Carriers (Easter 2020)

We begin our meditation this morning in the name of Jesus, our risen Savior, dear Christian friends.

Welcome to the empty tomb! (Today and every day day) it is the world’s epicenter for hope! We trace all our hopes for eternal life back to this day in history. Two thousand years ago, our crucified Savior, Jesus Christ, emerged victorious from the grave, and when he did, he broke Satan’s chains that left us fast-bound in sin and death. Jesus’ empty tomb makes it clear that he is more powerful than death.

Earlier in the Lesson from 1 Corinthians 15, the great resurrection chapter of the Bible, Paul says that, “The last enemy to be destroyed is death” (1 Corinthians 15:26). And that’s exactly what Jesus has done! He is that powerful. And his love for you is that powerful. Jesus loves us so much that he’s willing to go through death and the everlasting torment of hell to rescue you! His love is that strong. In fact, Solomon, in his Song of Songs speaks of Christ’s love for his Church as being like that, a love that is stronger than death.

Why is this so important? Why does this matter so much? Well, consider that this past Good Friday, while we were remembering Jesus’ death on the cross, 639 more New Yorkers died from COVID-19 in a single day. NYC alone had been seeing 400+ deaths per day for a solid 5 days in a row. It was reported that 9-11 operators pick up a new 9-11 call every 15.5 seconds. Refrigerated trailers are being converted into makeshift morgues; funeral directors literally have to step over over bodies on their way to make their pick-ups. Near Long Island there’s a place now for mass burials, a sort of potter’s field for the poor. And Detroit I’m told just exceeded NYC’s daily death rate. Right now, the novel coronavirus is the No. 1 cause of death in the U.S. killing more people on average per day than cancer or heart disease. Of course the reality is that Covid deaths will start to decline, while cancer will keep going on to kill an average of 600,000 people this year. But even you don’t live in NYC or Detroit, or you don’t have cancer, what the Apostle Paul said in the Second Lesson today he says about all of us, that, “The last enemy to be destroyed is death” (1 Corinthians 15:26). And that’s exactly what Jesus has done! (1 Cor.15:20,57) “Christ has indeed been raised from the dead,” Paul says, “the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep...thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ!”

Today, in Luke’s account of the Resurrection, we look to see the Risen Christ as the one who carried our sin at Calvary, and has delivered us from sin and death. And he has commissioned us his followers to carry the good news of his resurrection into all the world. As his witnesses, we are carriers of hope!

I’d like to explore that theme with you in Luke’s Gospel this morning. We start with Christ, the one who carried our sin at Calvary. Easter means nothing to anyone apart from Good Friday. Jesus himself said many times before what the angels repeat for his followers at the empty tomb. “The Son of Man must be delivered over to the hands of sinners, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.’ Then they remembered his words.” It’s nothing short of a miracle that they ever got this about Jesus at all! What happened to Jesus when he was crucified had to happen if a whole world of sinners was going to be rescued from the wages of our sin. These were the things Jesus had been saying all along about himself, things written about him everywhere in the Law, and the prophets and the psalms.

For example, in Isaiah 53 it says this Jesus who carried our sin. (Isa.53:2,3,4) He grew up before him like a tender shoot…he was despised and rejected by men...Surely, he took up our pain and carried our suffering, yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him, and afflicted.” (Isa.53:6) “We all, like sheep, have gone astray,” Isaiah says, “each of us has turned to our own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” Jesus carried our sin at Calvary. The Son of God died a real death and was laid in a real tomb to pay the price for the sin and iniquity of every human being going back all the way to Adam and Eve.

If Jesus’ empty tomb is the epicenter for the hope of eternal life, then ground zero for death and hopelessness goes back at the Fall into sin in the Garden of Eden. The Bible says, (Romans 5:12) “Just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all have sinned.” One person, Adam, gets infected by the poison of sin, and it infects us all. We will die one day from one cause or the other, because just like Adam, we all have sinned. We all become carriers of sin and death and pass it on to each other because of our unholy birth. Going back to Adam, we are all born in sin. And as the Bible says, (Rom 6:23) “The wages of sin is death.”

