Sermons
Spirituality Around the Clock: “MYSTICAL/PURITANICAL"
Mystical/Puritanical
1 Corinthians 2: 12-16 New Revised Standard Version
Our text makes clear that spirituality is required for a correct understanding of the things of God. Those who cannot discern things spiritually will never understand. Both mystics and Puritans would agree on this, but they differ over how the mind of God can be known.
Mystics seek a direct communion with God. That communion produces insights and knowledge of God’s mind and will. Puritans seek a life obedient to God’s will, believing that obedience leads to insight and knowledge of God.
Mystical spirituality finds greatest support in the ancient orthodox churches, which still interpret Scripture and the world with heavy emphases on union with Christ and what they call theosis, which is humankind’s elevation toward divinity by means of that union.
Puritanical spirituality is grounded in the simplicity of obedience. Obeying God’s Word yields the good life on Earth and treasures in Heaven. We’ll start with the mystical.
Mysticism depends upon extraordinary personal experiences. Jacob’s ladder, Moses and the burning bush, Paul on the road to Damascus, John’s Revelation at Patmos—these are individual experiences of God that continue to feed the faith of God’s people. But the whole community did not have such an experience; just one specially called person at a time. Mystical spirituality is founded upon the extraordinary religious experience. It is extremely personal and subjective, though it may yield fruit for the whole community.
Beyond the biblical accounts of theophany—wherein God speaks or appears to an individual—church history has its mystics up to the present day. Christian mystics are those who found themselves met—or even seized by—the Holy Spirit. They may have been given visions, clarification, or just been given a glimpse of Heaven.
Matt mentioned Hildegaard of Bingen, a 12th century mystic whose visions, music, meditations, and writing continue to inspire Christian faith. Other significant names well worth studying include: Maximus the Confessor (c.580–662), Anselm of Canterbury (1033–1109), Bernard of Clairvaux (1090–1153), Francis of Assisi (1181–1226), Bonaventure of Bagnoregio (1221–1274), Meister Eckhart (1260–1328), Julian of Norwich (1342–1416), The Cloud of Unknowing (c.1345-1386), Joan of Arc (1412–1431), Catherine of Genoa (1447–1510), Ignatius of Loyola (1491–1556), Lucia of Narni (15th c), Teresa of Ávila (1515–1582), John of the Cross (1542–1591), and Emanuel Swedenborg (1688–1772).
But once we get into the 1800s, the number of mystics explodes. With the Second Great Awakening came a revival of mystical spirituality. Every evangelist in every town was having visions and making prophetic utterances. We have Mormonism, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and a panoply of end-times visionaries as the result.
Some denominations came to elevate personal experience to a position of chief authority. Your Christianity, in their view, depends upon your having had a significant, personal experience of God’s love—perhaps dramatic, but nonetheless something clearly “spiritual.” That is mystic spirituality at work in modern American churches. It’s more than just a blessing to have such and experience; it is your membership card. Some denominations expect a personal, mystical encounter with the Holy Spirit before your Christianity can be validated. If you have not had a personal, mystical experience of God, then you’re not really a Christian, they would say.
I understand this because I, like many of you, have had religious experiences. I’ll tell you about one:
When I was 15, my parents and I were returning to Omaha from California after Christmas break. We had a big, yellow, 1968 Pontiac Bonneville station wagon, a banana boat of a car. We passed through Denver on I-80 about 9 o’clock at night, pushing our way forward thinking we’d find a place to stay somewhere just ahead. By 12:30 in the morning, we arrived in North Platte, Nebraska, but found no vacancies. We sat down in a truck stop for a late meal. I don’t know that breakfast can ever taste better than it does at 1 in the morning when you’re still feeling wide awake.
Since we were anxious to get home, we decided to go for it and drive through the night to Omaha, about 4 hours. We’d be glad to be home.
The great thing about the Bonneville is that you can level out the back seats—and the way-back, which faced out the back window—and comfortably stretch out in a big sleeping bag. I laid there, riding through the western Nebraska desert, looking out the long side windows at the enormous expanse of stars, which seemed especially bright on dark, winter nights out in the middle of Nebraska nowhere.
