"Why Search Among the Dead?" given March 27

In the Eastern Orthodox Church, Easter sermons always begin with a joke, to honor the holy joke that God played on the universe and death and the devil on that first Easter. So, in that tradition…

A man was driving along the highway and saw a rabbit hopping across the middle of the road. He swerved to avoid hitting the rabbit, but unfortunately it jumped in front of the car and was hit.

The driver, being a sensitive man as well as an animal lover, pulled over to the side of the road and got out to see what had become of the rabbit. Much to his dismay, the rabbit was dead. The driver felt so awful he began to cry.

A woman driving down the highway saw the man crying on the side of the road and pulled over. She stepped out of her car and asked the man what was wrong.

“I feel terrible,” he explained. “I accidentally hit this rabbit and killed it.”

The woman told the man not to worry. She knew what to do. She went to her car trunk and pulled out the spray can. She walked over to the limp, dead rabbit, and sprayed the contents of the can onto it. Miraculously, the rabbit came to life, jumped up, waved its paw at the two people, and hopped down the road.

Ten feet away, the rabbit stopped, turned around, and waved again. Then it hopped down the road another ten feet, turned and waved. It repeated this over and over and over again, until it was out of sight.

The man was astonished. “What was in that spray can?” he asked the woman.

The woman turned the can around so that the man could read the label. It said, Hair Spray – Restores Life to Dead Hair. Adds Permanent Wave.

At first glance, we might wonder at how quickly the faith of those first followers of our Lord seem to have evaporated. It must have all been very easy to believe in Jesus when He was still with them. Easy enough to believe--when they could hear Him preaching.  Easy enough to love Him—when he was there in their midst loving them.

Easy enough to declare Him master, and teacher. when they could listen to his teachings.

Easy enough in the light of all his miracles and deeds of power, even to proclaim Him as Messiah, and Son of the Almighty God,

But then push came to shove. Then they saw their Messiah betrayed by one of their own. Then they saw Him captured, tried, stripped, beaten, crucified, dead and buried. When the reality of the Passion came crashing down upon them, then it seems, they were ready, with regrets, to write it all off. Too bad. Another Jewish hope crushed by the oppressor. Look for His hope, look for His teachings, look for Him among the dead now.

In fairness to the women and the Eleven and the others, we have to admit that they did manage to remain together. They did not separate and flee in twenty different directions. That would certainly have been understandable. After all, they were accessories, before, during, and after the fact of a capital crime—preaching without a license. The were the accomplices of a condemned and executed criminal. The occupying Romans, or their puppet local government could easily have decided at any time to round them all up.

So perhaps, in remaining together, we can see more than just their shock and apathy. Perhaps we can see more than just a reluctance to part with friends they had lived with for the past three years.  Perhaps, just perhaps, we can see in the fact of their remaining together the last fading embers of their faith--embers they either could not, or would not extinguish.

As the group of women trudged up the hillside toward the tomb, carrying the embalming spices in their hands, sorrow weighing so heavily on their hearts, can we perhaps see something more than obedience to the burial customs of their place and time? Can we perhaps see this as something more than merely a final act of devotion to a dead, beloved friend? Can we perhaps see in their actions, a tiny spark of hope? Hope so ridiculous, hope so unreasonable, hope so patently absurd that none of them would even dare voice it-- not to each other-- not even to themselves?

No, it couldn’t be. Who could believe the Master was no longer with them?  How could God have allowed this to happen? Yet they knew they had to accept it. They’d seen with their own eyes how they nailed Him to that terrible tree. They’d seen the soldiers pierce His side.  They’d seen Him die. Why then, couldn’t they accept the terrible reality? Yet, they would have recalled how He’d once said….something about been killed and rising again, hadn’t they.  And, what about Lazarus? They’d seen that too, hadn’t they?

No, it was impossible. The women and the disciples couldn’t even dare to allow

themselves even the possibility of believing in that.  They couldn’t allow themselves

of hope.  And yet... ?

Of course, it was nothing but a faint and fleeting hope. A hope they would have refused to nurture, much less name, much less even admit to-- for fear of even deeper, darker disappointment. Never-the-less,  they couldn’t quite  bring themselves to  stamp that tiny sliver of hope and belief from their hearts.

