John 20:1-18
Easter: April 24,2011
It’s Easter! What do you see? The lilies, the sun, the colorful eggs, the bunny? What do you see this Easter morning? This is the question asked in John’s gospel. In his telling of the extraordinary event of the empty tomb, his focus is on how people see it. And of course, he’s counting on the double meaning of “see”, which works the same in Greek as it does in English. Literally seeing with the eyes and seeing in terms of understanding…or better, insight.
As we enter this passage, the first thing we are told is that it is night time and Mary Magdalene is on her way to the tomb Jesus while it is still dark. And this darkness serves as a clue to the reader that Mary has no idea what is going on or what is going to happen – she’s “in the dark”. The fact is, she sees nothing yet. But, when she arrives at the tomb, she sees something: The stone has been removed. That’s all. She can’t see anything else – she has no insight yet. So, in confusion, she runs off to tell Peter and the “other” disciple that Jesus’ body has been moved. Then they go to the tomb to have a “look”.
As each one comes to the tomb, we’re told what it is that they see when they get there. Peter pokes his head inside and sees all the strips of linen, and the burial cloth and notices their location relative to each other. Wonderful Peter – always so eager, so thorough and often so wrong! Finally, the other disciple enters the tomb, and the author tells us only that he “saw and believed”. He had some kind of insight, though the author of the gospel doesn’t tell us yet what that is. It’s the same scene – an empty tomb with some folded up linens – but the conclusions each of our characters draw are very different.
Now, the two disciples exit the stage and we stay with Mary, whose vision is slowly changing as she has more extraordinary experiences – more and more extraordinary visions. Because at first she only saw the stone moved away and can’t seem to see Jesus’ body – she is upset. She’s weeping. She doesn’t know what to do next. So, she peeks inside the tomb again – maybe my eyes have played a trick on me, she was probably thinking. But, instead of seeing the body, this time she sees two angels in white. They ask her why she’s crying, and Mary answers. But even this celestial vision is not enough for Mary to see anything but the missing body, to understanding anything except Jesus is supposed to be here, in the tomb, dead. So, when she turns around, Jesus himself is standing before her, and she sees him, but she doesn’t really see him…she can’t tell who it is – because, of course, he looks different from what she would expect.
Both Mary and Peter are looking at the concrete surroundings, noticing the details and looking frantically for the body that is supposed to be part of this graveyard scene. They are looking for something so particular, so limited they can’t possibly see the real truth. They are looking for the dead Jesus. They believe that his life and influence have ended with his death and all that’s left to do is seal up the tomb and grieve their loss.
So, What about us? What do we see? And where do we look?
Starting last November – with Advent – we have walked with Jesus from birth, through his ministry and life, and all the way to the cross. This metaphorical walk we take year after year helps form us and deepen our faith as Christians. It is the walk that helps us see, because this journey with Jesus adjusts our vision and our focus so we can see the world as Jesus did – as God wants us to.
By looking at Jesus’ life, we get a new prescription for our glasses so that as we walk through our lives and world, we see not the glory of riches, but the beauty in relationships, we see not the might of violence, but the power of nonviolence, we see not just our friends and families, but the lives of the poor and the hurting are placed under a magnifying glass. And of course, as we have been so keenly aware of this week, we’re asked to see that leading a life like Jesus did can bring us into conflict with others…it can even lead to the cross.
But if we only walk to the cross, our eyesight isn’t perfect yet. The people following Jesus could see these same things – These new ways of looking at power, wealth, and relationships. Their prescription had been changed. But that first Easter morning their eyesight, their insight, was still insufficient. And if we stop at the cross, our vision will still be blurry. The problem with the eyesight of the disciples from the moment Jesus died was that they were looking in the wrong place for the wrong things.
We have the glasses that were refined by the story of Jesus’ earthly life, but now our gaze needs to turn away from this particular person – bound in time and culture and context. We have Jesus’ sight, and now we need to stop looking for him because the risk of looking only to the dead person of Jesus is that we won’t see – and won’t be – the living Christ – and the living Christ is all around us, in us and among us.
I think we often look primarily for the dead Jesus. We bind our faith to an understanding of a Christ who is equivalent with the Jesus of 1st century Palestine, and is therefore bound up in that time and place. Then, when things go wrong, we look to Jesus – wait for him to help us. We pray for miracles just like the ones he performed, but only end up disappointed. When believing in Jesus as Lord and Savior doesn’t solve our problems, we become resigned. We grieve over the violence of this world, but take it for granted as a part of our lives. We see no way for peace. We resign ourselves to a world where poverty will always be a fact of life. We are saddened by these things, but ultimately we don’t really believe they will change, do we? We can’t see any other possibilities, because we are looking in the wrong direction for the wrong thing.
So what, in the end, changes Mary’s sight? Well, her transformation begins when the risen Jesus calls Mary by name. But, really, her sight is still quite blurry. She thinks she is seeing Jesus, the man who died on the cross. In fact, she so wants to see only Jesus the person that she tried to physically fix him to that very spot. She grabs a hold of him. I picture her taking hold of his ankles and trying to plant his feet in the ground. But, when she tried to live in the past, the risen Jesus gently helps her recast her gaze – “Don’t hold on to me,” he says. Let go of what you know so you can become what you, and all of God’s creatures are created to be – the new, living Body of Christ. It’s time. You are ready. Then, Mary really sees – she stops looking for the dead, and begins living as one named and called by God into the body of Christ. And she goes to tell the others what she has now truly seen with her very own eyes.
Jesus was just the beginning and we are the ongoing manifestation of God’s incarnation. And as such, we cannot stay locked in how we have always seen things. We can not get seduced by the devil we know – seeing only the immutability of the world’s sufferings and brokenness.
We know now what this belief is that the other disciple has when he sees the empty tomb. It is not belief in something particular, some fact that he can’t let go of. It is not belief in a person – any person, dead or alive. He believes not in Jesus, rather he believes what Jesus actually told them and believes in what Jesus called them to do. He believes the extraordinary, un-believable things Jesus was saying all along: That after he was gone they would no longer have him to follow, but they would be given the divine spirit to move them, guide them, and give them the courage necessary to carry on Jesus’ work. Maybe the disciple even believed that crazy thing Jesus said earlier in John’s gospel: That the disciples would do even greater things than Jesus did. Even greater things – do we believe that? Do we understand what that means when we look at the empty tomb?
We can’t look back. We are named and called by God. We look forward to the possibilities that lie just outside our physical sight. This is a vision that completely changes who we are and gives rise to a hope that we could never produce on our own. Where should we look on Easter? Don’t look back. The risen Christ is right here, right now gathered in this sanctuary, ready to carry on what Jesus started. Christ is risen – right here right now. Alleluia! Amen.