Then came my mystical experience. I was touched by the Holy Spirit.
As I looked at the stars, all of a sudden, the whole sky seemed to snap into 3D perspective, like one of those MagicEye posters. It was as if I were able to take in the whole cosmos in a single glance.But it was something more. I thought, “Of course God is real—only a total fool could think otherwise.”
Light and clarity seemed to pour into my soul from a source beyond anything in myself or even my Christian environment and upbringing. I felt the Spirit of God and knew that he loves us all more than we can hope or imagine. I also knew that everything I had been brought up to believe about Jesus was attached to and had grown out of this same love. Jesus is the story of God’s love and not just the story we tell, but He is the actual, historical event of God’s love for all people.
My heart was full to bursting. I knew God and knew that God knew me. To know that is to have love—like discovering the fountain of living water inside—and I felt two feet taller.
The importance of love was impressed upon me. I thought about how important love is and how resistant, how hesitant, we all are to its free expression. Fear is indeed the opposite of love. Fear makes us silent when we should speak up in love, and fear makes us say a lot of stupid stuff to cover over the discomforts of failing at love.
I thought of all the old guys at church—these old Swedes who linger around in suits on Sundays and serve as ushers and greeters—these older men and women who I walked past every Sunday and tried to avoid so I could hang out with my friends. Now, I loved those guys and wanted to be with them. I wanted to wear a suit and greet people at the door with them. I wanted to share their company, for Christ was present in them as He is in all His church.
I loved my friends, but wasn’t mature enough to tell them so, but now I to do better. I felt the Spirit and the nearness of Christ, and I knew this was the pearl of great price, the treasure in the field, the most important thing in all existence, and I knew as well that nothing in the world would satisfy me outside of this love and awareness. God has a plan, I thought, and the plan is the same as this love. This love is the same as His presence. To know God’s presence is to feel His love, and there’s no hope in this world outside the awareness of His love. But in His love, all things are fulfilled, and human beings taste the perfection of Heaven.
It was, for me, a night of life-changing conviction. I had been given a personal experience of God’s love. There are lines in the hymn, “The Church’s One Foundation,” that came to me:
Yet she on earth hath union
With God the Three in One,
And mystic sweet communion
With those whose rest is won:
O happy ones and holy!
Lord, give us grace that we,
Like them, the meek and lowly,
In love may dwell with Thee.
It was that mystic, sweet communion, given by the Holy Spirit, that sealed my heart and destiny.
Problems with Mystical
But there are problems with the mystical experience. The downside of that experience is that it couldn’t last forever, though I hoped and prayed it would.Mystical spirituality is not in our control—it comes or it doesn’t—and the Spirit blows like the wind.
There are certainly forms of Christianity that attempt to recapture or reinvent the mystical experience. Some Pentecostals thrive on trying to lasso-down the Spirit in worship, falling all over themselves like the prophets of Ba’al to prove their sincerity and worthiness for such an epiphany.
Others seek it through meditation, or self-denial and fasting. Mystical types may shape their entire life around trying to recapture that old feeling or seek to work their way up into it. Personally, I dont’ think God works that way. The prophets didn’t study to be prophets; they were simply chosen by God. They spoke God’s Word because God gave it to them to speak.
The chief problem with mystical spirituality is that it’s so subjective and personal. As Paul tells the Corinthians about tongues,
“Those who speak in a tongue build up themselves, but those who prophesy build up the church.” (1 Corinthians 14:4).
Those who have grand religious experiences benefit from them, but what use are they to the Church and greater witness to Christ?
Who can really put words to such an experience? The great poets—especially the great Christian poets like George Herbert, Thomas Traherne, Richard Crashaw, Gerard Manley Hopkins, and T.S. Eliot —all tried, and the best of them manage to capture and communicate at least a taste of divine revelation; but they are few and far in between. We can thank God for choosing the ones He does.
