THE EMPTY TOMB
EASTER EVE
Tonight
is the defining moment of Christendom. Tonight we meet the empty tomb. In so
doing, you and I confront Christ’s resurrection, which marks His victory, His
triumph, over evil, sin and death. By the resurrection of Christ, God shows us
that hope overcomes despair, that righteousness overcomes injustice, that mercy
overcomes oppression and that love overcomes terror and hatred.
It is the doctrine of the resurrection
that sets Christians, you and me, apart from other religions and
interpretations regarding the meaning of life. By His resurrection Jesus is
more than just a holy man, more than a prophet, more than a teacher-rabbi, more
than a miracle worker-healer. Christ’s resurrection affirms Jesus as the Son of
God, the Messiah, the guarantor of eternal life. Christ’s resurrection changed
history and redefined the meaning of life for millions.
Now I am going to tell you three
stories. You have heard them before. The first story: Years ago, I met the
Easter Bunny. It wasn’t really the Easter Bunny; it was a person in a white
rabbit suit out in the day care playground. She was having a great time with
the kids. In my imagination I asked, “What are you doing?” “ “Oh, I’m having
fun with the children. I guess I am trying to remind folk of joy and peace and
new birth.” “ Funny, I replied, that is my job too. Hop along,” I said, and she
did.
Imagination transports us through the
spectrum of time, enables us to participate in various dimensions of reality
and to grasp truths that often seem ephemeral. One of which is the story of the
resurrection. It is the story of hope. It is the assurance of eternal life with
a loving God. The story of the Easter Bunny moves us to that direction. It is
good. The secular world is but a reflection of the eternal world. It prepares
us for truths too deep for tears, too joyous for laughter.
For many Easter is simply the seasonal
celebration of spring and new birth, a reflection of the life cycle. But for
Christians, Easter is more than the religion of nature; it is the statement
that through the revelation of Jesus Christ each one of us receives the promise
of eternal life with the source of all life and all beauty and all love, God
Himself.
Now for my second story: Jesus was a
Jew. You cannot understand Easter without knowing about the prophecies in Isaiah, Jeremiah and the Psalms.
Israel longed for, hungered for, a messiah. Jesus fulfilled that expectation
and hunger. The Old Testament is the
foundation for Christianity. Our Easter event is the demarcation of
Christianity from Judaism.
The third story: It is part of a much
longer story, which is one of my favorites. Some years ago I had a call at
10:30 p.m. from Bouton and Reynolds Funeral Home. “Father Gage, this is
Michelle. I have a special request of you. Could you do a Jewish funeral
tomorrow at 11:00 a.m.? I cannot get a rabbi. The family had decided they would
not have a funeral, but at the last minute felt that they had to have some kind
of service. They are more or less non-practicing Jews. When I was unable to get
a rabbi, I told them that I knew a really nice Episcopal priest, who would try
to help them. It will be just a small family gathering. Can you help me out?”
“Sure, Michelle, I’ll do what I can,” I replied. After I hung up and told my
wife, Faye, about this, she replied, “Are you out of your mind?”
Apparently I was. I got up early the
next morning and went down to my office. I have some books on funerals, and I
thought I would find something in them. Nothing. “Oh, well, I thought, I’ll
just take the burial service in The Book
of Common Prayer and delete any references to Jesus.” Wrong. The burial
service opens with, “I am the resurrection and the life, saith the Lord; he
that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live; and whosoever
liveth and believeth in me shall never die.” (BCP p.469)
The whole burial service is loaded
with Easter and resurrection theology. So I put together a service of an
opening statement, a prayer, a psalm, a reading from Ecclesiastes, a prayer, a psalm, a eulogy and a closing prayer.
When I got to the funeral home, the
“small family gathering” was of 80, 60 men and 20 women dressed in black. I
told them that I was honored to be with them in their time of grief and loss
and that my job as a minister was to tend to the needs of all people in the
heart of Stamford. They were relieved and the service went well.
My point is that it is the Easter
story of the resurrection that is the lynchpin of our Christian religion.
Judaism is wonderful and we are deeply indebted to it for our Judeo-Christian
heritage. But we part company in our narrative, in our history, in our
imagination, in our expectations and in our philosophic/theological worldview
as a result of the Church’s experience, of your and my experience, of the empty
tomb.
My third story is more of a
reflection. On Tuesday of the following week, I gave the homily at the funeral
of a woman I had known for 25 years. She was the same age as I am and we shared
the same tart sense of the absurdity of life. We also shared a deeply felt
reliance upon God and thankfulness for the salvation, which we found in Jesus
as the resurrected Christ. We will meet in heaven someday and have a great time
comparing our observations and experiences. Following her funeral, I had two
other funerals in the upcoming weeks. One woman I’d known for 45 years. The
other woman I knew not at all.
In each of these funerals, my job was
to articulate the Easter message of the resurrection. It was to affirm that in
the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ you and I have a personal
promise that says that life is purposeful, is meaningful, is positive,
creative, recreative and full of redemption and hope. It is the message of the
resurrection. The Easter event that you and I celebrate is the affirmation of
that which is mysterious and imponderable. It speaks to our own hunger for
victory and triumph in life. It speaks to our own instincts and consciences, to
the image of God within us, which recognizes the truth of an unimaginable
triumphant act of a miracle – of the resurrection event, which is the focus and
pulsating signal of our life and our hope.
Brothers and sisters, the old Book of Common Prayer has it nailed when
it proclaims, “I am the resurrection and the life, saith the Lord; he that
believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live; and whosoever liveth
and believeth in me shall never die.
I know that my Redeemer liveth, and he
shall stand at the latter day upon the earth; and though this body be
destroyed, yet shall I see God; whom I shall see for myself and mine eyes shall
behold, and not as a stranger.” BCP
Tonight you and I celebrate the victory
of love over cruelty, mortality and despair. We celebrate that triumph because
it speaks to us collectively and
individually and because it also speaks for
us. You and I exalt in the triumph of Jesus Christ over evil, sin and death.
And that’s an amazing victory and triumph! That brothers and sisters, is our
triumph. Jesus Christ is risen.
Brothers and sisters, let me hear it; Christ is risen. The Lord is risen in
deed. Alleluia. Alleluia. Alleluia. Amen. – Fr. Gage
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