With Fear and Great Joy
Rev. Mark Schaefer
Kay Spiritual Life Center
March 23, 2008—Easter Sunday
Acts 10:34-43; Colossians 3:1-4; Matthew 28:1-10
Acts 10:34-43
Then Peter began to speak to them: “I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him. You know the message he sent to the people of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ—he is Lord of all. That message spread throughout Judea, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John announced: how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power; how he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. We are witnesses to all that he did both in Judea and in Jerusalem. They put him to death by hanging him on a tree; but God raised him on the third day and allowed him to appear, not to all the people but to us who were chosen by God as witnesses, and who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one ordained by God as judge of the living and the dead. All the prophets testify about him that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.Colossians 3:1-4
So if you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth, for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life is revealed, then you also will be revealed with him in glory.Matthew 28:1-10
After the sabbath, as the first day of the week was dawning, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. And suddenly there was a great earthquake; for an angel of the Lord, descending from heaven, came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow. For fear of him the guards shook and became like dead men. But the angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid; I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified. He is not here; for he has been raised, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples, ‘He has been raised from the dead, and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him.’ This is my message for you.” So they left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples. Suddenly Jesus met them and said, “Greetings!” And they came to him, took hold of his feet, and worshiped him. Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me.””
I. THE GOSPEL
The Gospel is a Gospel of Hope. It is a Gospel of Love. And the core of the Gospel is the message that we proclaim today: Christ is Risen! Christ is Risen Indeed! A message of power and transformation.
And so it surprises me to see how fear figures into the Easter story. The two Marys go to the tomb as the day was dawning. Suddenly: a great earthquake! And an angel of the Lord comes from heaven rolls the stone away and sits on it. His appearance was like lightening and his clothing like snow. “For fear of him the guards shook and became like dead men.” It was not only the guards—the women too were clearly afraid. For the angel says, “Do not be afraid…”
After they have seen the empty tomb they leave the tomb “quickly with fear and great joy” and run to tell the disciples. Jesus himself, when they encounter him, tells them also, “Do not be afraid.”
We celebrate Easter as a joyous holiday. A victory of life over death. Of hope over fear. A victory of God. So, what is it about the encounter with the Empty Tomb that is such cause for fear? It seems that it must be more than simply the encounter with the angel, whose appearance is dazzling.
II. FEAR OF CHANGE
A few weeks ago downstairs outside the office we moved the furniture around a bit, completely removing some shelving, shifting some cabinets around, and so on. We did this to add some seating space, to make it a little more hospitable. One student came by and said, “I don’t know. I don’t deal well with change.”
Another time, the worship committee decided to make some changes in worship, moving a few things around, changing a few others. A student who was abroad when this happened returned the following semester and expressed displeasure and confusion. “When did this change?” It would have been easier if everything had remained the same during the absence abroad.
We don’t like change. We don’t like when little things are changed. We don’t like it when big things are changed. For many of us, change frightens us. The bigger the change, the more we are frightened.
Think about the times you have been the most afraid, the most anxious. Absent any imminent mortal peril, absent being afraid for your life, the things that have likely caused the most fear have been those times when you have had to enter into a new situation, where your life was changing. Going to a new school. Starting college. Entering a new relationship. Leaving an old one.
Do you remember how much fear and anxiety surrounded the September 11th attacks? The fear was not so much based on proximity to the attacks—most people do not live near New York or Washington. The fear was not even really rooted in a fear that it could happen where you lived—though a few shopping malls in Nebraska did up their security measures. The fear for most as a sense that the world would never be the same again. And that this new ‘normal’ involved a world we were not accustomed to.
We have a couple million years of instinct in us that helps us to make sense of our surrounding environment. We do so for our safety and the safety of those we care about. We do so for our survival. When our surrounding environment changes suddenly—we react in fear. Even things that are good for us can frighten us if they represent a change from the safe and familiar.
III. THE POST-EASTER PARADOX
Indeed, the women fleeing from the tomb “with fear and great joy” represent the paradox of the life of a post-Easter Christian. It is a joyful time but there is a tremendous amount of anxiety that comes from knowing that the world as we knew it will never be the same. Especially for us.