In modern times, spirituality has been taken over by “spiritualists” and psychedelic explorers. Timothy Leary led many people to believe that an authentic, religious experience was available to all through LSD, comparing stoned-out hippies to the great mystics and geniuses of history (who, by the way, all came by their insights after years of devotion and dedication, not by dropping a tab of acid).
If spirituality works that way, it is revealed to be little more than a chemical phenomenon—hardly worth setting in the balance of authentic spirituality.
Puritanical
As I started out saying, the puritanical spirituality, like the mystical spirituality, is also introspective. But it differs on several counts. The Puritans, for one, were much more communal than individual. One person’s extraordinary experience was nothing if it did not somehow edify the whole body of Christ.
Unfortunately, mystical experiences don’t strike entire communities at the same time (except for Pentecost, which we will discuss on Pentecost). Whereas mystics tend to escape into the metaphysical, Puritans focus on bringing the metaphysical into flesh and blood practice. Information that is not incarnated in the congregation is pointless.
Mystics focus on communion with God and becoming one with His love. Puritans focus on living to please God and serving Him with every aspect of their lives.
Mystics focus on oneness of all things; Puritans focus on purity or righteousness in all things.
Mystics believe in special revelations—that divine insights come from extraordinary personal experiences. Puritans believe in sola scriptura—that the Bible alone is sufficient for all we need to know about God, and that further human insight and wisdom come not from wild experiences, but from hard work and diligence in seeking to live righteous, Christlike lives.
Like the mystics, Puritans believed in the benefits of intensive prayer, but all insights gained from direct apprehension of God were subject to the clear, written Word of God.
The Puritan life is one of intense effort to align oneself, one’s family, one’s village, and nation with the will of God as revealed in Scripture. Obedience is not a mystical union with Christ so much as a painstaking discipline. Puritans believed that our thoughts and behaviors truly matter. Union, for them, means a oneness of will that translates to a godly life.
Puritans can be thought of as minimalists. They wanted all the barnacles scraped off their religion so they could honor the true core of it. No Catholicism, no fancy liturgy, no popes, no bishops, and no bells, smells, fusses, or frills—just the basics.
Devotion involves removing all the things that distract us from total commitment. Whatever competes for the affections of your heart, whatever distracts you from loving God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength—these are what you actively remove in order to secure your complete devotion.
There is some overlap here with piety—which we will talk about in a couple weeks—but whereas piety focuses on personal devotion, puritanism focuses on collective devotion. It is the devotion of the community that matters most—the righteousness of the society and nation—which is why English Puritans left Catholic/Anglican England and came to the new world in the hopes of establishing righteous and godly colonies. The righteous society would nurture and build righteous individuals.
The Puritan instinct lives in each of us, and we awaken our inner puritan any time we want to do some kind of spring cleaning for the soul. Clear out the clutter and get things right with God, but remember this is a corporate or collective application. The desire is to fix up the community or the whole society, not just one’s own house.
Puritan spirituality is very much alive today, but it is more apparent in its secular manifestations. The puritanical vegan seeks to remove all meat and animal products from her diet. If that were the end of it, she would be a pietist, but in that she wants no one else to eat meat and thinks you and I should be non-meat-eaters as well—that is puritan.
Environmentalism is coming to look like America’s present puritan spirituality. Its true believers have removed pollutants from their life—they recycle religiously, drive hybrids, and constantly measure the carbon footprints of themselves and others. Their puritanism comes with their expectation that you and I should be expected to do the same, by force of law, if necessary. They envision the government as the enforcer of their code, ridding society of its many sins and pollutants.
The upside of puritan spirituality is the instinct to live a righteous and godly life. The downside is their expectation that their particular code of righteousness ought to be applied to everyone.
We vote with a puritan spirituality, hoping to make America an even better place than it was in the prior four years. When we vote, we choose the trajectory we believe will make America great again, or more just, or more prosperous for all.
