Resurrection Sunday - Seeing Through Grief to Hope

Early on Sunday morning, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and found that the stone had been rolled away from the entrance. 2 She ran and found Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved. She said, “They have taken the Lord’s body out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him!”

3 Peter and the other disciple started out for the tomb. 4 They were both running, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. 5 He stooped and looked in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he didn’t go in. 6 Then Simon Peter arrived and went inside. He also noticed the linen wrappings lying there, 7 while the cloth that had covered Jesus’ head was folded up and lying apart from the other wrappings. 8 Then the disciple who had reached the tomb first also went in, and he saw and believed—9 for until then they still hadn’t understood the Scriptures that said Jesus must rise from the dead. 10 Then they went home.

Jesus Appears to Mary Magdalene

11 Mary was standing outside the tomb crying, and as she wept, she stooped and looked in. 12 She saw two white-robed angels, one sitting at the head and the other at the foot of the place where the body of Jesus had been lying. 13 “Dear woman, why are you crying?” the angels asked her.

“Because they have taken away my Lord,” she replied, “and I don’t know where they have put him.”

14 She turned to leave and saw someone standing there. It was Jesus, but she didn’t recognize him. 15 “Dear woman, why are you crying?” Jesus asked her. “Who are you looking for?”

She thought he was the gardener. “Sir,” she said, “if you have taken him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will go and get him.”

16 “Mary!” Jesus said.

She turned to him and cried out, “Rabboni!” (which is Hebrew for “Teacher”).

17 “Don’t cling to me,” Jesus said, “for I haven’t yet ascended to the Father. But go find my brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’ ”

18 Mary Magdalene found the disciples and told them, “I have seen the Lord!” Then she gave them his message.

Introduction

It is another morning of the aftermath.

Let’s roll back, for a brief moment, to the last days of Lent. Thursday night, the disciples gathered with Jesus in the upper room to break bread, celebrate the Passover, and remember God’s faithfulness to the people of Israel. Feet had been washed, final words spoken, the meal transformed from the ancient ritual into a fresh reminder of God’s presence with us even now.

There had then been betrayals. Judas left the group to turn his friend over to the authorities for arrest on grounds of sedition. Peter stood on the street corner, wishing he could speak up in protest, but ultimately denying that he even knew Jesus. Jesus has cried in the garden, but warned his friends to not lift up arms in a violent revolt. Instead, he surrenders as a political prisoner, off to endure a sham trial, a brutal beating, and public execution. The disciples gather or scatter — depending on their constitution for such severe and unjust proceedings.

On Friday afternoon, Jesus breathes his last breath. An earthquake rocks Jerusalem. The temple curtain is torn in two. Roman soldiers ponder what appears to be a mistake — did we just kill God, they ask?

The faithful Jospeh of Arimethea arranges to take Jesus’ body and bury him properly. The Lord shouldn’t be left for the crows, he belongs in a proper tomb. Weeping and full of despair, Jesus’ friends, family, and dear ones follow him to the tomb, prepare the body, and roll the stone over the entrance.

Saturday…oh desolate Holy Saturday. I’m sure some of the disciples slept all day — how can you get up when you’re filled with such grief? Others may have heeded Jesus’ words — wash your face, get up, and keep moving, keep loving the poor, caring for the sick, comforting others whose grief has risen more closely to the surface. They start living what Jesus had taught them.

I imagine Saturday night — the aftermath of death and cleaning up after the struggles of Thursday and Friday, now everyone gathers back in the upper room. They update each other on what they’ve seen. Peter is a wreck, wishing he could just keep his mouth shut for once. John sits beside Mary, the mother of Jesus, leaning in to comfort her in her (and his grief). James, Thaddeus, Andrew, Bartholomew, Philip, Matthew, Thomas, Simon, and the others…gather to check in — where is Judas? Where is Mary Magdalene? And they wonder, where are the crowds who called out “crucify?” The ones who a week ago had shouted Hosanna, but infiltrated with political greed and the zeitgeist of the Passover feast. Where is everyone?

Then Sunday morning rolls around.

We find dejected, brokenhearted Mary Magdalene in Joseph’s garden, wandering in her grief and longing for her friend, Jesus, to not be dead, to not be gone, to not have lost the fight. In her stupor, in her tear-filled vision, she sees a man.

Seeing Through Grief

The morning begins with such immense grief and despair.

Have you ever cried so hard that your eyes fill up with tears and you open them to see blurry lights and moisture and you simply can’t see right? We intellectually know we can just wipe those tears with our sleeve and move on, but there is this subtle panic that sets in for just a millisecond — we wonder, will I be able to ever see rightly again? Am I drowning?

Let’s talk about grief. Grief can feel like drowning.

We don’t fully experience the joy of this day if we do not acknowledge the grief of what comes first.

This is why I so love Mary Magdalene’s story and find myself so grateful that she is the first one to the tomb and the one who lingers after the other disciples returned home.

I love it, in that she is us. Her bleary-eyed wonderings at the gardener are so much like how we feel in our grief.

She is our desperation, our longing. Her grief and panic are ours.

