Joy reigns

Eas­ter – a joyful dra­ma with extras and lea­ding actors.

Good Fri­day and Eas­ter affect us all. On Good Fri­day, dra­ma­tic events of Jesus» suf­fe­ring and cru­ci­fi­xi­on hap­pen­ed and the disci­ples were frus­tra­ted after his death. But on Eas­ter Sun­day, a new day dawns as the tomb is emp­ty and Jesus is risen. The disci­ples are fear­ful and unbe­lie­ving at first, but Jesus appears to them and brings them rest and peace. The sto­ry of Jesus with his church was not finis­hed then – quite the oppo­si­te: it continues!

It is some­thing very spe­cial to preach on Good Fri­day and Eas­ter, becau­se the grip­ping thing about the­se two days is that both are Jesus expe­ri­en­ces that affect us humans at 100%. What hap­pen­ed then con­cerns every per­son in this world. What dra­ma­tic events they were: After an unpar­al­le­led tira­de of mockery, after whip las­hes, pun­ches in the face, many fist mes­sa­ges and a crown of thorns, Jesus is final­ly nai­led to the cross. In a ter­ri­ble ago­ny, Jesus dies; then the sol­diers stab his side to be quite sure that Jesus is dead. Two good-natu­red men take care of the body, anoint it, wrap it in fine linen cloths and place the decea­sed in the tomb belon­ging to one of the men.

Jesus – that was once

Final­ly, the men push a hea­vy stone in front of the ent­rance to the tomb – finis­hed, that’s it! Many of Jesus» fol­lo­wers at that time had the impres­si­on: «Now it’s all over. Jesus, that was once!» He did so much good. He spo­ke of things we have never heard befo­re! Ever­y­thing was fine and good. Now this frus­tra­ti­on! And Jesus» oppon­ents are now bea­ming, laug­hing and cele­bra­ting: the chief priests, the Pha­ri­sees and the Roman rulers: «Jesus, that trou­ble­ma­ker, is finis­hed. Now peace can return to our regi­on!«For them, the hea­vy stone in front of the tomb was the final con­clu­si­on of a trou­ble­so­me sto­ry. They had Pila­te, the gover­nor, seal the stone and sol­diers guard the tomb! Even today the­re are peo­p­le who have cle­ared up with God, Jesus, the Bible, the Church – they have buried ever­y­thing Chris­ti­an and clo­sed and sea­led their hearts!

A new day begins and I rejoice, yes, I rejoice

But then – on the mor­ning after the Sab­bath, a new day dawns! Not­hing with end! To be con­tin­ued! Jesus is far from finis­hed with us. A new day beg­ins… Eas­ter, the resur­rec­tion day dawns! The earth shakes; an angel comes from hea­ven and rolls the stone away from the tomb as if it were made of Sty­ro­foam and sits on it – what a picture!

«Ear­ly on Sun­day mor­ning, Mary Mag­da­le­ne and the other Mary went out to the tomb. Sud­den­ly the­re was a strong ear­th­qua­ke becau­se an angel of the Lord des­cen­ded from hea­ven, rol­led the stone asi­de and sett­led on it»(Matthew 28:1–2 NLB).

The women who walk to the tomb ear­ly in the mor­ning are speechl­ess. The gra­ve is emp­ty! Are they hap­py? No! Mary Mag­da­le­ne is crying becau­se she thinks that someone has taken the body away. They still wan­ted to embalm the body. The women go to the disci­ples and tell them that the risen Jesus had met them on the way – but none of them belie­ve the women. Whoe­ver thinks that a fren­zy of joy has then bro­ken out among the disci­ples is mista­ken. The disci­ples have bar­ri­ca­ded them­sel­ves behind clo­sed doors. Two disci­ples final­ly dare to go to the tomb them­sel­ves, but the­re are no more angels to be seen. They go into the tomb and still see the linen cloths with which Jesus was wrap­ped. Anger, dis­ap­point­ment and fear are often bree­ding grounds for cri­ses of faith and low spi­rits. The most beau­tiful pro­mi­ses and pro­mi­ses of the Bible are sim­ply for­got­ten! The disci­ples only real­ly rejoice when Jesus comes to them through the clo­sed door on the same day in the evening.

