Ministries Sermons School Youth Home
MARCH 23, 2008
Now after the Sabbath, toward the dawn of the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. And behold, there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning and his clothing white as snow. And for fear of him the guards trembled and became like dead men. But the angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. He is not here, for he has risen, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead, and behold, he is going before you to Galilee; there you will see him. See, I have told you.” So they departed quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples. And behold, Jesus met them and said, “Greetings!” And they came up and 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, and there they will see me.”
Matthew 28:1–10
The late Frank Harrington, onetime pastor of Peachtree Presbyterian Church, told of visiting churches in North Korea and Eastern Europe. This was before the fall of communism in Europe.
In both places Christians had suffered immensely for their faith. Hungarian pastors preached the Gospel while KGB agents sat in the balconies. The agents took pictures of the worshipers and kept notes on each of them. This information was collected and kept in files. Because of this, Christians were frequently denied jobs and apartments.
But the more the faithful suffered, the more the Church grew — in both faith and numbers. I like to call this phenomenon the First Law of Spiritual Thermodynamics, namely, the greater the heat, the greater the expansion.
But then God moved his little finger and the Iron–Curtain dictatorships in Eastern Europe fell. And when they did, oppressive governments disintegrated! In Czechoslovakia, the church bells had not rung for forty–five years. But on November 27, 1989, there was a sudden outburst of freedom. At noon, every church bell in the nation started to ring! While the bells were ringing in Prague, a sign was placed on the lawn of a church. Against the background of the sounding bells, it simply, yet magnificently, read: “The Lamb Wins!”
Yes, the Lamb wins!
— All of the atheistic indoctrination;
— all of the guns and weapons; and
— all of the warplanes and threats, ...
could not stop the Lamb’s Church from rising out of the rubble and ashes.
The words of Jesus were confirmed again. Hadn’t he said, “On this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it”?1 Behold, the remarkable truth: Without arms and armies, the Lamb of God, whose kingdom is not of this world, defeats the kingdoms of this world. He snatches victory out of the jaws of seeming defeat.
But this wasn’t the first time that victory rose out of the ashes of defeat. In the wee hours of that first Easter morning, nothing looked more certain than that the Lamb had suffered an irreversible loss. Death has a way of looking like utter loss and failure.
On that first Easter morning several despondent women, followers of Jesus, got up early. They had a thankless job to do. They had the unenviable task of going to the tomb to complete the job that was left half–done on Friday, namely, to finish anointing Jesus’ dead body with spices. Deep grief filled their hearts because death had come to their Master.
What a sad procession this was. Who can know the depths of their misery?” “How could this be?” they must have thought. Jesus had raised the dead, and he himself was dead. How do you make sense out of a thing like that? One thing is certain. Their view of that Easter dawn was much different from ours today. Unlike us, they weren’t planning any Easter celebrations. They hadn’t yet learned what we now know.
But let’s give them time.
What drew the women to the tomb this morning was their desire to do the most they could do for the One who had reached in and touched their lives as no one had ever done before. And so they go. Their Sabbath–interrupted funeral procession marches onward to the tomb.
They did have a question though. They wondered how they would get the heavy tombstone covering the tomb out of their way. Without this, none of their work could be done.
Then, suddenly, they caught their first glimpse of the tomb. They could hardly believe their eyes; the tombstone had been removed. Our text tells us what happened. We read, “And behold, there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone and sat on it.”2 I like those last four words, “and sat on it!” Now that’s protection!
At any rate, everything is in the angel’s hands. He excavates the landscape by rolling the stone away. This was just the Prelude to God’s remarkable Resurrection Symphony? Behold, the tomb is empty. And inquiring minds want to know: Does the Lamb live?
The Prelude continues. But there’s a problem. There’s a contingent of Roman soldiers guarding the entrance to the tomb. And they will keep Rome’s honor by securing the tomb against any and all intruders. No one has to tell them it’s a capital offense to abandon the watch.
But God’s angel not only excavates, he also intimidates. In fact, he causes these brave soldiers to quake. And they quake with utter fear. So they hightail it out of there. Indeed, Matthew reports that “the guards shook for fear”... “and became like dead men.”3 Here we see the finger of God bring utter chaos and defeat to the powers of this world. The Prelude has ended. The question arises once again: Does the Lamb live?
We move on.
The Symphony begins with cautious tones. As the women come closer to the tomb, the scene is confusing for they do not yet know what had happened. Yes, the stone had been moved, and the guard unit had fled. But where was the Lord’s body? Was it still in the tomb or did some thief steal it? They draw closer. As they did, God’s angel appears to them. Fear grips them! But the angel silences their fears. The Symphony now reaches a crescendo . . . so that the angel may preach the first Easter sermon. To these startled women, he says, “You seek Jesus of Nazareth who was crucified. Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but he is risen just as he said! Come and see the place where the Lord lay. Go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead.”4
Let the whole earth hear the majestic strains of the Symphony: On Friday night the dour announcement went out: “The King is dead!” But now the trumpets signal a titanic reversal: Behold, the King is alive! And now comes the shout of acclamation from one and all: “Long live the King!”