God never intended that for anyone. The world he made was completely perfect and free of sin and death. No, this is the world we have re-made for ourselves by our sin. A grave was never supposed to be part of Adam and Eve’s future, or ours, but sin changed that. The grave that Joseph of Arimathea donated for Jesus’ burial, was at first, his own. He purchased it for him and his own family--he planned on using it for himself one day! What an act of kindness and faith then, when Joseph donated his sepulchre to lay Jesus’ body to rest—I imagine the look on his face when Jesus gave it right back to him after rising from the dead!

Having made a full payment for our sins, Jesus now took his life back up again. That’s what the joy of Easter is really all about! That Jesus pick up our sin and guilt, carried for us on the cross, and now comes in his state of exultation carrying the gift of eternal life, which is exactly why Jesus said he came in the first place. (John 10:10) “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.”

Reading in Luke’s Gospel it’s clear that as the women made their way to the tomb, all life and hope had evaporated like the morning mist. They came (v.1,2) “carrying the spices they had prepared,” fully expecting Jesus to be there in the stone. They carried worries and fears in their heart. “Who will roll away the stone for us, they wondered?” But when they arrived, “They found that the stone had been rolled away from the tomb., [but] (vv.3-6) “when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them...“Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here; he has risen!”

What incredible news the angels carried from heaven that day to drive away all the fear and sadness in these women’s hearts. Not all at once. At first there was shock and amazement. The two angels were dressed (vv.4,5) “in clothes that gleamed like lightning.  In their fright, the women bowed down with their faces to the ground.”

They were terrified because these holy messengers came straight from God’s holy throne in heaven. The women fell down before them--you would too—these winged emissaries were holy, holy, holy, just like the God they served! Standing in the empty tomb they carried two these two things from God--a question and an exclamation mark! “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here; he has risen!”

To tearful and fearful hearts these heavenly messengers delivered the good news that their Friend and Savior was not dead, but had indeed risen, just as he said he would! (vv.6-8) Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: ‘The Son of Man must be delivered over to the hands of sinners, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.’ Then they remembered his words.”

What the women forgot and lost sight of, the angels proclaimed to them again by simply repeating Jesus’ words. “Then they remembered.”

That’s how Easter joy comes to us. It comes through the words of Jesus and the message about the salvation he came to bring. It wasn’t the first time God dispatched angels to carry his good news. They were also carriers at Christmas of that good news of great joy! Angels are everywhere in the Book of Acts, too. The are God’s fiery servants who do his bidding perfectly.

But dear friends, as impressive and powerful as the angels are, it isn;’t angels that Jesus calls to be carriers of his good news in all the world. We are the ones Jesus has commissioned to be his carriers of hope. Why us? The writer to the Hebrews explains, (Heb.2:14-16) “For surely it is not angels he helps, but Abraham’s descendants [that is, believers in Jesus].” (Heb.2:14-15)  “Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might break the power of him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil—and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death.”

Think about that. Not angels, but you and me, us believers, we are the ones God has chosen to carry the life and hope of Christ to the world—unholy, imperfect and sinful by nature, but transformed by the message of forgiveness , life and salvation that are ours in Christ Jesus!

Jesus himself appeared to his followers proclaiming his Easter truth in person—he appeared to Mary Magdalene at the garden tomb, and then to the women on the road as they went to tell the rest of the Twelve. He appeared to Peter and John, to the Emmaus disciples, and then to all the rest in the Upper Room later that evening. In the days that followed Paul tells us that Jesus appeared to more than 500 believers at one time, revealing the obvious good news of his resurrection and reminding them of everything he had taught them.

Later in this chapter, Luke says Jesus, (Lk.24:45-47) “opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. He told them, “This is what is written: The Messiah will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations.”

That’s what Easter is really all about. It’s about the life and hope that Jesus gives us. The Apostle Paul says that bu virtue of our Baptism connection to the saving work of Jesus that we literally carry the life and hope of Jesus inside of us—eternal life is literally surging through our veins—Jesus is that life—you carry Jesus in you and with you as you proclaim the message of Easter. (John 11:25,26) “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me will live, even though he dies, and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.”

Welcome to the empty tomb dear Christians! The world’s epicenter for hope! Live with the joy his resurrection brings to you, and carry that life and hope of Jesus to the world! Amen