«On the evening of that first day of the week, the disci­ples met behind clo­sed doors becau­se they were afraid of the Jews. Sud­den­ly Jesus was stan­ding among them! «Peace be with you,» he said. And after the­se words he show­ed them his hands and his side. Joy fil­led the disci­ples when they saw their Lord» (John 20:19–20 NLB).

Jesus brings calm and peace to the­se moving moments of days gone by. «Peace be with you!» The­se are words that remind us of Christ­mas! Today is ano­ther day of joy! Joy reig­ns in hea­ven and on earth!

The church – the next chapters of the Jesus story!

I can ima­gi­ne that after­wards the­re was gre­at expec­ta­ti­on among the disci­ples that things would now go on as befo­re. But they have to go the long way to Gali­lee wit­hout the rab­bi, whe­re Jesus wants to meet them again. Jesus still has many things to say to his disci­ples. He meets them again and again until he returns to the hea­ven­ly Father on the day of his ascen­si­on. After this dif­fi­cult fare­well, they con­fi­dent­ly embark­ed on their chan­ged dai­ly lives. The evan­ge­list Mark descri­bes it like this: «But the disci­ples went ever­y­whe­re prea­ching the good news. The Lord work­ed through them and con­firm­ed ever­y­thing they said with many mira­cu­lous signs.»(Mark 16:20 NLB).

Jesus retur­ned to his hea­ven­ly Father at the Ascen­si­on. But he is still the one who is pre­sent among us in the Holy Spi­rit. Peo­p­le who belie­ve in him and have accept­ed Jesus into their lives repre­sent Jesus on this earth! In Ephe­si­ans it says that now the church here on earth is his body: «God has pla­ced ever­y­thing under the rule of Christ and has appoin­ted Christ as Lord over the church. But the church is his body, and it is fil­led with Christ, who fills ever­y­thing com­ple­te­ly with his pre­sence.» (Ephe­si­ans 1:22–23 NLB).

Jesus is even more inten­se­ly pre­sent on this earth than befo­re, whe­re he could only be in one place! The power of God working in the­se churches is the same power with which Jesus was rai­sed from death. Can we grasp this suf­fi­ci­ent­ly? We are the mem­bers of his body here! Tog­e­ther, here on earth, we are the body of the resur­rec­ted Jesus Christ! «The church is his body, and he lives in it with all his full­ness – he who fills ever­y­thing and ever­yo­ne with his pre­sence»(Ephe­si­ans 1:23 NGÜ).

 You are magnificent!

Jesus hims­elf goes one bet­ter: we share in his glo­ry! «The glo­ry that you have given me I have now also given them, so that they may be one as we are one. I in them and you in me – so that they may attain com­ple­te unity, so that the world may know that you have sent me and that they are loved by you as I am loved by you.» (John 17:22–23 NGÜ).

What image do you have of yours­elf as a Chris­ti­an? «I’m cer­tain­ly not that bad, but glo­rious would be quite a bit of an exag­ge­ra­ti­on!» If that is your opi­ni­on, I can only ask you: Why do you always look only at yours­elf and for­get Jesus who dwells in you with his glo­ry? The­re is a fit­ting expe­ri­ence on this the­me in the Pas­si­on sto­ry. When my wife and I read the sto­ry of Peter, who denied Jesus three times, she said to me: «Why do you always look at yours­elf?You, what Peter expe­ri­en­ced, that is the most impres­si­ve and mind-blo­wing event for me. How many times I wan­ted to con­fess Jesus and I did­n’t do it!«Of cour­se I could imme­dia­te­ly join in this lament: «Why have I so often kept silent and not said what Jesus means to me in front of others – only out of pure fear of man!»

The beau­ty of this sto­ry is that Jesus did not stop loving Peter. Imme­dia­te­ly after his deni­al, Jesus sought eye cont­act with Peter. It then occur­red to Peter that Jesus had pre­dic­ted this deni­al to him. This was not a look from Jesus, that could killbut a con­nec­ting eye cont­act! You are a God who sees me! And inte­res­t­ingly, at the emp­ty tomb, the angel says to the women: «Now go to his disci­ples and tell them, Peter also: Jesus is going ahead of you to Gali­lee. The­re you will see him, as he told you befo­re he died!»(Mark 16:7 NLB). In other words, Peter the fail­ure should not run away now! «Peter, I’ll see you in Gali­lee! I have not buried my pro­mi­se to you!» From now on you shall be cal­led Peter. Upon this rock I will build my church, and all the powers of hell shall not pre­vail against it.»(Matthew 16:18 NLB).

