Two men reconnected at their high school’s 20-year reunion. One said, “My life has been a series of “good news-bad news” events. I married a pretty girl with money.” His friend replied, “Oh, that’s good news.” “No, it’s bad news,” he said. “Her mother moved in with us.” “Oh,” said the friend, “that’s bad news.” “No, that’s good news. My mother-in-law bought me a shiny new Cadillac as a thank-you.” “So that’s good news,” encouraged the friend. “No, that’s bad news. The car was stolen.” So the friend patiently answered, “That’s bad news.” “No. That’s good news. My mother-in-law was in the car when it was stolen!”

 

I’ve got good news and bad news this morning. Which do you want first? OK. Here’s the good news: Jesus Christ is alive! He is risen! It all started when Mary Magdalene saw that the stone in front of Jesus’ grave had been rolled back. Someone has pointed out that the stone was rolled away, not so Jesus could get out but so we could look in! So Mary was the first witness to the empty tomb. Mary! Of all people! A female (in that culture, women did not qualify as credible legal witnesses). And she was from Magdala, a town known for its wickedness (the rabbis of the day had marked it “Sin City”). And besides all that, she was unstable. Luke tells us (8:2) that she had been possessed by many demons until Jesus touched her life. So here’s a signal of hope to all of us who are weary, neglected and feeling like our lives are in tiny broken pieces—God has good news for us and God lets us peer into an empty tomb. God not only includes us in God’s story; God also invites us to share it.

 

After Mary saw the stone rolled away, she went and got Peter and John to investigate. What did they see when they looked in? Neatly arranged death clothes, particularly, the cloth with which the head of Jesus had been wrapped. Neatly arranged? That means no grave robbers were involved. It’s as if Jesus just slipped out of death’s hold and just as if he had awakened from sleep, he made his bed. He must have remembered his mother, Mary, telling him when he was a child, “Jesus, always make your bed when you first get up. That way it will be taken care of for the day.”  

 

And after John looked in to the empty tomb, scripture says “he saw and believed” (v. 8). That is, he finally grasped that Jesus’ raising wasn’t just not about resuscitation (a restoring of earthly life), not just about immortality (our invisible spirit living on somewhere, somehow), but about a new body, a new order of reality, a reversal of history, a transformation of the cosmos. 

 

There is a plantation home in Louisiana, called Oak Alley. Every clock in the old house is at 7:30 because that’s the time—7:30am—when the matron of the house, Mrs. Stewart, died years ago. All time stopped. Well, for us, the opposite is true. Jesus Christ was raised. And he reset all our life clocks. We will never be the same. And so, at Christian funerals, we are not carrying loved ones to the dark shadows of nonexistence; we are carrying them into the arms of God.

Ah, but remember? There’s also bad news in the resurrection. The good news: Jesus is alive. Here’s the bad news: Jesus is alive. Notice with me that Mary was fooled. She didn’t recognize Jesus (vv. 14-15). She thought he was the gardener. The bad news is this: Jesus will just show up anywhere, unannounced and sometimes unrecognizable. It isn’t very thoughtful of Jesus, is it, just showing up like that? He’s in the face of a hungry or homeless person, or some lonely person who needs our attention. And we don’t recognize him.  Jesus the Risen One shows up in the most unlikely places and times…when we’re doing something we shouldn’t be doing, when we are making selfish choices, or hurting another person, or giving ourselves to the wrong kingdom.

 

And then when she did recognize Jesus (v. 16), Jesus told her not to clutch him. The Risen One cannot be contained or managed. It isn’t like it used to be, Mary! You can’t get a solid grip on this Jesus. He won’t be manipulated or stay fixed (in fact, Carlyle Marney points out that the only time Jesus could be nailed down was when he was nailed up on a Cross! And he didn’t stay there!).You just never know where this Risen One will show up or what he’ll ask of your life or expect from you.

 

 

To put it bluntly, this Risen One is a bother! He starts messing with our lives, our choices, our priorities. Yes, sometimes it would just be easier, less trouble, if He didn’t show up, making all these demands of us. But, oh, what we would miss if we never opened the door!

 

Tom Long makes a distinction that I think is helpful on this Easter morning. Accompany Them With Singing—The Christian Funeral, p. 38] He says we need to know the difference between death (lower case “d”) and Death (upper case, or capital “D”). Lower case “d”, death, is still a reality in our existence. It hurts. But it is a natural part of human life. Capital “D” Death, however, is an entrenched evil. It is our enemy. It dehumanizes, destroys, hates, poisons relationships. It is about spiritual warfare. When Jesus died, he faced down Death (capital “D”). When he was raised, he stripped it of its power. In Jesus, Death dies; it is literally banished to hell.

 

And so we say with the prophet Isaiah, “Holy, holy, holy. The whole earth is full of your glory.” Nothing can defeat God’s children of the resurrection. Not death, not hell, not sin, not injustice, not hate, not despair. We are more than conquerors through him who loved us.