Opening: Christ the Lord Is Risen Today #216

Easter

Luke 20:1-18

Bagpiper: Amazing Grace

Opening: Christ the Lord is Risen Today #216 Dedication: The Strife is O’er #221 Invitation: Ocean Is A Call To Worship (insert)

Magdalene, Simon Peter and the disciple whom Jesus loved

Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed! In word and in deed.

The words we hear this Easter morning come from the fourth gospel. A narrative. The story of Jesus of Nazereth explaining to us that Jesus was the Christ of faith. I think many standing in pulpets this morning would rather preach from an epistle, sermonizing from an ancient sermon…it is easier and neater, logic upon logic, rhetoric upon rhetoric. But narrative (story) has mystical power, stories that engage our memories and invite us to fill in the gaps with our own personal experience. If we have heard the evangelist author of the gospel of John tell us about the Easter event, the first encounter with the Risen Christ, then this story has become part of us. We have a relationship with the story and have made it our own. We relate to one or all three of the first to see an empty tomb, Mary Magdalene, Simon Peter and the other disciple, the unnamed disciple, the one whom Jesus loved. This morning, we hear the old, old story. Do we hear with open hearts and minds? Do we let Easter embrace us and lift us to higher levels of sensitivity, deeper levels of love and stronger levels of confidence? These ancient, beautiful, brilliant words that weave us into a dwelling place of spirit. Words that bring us closer to the Source of all being. How can our lives possible be unchanged with this understanding?

In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. The spiritual Word. The Cosmic Word. Begotten of God. Begotten not made. Of the same substance of God. Divinity co-existing with flesh. A light that shines in the darkness…the true light which enlightens everyone…in the world and the world did not know him. And, according to the Gospel we call John, all who receive the cosmic Word, all who receive the True Light, all who receive the son of God, that son, the Christ gives power to likewise become children of God who were born not of blood or the will of the flesh, but of God.

You are the light of the world. Isn’t that exciting? Or is that scary? Is it good news? Or is it a challenge to realize your potential?

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.

Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.

We ask ourselves,

'who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous?'

Actually, who are not to be?

You are a child of the Universe.

Your playing small does not serve the world.

There is nothing so enlightening about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are born to make manifest the glory of god which is within us.

It is not in just some of us, it is in all of us.

And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.

As we are liberated from our own fears, our presence automatically liberates others.

--Nelson Mandella (1994 Inaugural Speech)

You are the light of the world.

Mary, the woman from Magdala was the light of the world. After losing her dear one for the second time, she stands alone weeping. Why are you crying? Why are you crying? She hears these words and the fire in her eyes flame in the direction of the one she assumes to be the gardener. She speaks directly to him as few women could - with power - and then focuses on his face. The familiar warmth coming from the one who calls her by name. She is the first to encounter the risen Christ. And so she is not equal to the apostles as the early church claims, no she is superior. She encounters the one she has lost twice and she wells up as her arms tighten, aching to embrace and hold on for dear life. Can’t do that. Can’t do that. Can’t hold on to the old body, for behold I am doing a new thing. Christ encounters her when Christ encounters her. And each encounter is life changing. And life giving. And her life touches and shapes the lives of so many others.. because she is the light of the world just as you are the light of the world.

As Doug Adams said to us in his sermon about forgivenes that Simon Peter the one who denies even knowing Jesus three times, the one who later need to be challenged and asked three times, “Do you love me”, well, you would think he would be punished for his bad judgement, and so do we nail him with three strikes and your out? Nope… we make him head of the Church. The Roman Church that is. Simon Peter, Simon the Rock, the first bishop of Rome as tradition tell us, so in essence, the first Pope. The Roman Church with a bishop who was the first to walk into the empty tomb, and still not understand the resurrection. We know rock like folks, don’t we. Who sincerely claim to love Jesus but really don’t understand the liberating message of the Gospels. Simon, son of John, do you love me? Simon, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go… Simon would also suffer a crucifixion. Simon Peter, dispite his obvious character flaws, also the light of the world.

Simon, the son of John is told the news by Mary, the daughter of a prominant Magdalene family, that the stone had been rolled away from the tomb and the footrace began with another disciple who remains unnamed in the narrative. And the other disciple gets to the tomb first. The other disciple, Simon Peter’s nemesis, the one who is the one Jesus loves, the one who lies with his head on Jesus’ chest, the one we begin to understand is the best disciple Jesus had, the only disciple in this Gospel who stays with Jesus until the end… woman here is your son. He is the one who understands immediately upon inspecting the tomb what has happened… he believed when Simon Peter was still scratching his head. Do we know people such as this one Jesus loved? So with the program, so centered, so caring, so able to “get it” and so willing to empty one’s self that we are not prodded to remember her or his name.

As soon as Simon gets the cryptic message from the risen Christ that he will also be crucified, he turns to see his nemesis and said to Jesus, “Lord, what about him?” The Rock is asking, is he going to be crucified as well? And Jesus answers, “If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is it to you?” So rumors spread that this disciple would not die. “Lord, what about him?” What about this unnamed model of discipleship? Credible scholarship tells us that the beloved disciple became a bishop in his own right with a following who eventually would develop the Gospel narrative we read today. And although the Roman church, the church of Simon Peter would eventually overshadow the community of the beloved disciple, here we are today remembering Easter in the way it was taught by that community. Illumined by yet another light of the world that shines in the darkness.

This morning, Christians of all flavors are celebrating the risen Christ… each community with its own understanding and often each member of that community with a unique view of the mystery of Easter. Some of us Mary Magdalenes, some Simon Peters, some unnamed, some combinations of these icons of how to respond to the risen Christ. Some of us like Thomas, the one remembered as the doubter who we will visit and consider next week. Each of us with access to the light, to the cosmic Word. Each of us called by name.

Christ is risen. Indeed. In word and in deed. And this risen Christ calls you by name and says you are the light of the world. You are a child of God. You are an ancient being. Part of the old, old story. How can your life possibly be unchanged with this understanding? Easter morning in this beautiful setting, the ocean itself calls us to worship with gentle wave after wave of beckoning us to engage the risen One. As we sing, Ocean is a Call to Worship anyone who wishes to walk forward and affirm the good confession to become part of this particular faith community we now remind you that this is a hymn of invitation. Please stand as you are able and let us sing together.