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The Significance of Easter John 20: 1 – 18 Because the resurrection, the rising of Jesus from the dead, is such a significant story in our Faith tradition, much has and can be preached on this story of Jesus. Not only is it probably the most important story in our faith tradition, but it is a story that is rich with symbolic meaning that communicates the profound spiritual truths that underpin the Christian faith. This morning I would like to pick up on 5 things that stood out for me as I read it during the week. 1. The first thing that struck me was that the resurrection story starts early on the first day of the week. This was the day after the Jewish Sabbath. ‘Early Sunday morning, while it was still dark’ we are told the disciples came to the tomb. Just as Nicodemus had come to Jesus in the dark and through his encounter with Jesus moved from spiritual darkness into enlightenment, so the disciples come to the tomb from the darkness of their grief after Good Friday, into the light of the Resurrection. The Resurrection occurred on a new day at the start of a new week. What might this reveal to us about the significance of the resurrection? This is a story about new beginnings Because Jesus rose from the dead, new life has begun, new ways of seeing life and death, new ways of understanding the world. The point is emphasised by the Gospel writer inserting the detail that it is a woman who first reaches the tomb, none other than Mary Magdalene. Not only does the resurrection occur at the start of a new day and that points to new life, but also a woman disciple is the first to reach the empty tomb and this points to a new order. The kingdom of God is indeed at hand: As Paul points out in Galatians 3 28There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. This equality in Christ applied to gender differences, men and women, racial difference, social differences and religious differences and as such was quite a revolutionary concept in the social structure during Jesus’ time and lest we forget, it is still pretty revolutionary today also, in many parts of the world.
2. The second thing I noticed is that when the disciples arrive at the tomb,
the stone had been removed. Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and found that
the stone had been rolled away, the entrance had been unblocked and the
empty tomb revealed that Jesus had been raised from the dead.
Let us pray today that God’s Holy Spirit would remove from our lives the
obstacles that For each of us there will be a different stone that is blocking our way from being fully devoted followers of the risen Christ.
Apart from the sheer mystery of such a meeting I think her encounter reflects that in the resurrection of Jesus, earth and heaven came together in that moment in time. Jesus, God incarnate, rose from his earthly being to his rightful place of authority in his heavenly being. The cross now has added symbolism as the point where heaven and earth intersect. 4. Fourthly, we notice that Mary mistook Jesus for the Gardener. This is ironic. The lord of the universe is mistaken for a gardener? The earthly hierarchy has been upset once again by Jesus and we are reminded of the parable in Matthew 25 Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’ 37“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’ 40“The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’ I am also reminded of Jesus words to his two disciples about the first being last and the last being first. We should not be surprised that Mary mistook Jesus for a gardener for there is something of Jesus in every gardener also and all his life Jesus taught the power that lies in being powerless in worldly terms. 5. The final symbolic action that stood out for me in this story, is to be found in John 20:6 - 7 where we are told that the linen wrappings were still lying in the grave undisturbed. This is significant because in this phenomenon we have circumstantial proof that the body of Jesus had not been stolen or physically removed from the tomb, but had passed supernaturally away leaving the clothes intact. When the other disciple, whom we think was John himself, entered the tomb and saw the grave clothes, we are told he believed. In what I wonder? It is implied that the circumstantial evidence convinced him to believe in the resurrection of Jesus. The fact that the body had miraculously passed through the thick folds of the grave clothes, leaving them unmoved, and that they had not been unwound by human hands, meant that an extraordinary event had taken place, Jesus had risen to another kind of life. The evidence of the intact and not unwrapped grave clothes, prove that Jesus Christ was unlike Lazarus, who needed to be loosed from his wrappings after He was raised from the dead (John 11:44).Simply put: the grave clothes demonstrate that Lazarus was resuscitated while Jesus was resurrected. Because he rose in this way, we have the sure hope of rising too, when it is our turn to die. Our whole Christian theology about life after death is based on the resurrection of Jesus Christ. So we may glean from these 5 symbolic references in John’s account of Jesus Resurrection that: 1. The Resurrection of Jesus has ushered in a new understanding of death. It marks not the end of life but the beginning of new life that will last for all eternity through Jesus. 2. It has ushered in a new order where all are equally entitled to receive the Good News of the salvation through the risen Christ. 3. In Christ’s resurrection we see heaven and earth reconciled and intersecting. The kingdom of heaven is no longer some far away place but right here where we or any community gather around Christ and submit to his authority. 4. Finally,those who want to see and recognise Jesus need to look for him in the ordinary and the every day. Jesus even in his resurrected state is to be found in the midst of the world he created. The Lord is risen,
Alleluia, he is risen indeed. |
