Sermon for Easter Day

April 11, 2004

St. Luke’s Church, Jamestown, NY

Eric M. Williams

Isaiah 65:17-25 Psalm 118:1-2, 14-24 1 Corinthians 15:19-26 Luke 24:1-12

An Idle Tale?

Several years ago, a priest visited a Sunday School class. She asked the kids: “What happened on Easter?” For a moment there was silence, then one little boy responded, “Oh, that’s when the Easter bunny comes out of his hole and if he sees his shadow there’s six more weeks of winter.”

The Easter story has never been an easy one to grasp. Right from the beginning there was doubt and confusion. When the women returned from the empty tomb and reported their amazing discovery to the apostles, “[the story] seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them.” An idle tale—that was the first response to the story.

St. Paul also had a tough time telling this story to the churches he founded. In Corinth, his most problem-filled church, there were some who denied the reality of the resurrection. For them, too, it seemed an “idle tale,” interesting, perhaps, but not personally meaningful. St. Paul writes to them this moving and powerful reply. “If for this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.” For Paul, the resurrection of Jesus Christ is the message of salvation. Without this central part of the story, the whole thing falls apart. It is the resurrection of Jesus, God’s triumph over sin, evil and death, that gives our life its meaning, the promise that our sins are forgiven and that we too can have eternal life. For St. Paul the story of the resurrection is not an idle tale; it is the deepest truth he knows, and the true meaning of life.

But that wasn’t always the case. Paul knew about Jesus from early on. Back then he was known as Saul and his mission in life was to stamp out the story of Jesus, by persecuting the early Christians. On the road to Damascus, Paul saw the light, literally. That was the day Jesus’ story became Paul’s story. From that day on, he dedicated his life to living the story and sharing the story. Because of his encounter with the risen Christ, he was willing to accept joyfully tremendous hardship and suffering, imprisonments, beatings, shipwrecks, opposition and persecution, and eventually even martyrdom. That’s what happened to Paul when Jesus’ story became his story. Knowing the story, living the story and sharing the story changed not only his life but the course of history.

St. Peter, too, had to make Jesus’ story his story. His path was different from Paul’s. He knew the story of Jesus perhaps better than anyone. He was with Jesus during his whole ministry, the leader among the disciples, and arguably Jesus’ closest companion. It was Peter who began to live the story one day on the sea of Galilee. In the middle of a stormy night he took a leap of faith, and for a moment walked with Jesus on the water. But Peter was a man of fits and starts, one step forward and two steps back. It was Peter who first acknowledged Jesus to be the Messiah, and Peter who denied him three times in the courtyard on the terrible night Jesus was betrayed and arrested. And it was Peter on Easter morning, after hearing the remarkable story of the women, who ran all the way to the tomb to see for himself. Like Paul, he dedicated the rest of his life to living and sharing the Good News. Like Paul, he was willing to endure persecution and eventual death. Like Paul, his life was changed when Jesus’ story became his story.

We are here this morning because of a story, a story that is still for many of us an idle tale. You see, we live in the “real world” of science and bills and schedules and CNN. Stories about resurrection often seem as far-fetched as the Easter bunny or the groundhog. We like this story of Jesus, we are attracted to it. We even believe it, to an extent. But many of us still struggle to make it our story; we have yet to really know it, live it and share it. We keep a separation between faith and life, between Sunday morning and the rest of the week. In a sense we want Jesus to stay safely in the tomb where he won’t come out and bother us, make demands on us, shake up the comfortable life we have created for ourselves. Once a week we come to church to focus on “spiritual things” and then we go back to the “real world” of real life and real problems, but we rarely put these two worlds together.

And because we have not made Jesus’ story our story, Jesus himself gets pushed lower and lower on our priority list. We will worship later, study later, serve later. In the meantime, we have more important stuff to do. I imagine Jesus emerging from the tomb and saying to me: I became a human being, endured conflict, suffering and crucifixion, and then even overturned death itself for you, so that you could play golf and do your laundry on Sunday! Now, there’s nothing wrong with playing golf or doing laundry—although as Susan will tell you I’m not very good at either one. The point is that we need to make Jesus’ story our story, we need to put God first in everything. We need to know the story, live the story and share the story, not just in this special place on one special day a week, but always and everywhere. Making Jesus’ story our story means that God has something to say about everything in our life, including golf and laundry and even shopping.

I have it on good authority that many of you go directly from church on Sunday to another temple, a shrine of hedonism, known as Wegman’s. Imagine with me for a moment grocery shopping as a holy experience. As a lover of food, Wegman’s already is a kind of holy experience for me, but this is what I mean. As you walk around the store with your shopping list, give thanks for the incredible abundance of food you are able to enjoy. Think of the hundreds of people all over the world whose labor produced this food. Pick up something extra to put in our food donation baskets, perhaps one of the “buy one, get one free” items. Consider bringing an elderly neighbor shopping. As you shop, be mindful that you are created in the image of God and your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit. Look at the items in your basket and ask yourself if you really want to offer junk food to that temple. Actively notice the other shoppers. Take time to greet your friends and acquaintances. You’d be surprised how often one two-minute conversation can turn someone’s bad day into a good day, or how often we learn of real joys, problems or needs that we can later respond to in prayer or in concrete help. Finally, take a minute to thank the workers at the store. Greet them by name and make sure to see them as human beings, not just faceless, nameless cogs in the machine. Amazingly, the grocery store will become alive with the presence of God. By making Jesus’ story your story even at Wegman’s you will be well on your way to a transformed life.

Now admittedly, this is not as dramatic as the martyrdom of Peter and Paul. But it is the first step toward following Jesus out of the tomb and back into the world he died to save, a world hungry for the story we have to tell. It is a first step toward a life filled with the presence of God, a life based not on an idle tale, but on the Good News that Christ is alive, that our sins have been forgiven and that resurrection life begins today!