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The Sunday Of The Resurrection: Easter Day
Almighty God, who through thine only-begotten Son Jesus Christ overcame death and opened unto us the gate of everlasting life: Grant that we, who celebrate with joy the day of the Lord's resurrection, may be raised from the death of sin by thy life-giving Spirit; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the same Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
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The Sunday Of The Resurrection: Easter Day
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Scripture citation(s): Luke 24:13-25
A Sermon by
Fr. Daniels
on
Luke 24:13-25
✛
Alleluia, the Lord is Risen
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For at least some of Jesus’ friends, the first Easter morning had started very early, while it was still dark and quiet. It is hard for me to imagine the toll that the events of the previous week had taken on them. Everything had been tied up in Jesus. All of their hopes had found their guarantee in him. Hopes for themselves, but also for all of the children of Israel who longed for the promised Messiah. Just one week ago it had all seemed so close. The crowds were cheering, there were miracles, healings.
Then things went wrong: betrayal, the arrest and trial, the crucifixion, death, and burial. It is hard to imagine how it must have felt for the heavy reality of death to have come upon them and suffocated the dreams that had been animating their lives. Maybe they woke up with dread on that third day since their hoped-for savior had died.
And then, Mary Magdalene said … and then Peter … that he wasn’t there… Now people were saying that Jesus wasn’t there, in the tomb, anymore. It is hard to imagine.
It is in this completely baffled state that we find two friends of Jesus on the road from Jerusalem to Emmaus, talking about everything that had happened. It is in this baffled state that they are joined by a stranger, Jesus himself whom they don’t recognize, but who walks along with them as they go. He is impatient with their confusion and despair, and talks through the scriptures with them, showing them how everything that was baffling to them was exactly what had been foretold, exactly what had been promised as part of the exaltation of the Messiah, not his disgrace. By the time they recognized Jesus, he was gone, “vanished out of their sight,” and they were never the same again.
The blindness of the two on the road—understandable though it may be—is one more misrecognition of Jesus in a gospel that is full of them. But on the walk to Emmaus, the lives of these two friends were touched and they began to see, they began to recognize for the first time the full scope of the Christ event, the universal significance of the life and death and resurrection of Jesus.
These gradual recognitions by the disciples show how the resurrection appearances are the breaking in of truth to a world that has trouble seeing, a truth that could not even be silenced by death, because God had spoken his Word. His voice may be quiet, but listen closely and you will hear that it is the clear voice of truth. He spoke it then; he speaks it now.
That scorching truth of Christ helps us recognize who we are, as people, as the people he walks with. As the disciples would find in the coming days, the risen Christ shows us that we are people who are not innocent, but we can be forgiven, forgiven even of the sins that nailed him to the cross. The truth of Christ shows us who God the Father is. He is the one who gave his only begotten Son, so that the world might be saved. The truth of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, and his presence with us even to this very day, shows us that when we have done our very worst, God is the one who loves us. When we have crucified the Messiah, God is the one who forgives us. When we are in thrall to the forces of darkness and evil, God is the one who saves us.
We see in the resurrection of Jesus Christ, that that sin and that darkness and that death will never be victorious, because to those forces that would lie and kill and destroy, God says no. To the death that wants to enslave the world, God says no. To the sin that would separate us from the very source of life itself, God says no. They will not be, they cannot be, the last word, because the resurrection of Jesus Christ, on this very day, is God’s yes to us. God’s final word to his people is yes. Yes, there is life on the other side of death. Yes, there is hope, even for us. Yes, God’s spirit is always with us, even when the world seems god-forsaken.
Because now we know that Jesus is alive and he will live forever, and he lives for those who love him, and he lives for those who hate him. He lives to save his friends; he lives out of a love for his enemies. Here is the truth of the ages, the content of the Scriptures, the Word himself that will never be silenced. The crucified and risen person of Jesus Christ is God’s yes to his people and it will never be changed. It is a promise that will never be broken. He is the guarantee for that sure and certain hope that the ground of all reality is the crucified and risen Christ whose love is for all sinners. Alleluia.
This is our Easter song, because the Lord is risen, and God’s final word is yes. Alleluia.
From the moment we are born by water and spirit, we sing, Alleluia.
On the road to Emmaus, the risen Lord speaks with the voice of truth, and his final word is yes, and we raise our voices in reply, Alleluia.
And at the hour of our death, with our very last breath, may we be entrusted to the care of the risen Christ, and may the last word on our lips be Alleluia. For the Lord is risen indeed.
Amen.
