Recognizing the Risen Christ
The Rev. Dr. Seth Weeldreyer, First Presbyterian Church of Kalamazoo
March 31, 2024 – Easter Sunday
John 20:1-18; Luke 24:13-39
Do we know it’s Easter? Do we recognize the risen Christ when he comes to us?
Maybe we’d each traveled all day to Emmaus and back in some way. It was almost evening, the day nearly over. When God urged us to stay together for a while, at a Session meeting – around long tables talking, discussing, nourishing one another with things we know as we broke open our life together. Baptisms and funerals, serving people who hunger, supporting a Ghanaian student becoming a minister.
To begin each meeting, one elder offers a reflection of living faith. A touching, inspiring God-moment story from ordinary life, others might relate to in longing if not personal experience. For years they’d followed their daughter all over the world in her way of service. Peace Corps in Benin, China, Mauritius, then State Department in Congo, China again. Places in the world needing God to bring new life. People engaged in humble, loving sacrificial service, that gives hope, joy, real practical improvement. As Covid faded a couple of years ago, he yearned to visit his beloved daughter and family in Guangzhou, China. Happened to be about this time of year, Easter coming. He really wanted to worship somewhere on Easter morning. Understand, he said, how oppressive it is, how hard for Christians to worship in China. Soldiers guard church doors and check foreign passports – yes, you have to be a foreigner to enter, no locals allowed. He researched churches, calculated a potentially hour uber ride across a city of 15 million people with absolute necessity to know Mandarin on the way. Accepted, well, that’s not going to happen! So instead, somewhat bereft, he went for a walk with his family. Found a big city park. Heard a saxophone faintly in the distance. Intrepid jazz-lover as he is, he ambled off alone, seeking the source of dulcet tones. Eventually found a lone man in the garden playing a tune he didn’t recognize. But when the man saw this towering white dude – clearly not from around there – he changed his tune. Our friend began to recognize: Be Thou My Vision, O Lord of my heart. There was Easter, he declared, beaming his radiant smile, (and if I know him at all) with maybe a glistening eye.
Be thou my vision, O Lord of my heart. Naught be all us to me save that thou art
… he prayed, and maybe so do we … yearning to know it’s Easter.
Because, friends, sometimes it can be hard to see the risen Christ. That’s what both texts convey. You see, getting crucified was not exactly what was expected of Jesus as king and of God’s reign he’d bring. For all his followers saw and knew, that was the end—body wracked, breath gone, belief lost, mission failed. They go to the garden and set out on the road only able to conceive how to grieve. All their hopes and expectations, dreams of what would be, their fond memories … now under a pall shadow as dark as the night just before dawn. Any light ominously distorted like an eclipse in early afternoon.
Texts convey it’s hard to see, maybe a common experience we know in our way. When a shroud of sadness / frustration / uncertainty hangs over our broken bodies, hurting hearts, reeling relationships. Hard to see God’s promise of Holy Love that brings new life. Hard to see hope in hard times, how to forgive amid conflict. Hard to see life flourishing in the fullness of peace God wants for all people and creation, when poverty grips, illness and ailments plague us, wars far away and gunshots closer at home reverberate such fear and anger.
Mary goes to the tomb, finds it empty, runs back to tell others. Two of them run to check it out themselves. Faithful people over ages have tried to divine John’s sports play-by-play announcing. Symbolism, deeper meaning … and some scholars imagine it’s also a touch comedic. Like … what movie scene might come to mind? O Brother Where Are Thou-esque bumbling characters so excited, running full out, arms flailing, stumbling, one sees the tomb stops short, the other crashes through his shoulder all the way inside. Or maybe ala Mary we could imagine what Disciple Barbie would look and act like?! Or maybe with the frantic rushing and hint of confusion, gospel writers nod to parents like us 19-20 centuries later trying to get three young kids perfectly dressed for Easter worship at church, let alone look respectable ourselves when all hell of accidents, distractions, and hints of willful demonic possession break loose.
Friends, can we see that it’s Easter in the most intimate parts of our life – like Mary going to the tomb in the darkness alone on the streets. Can we see it’s Easter amid bustling parts of our society – like two on the well-traveled road to Emmaus, throngs of others passing each direction as they saunter along. Be thou my vision. Yeah, I imagine Mary in the garden and the two ambling to Emmaus would have prayed for God’s promise in Christ to be as real for them in life as dulcet tones from a saxophone.
