{"id":11098,"date":"2021-02-07T19:48:59","date_gmt":"2021-02-07T19:48:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theologie.whp.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/?p=11098"},"modified":"2023-02-07T15:46:53","modified_gmt":"2023-02-07T14:46:53","slug":"john-201-18-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/john-201-18-3\/","title":{"rendered":"John 20:1-18"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Easter Sunday, April 16, 2006<\/strong>
\nSermon on John 20:1-18 by Hubert Beck <\/strong><\/h3>\n

„Now on the first day of the week Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early, while it was still dark, and saw the stone had been taken away from the tomb. So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, \u2018\u201dThey have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.\u201d So Peter went with the other disciple, and they were going toward the tomb. Both of them were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. And stooping to look in, he saw the linen cloths lying there, but he did not go in. Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen cloths lying there, and the face cloth, which had been on Jesus\u2019 head, not lying with the linen cloths but folded up in a place by itself. Then the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; for as yet they did not understand the Scripture, that he must rise from the dead. Then the disciples went back to their homes.<\/em><\/p>\n

But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb, and as she wept she stooped to look into the tomb. And she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet. They said to her, \u201cWoman, why are you weeping?\u201d She said to them, \u201cThey have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.\u201d Having said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, \u201cWoman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?\u201d Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, \u201cSir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.\u201d Jesus said to her, \u201cMary.\u201d She turned and said to him in Aramaic, \u201cRabboni!\u201d (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, \u201cDo not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brothers and say to them, \u2018I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.\u2019\u201d Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, \u201cI have seen the Lord\u201d \u2013 and that he had said these things to her.“<\/em>
\nJohn 20:1-18<\/em> (English Standard Version)<\/p>\n

NO MORE WEEPING! <\/strong><\/p>\n

We, who have heard the story of Jesus\u2019 suffering and death in recent days, are particularly blessed because we read everything \u201cbackward,\u201d knowing already in hearing the passion account what it is all about and what is going to happen after Jesus is laid in the grave. We are equally blessed in reading the Easter scriptures today because again we read everything \u201cbackward\u201d as we hear the resurrection story, for we know where it is leading us and what will take place in its aftermath.<\/p>\n

We have a real problem, at the same time, when we hear the story of Jesus\u2019 suffering and death precisely because we read everything \u201cbackward,\u201d knowing already in hearing the passion account what it is all about and what is going to happen after Jesus is laid in the grave. We have the same problem in reading the Easter scriptures precisely because in reading everything \u201cbackward,\u201d we know where the resurrection story is leading us and what will take place in its aftermath.<\/p>\n

The problem, simply put, is this: It is hard to \u201cread ourselves\u201d into these stories as though we lived alongside those who were a part of them. It is hard, e.g., to realize how totally, thoroughly, absolutely, completely bewildered and befuddled the disciples and those who loved Jesus were through the hours of his agony, at the apparent finality of his death and in the tearful laying of his body in the grave. It is hard to completely comprehend the uncertainty, the fearfulness, the questioning, the terrible darkness of mind and soul that hung over those who hid behind locked doors on that Sabbath. They wondered what the future might hold for them now that they were not only disillusioned, but also in great danger, being known, as they were, as the followers of this dead and buried Jesus. It was an awful and petrifying moment, this darkest night of their soul. They had never anticipated this death of Jesus even on the night of their last Passover celebration — and they never thought it possible as they walked to Gethsemane in the darkness of that night that within twenty four hours his body would be laid in a tomb. He had told them of this moment time after time, of course, but they had never \u2013 nor could they, really — quite take his words about suffering and death seriously. Now those words had come true and they had no idea of what might come next \u2013 in spite of the words he always added after he spoke of his suffering and dying \u2013 that he would \u201con the third day be raised again from the dead.\u201d (Matt. 16:21; 17:22, 23; 20:18, 19) Deep despair smothered the atmosphere. Their hopes were dashed and the future was dark. There was nothing left but weeping and fear.<\/p>\n

But we<\/em><\/strong> read this story backwards through the resurrection and ascension of our Lord. We know, even in the midst of our deepest sadness that this is not the end of the story. The movie \u201cThe Passion of Christ\u201d reduced us to tears . . . but they were not the tears of people who saw nothing other than hopelessness when Jesus was laid in the tomb and the rock was rolled in front of the grave. Our weeping on Good Friday never has the finality for us that it had for the disciples. Our sadness is greatly tempered compared to those who sat in the silence of the Sabbath, waiting for the moment when his dead body might be given more loving and complete treatment early the next morning.<\/p>\n

