Prokeimenon. Mode 2.
Psalm 117.14,18
The Lord is my strength and my song.
Verse: The Lord has chastened me sorely.
The reading is from Acts of the Apostles 6:1-7
In those days, when
the disciples were increasing in number, the Hellenists murmured against the
Hebrews because their widows were neglected in the daily distribution. And the
twelve summoned the body of the disciples and said, "it is not right that
we should give up preaching the word of God to serve tables. Therefore,
brethren, pick out from among you seven men of good repute, full of the Spirit
and of wisdom, whom we may appoint to this duty. But we will devote ourselves
to prayer and to the ministry of the word." And what they said pleased the
whole multitude, and they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy
Spirit, and Philip, and Prochoros, and Nicanor, and Timon, and Parmenas, and
Nicolaos, a proselyte of Antioch. These they set before the apostles, and they
prayed and laid their hands upon them. And the word of God increased; and the
number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem, and a great many of
the priests were obedient to the faith.
The Gospel according
to Mark 15:43-47; 15:1-8
At that time, Joseph of
Arimathea, a respected member of the council, who was also himself looking for
the kingdom of God, took courage and went to Pilate, and asked for the body of
Jesus. And Pilate wondered if he were already dead; and summoning the centurion,
he asked him whether he was already dead. And when he learned from the
centurion that he was dead, he granted the body to Joseph. And he bought a
linen shroud, and taking him down, wrapped him in the linen shroud, and laid
him in a tomb which had been hewn out of the rock; and he rolled a stone
against the door of the tomb. Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses saw
where he was laid.
And when the sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome, bought spices, so that they might go and anoint him. And very early on the first day of the week they went to the tomb when the sun had risen. And they were saying to one another, "Who will roll away the stone for us from the door of the tomb?" And looking up, they saw that the stone was rolled back; for it was very large. And entering the tomb, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, dressed in a white robe; and they were amazed. And he said to them, "Do not be amazed; you seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen, he is not here; see the place where they laid him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going before you to Galilee; there you will see him, as he told you." And they went out and fled from the tomb; for trembling and astonishment had come upon them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Christ
is risen! [He is risen indeed!] Kristo amefufuka! [Kweli amefufuka!]
Death is always the end of the story, isn’t it? Look at how our many cultures struggle so with death. We are so afraid of death, of dying. Our traditional religions go to tremendous lengths to protect us from the dead, from the ancestors, to keep the living from being troubled by those who have departed from us. And we are afraid of dying. I remember a conversation I had with a Kenyan friend back in the 1980s. He had been sick, and I asked him, “Why don’t you go to Kenyatta Hospital and let them help you?” And he said, “No, that’s where people go to die.”
The reality of death. The fear of death. The terror of death. Our world has no answer. We try to build a bridge over the abyss of death and our fears of dying with platitudes, or distractions, or addictions. We try to comfort ourselves by making the Bible say things that the Bible nowhere says, like we will all go to heaven when we die. But when you open a Bible and actually read what Jesus and the Apostles say, going to heaven is not what the Gospel is all about. God is doing something much more profound. Our situation is actually worse than we have allowed ourselves to imagine. As St. Paul rightly says, death is the last great enemy. And this is why Pascha is so central to real orthodox Christianity, and that without Pascha, there is no Christian faith, and no hope for you or me in the face of a life that ends in death and the grave.
A group of women made their way in the darkness before dawn to the cold dark tomb where Jesus’ body lay. These women understood that death was the end of the story. These women had known Jesus, they had heard him teach, they had seen the miracles, lepers restored, blind given sight, paralytics walking, a dead son restored to his widowed mother, and even just last week, (was it only just last week?) Jesus had called the dead Lazarus from his tomb after his being dead four days. But after an absolutely tumultuous week, Jesus had been seized in the middle of the night, taken off to a secret trial, handed over to the Romans, who treated him like any other outlaw. They crucified him, as if he were a bandit, as if he were a murderer. And these women, horrified, watched him suffer and then die. They watched and wept as that rich man from Arimathea took down his body from the cross. They gathered around and helped as his body was washed and quickly wrapped and carried to a nearby tomb, because the sun was setting and it was almost Sabbath. They saw where they laid his lifeless body. They watched as the men rolled a big stone across the entrance. They stumbled home in the darkness, drained, empty, numb. They had thought that Jesus might be the one who would save Israel. But the story had come to a terrible end. That is what death does. It brings every story to a terrible end, even yours, even mine.
Every culture has its ways of coping with death. Somehow, the rituals help soften the blow. In America we have our viewings and visitations, our funerals, our graveside prayers or scattering of ashes. For these women, they were doing what they had done so many times before when a loved one had died or a friend was bereaved. They stepped in for the family and took care of the body. They prepared the body for burial. For Jews, there was no embalming; the custom was to bury the dead on the day they died. This involved washing the body, anointing the body with spices to offset the stench of decay, and of wrapping the body in a shroud. The body would be taken on a bier to a tomb and left on a slab. The tomb was then closed. The body would decompose and after some months, members of the family would return, open the tomb, and collect the bones and place them in a small box, an ossuary, which they would then put in a niche in the tomb. This would offer some closure. And the tomb would be ready to be used again.
These women, therefore, had a job to finish. So after the Sabbath, before dawn, while it was still cool, they gathered by the city gate. They knew where the tomb was. They came with their spices. They came because the story was over, and this is the only way they knew to cope. They had followed Jesus from when he was in Galilee. They came with him to Jerusalem. They followed him as he carried the cross. They had gone with him as far as they could go. But now death had ended his story. They came to say goodbye to a man they knew and loved. Today we would call it grief work.
