Easter Day - Before and After

Scripture: Matthew 28:1-10

Matthew 28:1–10 NIV

1 After the Sabbath, at dawn on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to look at the tomb. 2 There was a violent earthquake, for an angel of the Lord came down from heaven and, going to the tomb, rolled back the stone and sat on it. 3 His appearance was like lightning, and his clothes were white as snow. 4 The guards were so afraid of him that they shook and became like dead men. 5 The angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified. 6 He is not here; he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay. 7 Then go quickly and tell his disciples: ‘He has risen from the dead and is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him.’ Now I have told you.” 8 So the women hurried away from the tomb, afraid yet filled with joy, and ran to tell his disciples. 9 Suddenly Jesus met them. “Greetings,” he said. They came to him, clasped his feet and worshiped him. 10 Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid. Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me.”

4/5/2026

Order of Service:

Announcements

Opening Worship

Prayer Requests

Prayer Song

Pastoral Prayer

Kid’s Time

Offering (Doxology and Offering Prayer)

Scripture Reading

Sermon

Communion

Closing Song

Benediction

Special Notes: Week 1: Communion

Easter Sunday

Opening Prayer:

God of eternal life and ultimate victory, we confess that we sometimes live as though the tomb is still sealed. We doubt your power to bring new life from death and struggle to walk in resurrection joy. Forgive us, Lord, and help us to live as easter people, proclaiming Your hope and love to the world through the resurrection truth. We pray this in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Call to Worship

Leader: Christ is risen!

People: He is risen indeed!

Leader: The stone has been rolled away, and the tomb is empty.

People: Death has been defeated, and love has triumphed.

Leader: Come, let us worship the risen Lord.

All: Hallelujah! Christ is risen!

Before and After

Movement 1: The story is not over

For the last several weeks during Lent, we walked through a series called Sinners, and we saw how Jesus entered the lives of all kinds of people and began to transform them. On Friday, we watched as he was numbered among sinners himself, counted as one of us. He carried our sin to the cross, and then we closed the book. It was finished. We said goodbye, and that's where we left off. But this morning we open a new series called "Before and After" because God wasn't done writing yet.

Movement 2: Stories in our lives

Our lives are built around stories. The stories that guide our lives don't have to be long to take us on wild adventures in cars and boats, on trains and planes… all hovering around an attempt to get us to eat green eggs and ham and try something new. Those are stories that are short enough to read in one sitting. But they can grab our imagination and keep us coming back, reading them over and over again as we learn to live out the lesson buried within.

There are longer stories as well. Not many of us reach the end of a long book — whether it's War and Peace or even the Bible itself — and say, 'I can't wait to go back to the beginning and do that again.' We close the book, say goodbye, and move on. And that's why I think some people don't want to start a book, especially a long one without knowing how it ends. They skip ahead to make sure they are going to like it before they even begin.

Our passage today begins with two women who had given up years of their lives to invest in this story of Jesus. They thought it would be a story of joy and adventure. But it had become a tragedy. And so they were going to close this book so they could move on with their lives.

Movement 3: Going through the motions

Our church family has experienced loss in these past weeks. I've watched the grief wash over people in waves. Each person responds differently. Some get overwhelmed and emotional. Others try to be strong for those around them. Some of us find we can't sit still. I wonder if Mary Magdalene was one of those people.

She knew it wasn't safe to be out in public. Nicodemus and Joseph, two members of the Pharisees who were secretly disciples of Jesus, had taken care of the initial preparation of his body. But it may have been time for some final preparations before sealing the tomb for good. Of course, that would be under normal circumstances. The Jewish leaders had already sealed the tomb for good with a giant stone, and they had Roman guards posted outside to keep everyone away. They too wanted this story to end.

So here is Mary Magdalene, lost in her grief. She took another Mary with her and headed to the tomb. I don't know what she hoped to find or do. Perhaps it was just going through the motions when loved ones die. You just go and check to make sure everything is okay, even when you know it's not okay. Your grief drives you to try.

Movement 4: Grief Interrupted

That grief and hopelessness gave way to fear as they headed toward the tomb that morning, when suddenly the ground began to shake beneath them. God sent his son, and now the very earth was crying out beneath them as if in response to what had been done to him. Common sense may have told them to run and hide, but their grief kept driving them to the tomb.

