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April 6, 2008
Practicing Resurrection1
Luke 24:13-35
Every year it happens—the post-Easter let down.
I remember I experiencing this as a kid. I could hardly wait to dye eggs every year and I would color as many as my mother would allow. After Easter was over, at first I looked forward to all the deviled eggs and egg salad sandwiches we got to eat, but after a few days, that row of brightly colored hard-boiled eggs on the refrigerator door looked more like a burden to me than anything else. I experienced something similar with chocolate bunnies that had tempted me from store shelves in the days leading up to Easter, but somehow lost their appeal after the shrink-wrap was removed and I'd bitten off the ears.
Perhaps clergy feel this let-down more than anybody. Several of my colleagues commented this week on how tired they are right now. And perhaps I shouldn't tell you this, but as beautiful as the flowering of the cross service is, there is nothing like seeing it the Friday after Easter when all the beautiful blooms have dried up and faded.
If Easter Day is the mountaintop, what comes after it must be the valley. But here's the thing: it is still Easter. Because Easter is not a single day, it is—according to the liturgical calendar—a season.
Not only that, but except for Ordinary Time, Easter is the longest season. Advent is roughly four weeks long, Lent is always 40 days (plus six Sundays), but the Season of Easter is seven weeks plus one day in length, also known as “The Great Fifty Days.” The Season of Easter ends on the day of Pentecost (the name itself derived from the Greek word for “fiftieth”).
Easter is the longest season, and with good reason—we need it to be. On Easter Sunday, we pull out all the stops. There is an excitement in the air as families and friends gather from near and far to be together and we enjoy this out of the ordinary day. Flowers fill the sanctuary as do the sounds of brass and organ and choir and bells; bright-faced children arrive in their Easter outfits, anxious for the egg hunt. It is very easy to focus on and enjoy the trappings so much that we forget that new dresses and jelly beans and ham dinners are not actually what Easter is all about.
But then, let's be honest here—what Easter is all about requires a suspension of disbelief. We are rational people. We depend in our daily lives on empirical evidence and information that has been tested and re-tested. If we approach the resurrection with the same standards with which we test other theories, it is, at best, improbable.
We need Easter to be a season of fifty days rather than a solitary Sunday because we need that much time to wrap our heads around resurrection, and have the truth of it sink in.
The creators of the lectionary readings seem to have understood this because here we are, the third Sunday of Easter, and it is still that first Easter day.
The witnesses that first day seem to be as slow of heart as we are. The Gospel writer, Luke, tells us that when the women reported to the apostles that they had found the tomb empty except for two angels, their words seemed to the rest “an idle tale, and they did not believe them (24:12).” Next comes this morning's story about the walk to Emmaus. And if you read just a few more verses beyond what we read, Luke writes that while the followers were still discussing stories of Jesus appearing to not only the two on the road to Emmaus but Peter (a story which no gospel writer tells), “Jesus himself stood among them. But they were startled and frightened (24:36-37).”
I love that. Even while they are all standing there, talking about and hoping that the resurrection is true, Jesus appearing to them nearly frightens them to death.
Between them, the four gospels tell only seven stories of Jesus appearing to his followers after he has been resurrected 2. And in every one of them, some, if not all, of the followers are described as being frightened, or full of doubt, or both.
Frankly, this gives me great comfort. If those who were there, who actually saw the resurrected Jesus, had difficulty believing this extraordinary event, then perhaps those of us who harbor doubts some two thousand years later can take heart.
Because while I know there are people who have no trouble believing that Jesus' resurrection is true, I also know that there are people for whom the resurrection is a stumbling block. They want to believe it, but just can't get past the impossibility of it.
I know, because I have been there.
When I started seminary back in 1995, I was fairly naïve. My reasons for being there were not particularly well-thought out—I was there because many people I respected told me I needed to go and because after returning from a volunteer year in Germany, I didn't know what else to do. My faith was an important part of who I was, but I had never been asked to think critically about it before, to do critical reading of scripture and see where things line up and where they don't. Seminary forced me to do this, and at times it felt like everything I believed was unraveling.
I remember in particular one day in my senior year, sitting in the office of a favorite professor, confessing that I was no longer sure if I believed in the resurrection. I was panicking, because graduation was looming before me and I had to decide whether or not I could do this thing called ministry or not, and believing in the resurrection seemed like a basic requirement.
