St. Andrews Episcopal Church

RECENT SERMONS

Easter at the tip of a tree
SERMON PREACHED ON EASTER DAY, APRIL 8, 2007
[Luke 24:1-12]

The sun doesn’t “rise” – we know that, though not known in Bible times. The same laws govern the universe at the time Jesus lived: that Earth turns on its axis until sunrise “dawns,” its light covering consecutive parts of the globe. My first parish was on the coast of Massachusetts,
so I inaugurated a sunrise service at Silvershell Beach. By triangulating charts from nearby Coast Guard stations I was able to begin the service 10 minutes before sunrise. Setting up the rickety old Navy pump organ on the sand, I’d see an eerie line of cars appear in the darkness,
winding toward the beach, headlights on like a procession of muted candles. Even if it was cold, cloudy, or raining, 40-60 hearty souls would gather facing east across the bay. Wherever we were in the ancient Easter Vigil, the first person to see the sun would shout: “Alleluia! Christ is risen!” and everyone would respond – say it with me, “THE LORD IS RISEN INDEED! ALLELUIA!” One mystery: year after year the same man was first to see - and shout. Finally I asked, “How do you do it?” He smiled and confessed, “While everyone is facing eastwatching for sunrise, I face the opposite direction, and a split second before the sun pops up over the horizon, its rays hit the top of a tall tree, and I whirl around and shout, “Alleluia!”

Now no one knows what happened that first Easter, but I invite you to a mystery. I believe Easter happened like that sunrise on Silvershell Beach: a slow dawning, not an instant realization. As the disciples turned their hearts and memories toward their dark-night experience
with Jesus, struggling with the meaning of his death after their three years together, meaning finally dawned, and – like the sunrise – resurrection rays spread gradually over them and beyond them. Not a single instant in time, but a continuing process, its enlightening rays striking people at different times in their lives. I had just typed this “aha!” into my computer when The Living Church magazine arrived in the mail. In a review of Bishop Spong’s latest book, Jesus for the Nonreligious, I was delighted to read that he had reached a similar conclusion, seeing the resurrection not as a single event but a realization by the disciples some 6-12 months after Calvary that “the reality of Jesus’ death kept being challenged by the reality of their experience of life with him.”

I believe in evolution and that its process is more than biological. You can actually see the ongoing evolution of Easter stories, too - though condensed in the gospels, as if they were instantaneous. I don’t know if you’ve ever noticed, but the farther away in time from Jesus’ death, the more physical the resurrection experiences became. From Mark’s empty tomb in 70 AD to Luke and Matthew’s birth and resurrection narratives around 85 (AD) to John’s magnificent theological gospel in 95 AD where resurrection experiences became downright physical: Jesus walks on water, barbeques on the beach, tells Thomas to feel the wounds – seeing in the gospels the human Jesus evolving into the divine Christ, from experience to meaning.

So Easter Day was – in a sense – like the sun hitting the top of the tree where just a few women spotted it, most looking elsewhere for the coming of the Messiah. Gradually the Easter experience dawned on others – and kept dawning, its light spreading from one person to another, seen in a person’s face, a person’s eyes, a person’s excitement, a person’s love. That’s huge, because it means that Easterery is still happening, not relegated to one past event – a continuing process to this very moment when resurrection light can touch you and me. The sun is always shining, and just as sunrise is the earth turning toward the sun, so some action is required of you to turn toward the rising of the S-O-N son of God to see resurrection light! Easter is never a second-hand experience. You’ve got to see for yourself, question for yourself, as Thomas did.

One of my primary passions as your rector has been to relate the reality of biblical experiences to our 21st century scientific/spiritual worldview, but I would never try to explain Easter. I do invite you into its reality, summarized by the final sentence of the ancient Exsultet,
which Maryellen chanted so beautifully by candlelight at last night’s Easter Vigil: How blessed is this night, when earth and heaven are joined, and man is reconciled to God. That is a great promise filled with caution. When you see the world in the clarity of Easter light with its warming rays of compassion and forgiveness, you can’t turn your gaze from the needs in front of you, can’t turn your attention away from injustice or prejudice; can’t divert your attention from hunger, poverty, loneliness, illness – or any other affliction of society here or abroad, because the light of the risen Christ is penetrating. Easter light of the risen Lord shines into your heart and mind even with your eyes closed. That can be disturbing, discomforting – convicting, even dangerous – and I’m not kidding. Look what happened to the disciples. In Rome and Jerusalem they were known as “trouble-makers,” serving, affirming and liberating people in the same way Jesus did, still mixing with the wrong crowd. If we are quietly pious and not making trouble in the face of injustice we are not worth our salt as Christians. I believe Spong describes Jesus’ spirit accurately, contending that the authentic Jesus we discover is a fully human, charismatic figure who broke down barriers of tribalism, racism, prejudices, stereotypes, and religious boundaries that keep us from our full humanity. This human Jesus enables those around him to be “fully human,” wherein they experience the divine.

Earth and heaven joined, man reconciled to God. The way we are reconciled to God is by being reconciled to other human beings, especially people we don’t like, people who are supposed to be our enemies. Easter light shines even on them as fellow humans worthy of
empathy, which is sometimes hard to see or feel. People are still looking for the Messiah – or his Mother - in all kinds of weird places, but Jesus built on the Old Testament notion that history – not nature – is the arena of God, human relationships our link with God, and the basis of values and morals; the place meaning is found, which helps us face both life and death in all their painful realities. Human relationships our link with God, bringing us joy, as well! Speaking on the phone with our granddaughter yesterday, I asked her a question. She responded, “Let me check with my mom – your daughter.” Imagine if we could see all people linked together in relationship that way! The light of Easter can help us do that.

So, my faith – 2007 - is that Easter is still happening, still evolving, can still surprise you with meaning where none should be, and – I hope - jolt you and me out of comfortable insensitivity and inaction, personally and politically. Resurrection out of crucifixion? No way! Seems absurd. But there it dawned! Life in the midst of death! Hope in the midst of despair! Meaning in spite of everything. Easter happens when the rays of the son touch you and warm your heart and call you to new a vision of caring, to new joy in community, new commitment; when you feel in your heart: Alleluia! Christ is risen in me! The Lord is risen indeed, Alleluia!

return to the top