How torn Mary and Mary and Joanna and the other women must have been on that long walk to the tomb! What a terrible feeling of grief, tinged with perhaps the slightest touch of anticipation they must have experienced! Can we imagine them-- at first trudging along, almost at a crawl, then rushing ahead, almost running, then suddenly slow to a shuffle as they seesaw between despair and unreasonable hope?

And when they arrived. The stone was rolled back! What was going on? Can it be? Where did these men come from? Their appearance is so strange? They are speaking-- who are they? "Why search among the dead for one who lives?" The men say. What does that mean? Where is the Master's body?

Why did Mary and Mary and Joanna and the other women look for Him among the dead? Because even though they dared not believe in the impossible, neither could they quite believe the worst. Even after three years of His presence and teaching. Even after witnessing so many healings and other acts of deliverance. Even after seeing Him raise Lazarus and the widow's son.

They couldn't help but search for Him among the dead. They could not quite believe that Jesus would really be able to rise from the grave.  Yet they couldn't quite stop hoping that He might.

Luke tells us that even after the women returned, the Eleven and the others assembled in the Upper Room couldn't believe their tale. They too, had looked for Jesus among the dead. Even Peter-- impulsive, loud-mouthed, pompous, over-eager Peter ran to the tomb to look for his Lord. He too, sought Jesus among the dead.

Yet, can we really blame them? After all, they all had the unassailable evidence of their own senses. They had seen Jesus die! They had the wisdom of the world-- logic, common sense and reason telling them. Look for Him among the dead! A belief in the after-life was a topic of hot debate in Religious Judaism of Jesus' time. But no faction  taught the immediate, literal resurrection of the dead! So their religion as well, taught them to look for Jesus among the dead.

It's true that Jesus had once told them that He would rise again. But that would have been terribly difficult in the light of the overwhelming evidence of their own eyes, their reason, their common sense, their logic, and even their historic faith. Look for Him among the dead. They had only the word of a dead man that He would come back.

But He did. He came back. In the face of logic, common sense, religion, and the evidence of their own senses, Jesus Christ rose from the dead and lived again. Why search for Him among the dead? He is not there. He is risen!

When you and I affirm that, we express in the most radical way possible, a belief that every human being has somewhere deep inside them. That belief is really the hope that in this sad and sinful, blood-soaked and strife torn world--someday, all evidence to the contrary, somehow, truth and love and goodness and godliness will eventually triumph. 

Everything that you and I do in this life is to one extent or another, colored by that insight. We all of us, no matter how pessimistic or cynical we fancy ourselves to be, want to be able to believe that goodness does exist on this broken planet and that it will one day emerge victorious.  Our religions, our literature, our philosophy, our drama, our art and culture, even comic books and cowboy movies all reflect that theme.

We want to believe that our existence on this tear-soaked, blood-stained planet contains at least the possibility of meaning, and purpose. We want to believe in ultimate Justice.  We want to believe in ultimate Good.  We want to believe, As novelist Frederick

Buechner  puts it, that our own lives have a plot. And ultimately that life itself has a plot.

We want desperately to believe as Gandhi said,

"When I despair, I remember that all throughout History the way of Truth and Love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers and for a time they have seemed invincible. But in the end they always fall. Think of it. Always."

At Easter, when we affirm the truth of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ,  we are expressing in it’s most radical and sweeping form that deep-set, often hidden belief in the existence of ultimate Goodness in the world and of the goodness of life in it's most specific and extreme form. We are boldly affirming that Goodness and Godliness, that Truth and Love have in fact already triumphed and will indeed continue to prevail in the face of all that is yet to come. We are affirming that that this world is not our end, and that  in Jesus Christ, History has reached it’s sublime, redeeming moment and that our Creator has  already won the ultimate victory over sin and death.

If Easter says or means anything at all to us it is that simple, yet ringing affirmation. The pyramids of Egypt are famous because they contained the mummified bodies of ancient Egyptian kings. Westminster Abbey in London is renowned, because in it rests the bodies of English nobles and notables. Mohammed's tomb is noted for the stone coffin and the bones it contains. Arlington cemetery in Washington, D.C., is revered, for it is the honored resting place of many outstanding Americans. The Garden Tomb of Jesus is famous because it is empty!

Why look for Jesus among the dead? He is not there. He lives! He lives within our hearts. He lives within our lives. He lives within our world. He lives within the Godhead.

Why look for Him among the dead, why look for Him anywhere, except in the midst of life— where except in our midst? That is where we will find Him. He has been raised up. Look for Him among the Living!       Amen.