On the home level, puritan spirituality disdains excess. The stuff we have but neither like nor need can begin to smother the inner puritan. “Get Marie Kondo in here! Time for a spring cleaning for the whole family.” The puritan home spring cleans 24/7, and as a house puritan, I know I am happier with every box I donate to thrift, or every decent piece of furniture I surrender to Bridges to Home.
It may hurt a little at first, but removing the barnacles is necessary work that always feels better in the long run.
Summary
We carry both spiritualities within us. It is right and good that we should seek The Lord’s presence in every moment of every day. When we wake in the morning, we should seek Him in the beauty of day, seeing His love and handiwork in the sunlight slanting through the trees. We, too, are mystics capable of unity with HIs Spirit if we can simply pause, be quiet, and know that He is God. We also do well to simplify our lives in order to focus on what is crucial in our faith. Deep down, we desire to be totally committed in our faith, but the pressing burden of necessity keeps us bound up in the shallow waters of stuff and the trappings of excess. We need each other—we need to be a part of a community—and by hope and prayer we do become a people dedicated to the Lord.
Spirituality Around the Clock: “SACRAMENTAL/INDEPENDENT"
Sacramental/Independent
Pastor Noel Anderson, First Presbyterian Church of Upland 5/11/21
Text: Matthew 16: 13-20 New Revised Standard Version
13 Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” 14 And they said, “Some say John the Baptist, but others Elijah, and still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” 15 He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” 16 Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” 17 And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven. 18 And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it. 19 I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.” 20 Then he sternly ordered the disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Messiah. †
Our new series, Spirituality Around the Clock, looks at twelve different flavors of spirituality—all of which can serve Christ. It is incomplete to think of spirituality as a single item or of being about only one thing. In fact, spirituality is as florid and diversified as an orchestra. You can rightly fault me for oversimplifying this series to merely twelve types, but we must start somewhere.
I’ve organized these different kinds of spirituality in pairs of what can be called opposites—like opposite poles on the same line—like the series of unresolved tensions we explored earlier this year.
We’re going to do our best to reflect something of each spirituality within our worship service as well.
Today, we’re looking at 12 and 6 on the clock: Sacramental spirituality and Independent spirituality.
Sacramental Spirituality
Some people love so-called high worship. By high, they mean steeped deeply in tradition, using forms that are centuries old. The positive experience is feeling like a part of something bigger and more ancient than flashy trends of the present day.
To lose oneself within the greater body of Christianity is part of it. Personal preferences are abandoned because the self is much less important than the whole. To lose the self in the greater Body of Christ is a fit corrective to so much of what plagues the western world. It is movement away from the “it’s all about me” attitude toward the communion of the saints.
But this is not just about a worship style; Sacramental spirituality derives its nourishment from the sacraments themselves. In protestantism, The Lord’s Supper and Baptism. Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches have seven. The extra five were added in church history, but Protestants only hold to those instituted by Christ Himself in the gospels.
We should think of the sacraments not as something we do for God, but as God’s gifts to us, His Church. The Lord’s Supper and Baptism were not our idea—we didn’t invent them—but they are given to us by Christ. Whenever we celebrate a sacrament, we exercise obedience. Why do have baptism and the Lord’s Supper at all? Simple: because Jesus tells us to do them. “Take, eat,” He says of the Lord’s Supper. “Go forth and baptize,” He says of baptism. We practice these things in simple obedience.
As a Presbyterian student at Jesuit Gonzaga University, I attended “mass” a couple times a week. The liturgy is set: a rigid, inflexible script. While the ancient words didn’t impress me, I was very impressed by the sense of oneness of the catholic church all over the world. In every time zone and every language, these words are being said in a constant, unending sacrament. This worldwide oneness is not something that can be captured by low, independent churches who think they’re the only ones doing it right.
As for the extra sacraments that churches have added, these become “sacraments” only through the authority of the church itself.
“And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”
Not long after the conversion of Constantine and the name-change from The Roman Empire to the Holy Roman Empire, church authorities seized those keys and have wielded them with an iron fist, transforming the earthly body of Christ into fiercely authoritarian bureaucracy.