We all know what happened next. It is not a long walk from the gates of Jerusalem to Joseph’s tomb where Jesus’ body lay. The practical soul among them was already fretting about how to move the stone from the front of the tomb. And as they followed the path around the bend and the tomb came into sight, they caught their breath and stood, stunned. No one ever expects an angel. And angels are always having to tell people things like, ‘Don’t be afraid!’ ‘Don’t be alarmed!’ this angel says. Easy enough for an angel to say, but for a small group of women who have just stumbled upon the end of the old age and the beginning of the new, terror is understandable.
An angel is one thing, but it’s what he says that absolutely undoes them. ‘You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen; he is not here. See the place where they laid him.’ (Mark 16:6) Excuse me, but I’m sorry, this just doesn’t happen. Death is always the end of the story. There are no categories for this, not for these women, not for us. OK, even so, we’ve sort of gotten used to this idea that Jesus has risen from the dead. That’s why Pascha is such a big deal, and rightly so. But it’s what the angel says next to these women that I want to leave you with. He says, ‘But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going before you to Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.’ (Mark 16:7)
Just a couple of obvious things. First, notice that this is a commission. The angel says ‘Come and see,’ and then he says, ‘Go and tell,’ specifically go and tell the disciples what you have heard from me – that Jesus is risen from the dead – go and tell what you have seen with your own eyes – namely that the tomb is empty. No greater charge has ever been given.
Secondly, notice to whom this commission is given. The angel did not appear to Peter, or to any of the other disciples. The angel did not make this announcement to Pilate, or the chief priests, nor did he call a special meeting of the Sanhedrin. He didn’t appear in Herod’s court or in Rome before the emperor. No, this is a couple of women. They have no legal standing as witnesses. They are not movers and shakers. They wield no power or influence in the halls of the mighty. With all due respect to the women here, God chooses political, cultural, societal nobodies to be the ones entrusted with the most important message ever given to anyone. I don’t think they had ever been to college, much less seminary. Jesus had said on a number of occasions that wherever he was in charge, the first would be last and the last would be first. Well, this is what that looks like.
Lastly, I just want to point out that nothing has changed today. The tomb is still empty. And in spite of the studied blindness of our cultures, Death is not the end of the story. Instead with the resurrection of Jesus, an entirely new story has begun. And it’s a story that has involved many people over many years. But now if you look down on the page, we’ve come to that part in Jesus’ story that’s about you, and about me. That’s your name I see written here, and our parish! Our lives are being touched and transformed as the good news comes even to us. We, too, are hearing with our own ears, seeing with our own eyes, experiencing in our own hearts what the risen Jesus can do. But just like with the women, the myrrh-bearing women, it doesn’t stop with them – it doesn’t stop with us. Instead the angel says to us, ‘Come and see! Go and tell!’ We, too, have the same commission. ‘Go and tell’ all these people in our families, in our neighborhood, in our schools, in our places of work, all these people who live their lives in the valley of the shadow of death, tell them Jesus is risen, death is defeated, we need no longer be afraid, we need no longer be enslaved. We, too, stand at the end of the old age and the beginning of the new. Death’s reign of terror has come to an end for us. Jesus has become the first-fruits of everyone he will raise from the dead. And just as he says to Martha, He says to you right now: ‘I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me, though he may die, shall live. And whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die. Do you believe this?’ (John 11:25-26) Did Martha believe this? Did the women believe this? Do you believe this?
Jesus is the start of what God is doing with this world, of how God is renewing and saving His world.. With the defeat of death and the resurrection of Jesus, the New Creation has begun. Not just those of us who die will be saved from death, but the entire creation will be made new. The end of our lives is not to be some disembodied spirit floating around some heaven somewhere. Rather God will do the very same thing for you and me as He did for Jesus, we will be raised from the dead, and we will live in a new Creation, where sin and death are no more, where we will live fully human lives the way we were created to be.
Mark’s gospel ends with this: ‘And they went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had seized them, and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.’ (Mark 16:8) There is more speculation than you can shake a stick at as to whether or not the original ending of Mark’s gospel got lost, and if it did, how might it have ended. But for our sake, I’m glad it ends this way. I think I would have done the same thing if it had been me. And we do know from the other gospels that they in fact came face to face with the risen Jesus, that they did recover from their shock, that they did tell the disciples (who at first refused to believe them). They went on to be among those praying in the upper room, among those filled with the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, among those who were part of the first churches. But it started with ‘Come and see’ and ‘Go and tell.’ These women were right there at the dawn of the Kingdom of the risen Jesus. ‘Come and see,’ the angel said. ‘Go and tell,’ he commissioned them. They are first apostles. The very first missionaries.
The same call is on my life – Come and see! Go and tell! And the same call is on your life, too. Everything changes when we meet the risen Jesus. When we see Him for who He is. And if our Christianity hasn’t made any difference in our lives and priorities, living as if this world will never end as if we can put off death indefinitely, if we are still running around like everybody else in our culture, as if getting rich, or becoming powerful, or if eating and drinking and sex are what this life is all about, then it must mean that we haven’t met Him yet. We honor these women today because in them we see what it means to be not just an apostle, and not just a missionary. We see in them what it means to be a Christian, right here and right now. Come and see, says the angel at the tomb. Go and tell.
In the name of the Father and of the Son
and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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