Acts 10:34-43, Colossians 3:1-4, Mark 16:1-8
Easter 2009

Having raised in the Baptist Church I did not know how Easter Sunday for a particular year got determined. Now I know that Easter always falls on the first Sunday after the first full moon on or after the spring equinox. For most of us we don’t necessarily ponder on the significance of choosing Easter Sunday in such a matter. But for the early church the importance of choosing Easter on that one particular Sunday closest to the first day of Spring was immensely symbolic of new life. Easter coincides with the beginning of Spring or the greening of the earth. The Resurrection of Jesus gets emphasized along with the whole world coming to life. Dry and bare trees begin to sprout tender leaves, birds start chirping more, and hibernating animals awaken from their deep Winter sleep. We also begin to see more flowers and the rain brings out the smell of the earth, and the whole atmosphere seems more joyous. Therefore, this time of the year is meant to remind us of new life and the power and will of God to create life. Today we have even more of a cause to remind us of life because we celebrate the natural birth as well as the symbolic birth of Bradley Chan into a new and transformed life in Jesus Christ.

The beginning of the Spring season and the birth of a baby are of course natural phases in the endless cycle of life and death as we know and see in our world. However, the natural beginnings of this world are but a shadowy reminder of the Resurrection itself. The Resurrection is like nothing we have seen before. It is new life but not quite in the same way that Spring brings forth new life on Earth. In Spring we expect buried seeds to sprout new plants and the seemingly lifeless trees of winter to be green soon. We also know that when we bury our dead that there is a certain finality as we cover the grave. Death always brings pain for all of us, and often death creates a hole in peoples’ lives that never really gets filled. And it is in our efforts to deal with the pain, to fill the vacuum left by our loved ones that we find ourselves hanging on to memories of them.

Resurrection on the other hand, is not about remembrance and memories. On that first Easter morning, the two Marys, and Salome set out hoping to pay their respects and maybe recollect and preserve the many memories of their beloved Rabbi in the quiet of the cemetery. Visiting the grave of a loved is always a bittersweet experience. It is bitter because we feel the absence of our loved ones, but the grave also strangely enough brings comfort with the knowledge that our loved ones are now resting in peace. In many ways for the women to visit the tomb of Jesus was part of their process of finding comfort and bringing closure to the relationship they had with Him. However, the death of Jesus was not meant to be an ordinary one like ours embedded in the natural cycle of life and death, as we know it. His death was not meant to create the kind of vacuum and pain we continue to feel in the face of death. The pain is gone and the vacuum of the grave is now filled with life, because Jesus’ body is no longer in the tomb. Those who live cannot stay in the tomb, Jesus is alive and has gone out into the world. The women went expecting to grieve over their loss, but Scripture says that, “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.”” That which is alive cannot be buried, nor can it remain still. The heaviness of the stone that covers the grave has been shattered by the resurrection of Jesus.  And there is no lifeless body waiting to be preserved in spices and in memories, because the Resurrected Christ now calls us to the activity and pulse of creating new life.

That New Life, which has arisen without leaving behind any trace of the old is an even more terrifying thing to comprehend than even death. The new life in Jesus is not like the plants that sprout holding on to the rotting shell of its seeds.  It is not like our genes that live on in our children, nor is it like the memories of our loved ones that live on in our narratives. Somehow we learn to deal with death, but to deal with the New Life that Jesus has brought forth requires a total shift and reorientation of our lives from what we have known to what we cannot even begin to grasp. Resurrection forces us to not only to imagine but also to accept and believe in the complete transformation of every aspect of death to life. It is no wonder that the women were terrified, filled with amazement, and lost for words.

Over the years we have managed to convince ourselves that we can enjoy New Life in Christ within a very controlled environment. But if the empty tomb does not generate some terror and complete amazement in us, then we have not really wrestled with the implications of the Resurrection.  Words cannot describe the possibilities of the transformed life promised in and through our Risen Lord Jesus. That transformation has come and can come only if we have gone through the agonizing walk and surrender of our lives at Calvary. The terrifying thing about the Resurrection has been and will always be in the fact that it is something totally unnatural and uncontrollable. It was unnatural for women in Jesus’ time to be considered viable witnesses, but at the empty tomb came the command for the women to go out as witnesses of the risen Jesus.  It was the risen Jesus that let Peter to do the unnatural thing for him of going to the gentiles to preach the good news of salvation from God. It was the risen Christ who spoke to Saul of Tarsus, prosecutor of Christians, who transformed into Paul the Apostle of Christ.  The Resurrection is terrifying because it is so much about life with no room in it for death or decay. It is the Resurrection that forces us to confront the truth that Jesus is not about memories, preservation and shrines. Instead, Resurrection is the perpetual eruption of life, holy and sacred, as God desires it to be, not like we would define it.

Stephen and Vivian, as parents I know how tempting it is to think that we can shape the lives of our children to fit the dreams and desires we have for them. As parents we do know some things, and it is our responsibility to pass on the best we can to equip them for life as they grow. But, let today’s baptism and the promise of new life in Christ be a reminder to all of us that there is nobody on earth that can love our children more than God. God cares for a holy, full, and transformed life for all of us so much that He sent His only son to die for us. Let Bradley’s baptism be more than just the fulfillment of our Christian duty. Let this baptism be a reminder to all of us of the beginning of life in the power of the resurrected Jesus who lives on to bring forgiveness, healing and transformation in all who come to Him. May we all live as witnesses of the empty tomb for Bradley as he grows and to the world where we live in the midst of many gravesites. Let me close by reminding us what Paul says, “Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore we have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his…if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him.” (Romans 6:3-5,8) Amen.