Thou my best thought by day or by night, waking or sleeping thy presence my light.
Be Thou my wisdom and my true word, Thou ever with me and I with thee, Lord.
Friends, do we know it’s Easter? Really know it. Believe it. Trust it. Do we recognize the Risen Christ with the eyes of our hearts when he comes to us? Because you know, that’s what really matters and makes all the difference. Chatting with a young man this weekend, he asked about pilgrimage places we’ve been, like the Holy Land. He wondered can we really see many actual biblical places all these years later. We talked about the Bible as holy stories more than historical fact, and complications of excavation. And what’s more impactful for me is the holy devotion of humans who’ve lived in these places; or come searching prayerfully. Maybe his slightly nodding head meant he connected in some way. As I’ve thought a bit more, here’s what I’d want to say. Of course, scientific evidence will never prove the resurrection or the Holy Sepulcher as Jesus’ actual tomb. And … yes, I believe we can see these holy places, recognize what Mary and Cleopas experienced, know the Risen Christ, the true Easter promise … in how we feel our hearts burning. How this Divine Love changes lives. And we respond: Christ is Risen, indeed!
Friends, we know it’s Easter whenever God’s love in Christ appears vital, as intimate as calling our name, kindling the beloved essence inside us that’s always there even through tragedies and poor choices, trying circumstances; as intimate as chatting over a quiet meal together where life becomes clear. We know it’s Easter, when the way of Christ appears among us powerful, impactful bringing life amid all the loss, bias, injustice of society.
Here’s how I’ve recognized the Risen Christ this weekend. We came here yesterday for a little memorial in our Columbarium, recalling the life and love we’ve been blessed to receive from a devoted mother, grand- and great-grandmother, sensing her vital, tap-dancing character still among us, within us … as stories continued over lunch that followed. Christ is risen!
On my way home, I stopped by the grocery store. On my way in, pushing a small cart with empty bags in the seat, he said hi. Hadn’t seen him in quite a while. We caught up. Five minutes later, noting my collar, he starting lamenting the state of the world. Good Scots Presbyterian lineage for him, and he married a good Jewish woman. He condemned the horror of Gaza, appealing to speak critically of Israeli actions, while naming that it’s not anti-Semitism, still fearing that real rise of hatred, as well. We could have made it to Emmaus and back as people kept saying this is my car and we’d shift another parking spot … as in his earnest care for peace for all and our shared conversation I recognized God’s vision for our world passionately alive, pursued with purpose—security, equity, ability to flourish in peace shared by all. Christ is risen!
Friends, after however tender it was to see this beautiful sanctuary stripped bare on Friday night, touching something emotionally vulnerable inside us, here we come today along our Emmaus road of life together.
Here we come having lost a beloved in body or to the insidious vortex of dementia, maybe setting out each day seemingly only able to conceive how to grieve. And here we know we are not alone—others walk this road with us. And with all our cherished memories and that ever-present compassionate care just maybe we can see a ray of joy on the horizon. Christ is risen!
Here we come after however many weeks or months away recuperating from a health concern, or just reconnecting again in person after slipping away—so good to see the smiles and hear the voices in this loving company. Christ is risen!
Here we come however many days, weeks, years sober and every morning we receive grace to take another step in recovery. Christ is risen!
Here we come amid myriad other transitions—life as we’ve known it ending; yearning for a new beginning … and the Holy One calls us by name: You are loved! Here we come amid myriad other social concerns—afraid the world as we’ve known it is ending; yearning for hope, for some way to make a difference … and we hear again Jesus’ promise that after suffering and loss he will enter into his glory! The glory of God in Christ that is human beings and all creation fully alive!
Dear friends, in all the glory of this day here’s what my burning heart yearns for. That we may come to this table with whatever our fears and imperfections, our uncertainties and questions of faith, stumbling / bumbling steps through life and hear God say: You … You are loved. Did we hear how loud it was saying it together? That’s what so many people we know, and strangers all around us also yearn to hear. With that promise, that purpose, as a couple of disciples long ago urged a seeming stranger to stay for a meal together, may we take bread, be blessed, break open our lives, open our hearts to God’s love for us in Christ. And we will know it is Easter! And then our eyes will open and we will recognize: Christ is risen! Hallelujah!
Thanks be to God. Amen.