He’d get up to smoke, but he wouldn’t announce it anymore.

            On night number four, he said to all of us, “you guys gotta help me out here.  I’m freaking out.  I’ve got this little man down the hall, you know.  And I’m not much of a man to be calling myself a father.  But, I look at those little eyes, and those little feet.  And if I don’t get straight, what is all of that going to grow up to be?”

            And he said, “you’re the preacher.  Can’t you get all these fellas here to pray with me?  I mean doesn’t that stuff work?  Isn’t there something in the Bible about being able to die and get a fresh, clean start all over again?”

            And you know something?  There is something in the Bible about that.

            I had no idea what I was dealing with there in that lounge at 2 am.  I didn’t know if any of these guys went to church.  I didn’t know if they might adhere to some other faith, you know.  We didn’t talk about any of that together.  We talked about basketball because it was February and we were all nervous men who could only manage to talk about sports.

            Then this big guy across the room stood up and walked over to us.  He took off his ball cap and said, “okay, preacher.  Let’s do this.  I don’t know about praying.  But, we can do this.”

            And sometimes that’s how it happens.  God manages a little grace in spite of us.  And a big ‘ole stone starts to roll away from the tomb we’ve been stuffed into.  And we become Easter people.

Rev. David James Brown

Park Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)