The more authoritarian a church becomes, the less the individual matters. Conform or die is the unwritten code. Your obedience to God is constituted by your obedience to the institutional church. They call it Magisterium—the institutional church that God’s presence in the world today. The magisterium speaks for God, and those who defy the magisterium defy God and lose their salvation.
The grace of God, the forgiveness of Christ, the power of the Holy Spirit—these are possessions of the Church, and its leaders can bestow or deny them to anyone they choose.
This is how they interpret today’s text. But it’s not the only way to read the text and not the only way to serve Christ, so we now look at Independents.
Independent Spirituality
All independents are Protestants of one stripe or another. There are some great names associated with independent spirituality. People like Sore Kierkegaard, Simone Weil, and Blaise Pascal—all of these were deep Christians who have influenced millions, but none of these ever joined the Church. They were outsiders, standing in the doorway, but people of extraordinary faith and deep wisdom.
Independents don’t like the idea of losing themselves in some great collective. It’s not that they’re in love with themselves, but rather that they celebrate their status in Christ as sons and daughters of God.
Yes, the Church is the Body of Christ, but not the institutional church. The Roman Catholic Church, the Orthodox churches, and all the Protestant denominations—they’re all simply provisional. The grand magisterium of the Catholic faith is just another denomination among denominations. The real Church—the real Body of Christ—lives in the eyes of God alone. It doesn’t matter which denomination you choose; what matters is that every person as an individual comes to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. Salvation is not in the Church, but in Christ Himself. To know Christ is to be in the true Church, despite whatever name is on the sign in front of the building.
The Independent spirituality experiences God not in the inherited structures or liturgies of the Church, but rather in meeting God in every place and in any moment.
Independents are those who are fond of saying things like, “You don’t need to go to church to be saved,” and “The Church shouldn’t pretend that they own God,” etc.
Independents tend to be anti-authoritarian on the scale, and tend to distrust institutions and anything that looks club-ish or clique-ish.
If you attended a college with fraternities and sororities, you can see a picture of this distinction. Those in the greek houses love the brotherhood or sisterhood of the group, and they draw nourishment from their fraternal identity. They spend their college years as part of a club to which they feel deep and abiding loyalty.
The “independents” are those with no interest in fraternities or sororities. They may even view them with mild contempt, regarding their members as a bit weak for not being able to make a go of it on their own.
The positive side of independent spirituality is their emphasis on personal responsibility. On the downside, they have turned church-going into a consumer experience. Pick and choose, go your own way, and answer to no one.
Comparison / Contrasts
Sacramentals and Independents differ on several poles. The Sacramentals lean heavily on the Church and their place within the Church. Independents celebrate their freedom in Christ first and see the Church as a collection of fungible denominations.
Sacramentals relish the experience of losing themselves before the majesty of the Church; Independents seek to experience the power of the Spirit whenever and wherever they may.
Theologically, Independents find their authority from Scripture alone. They say a think is right or true “Because the Word of God says so.” A Sacramental would say a thing is right or true “Because the Church says the Word of God says so.”
Independents feel that it’s about “God and me,” while Sacramentals feel it’s “God and US, the Church.”
Sacramentals find their nurture and direction in the catechisms—or even the Confessions—of the larger Church; Independents seek nurture in independent study—wherever it can be found.
To the Table: a Sacrament of God
As we prepare to come to the table of Christ, let’s understand that both the Sacramental and Independent spiritualities have a place here. The Lord’s Supper is a sacrament, instituted by Christ Himself. As such, it is not a product of the Church; it is a gift from God to the Church. And while it is not the church’s possession, its practice is the Church’s responsibility. There are things which God has given to the Church—the collective faithful—that are not given to individuals.
Jesus says clearly in Matthew 18: 20:
For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.”
There are independent roles and missions to be fulfilled, but God’s intention is clearly that we should know the blessings of fellowship, which includes church discipline—the shaping of our faith after the image and nature of Christ.