Friends, we have been collectively grieving for a long time now. The COVID-19 pandemic brought so much to the surface for us, our fear of disconnection was manifested, the fractures of our lives that seem to keep breaking open, even when it looks like they could begin to heal.

My wife, Stacy, and I have been discussing for the last few days how this Easter feels different. The last couple of years, we have anticipated Resurrection Sunday, but have also been weighed down by the oppressive forces of grief and loss that our world has known. Wars, environmental catastrophes, genocide, financial hardship. So much has weighed us down.

And yet this year, there feels like something is shifting. Like life might break through the grief, life might start again.

This is why we need Mary Magdalene’s witness and modeling — she lingered in her grief, she faced it, she questioned the one who might be able to help that grief be undone into a cathartic moment of release and final closing.

And so, she looks at the man again. He knows her name! And through her tears, she suddenly can see him anew, see him again, but now rightly.

“Rabboni!” she cries! Teacher, friend, Jesus! Passing through her grief into hope, Mary lights up and sees him again, with resurrected vision. Her sight has changed, been made new, revealing the teacher she loves, the Christ, in front of her.

Her grief has taught her to see the world rightly, with new eyes.

Friends, this is what resurrection looks like. This is it. Seeing through grief to hope.

Resurrection from Grief — Hope

I wonder, did we come together today expecting to hear about the resurrection of Jesus, but also doubting or struggling with the idea that resurrection might actually occur for us, too? Perhaps we struggle with the logistics of it — resurrection of the dead? Eternal life? So you say I’m going to die (we all die) but then wake up again? Really?

Yes.

But I get this struggle. Sometimes, our ideas about resurrection and life after death are far too lofty or abstract. Sometimes, it feels like they aren’t concrete, grounded, enough. Sometimes, we think resurrection could only ever happen for the super spiritual, the saints who have gone before us…but never for us.

This is the good news, today: Resurrection is already happening, all around us. Now, certainly, I believe in the resurrection of the dead and the life everlasting in Christ, as we say in our creeds and confessions. But I’m also with you, that can feel too disembodied, to “off in the distance.”

We need a living, real sense of what resurrection means here, now, today.

Thank the Lord, we are witnesses to the resurrection in so many places and ways, if only we, like Mary Magdalene, see through the tears and grief and discover a new and right way of looking at things.

Resurrection happens all around. Let’s consider some ways we actually witness resurrection.

Resurrection happens when the doctors find a treatment to heal our ailing bodies.

Resurrection happens when we find our voice again, after years of being silenced by others, after years of shutting off what we feel, after years of hurt, when we find our song to sing and we lift it up with freedom.

Resurrection happens when a gay couple, long ago hurt by the church, can once again find a community of Jesus where they belong, they are welcomed, and their love is celebrated.

Resurrection happens when a transperson is able to accept and live into their body and identity as they know God made them to be, finally seeing the world and the world seeing them through the eyes of love, and finally knowing that God blesses and receives them.

Resurrection happens when we embrace one another in true connection after feeling like we would never again feel the touch of another human being, after years of isolation and loneliness.

Resurrection happens when we experience the support we need to overcome and move beyond addiction into new life.

Resurrection happens when our loved ones are taken out of critical care, when rehabilitation and physical therapy heal our once mangled bodies, when treatments help us to heal in mind, body, and soul following trauma, whether it be physical or emotional.

Resurrection happens when we acknowledge and see our racism, our privilege, and learn to yield it and engage in healing actions that repair and bring about real equity and justice for all people.

Resurrection happens when a community bands together to help flood victims or the unhoused make new homes, rebuild, and restore.

Resurrection happens when we are finally able to get free of an abusive relationship, to find healing and safety on the other side.

Resurrection happens when dying seeds fall to the ground and receive the soil’s nutrients and begin to sprout up with fresh starts on a spring morning like today.

Resurrection happens when we forgive, forgive others, forgive ourselves, forgive the systems that have perpetrated injustice upon us, forgive and make these relationships new — that’s resurrection!

Friends, the message of Easter is that resurrection is happening here, now, in us. Because we believe that when Christ is with us, in us, we also carry that resurrected identity. Christ in us means that resurrection power is in us. And yes, of course, I’m talking about life after death, but I’m also talking really practically about life before death, resurrected, made whole and healed.

It is my prayer that we be a community that lives the resurrection. That this church and our actions in the world as disciples of Jesus, that we would be a place where resurrection is just how we do things — reconciling and healing relationships, restoring and building up those who are hurting and in need, caring for and nurturing resurrection life in our children, celebrating the joy of wholeness in the resurrection of those who die, seeing resurrection happening all over the place and seeking out opportunities to participate in that resurrection life here and now. Life before death. Healing from suffering. Hope from our grief.

This morning, I hope you feel invited to witness the resurrection all around. If you need help seeing, if your grief is so very deep, your despair clouding your vision, then come, be welcome here, find a home to question and wrestle and heal and find support and walk with other people who struggle along the road as well, people who are faithfully trying to look for and bear witness to the resurrection here and now. Let’s help each other see it. Let’s help each other experience it.

Resurrection is happening, let’s celebrate it as one body, one people, gathered up in love and care and life together.