Easter Sunday 20th April 2014
Bible Reading: Mark 16:1-8
“If your day was a colour, what colour would it be?
Imagine what answer the women on the way to the tomb would have answered. It was less than two days since Jesus died. As far as they were concerned they were going to perform the ritual of anointing Jesus’ body. They were going to a cemetery, a place for good byes. In their minds it was an ending, not a beginning, not a gloriously bright new day.
But a rolled away stone, an empty tomb and an angel with a message changed all that. The early morning experience of the three women changed the colour of their lives. Sunday brought a new dawn for them and for the whole of humanity.
1. Dawn brought a new perspective on what was relevant
On the way to the tomb access to the body was a major concern for the
women. How were they going to manage the
stone? How were they going to convince
the guards they needed to get in the tomb?
How would they stand it, if they couldn’t do this final service for
Jesus? If they couldn’t get into the
tomb, then it would make what modern day bereavement counsellors call “closure” so much harder. They were taken up with grief, with the task they were to perform and with the obstacles in their path. But the dawn made their grief unnecessary, their task redundant and the obstacles irrelevant.
They didn’t need to negotiate with Roman guards because they had run off. They didn’t need to get into the tomb because he wasn’t there. They didn’t need their spices; they didn’t have a job to do because there was no body to embalm. They didn’t need to mourn Jesus, because He wasn’t dead!
What fears, tasks and obstacles are we battling with which are utterly unnecessary because Easter Sunday has dawned?
Why are we worried about our future, what might happen to our life, about dying, if Jesus is risen?
Why do we think the obstacles in the way of our being the kind of people God wants us to be and do the things He has called us to do are too big to overcome, when the angel rolled the stone away?
Why are we engaged in some practices and activities that are about dead issues?
Why does the church sometimes spend it’s time
fussing about duties and rituals that are more about dead things than
proclaiming a living Jesus?
Mark says they trembled and that they were bewildered.
The word in the Greek is ekstasis, from where we get our English word ecstasy.
Literally, it means to be bewildered by extreme joy. The women were so overjoyed that they could hardly contain themselves, and in their effort to do so, they were shaking.
Matthew 28:8 that they hurried away from the tomb, afraid yet filled with joy.
What a great way to leave a cemetery?
We don’t usually leave graveyards excited?
We usually leave there in pain over the death of a family member or friend! Even, if it’s not someone that we were closely acquainted with excitement is not an emotion we usually feel after leaving the graveyard.
Whether we view an historical event with intellectual assessment or with emotional passion often depends upon whether the events being considered have anything to do with us.
When we view the events of Easter, we can do so as an academic exercise if we want to, but to do so is to assume that they are nothing to do with you.
What happened in the garden is about the family of man everywhere. It has everything to do with who we think we are. We must let it touch more than our minds. We can get as excited about it as the three women who were there because what Jesus achieved is as much for us as it was for them. It should set our emotions ablaze!
3. Dawn brought a new hope for the world
It means that good is greater than evil.
The devil thought he had won and used his most powerful weapon death to assault and overcome the goodness of God. But the Son of God had the authority to lay down His life, and He had the authority to take it again!
It means that death is no longer a dead end.
It is no longer something that one must face with dread, and despair. Death is no longer the enemy of those who believe because it has been challenged, and conquered by the Lord. Because He lives, we shall live also.
It means grace is greater than all our sin.
Romans 5:20 says. “Where sin increased, grace increased all the more.” Christ’s perfect sacrifice of Himself, and His pure, holy blood, cleanses us from all sin, if we believe in Him.
It means that love is stronger than hate.
The hatred of unbelievers for Christ is clearly revealed at the cross, but God’s love is greater than human hate.
Jesus prayed, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." There is a length, breath, depth, and height to the love of God that cannot be fathomed.
4. Dawn brought a new task
The young man or angel according to Matthew gave the women a message. The tomb was empty because Jesus was risen from the dead. They were told to go and tell. They were to go tell the disciples and Peter, “He is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him just as he told you.”
But did they do as they were told? Mark 16: 8 is a bit puzzling at first. “Trembling and bewildered the women went out and fled from the tomb. They said nothing to anyone because they were afraid.”
It makes it look as if they had missed the point. Far from being excited it looks here like fear paralyzed them and as a result they said nothing to anyone.
It says that they were so afraid they said nothing to anyone.
The word afraid is the Greek word Phobeo. It has two possible meanings.
It could mean to be really frightened or to be overwhelmed with awe and reverence. In the context here it must surely mean extreme reverence. They didn’t say anything to anybody else, because the angel had instructed them to tell the disciples. So, they spoke to no one on the way back, and only spoke to the ones they were instructed to tell.
They respected, and demonstrated reverence to that very thing of which they were commanded to do.
The women approached the tomb, anticipating that they would perform a sacred task they left the tomb knowing they were to perform an equally sacred duty. They were completely focused on it they would not be side-tracked on the way by anything that might stop them getting their message to those who at that moment most needed to hear it.
We too have a sacred message to pass on to those who most need to hear it.
This message of the dawn was not something to just keep within the circle of friends of Jesus. It was just the beginning of a new age of the gospel reaching out to the whole world.
When Jesus appeared to the 11 remaining disciples, after telling them off for their slowness to believe He gave them a new task.
“Go into all the world and preach the good
news to all creation.” (Mark 16:15)
God bless you
Alan
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