The pas­to­ral con­ver­sa­ti­on with Jesus by the Sea of Gali­lee is heal­ing for Peter. Three times Peter says to Jesus with strength: «I love you. I love you. You know it: I love you!«Paul aptly recor­ded in Ephe­si­ans what kind of church God wants to build with Peter and the other apost­les: «For he desi­res to make her a bri­de of spot­less beau­ty, who can come befo­re him holy and bla­me­l­ess and wit­hout spot or wrink­le or any other imper­fec­tion.» (Ephe­si­ans 5:27 NGÜ).

We were recent­ly at St. Chrisch­o­na for a con­fe­rence of our Viva Church. The spea­k­er Johan­nes Har­tel raved about the beau­ty and glo­ry of God. Ever­y­thing he crea­tes in his beau­ty is beau­tiful. Now, in spring, when we rejoice in the rea­wa­ke­ning of natu­re in the gar­dens, we mar­vel once more at how glo­rious­ly he has crea­ted this world. And if the God who crea­ted the world so beau­tiful­ly crea­tes new peo­p­le in Jesus Christ, then they are also glo­rious­ly beautiful!

The con­fe­rence spea­k­er told us an important sen­tence about spi­ri­tu­al beau­ty: If you pay too litt­le atten­ti­on to the beau­ty of God in yours­elf and always des­pi­se yours­elf, get angry and reject yours­elf becau­se of your flaws and weak­ne­s­ses, then you remain emo­tio­nal­ly atta­ched to your con­tempt and pay far too litt­le atten­ti­on to Jesus in you. Jesus loves you and he is clo­ser to you in his divi­ne beau­ty than you are to yours­elf! That is how clo­se Jesus is to you! He looks at you and in His eyes you are glo­rious­ly beau­tiful, wit­hout spot, wit­hout wrink­le – sim­ply flaw­less and holy to boot! A beau­tiful bri­de for the groom!

In Colos­si­ans the­re is this glo­rious ver­se: «He has era­sed the list of char­ges against us; he has taken the indict­ment and des­troy­ed it by nai­ling it to the cross»(Colos­si­ans 2:14 NLB).

Some­ti­mes you have to do that in a very prac­ti­cal way: Put away this let­ter of debt! Wri­te down ever­y­thing that is on your con­sci­ence, rep­ent and then throw away this let­ter of debt. If that does­n’t awa­ken Eas­ter joy!!! Joy reig­ns! We dimi­nish the joy of Eas­ter for our­sel­ves if we do not take God at his word. If we do not take serious­ly many things that are pro­mi­sed to us. No: «We do not trust in our pri­vi­le­ges and in our own achie­ve­ments, but in Jesus Christ. Yes, I want to know Christ bet­ter and bet­ter; I want to expe­ri­ence in mys­elf the power with which God rai­sed him from the dead.»(Phil­ip­pians 3:3b,10a NGÜ). We know that Jesus is risen and ali­ve. But we want more. We want to expe­ri­ence even more of his resur­rec­tion power, day by day. In our­sel­ves, but also in the peo­p­le around us.

Amen.

Possible questions for the small group 

1. What are your expe­ri­en­ces with peo­p­le who don’t want to know about Jesus? How have you reacted?
2. What do you think is the reason that the resur­rec­tion accounts are so dif­fe­rent in the four Gos­pels? How would you explain this obser­va­ti­on? Does this dama­ge the cre­di­bi­li­ty of the Bible?
3. Why did Jesus» peo­p­le have so much trou­ble belie­ving and tal­king about the resur­rec­tion news? Read about the 3 women in Mark 16:1–8!
4. What «joy kil­lers» in faith do you experience?
5. What kind of resur­rec­tion power expe­ri­en­ces do you want in your life?
6. How do we suc­ceed in radia­ting more joy of faith? How does it work: to see more Jesus with his glo­ry in me than my short­co­mings and deficiencies?