EASTER SUNDAY
St. John 18:1-10
By: Tom Faggart
They walked by this place. These strangers from all over the world. There were black people, yellow, white people. They spoke languages of a dozen different countries. None alike ...but much in common ,namely the tears which flowed from their eyes. Tears as they waited. Tears as they entered this door, and tears as they left. Then we made our way to a raised area, sat on benches and watched the procession as it continued to make it way through this place.
It was a cut out room in the side of a mountain. Above it were openings of several caves. They were arranged in such a way that they made the eyes of the skull, and nose and mouth ... Golgotha's hill. The door was the same one mentioned in the lessons of the morning. It was and is an empty tomb.
It all started early in the morning almost 2,000 years ago. Darkness is the symbol of evil. John is saying here that early on Easter morning, while evil was still in control ... Mary came to the tomb.
WHILE IT WAS STILL DARK...
It was the darkest of nights...Jesus was dead...The DISCIPLE'S leader was gone. They were filled with sorrow.
Their hopes were dashed against a cross.
Laid away in a borrowed tomb.
Only memories remained.
Memories of visits upon a mountain.
Memories of words of wisdom and insight concerning
what life was all about, And
what they should be about as spiritual people.
WHILE IT WAS STILL DARK...
Gone was the possibility of a political kingdom of power.
Gone were the positions of power.
No sitting on the Left or Right hand.
Every vision and every hope of the past years had vanished before their very eyes. Now they were outside the law and even their lives were in danger ... IT WAS STILL DARK...
He was not dead! There was no physical proof. No body!
Did Jesus know what was going to happen? In the Fourteenth chapter of John he told his disciples that he was going to leave them. He was going to leave them for a specific purpose. The purpose to go and prepare a place for them to spend all of eternity.
Did Jesus realize that this event was going to bring the focus of the Western world to this place? Did he realize that people from all over the world would walk by this place 2,000 years later? Did he realize what God was going to do with his life? Seldom do any of us know what God is going to do! Seldom do we even have an insight into the power and greatness of God.
Becoming aware of the magnitude of God's is an evolutionary process in most people's lives. Yet, when it happens its power is great!
Bishop Arthur Moore used to tell the story of how his eyes were opened to the vastness of God's power. It was centered around the singing of the hymn.
There's a wideness in God's mercy,
Like the wideness in the sea.
Said he when I was a child I would go out to the Hadley's farm pond and look across its full acre, and wave my childish arms and sing to the top of my voice.
There's a wideness in God's mercy
Like the wideness of the sea.
As I would sing it I was thrilled to serve a God who had as much mercy as the largest body of water I knew.
Years passed. He grew up to be a minister. In fact, he had became a bishop in the Methodist Church. At the end of a 36 day trip across the Pacific Ocean he was standing on the bow of the ship looking toward land when he thought to himself. He had been to sea so long he had forgotten what land looked like. Suddenly he found himself transported back to his boyhood. He remembered how proud he was to serve a God whose mercy was as big as the neighbors farm pond.
On this day he sang the chorus again.
There's a wideness in God's mercy
Like the wideness in the sea.
Said he, it occurred to me that no one should ever sing that chorus who had not seen the ocean. The full impact of the meaning of the symbol exploded in his mind. The magnitude of God was more immense than the human mind could imagine.
Easter is something like that. It is a celebration of what God has done for us. Easter is being overwhelmed by what God has done for the whole world.
It is similar to standing on the bow of a ship after days at sea and being overwhelmed by the vastness of the ocean.
Those of us who live in the scientific world oft times need more to remind us of the power of this God we serve.
This past week the newspapers carried an article which confirmed the Big Bang Theory of the Universe. Several years ago we saw the birth of a star. This star was born 100,000 years ago. The light from it just arrived. This should give us an indication of just how large the creation of God is.
Light travels 160,000 miles a second. That's almost as far as it is from the earth to the moon at their closest arrangement. Every 10 seconds the light travels 1,600,000 miles. 9,600,000 a minute ...the distance between here and the sun. Multiply this times 60 and we are aware of how far it can travel in an hour. Multiply this times 24 for a day, and 365 for a year. 100,000 years means it traveled millions of trillions of miles. In the universe this is not so far away. My point is that a God who is great enough to create this could easily cause the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
We are here to affirm this day that we believe!
We believe that when we die ... we too will be raised as Christ was raised.
We are here to affirm that the power of resurrection also embodies the power of new creation in the ongoing lives of all human beings.
The light of God's power overcame the darkness of the depressed disciples on Easter Sunday. There is a new hope hope. There is a new day. He lived! He lives!
There's a wideness in God's mercy,
Like the wideness in the sea.
There's a kindness in his justice,
That's more than liberty.