Perhaps this is the reason there is a frequent resistance to observing Good Friday. It is not unusual to hear of Easter observances being held prior to or during Holy Week; to hear people speaking of the week as too morbid a dwelling on the death of Jesus. It was one criticism raised about \u201cThe Passion of Christ\u201d \u2013 that it dwelt unduly on his suffering and death. The events of that week force us to look upon things that we really don\u2019t like to recognize if we see Christ as suffering on our behalf, for it forces us to consider full and head-on the depth and width of our sinfulness that required such an acute agony on the part of this Suffering Servant. I hear on occasion how totally depressing it is \u2013 that one can hardly wait to get by Good Friday so that we can get to Easter Sunday.<\/p>\n

A painfully distressing crucifix hung in University Lutheran Chapel at Texas A&M where I was pastor for a number of years. It was made out of scrap iron tortuously welded together in such a fashion that it was as if that symbolic body were suffering beyond imagination. It was a terrifying sign of the agony of Christ with head thrown back virtually screaming at anyone who looked at it seriously, \u201cMy God, my God, why have you forsaken me?\u201d Most were repelled by it at first sight, but many came to recognize it as the necessary remembering of the torture inflicted on Jesus in behalf of human sinfulness. Some wanted it removed, taken down, put away, for it disgusted some who came to worship at the chapel. A few would never come back again because it was so repugnant to their senses. After all, crucifixes are supposed to look \u201cnice,\u201d are they not? Or at least reasonably \u201crefined.\u201d Certainly not ugly!<\/p>\n

But death is like that in its hideous barrenness — not only for the Christ, but for all people. We try to dress it up, make it appear less than what it is, speak of it sweetly, almost as though it were nothing more than a friend relieving us of our physical distresses and releasing us to a happier existence beyond. No higher compliment can be given the undertaker than to tell him \/ her how \u201cnatural\u201d the body looks \u2013 as if the person had always looked dead or, as is likely the case, the undertaker had made the dead person look as though he \/ she had never died at all.<\/p>\n

Even crucifixes sometimes seem to give the effect that Jesus is greeting death gladly, finally doing that for which he came, namely, to die for the sins of the world. We remove the ugliness from it, deny the horror of it, acting as though the wages of sin surely is not death, quickly jumping from our dying moment to resurrection with hardly a nodding recognition of the dreadfulness and awfulness of death, the final indignity visited upon our bodies. Don\u2019t go to funeral homes to find all that shockingly set before you. Go to morgues, to fields of dead soldiers and mutilated civilians lying untended in their hour of death. There you will find death to be an enemy, not a friend; a horror, not a benefit.<\/p>\n

Does this sound like an Easter sermon? To this point it surely does not!<\/p>\n

It is nevertheless a necessary meditation on the problem that those who loved Jesus were facing on the day they discovered that he had been raised from the dead..<\/p>\n

For, you see, Easter means nothing if we do not recognize, as did those around Jesus, that death is death in all its horrible reality. Our celebration of Easter is too often framed by an idea that the resurrection is a \u201cspringtime,\u201d the season when it is celebrated in the northern hemisphere. Perhaps those in the southern hemisphere have some advantage over us, for there Easter must be observed in the fall of the year when all is moving toward winter and the browning of the earth. In our part of the world it is all too easy to point to the return of the leaves, the blossoming of the flowers, the greening of the earth as though they were \u201cpictures\u201d of Christ\u2019s resurrection.<\/p>\n

All of that is fine and dandy, except for one simple fact: The greening of the earth is not a resurrection from any death; it is, rather, a re-emergence of life in dormant plants. They enliven again, bloom for a period of time, wither and return to sleep for another winter after which they will again begin the round of lively existence and dormant waiting. Dead plants do not return to life in the spring. If they were dead in the fall, they will not live in the spring; and if they die during the winter there will be no spring for them. Dormant things are only \u201clife-hiding,\u201d not dead! Dead things are dead, and that is that. They will not return to life. One can only weep over them, for their laughter is gone.<\/p>\n