I almost get the feeling that Independent types prefer the spirituality of Covid lockdown.
It is crucial that we capture the sense of unity that Christ intends for us. Yes, the Church is terribly fragmented, and no one denomination can claim to be the one and only “true” church. But salvation isn’t designed for the vacuum of independent life. We should remember that we are answerable to one another in Jesus’ name, and we should pursue the oneness of Christ’s Church whenever we come to the table.
The Lord’s Supper is one of God’s gifts to you and me. It is a visible means of God’s grace. When we partake of the bread and the cup, we enter into the spiritual Twilight Zone where all spiritualities merge.
We are all Sacramentals—humbling ourselves as we obediently receive, taking and eating as Christ commands. We are indeed linked with the Body of Christ around the world, through time and history—one communion of all the faithful.
We are all Catholics, connected as if in one, worldwide organization. We are all Orthodoxes, lost in the ancient mysteries of the sacrament. And we are all Independents, because coming to this table requires the best of you, and you must respond to God who loves you and cares about you individually.
As we come to the table today, prepare your independent spirit to join with that of all Christians as Christ unites us to Himself. †
EASTER: “THERE IS NOTHING THERE"
4/4/21
John 19:38-42
38 After these things Joseph of Arimathea, who was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, asked Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus, and Pilate gave him permission. So he came and took away his body. 39 Nicodemus also, who earlier had come to Jesus by night, came bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about seventy-five pounds in weight. 40 So they took the body of Jesus and bound it in linen cloths with the spices, as is the burial custom of the Jews. 41 Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden, and in the garden a new tomb in which no one had yet been laid. 42 So because of the Jewish day of Preparation, since the tomb was close at hand, they laid Jesus there.
The Setting
We've become very used to stories wherein the rich guys are the bad guys. We all love underdogs and love to see the poor vindicated and those who have not come to greatness, but our first heroes in the passion narrative are a couple of rich guys. Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus were rich guys. They were both well-to-do Pharisees with seats on the Sanhedrin. Think of the Sanhedrin as the ancient equivalent of the Supreme Court—one with seventy-one judges. That was their role: to hear cases and make judgments.
Both Joseph and Nicodemus were followers of Jesus and men of bold character. When Jesus' closest followers had abandoned him and run off in hiding to save themselves, Joseph and Nicodemus stepped up and took responsibility for care.
Joseph asks Pilate for Jesus' body. As a member of the Sanhedrin, Joseph would have had that kind of access. It was a huge favor to ask because crucifixion was about more than execution; it was about humiliation. Crucified men were not to be taken down and buried, for their presence hanging on crosses was a daily and hourly reminder that Rome was boss. You mess with Rome; you get the horns.
No Jew would ever want to see any other Jew crucified, for it was an offense not only to the man but to the whole of Israel. One Jew hanging on a cross presents a loud and effective proclamation that Rome dominates Israel.
And hundreds upon hundreds had been crucified previously, their bodies on crosses on the roads outside the city gates. Approaching Jerusalem, these crucifixes stood like billboards promising the same treatment for any acts of insurrection.
So to ask to take someone down would be to minimize that Roman message. Why did Pilate do it? We don't know, but we do know that he wasn't in favor of Jesus' crucifixion in the first place. He only did it to appease the Temple Establishment, who would have regularly asked that any other Jew—even the worst criminal—be spared crucifixion.
Together with his friend Nicodemus, Joseph takes down Jesus' body and place it in a new tomb nearby.
We don't know what Joseph did for a living, but we know he owned what had been a quarry just beyond one of the western city gates. Such quarries were mined for limestone until they could get no more. After that, they could be turned into gardens, or as with Joseph, garden tombs.
Golgotha means place of the skull. It may have been the location of many crucifixions over the years. Still, we know Joseph had turned it into a garden and had begun to hew the rock for a family tomb, not a stone's throw away from the spot of Jesus' crucifixion.