IV. THE COST OF DISCIPLESHIP
For the life of a Christian is forever changed. The Resurrection represents a decisive moment in the community’s life in God: a moment when the very world is turned upside-down. A moment when sorrow is turned into rejoicing. When injustice is turned into vindication. When brokenness is turned into wholeness. When weakness is turned into power. When death is turned into life.
And the consequences of that decisive moment are great for us. For we are called to live our lives in a manner that reflects the post-Easter reality, when all around us we live in a pre-Easter world.
We live in a world that worships power and strength, and we are called upon to live lives that embrace the strength of humility and the power of self-sacrifice.
We live in a world that worships wealth and riches, and we are called to live lives that embrace the richness of God’s love rather than any earthly wealth.
We live in a world that thrives on violence, and we are called to live lives of peacemaking, lives that eschew retribution for lives of reconciliation.
We live in a world that likes to build walls, and we are called to build bridges, to reach out in love to all.
That is a risky venture. It requires standing the face of some pretty powerful interests. It requires sticking our necks out. Speaking out for those without a voice.
It may require us to challenge those in power. It may even require us to challenge people we love, people who are close to us, when the Gospel calls us to testify to God’s love and grace.
It may require us loving those we wouldn’t otherwise. Sharing meals with the prostitutes, tax-collectors, and sinners of our day. It means testifying to a world that we have faith in but that is different from the world we inhabit on a daily basis. It means that for us, the world has changed. A frightening proposition, to be sure.
V. THE JOY OF THE GOSPEL
But there is also joy here. Because at the same time we are liberated from the ways of the old world. As Jesus says in John’s Gospel we are “in the world” but not of it. Not only has our world changed, but we have been changed. We are liberated from the idolatries of this world. We are freed from the priorities of a world that is still pre-Easter.
Old social structures have no sway over us any more. We are not required to buy into the bigotries and segregations of the old world. We do not have to accept the world’s definition of insider and outsider, the world’s divisions by class, race, age, sex, ability, nationality, sexuality, creed. We are freed to love one another. Not just called to do so, but freed to do so.
We are not required to buy into the culture of accumulation of material goods without end. A culture that tells us that what we are is what we own. We are freed to live lives of simplicity. Lives of balance. Lives that testify to a greater richness than a richness of stuff.
We are not required to buy into the broader definition of power, where strength and might determine what is right. We are freed to live lives of humility and self-sacrifice. Lives built not on getting other people to do what you want, but doing things freely for others out of love.
And finally, we are not bound to accept the culture of fear that dominates our world. The fear that you see every day on the evening news. The fear that drives all our advertising. The fear that drives our elections and the fear that is turning our communities into armed camps. We are freed to love.
Love is a risky proposition. Love entails a fair amount of risk. We run the risk of being hurt when we make ourselves vulnerable when we love. Perhaps the greatest irony is that the freedom to love creates the greatest anxiety of all. And yet, only love can cast out fear. As Bishop Romero of El Salvador, whose murder on Easter Sunday twenty-eight years ago tomorrow, we commemorate this week, said:
“Let us not tire of preaching love;?it is the force that will overcome the world.
Let us not tire of preaching love.
Though we see that waves of violence succeed in drowning the fire of Christian love,
love must win out; ?it is the only thing that can.”
VI. END
And it is because we find ourselves immersed in this love that we have our great joy. We, like the women running from the tomb are anxious because our world is changing, and at the same time immersed in a great joy because the world will never be the same.
Easter creates a number of paradoxes for the Christian. We find that we have one foot in the world that is, one foot in the world-to-come. We are at once citizens of the city of humanity, and the city of God. We are simultaneously in the already and the not-yet. We are afraid and yet we have great joy.
Our lives as Christians will not always be easy—testifying to a post-Easter faith in a pre-Easter world never is. There will be anxiety ahead. There will be doubt. There will be times when we are afraid. But all of it will be in the light of a great joy that we have—a joy of the victory of wholeness over brokenness, of death over life, of love over fear.
A victory of the Gospel of Love. A victory of the Gospel of Hope.