Perhaps now you can begin to catch a glimpse of why so much time has been spent on speaking about death during the first part of this sermon. The disciples were so sure of Jesus\u2019 death that they never expected to see him again! They were not just waiting for his return. Death was death, so far as they were concerned, and there was nothing left for them but weeping, hopelessness, despair \u2013 and fear. \u201cMary stood weeping outside the tomb.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd as she wept she stooped to look into the tomb. And she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet. They said to her, \u2018Woman, why are you weeping?\u2019 She said to them, \u2018They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.\u2019 Having said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, \u2018Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Once again we face our own problem in hearing this: We have been expecting it all along, for we know the story from its end. But for Mary \u2013 and for all those involved in this moment \u2013 she (and they) could only experience it as an incredible, improbable, unbelievable, inconceivable \u2013 even absurdly impossible \u2013 moment. She had seen him laid in the grave. She had come precisely to anoint a dead body. She had been enveloped in a grief beyond measure. She never, in her wildest dreams, thought she would ever see this man alive again.<\/p>\n

And yet, here he was! \u201cMary,\u201d he said. And with one word he turned her weeping into joy, her despair into hope, her sorrow into ecstasy. \u201cRabboni!\u201d she exclaimed. It couldn\u2019t be; it was not possible; it must be a dream \u2013 a vision \u2013 a hallucination \u2013 an apparition! That inability to completely comprehend his resurrection runs through all the accounts of his return from the dead. \u201cSo Peter went with the other disciple . . . Both of them were running together . . . And stooping to look in, he saw the linen cloths lying there . . . and the face cloth, which had been on Jesus\u2019 head, not lying with the linen cloths but folded up in a place by itself.\u201d \u201cTouch me and see,\u201d he would say to Thomas later. He would eat with them, converse with them, show himself in many and sundry ways to as many as five hundred people according to Paul in his letter to the Corinthians. In every way possible he made clear that the corpse of Joseph\u2019s tomb was the living, breathing, eating, touchable, active presence that they had once known \u2013 even if, at the same time, his resurrected body would appear and disappear in unlikely ways and at unlikely times, be recognizable and unrecognizable within moments of his appearance among and with them, be available to them always whether seen or unseen as he said shortly before his ascension, \u201cBehold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.\u201d (Matt. 28:20 ESV)<\/p>\n

Did YOU<\/em><\/strong> come to church this morning weeping, wondering where someone, a gardener or tomb-robbers or some friend wanting to give him a more proper burial, may have taken the body of Jesus? Hardly! You and I did not wonder in the least what we would find this morning \u2013 what would be said this morning \u2013 what would be celebrated this morning! The wonder and awe of the resurrection is hard to recapture when we have not really let Jesus die at all, having simply laid a dormant or semi-comatose or virtually dead body in the grave. The earliest proclamation of the Gospel had to constantly emphasize this simple fact: A man who had been crucified and laid dead in the grave, returned to life and was seen and talked with those among whom he had walked throughout his life! You hear that in the lesson from the book of Acts today. But that is only one of many sermons and speeches and proclamations scattered throughout that book as the disciples took this message into the then-known world: \u201cJesus Christ, crucified for the sins of the world, was raised from the dead and was seen and known to us until the day he returned to his glory in the heavens from whence he had come.\u201d That message was at the heart of Christian worship as the creeds became formal statements of that faith and confidence. In his suffering and death<\/em><\/strong> God had rescued all humans from the condemnation rightly belonging to them, and in his resurrection<\/em><\/strong> he confirmed that the suffering and death of this man Jesus was both acceptable to God and the promise to all humankind that the things that had been torn askew in Eden were set right on Calvary. There is no more need for weeping. The heavens and the earth can rejoice in the new day that has dawned on the earth!<\/p>\n

Just what does all this mean to us?<\/p>\n

Well, for each of us who have been baptized it means that our lives have been joined to this crucified and risen One in such a fashion that our old sinful self was crucified and a new person rose out of those waters. If you still feel that old sinful self tugging and pulling and demanding its due recognition from you day after day, you are not alone. St. Paul was very plain that such would always be the case when he said only a few verses after he wrote about our baptismal death and resurrection: \u201cI do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.\u201d Yet, having confessed that, he would also say, \u201cIt is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me,\u201d which calls for a continuing struggle against the death-dealing powers that assault me within and without. (Romans 7:13-20) That is why Luther, in speaking of the meaning of baptism for our daily life, says, \u201cIt means that our sinful self, with all its evil deeds and desires, should be drowned through daily repentance; and that day after day a new self should arise to live with God in righteousness and purity forever.\u201d<\/p>\n