Taking him down, they wrap his head in a face cloth called a sudarium, and once they lay him down in the preparation area of the new, unused tomb, they cover him over with linen cloth. The 75 pounds of spices and aloe were for the washing with warm water. They were probably not used. Crucified men were not usually buried, so the rules were off the books. The Jewish custom for a man who died by great violence as Jesus had would not be to wash, but to bury him with his blood upon him, intact, for they believed that one’s soul was in one’s blood. They simply folded the shroud over him and left him unattended until Sunday.
According to Matthew, some of the other Temple authorities worried that Jesus' disciples might try to steal his body from the tomb, so they had Pilate place guards to watch it through the Sabbath.
Why did they think Jesus' Disciples would steal His body? They abandoned Him at His arrest. They hid themselves to save their own lives because they knew that it was customary to crucify all the insurrectionist followers along with their leader. The Temple authorities way overestimated the Disciples' resolve.
That Sabbath—all day Saturday—must have been the worst day of their lives. I'm sure they didn't sleep well, eat well, and probably feared they would never get out of Jerusalem alive. I'm sure they spent most of the day making plans to sneak away as soon as possible, but some of the women were going to make sure Jesus' body had been properly taken care of before they left. That brings us to our Easter text.
John 20: 1-10
1 Now on the first day of the week Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early, while it was still dark, and saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb. 2 So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.” 3 So Peter went out with the other disciple, and they were going toward the tomb. 4 Both of them were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. 5 And stooping to look in, he saw the linen cloths lying there, but he did not go in. 6 Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen cloths lying there, 7 and the face cloth, which had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen cloths but folded up in a place by itself. 8 Then the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; 9 for as yet they did not understand the Scripture, that he must rise from the dead. 10 Then the disciples went back to their homes.
THE TOMB
The women go before daylight to tend in some way to the body of Jesus. Perhaps this is their last errand before rejoining the men and leaving town together. In any case, it’s hard to imagine them wanting to stick around any longer—nothing good awaited them in Jerusalem. Seeing the stone rolled away, the women panic and run back to the hideout.
Peter and John, emboldened by this weird event, throw caution to the wind and run to the tomb. They certainly loved Jesus, and even though they were afraid, they were not going to let Jesus’ body become a mockery. They get to the tomb, go in, and find Jesus’ shroud and sudarium—the face cloth—neatly folded and set aside. Though there’s nothing there—no Jesus—John puts two and two together, and he has faith that God is at work.
Question: who could have removed the body? Was it the Disciples? No, they were baffled to learn that the body was not there. What about the Temple authorities—could they have taken His body? No. They had no reason to do so—they, of all people, wanted to be sure that Jesus was dead, buried, and no longer a threat to themselves or anyone else. Could the Romans have done it? They were guarding the tomb, which means they were there. Could they have moved it? No. Those guards’ lives were on the line for not doing their job. They, of all people, would want the body in that tomb.
Furthermore, why would anyone steal the body without the shroud and face cloth? Who would go to the trouble of neatly folding it up? If anyone stole the body, they would have just lifted it out in its shroud, with its facecloth in place underneath the wrappings.
We’re not going to go into it further here, but I encourage you to find out more about the Shroud of Turin and the Sudarium of Oviedo. Despite what you may have heard, they have not been discredited, and both continue to make a solid witness to the death and resurrection of Jesus.
Aside from the burial cloths, there is nothing there in the tomb. The empty tomb is beyond dispute, and everyone acknowledges it. The Disciples acknowledge it, not with pride but embarrassment, because Jesus told them about it—told them it was coming—and they didn’t even see it while it happened! The Temple authorities acknowledged it and immediately blamed the Disciples for stealing the body of Jesus. We can imagine them enraged and asking Pilate, “Didn’t we ask you to put guards at the tomb? This is your fault!” The Romans didn’t know what to think, but many, like the Centurion at the cross, would find themselves amazed, and many would come to believe. Many in the world today look at the empty tomb and don’t know what to say about it. “There’s nothing there,” they may say. And they’re right, but not in the way they think they are. There is nothing there in the empty tomb, and that is the miracle.