Behold, the Lamb wins!
On Good Friday, when all was dark in this sanctuary, I asked the people of God to stand. I recited the First Commandment, saying, “You shall have no other gods before me.” I asked, “Have you broken this Commandment?” I then asked, “How do you plead, guilty or not guilty?” The congregation replied in unison, “Guilty!” And so we continued on for each of the remaining commandments. How do you plead? How do you plead? How do you plead? “Guilty! Guilty! Guilty!” was their reply.
I then directed my eyes upward in the darkness. I spoke to the LORD God, saying, “Father of all justice and mercy, your Son, our Substitute, has just completed the work you sent him to do. ‘It is finished!’5 he did say. And now his sacred body is limp and devoid of life. How, then, do you regard the sins of your people? Are they guilty or are they not guilty?” As the gavel hits the bench in heaven’s courtroom, a loud voice, the voice of the LORD God himself, penetrated the darkness and said, “I declare them all ‘not guilty!” I say again, “Not guilty!”
And this morning I say, “Blessed Father, how shall I, a mere pastor, give your people the assurance that your not–guilty verdict is true?” He replies, “Look over there. And when I do, I see Mary Magdalene weeping because her Savior is dead! Or, perhaps, she thinks, someone has stolen his body. Her weeping in nonstop! But there is someone with her. He speaks one word. He calls her by name. “Mary,” he says. She would have known that voice anywhere. It was the voice of Jesus. So it’s true. Jesus has risen. He has risen indeed! He has risen for time and eternity. The “not–guilty” verdict is true! And it stands so for all perpetuity!
So why is the resurrection of Christ such good news? It’s not just that Jesus beat the grave. It’s that he beat the grave for you! We could never call Good Friday “good” if there had been no Easter. As St. Paul soberly says, “If Christ has not been raised, your faith is useless and you are still in your sins.”6
Please remember what Jesus was sent to do. God sent him to live a sinless life in our places. He also sent him to pay the penalty of death and hell for us on the cross. What is Easter then? It is the proof that the heavenly Father has accepted the sacrifice of Christ as payment–in–full for all of our sins. It is also the proof that he lived a sinless life for us. Therefore, only he has the right to say, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no man comes to the Father but by me.”7 Faith alone saves, but it must be faith in Christ alone. Only he is worthy of your trust. Only he!
Let me tell you one of my favorite Easter stories. Once upon a time there was a caterpillar that used to crawl along the branch of a tree. He spent his life chewing and crawling. That’s all he knew. Some of the other caterpillars said that one day all caterpillars would be reborn into a new life. “How silly,” he thought to himself. “Every caterpillar knows that, when your time comes, you go to the cocoon and die. And that’s all there is.” And sure enough, the day came when he found himself caught in the threads of his own making. “Oh no,” he cried, “this is it! I’m going to die.” And soon the cocoon, his grave, enclosed him and he lost consciousness. Then, suddenly, he awakened with new vigor and vitality. He began to stretch and, behold, he broke out of the cocoon and saw his beautiful wings. The next thing he knew he was flying, darting here and there without a care. He soared high above the trees and came low to smell the nectar of the flowers. “This is paradise,” he said to himself. “How foolish of me to think that the cocoon was the end.”
My friends, we can summarize this story by saying, “What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the Creator calls a butterfly.”8 Likewise, what we believers call the grave, our Savior calls the gateway to Paradise! We sing hallelujahs without end on Easter because we know that our Paradise is made possible only by reason of Christ’s death and resurrection.
Behold, the Lamb wins! Out of the darkness of death, he rises. And from heaven, he says to his people, “Be faithful unto death and will give you the crown of life.”9 And this promise still stands! Indeed, all his promises stand. And they are meant just for you!
The Lamb wins! What majestic strains are woven throughout the tapestry of God’s Great Resurrection Symphony! He is risen! He is risen, indeed! Amen.
Soli Deo Gloria!
Endnotes
1 See Matthew 16:18.
2 See Matthew 28:2.
3 See Matthew 28:4.
4 See Mark 16:6; Luke 24:5; Matthew 28:6-7, passim.
5 See John 19:30.
6 See 1 Corinthians 15:17.
7 See John 14:6.
8 Attributed to Max Lucado. Source unknown.
9 See Revelation 2:10.
© Copyright 2008 by Redeemer Lutheran Church. All rights reserved.