That new man needs regular sustenance in the bread and wine wherein the crucified and risen Christ promises to be present for us. Coming to the table is a constant re-membering (note the significance of the word \u2013 to \u201cmember again\u201d him whose presence makes this eating and drinking an \u201cassurance that in the sacrament we receive forgiveness of sins, life and salvation\u201d [Luther in the Small Catechism]) of the death and resurrection of our Lord. We cannot come to this table meaningfully if we are not caught up in the death of this One here present. To receive the body and blood of a dead man who remained in the grave, however, is only to re-member death in all its ghastly horror. Here, though, is the body and blood of the resurrected and living One whose death was the death of death and whose resurrection is the promise of life to all who cling to him.<\/p>\n

Since the boundaries of death have been transcended and the deathly powers have been broken, does this not also open a whole new way to understand the whole of life . . . even all of history? One who smashes, fractures, ruptures, destroys the hold of death surely can smash, fracture, rupture and even destroy all that grips a dying world held tightly in the jaws of seemingly irremediable problems and troubles. Whether those distresses are cosmic in nature, earth-shaking in their anguish, or personal in their pain and distress and agony, there is always One near at hand who holds the power to break the bonds that so enslave our human condition. The dying throes of this earth continue to cast what seems to be a deathly pall over all creation and they challenge any power to defeat them. The ravages of our human situation that hold us so powerfully in their grasp to this day, however, are always and forever subject to him who has broken their might and who will ultimately call them all to account as their Lord and Master. \u201cWhat then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?\u201d Paul asks so poignantly. (Romans 8:31, 32 ESV)<\/p>\n

It is this risen Jesus who claims life in the midst of death whom we came to worship and adore this morning \u2013 a man who was as dead as death can claim a person, who was raised again by the glory of the Father, who lives and rules us and all things \u2013 the entire cosmic universe.<\/p>\n

We do not simply praise and adore him, however. We entrust ourselves, our sins, our welfare, the whole of our being and the entirety of all creation into his hands who has broken the enslaving chains of all that threatens us and would destroy us. Let us not simply rejoice in our personal salvation, therefore, but let us rejoice in the confidence that there is nothing, not even death itself, that can hold back the protecting and loving hand of him who lives and rules all people and nations, all of creation, the whole of our own small personal universes and the course of the whole cosmos, now and forever.<\/p>\n

This is Easter in all its glory. It is the time to end the abject and hopeless weeping that so easily besets us when the burdens of life seem too great or when the whole world seems to be spinning out of control in a horrible deathly spiral. Weep no more, for divine hope, bigger than death itself, has been exposed in all its glorious fullness. Life has risen out of the shadows of death! As Luke reports in his account of the resurrection: \u201cWhile they were perplexed about this [the empty tomb], behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel. And as they were frightened and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to them, \u2018Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen!\u2019\u201d (Luke 24:5, 6 ESV) The day of weeping has gone and laughter sounds over all the earth!<\/p>\n

The psalmist summarizes it so delightfully: \u201cThe stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This is the Lord\u2019s doing; it is marvelous in our eyes. This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.\u201d (Psalm 118:22-24 ESV) Amen.<\/p>\n

Hubert Beck
\nRetired Lutheran Pastor
\n hbeck@austin.rr.com<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Easter Sunday, April 16, 2006 Sermon on John 20:1-18 by Hubert Beck „Now on the first day of the week Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early, while it was still dark, and saw the stone had been taken away from the tomb. So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15761,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39,727,157,853,108,110,238,299,3,109],"tags":[],"beitragende":[],"predigtform":[],"predigtreihe":[],"bibelstelle":[],"class_list":["post-11098","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-johannes","category-archiv","category-beitragende","category-bibel","category-current","category-engl","category-hubert-beck","category-kapitel-20-chapter-20-johannes","category-nt","category-predigten"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11098","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11098"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11098\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16690,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11098\/revisions\/16690"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15761"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11098"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11098"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11098"},{"taxonomy":"beitragende","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/beitragende?post=11098"},{"taxonomy":"predigtform","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/predigtform?post=11098"},{"taxonomy":"predigtreihe","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/predigtreihe?post=11098"},{"taxonomy":"bibelstelle","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bibelstelle?post=11098"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}