A Change of Plans (Matthew 28:1-10; Easter; April 5, 2015)

A Change of Plans

Matthew 28:1-10
Easter
April 5, 2015

Rev. John M. Caldwell, PhD
First United Methodist Church
Decorah, IA

Our daughter, Beth, has written the shortest Easter sermon. She was visiting us at Easter time once when she was still in college and knew everything. I was working away on the Saturday before Easter and she advocating putting my sermon away and preaching what everyone had come to hear: a sermon in four sentences.

Here it is: Jesus was dead. Now he is alive. Hooray! Now go eat ham.

Short, sweet, and, I have to admit, the essence of every Easter sermon I have either heard or preached.

“Believe me, Dad,” she said, “people will thank you for it.”

Maybe she’s right. At the same time, I can’t help but feeling that there is something more that needs to be said. After all, at its heart, the Easter proclamation is about vindication; it’s about recognizing the winner; it’s about derailed plans suddenly re-railed. As humans we all tend to read into this that it’s a vindication of us, recognizingourselves as winners, and re-railing our plans. Then it is not so much Jesus who is risen from the dead; it’s us. Easter then becomes an affirmation of us and of the arrangements we have made for our lives. We move on with a will to whatever is waiting for us after church: ham, or (in our case) lamb, or (if you are a vegan or vegetarian) yams.

I can’t help the feeling that there is something else at work here, something more than the good feelings brought on by a promising spring after a long and hard winter, when we get to put away our sun lamps and can go to work and come home in daylight. I can’t help the feeling that there is news here that is so good it goes beyond our imagination. I can’t help the feeling that there is news here that is so good it has to be true.

That’s what Mary Magdalene and the “other Mary” thought. If we settle for less than that we will render their testimony false. If we settle for less than the fear and joy that they experienced we might just as well save ourselves the bother and go straight for the ham, lamb or yams.

The women, of course, did not go to the cemetary expecting Easter. Though we are not told what they planned to do once they got there, they went to see the tomb. Jesus was dead; they expected his body to be in the tomb.

Jesus had forced a showdown with the powers of Roman Jerusalem and he had lost. The rich and powerful won. Violence won. Injustice won. Hatred won. Death won. That came at no surprise, really, although they had perhaps hoped for more. Jesus had come preaching and teaching God’s care for the poor, the sick, the outcast, the sinners, in short, the losers of his world. He had stood with them and for them. He had even claimed that God favored them with special love. He had claimed that God was at work in them and among them, bringing the Kingdom of God into this world through them.

The rich, the strong, the insiders, the righteous, the winners didn’t take Jesus’ preaching very well. They felt threatened. That is, of course, because they were in fact threatened by Jesus. They reacted to him as to any one else who proclaimed God’s judgment on their comfortable arrangements of things. They killed him. All the rules were followed. Jesus was properly accused, properly convicted, properly sentenced. This is how the powers-that-be murder those who threaten their power.

Winners win and losers lose. There was nothing new about that and the women knew it. The women knew that Jesus was dead. The guards at his tomb knew he was dead. Pontius Pilate and the High Priest knew that Jesus was dead. They could all get on with their lives, whether lives of poverty or lives of privilege.

But that’s where they were wrong, all of them. That’s when there was an angel of the Lord, dazzling white and brilliant. That’s when there was an earthquake and the guards–tough Roman guards, veterans of multiple deployments–the guards fainted from fear. The women, frightened but bravely holding on to consciousness, received the message from the angel and instructions to gather the disciples and head for Galilee. And then Jesus himself met them as they ran to carry out their instructions. They touched the dead man, now alive, and heard his words.

Everyone’s plans changed in just a few moments. The Mary Magdalen and the “other Mary”, who until very recently in Matthew’s gospel had not even been mentioned, became the key figures the story. The authorities suddenly found themselves doing damage control, trying in vain to contain and control the story.

Soon the disciples did go to Galilee; they did meet Jesus there; they did receive their instructions to make disciples. “Make disciples everywhere,” Jesus told them, “even in Decorah.” Soon they found their voices; they went everywhere, even Decorah, and proclaimed that “Jesus is Lord.”

This was the outcast Jesus, the ex-peasant from Galilee, the criminal who died a shameful death, the loser, the gadfly, the one who mocked the rulers and punctured bloated egos, the lover of tax-collectors, prostitutes and other notorious persons, this Jesus is Lord.

We know that this is imperial language. Of only one other person was it said that he “is Lord” and that was the emperor. When the disciples found their voices they announced that Caesar is not Lord. All the so-called authorities are overthrown. All of them. Jesus is Lord, not Caesar.

I’m not sure that a lot of Christians get this. A lot of Christians seem to think that being a Christian should get them some power and special considerations. Their version of Christian faith should have a privileged place in public life. They should get to treat people they don’t like badly as long as they claim that Jesus doesn’t like them either.

What we don’t understand is that Jesus has dethroned every authority, even ours. Caesar is not Lord. Barack Obama is not Lord; neither is Joe Biden. Mitch McConnell and John Boehner–they’re not Lord. Neither are Rachel Maddow, nor Rush Limbaugh, nor Jon Stewart, nor Bill O’Reilly. They are all dethroned. The United States is dismissed, and so it the United Nations. Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan Charge are not Lord; they are unseated. Monsanto and Exxon are not sovereign. We owe no final allegiance to anyone’s Commander-in-Chief. The World Bank and International Monetary Fund are dethroned. The Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank are put down.

Now we are free to imagine a new world. We are free to dream a world where black lives matter, where the hungry eat their fill, where the earth sighs in relief from its long suffering, where love between equals is celebrated no matter who is loving whom, where the poor have all that they need to live good lives and the rich will no longer be burdened with more than they need. We are free to dream God’s dream.

Feel free to add to that list if you didn’t find something there to fill you with fear and joy. As for me, I found plenty. The news this morning is enough to unmake us all. The news this morning is enough to remake us all. The news this morning goes beyond what we have thought or felt or imagined. The news this morning is too good not to be true. And here is the news: Jesus was dead. Now he is alive! Hallelujah!! Now all we have to do is to live into this new life that has come to us. We can chew on that while we’re eating our ham, or lamb, or yams.

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