What I was hoping for, I suppose was for this professor to give me some incontrovertible evidence of the resurrection. I was stuck in my doubt, after all, because I was trying to take a rational approach. I was raised in a university community and I knew about the need for evidence and primary sources in making an argument.
But instead of giving me the proof I thought I needed, my professor told me, “Believing in the resurrection, for me, was a leap of faith. And once I took that leap, I have never looked back.”
Initially I was disappointed in her answer, and in some ways, it seemed too easy. But as I sat with her answer in the next days and weeks, I began to relax my grip on the need for evidence and instead began to live into the truth. And somehow, I recognized that I, too, could take that leap of faith because I began to remember all the times I had encountered Jesus along the way of my life and faith. Like the followers on that Emmaus road, I had had my eyes opened to the presence of the Risen Lord. And once they were opened, I could believe in the truth of the resurrection.
It is the story of the walk to Emmaus that shows us the way from doubt and disappointment to hope and belief. The story serves as a roadmap, a guide for what we believers are supposed to do this side of Jesus' resurrection.
We have two followers, bewildered by the arrest and crucifixion of their beloved teacher, discussing and trying to make sense of everything that's happened as they walk home together. Along the way, they meet a stranger and include him in their fellowship. As they walk together, the stranger opens their eyes to scripture and explains how everything that happened was according to God's plan. When they reach their destination the two friends insist that their new friend stay with them, and they share a meal together. The stranger takes bread, blesses it, breaks it and gives it to them and their eyes were opened and they recognized that Jesus had been with them all the way along. But as soon as they recognize this, Jesus is gone.
When we look at the story closely, we see that it contains the basics of the life of discipleship: fellowship, hospitality, word, and sacrament. These are the activities central to the life of every congregation. And it is in the midst of doing these activities, these practices that we, too, catch glimpses of the Risen Christ in our midst.
So it was with me.
I recognize now that I had met Jesus in my childhood, in the caring adults who taught Sunday School or directed the children's choir or simply knew me by name and greeted me each week; I had met Jesus in the woman who faithfully made treats especially for the children and was there to serve them to us every Sunday.
I caught a glimpse of the Risen Christ at Presby camp on Lake Okoboji , as we sat on the hill facing the lake during our morning devotion time, one of the first times I had been asked to think about what a passage of scripture was saying to me. I remember feeling like Jesus was sitting right there next to me.
I caught another glimpse during a high school mission trip to Washington DC, as we worked in soup kitchens and feeding programs and heard the stories of people who had read the gospels and felt a profound call to leave their old lives behind to live and work among the homeless. There I saw the power of the gospel first-hand.
I caught other glimpses of Jesus in college, while sharing the loaf and the cup with a small group of students late on Wednesday night, and in Germany , when I was invited into the homes and hearts of people who became my family during the year I lived there.
I came to know the Risen Christ in my seminary community, in the professors who—in spite of or perhaps because of their critical scholarship—showed great faithfulness in their teaching and living; in the stories my classmates told of how they were called to ministry.
And I have known the Risen Christ with all of you, in worship, as we've learned together, played and worked together, around dinner tables, in hospital rooms, in chance conversations in the hallway, and yes, occasionally even in meetings.
My list, when I think about it, is very long. I hope that when you reflect on your life, you also have a long list. And our lists are by no means finished, because as long as we continue these practices of hospitality and fellowship and word and sacrament, our eyes will be opened to Christ in our midst.
When we do these practices, we are in a very real way practicing resurrection . And as God's Easter People, practicing resurrection is what we are all about.
So I invite you this day, this week
to remember the places and times in your own life when you can look back and know that Christ was in your midst.
I invite you to be mindful of this promised presence
when you gather with the ones you love or people you hardly know,
when you extend a welcome to a visitor or a hand to one in need,
when you study God's word, alone or with others,
and whenever you share in breaking bread together.
My friends, practice resurrection, until the doubts and fears recede,
and you can live each day, trusting that Christ walks with you.
Amen.
1The title is borrowed from Wendell Berry’s poem, The Mad Farmer Liberation Front
2Matthew 28:9-10, 28:16-20, Luke 24:13-35, 24:36-53, John 20:11-18, 20:19-29, 21:1-24
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