AMAZEMENT
The text says, “Then the Disciples went back to their home.” Really? That’s it? Jesus has risen and you’re just going to go home and watch the game? Where’s the amazement? Where’s that holy fear and awe that drives you to purpose?
Is there anything more powerful in this life than that feeling of utter bewilderment and wonder that comes to us—that wonder wherein we look around and think, “What is going on here?” We mean not what events have taken place, but what is this—this entire existence all about?
There are moments when the Spirit seizes us with awestruck wonder and can make us call the rest of life into question. Have I been asleep? Am I just going through the motions of life like any other animal? What is this light that shines within? Why is it such a joy to exist?
Amazement can be fearful or fearless. The same can be said of joy.
Have you ever experienced joy and fear at the same time? We all have. Falling in love can be the source of amazing joy and fearfulness at the same time. Graduations are ceremonies of collective joy and fear—the happy transition of one accomplishment leads to the joyous uncertainty about the future. I felt that strange mix of joy and terror when I asked Tara to marry me nearly 17 years ago. I was so happy for her love and so terrified she might say no, and when she said yes, I was even happier and in some way even more terrified at the same time. Watching Gonzaga play UCLA last night—joy and fearfulness slammed together.
I suspect that Easter, for the Disciples, was this kind of joy—a fearful joy—excitement, terror, and wonder all rolled up into one. The fearful side of it sent them back home to think, bite their nails, and try to put together what on earth was happening.
The other kind of amazement comes later—at Pentecost with the Holy Spirit—and it is amazement without fear. Fearless joy. Have you had the experience of joy that is utterly beyond tension, anxiety, and fear? If you have, I’m sure you’re still seeking it. Fearless joy is what the Disciples have after the Holy Spirit is given to them. It feels like conviction—perfect, untainted faith. It feels like wholeness, like peace, like Heaven itself.
We are all pilgrims between Easter and Pentecost, moving from the fearful joy of witnessing the empty tomb toward the fearless joy of life in the Spirit. It is a wide-awake life lived for God’s purposes rather than our animal autopilot. For us, like the Disciples, everything changes because we’ve stepped into the tomb of darkness and death looking for Jesus and found there is nothing there—the tomb is empty, and that makes all the difference.
Resurrection
Jesus’ body was not left in the tomb. He was not merely resuscitated and returned to his otherwise-normal human life. When He appeared to His Disciples, his body wasn’t crippled over with slowly healing cuts, bruises, and swellings. He appeared to them as the Lord of life, with nail marks in his wrists as deliberate souvenirs.
Jesus was resurrected, which means He was raised to new life and a new kind of life. His body included His earthly body but was not physically limited. He has a heavenly body that is as physical and real as your body and mine, but one that can travel at will, appearing at will, and one that can, unlike ours, ascend to Heaven.
Our hope is not in a resuscitated Jesus but a resurrected Jesus. Jesus lives as one whom death cannot hold. God broke the code of death so He can offer us life eternal. Nothing in this world can do that. The cosmos itself cannot promise eternal life, for it, too, is finite and winding down.
Just as the cross was the crucifixion of all our sin, the resurrection is the total triumph over decay, death, and Hell. Jesus lives, and because He lives, we know He has the power to fulfill every promise. Because He lives, we know what He says is true, right, and good. Because He lives, we know we are never alone. Because He is alive, He is near, and He loves us beyond our capacity to comprehend.
He calls, do you hear? He reaches for you, are you drawn toward Him? He wants you to know freedom from sin, decay, darkness, and death; will you follow? He is alive! Open your soul to Him, surrender your heart—don’t fight it—He’s only trying to give you total grace, total peace, total joy, and unconditional love.
The good news is salvation—rescue from darkness and death—in Him is light and no darkness at all. So turn to Him, return to Him—even if you’ve done it before—turn again and let Him lead your life where it’s supposed to go. This is the only path to spiritual fulfillment.
You don’t have to do anything for it—He does it all for you—just let Him.