When they got there, they saw that the stone had rolled away. Not as if a team of strongmen had pulled it away, but as if the whole world had shaken it loose. Those guards who'd put that stone there in the first place were so shaken they had collapsed to the ground, looking as if they had been scared to death. In a cosmic reversal, the strongest of the living had fallen like the dead, while the one who was dead was no longer in the tomb.

There, sitting on top of that stone, was an angel of the Lord, shining like living lightning, dressed in clothes that were white as snow. It was he who had moved the stone and was terrifying the guards, and he would have terrified these two women, too. But he looked to them with kindness and said,

“Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified. He is not here. He has risen, just as he said.”

These women had come early that morning to close the book on Jesus and begin moving on with their lives. But God opened the book back up and told them, this story is not done yet. The angel told them,

“Come and see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples he is risen from the dead and is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him.”

Come and see for yourselves, and then gather the disciples and head back home to Galilee. You will see Jesus there.

Movement 5: Meeting Jesus on the Way

These women had been going through the motions because it was all they knew and it was all they could do... drowning in their grief.

God came to redirect that motion. I want you to hear that when he interrupted their grief, the first thing they felt was fear and confusion, and maybe even anger that this had been the worst week of their lives. And nothing, absolutely nothing, had turned out as they hoped.

But there, right in the midst of that sadness, fear, frustration, anger, and confusion, they had a new sense of joy bubbling up within them. When they still didn't know what an empty tomb meant, they obeyed the message from the angel of the Lord. And they ran back to tell the other disciples all that had happened, perhaps hoping one of them could help them figure out how to make sense of this shocking experience.

And that is where Jesus met them, in the midst of all of that mess. Running back in those early morning hours before they even got back to the other disciples, Jesus met them. They recognized him immediately, fell at his feet, and worshiped him as all those emotions washed over them in waves. The sadness, the fear, the disappointment, the anger, the confusion—all of it was giving way to a new sense of joy they couldn't understand and desperately wanted to believe in.

Jesus spoke into that: "Do not be afraid." The angel said it first, and now Jesus says it himself — do not be afraid. He redirected all of that anxious energy and told them,

"Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee. There they will see me."

The same thing that the angel had told them to do.

Almost.

Did you hear Jesus change one of the words in the command that he gave them?

(pause)

It was not, "Go tell the disciples." No, Jesus told them, "Go tell my brothers." On Friday, Jesus was numbered among sinners. On Sunday morning, he numbered sinners among his family.

Movement 6: A Place at His Table

Jesus didn't come back to just add one more chapter to his story. He came back to invite us into it and transform who we are as we become part of it.

This is the power of Jesus— his story, his gospel in our lives. We come to him as a stranger, and he invites us to become his friend as his story draws us closer to him. He calls us to follow and serve him, and we find the grace and forgiveness, the hope and strength in his love and his power. Every time we think we may have reached the end, this story of the empty tomb reminds us that He is not done yet with our world or with us. He is still shaking the world with the power of his love on the cross and his life that overturns the grave. He is still shaping us into the brothers and sisters he created and called us to be, saved by grace and sanctified by his Holy Spirit.

Some of you came today out of duty.

Some of you came here because someone you love brought you.

Some of you are really struggling just to get through the day.

Some of you have been going through the motions.

But today we are reminded that the tomb is empty and the story isn't over for Jesus or for you.

Some of you first encountered Jesus as a stranger — maybe today is even that day.

Some of you have gotten to know him and consider him a friend.

Some of you have committed your lives to serve him.

But hear what the risen Jesus says this morning: he doesn't call you servants. He calls you brothers and sisters. He calls you family. And he invites you to this table — not because you've earned a seat, but because he set a place for you.

Closing Prayer

Lord, we thank you for your self-sacrificing love shown to us on the cross. And we thank you that your story doesn't stop there.

When the night seems long, and the clouds of gloom surround us, we know that you are still with us because you have walked in our shoes, known grief, and been through the valley of the Shadow of Death yourself... and today we celebrate your victory over the grave.

Thank you for fighting for us and sharing your victory with us. Thank you for making a place for us and calling us to your side, not just as servants, but as brothers and sisters. We come today to celebrate and honor you.

In your Holy Name. Amen.