Sermon: "The Resurrection & Life"

1st in the "The Resurrection" series.
Delivered April 8, 2007 (Easter) by Rev. John Schmidt.
Other sermons in this series - 1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5

Sermon Series: "The Resurrection"
Easter leaves us with the Resurrection of Jesus, and now we have a chance to examine what difference Jesus' resurrection makes in the way we approach life and death, with a focus on how theology informs practical life.

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Let's pray. Lord, as we worship, as we come to a few moments where we think about what you have written, help us to open our minds, open our hearts to whatever we need to hear today, for we ask these things in Jesus' name. Amen.

I love Baltimore, but sometimes... yeah, that's right. Baltimore needs some good press. But there are times when that it's painfully apparent that I am not a native. One of those times was yesterday morning. I was trying to go to a meeting downtown. I was supposed to get on Martin Luther King going east. I was downtown and it took me 15 minutes to find Martin Luther King. Now I have been on it a hundred times. I could not find it. When I finally thought I was on it, I was actually on some kind of expressway sort of thing that was parallel to it and I had to turn around and loop around and I finally saw signs. I got on going in the right direction. Fifteen minutes wasted, but I handled it well. You know that. I mean...

I am a native of New Orleans and what that means is that Easter always came in a package of three events for me. It began with Mardi Gras. Then it went through Lent and then it ended with Easter. Now Mardi Gras was the part that I really understood, particularly as a teenager. They had the parades during Mardi Gras. They had the colors and then you had this incredible moment where you have a million people in the streets all having a party at the same time. Now Mardi Gras was a cool deal for me. It's the last big chance to indulge yourself before you go in to Lent, which was the time that you had to show that you were religious. I always wanted to have some kind of insurance with God. Now I am speaking just for myself, I don't know what other people think, but the way I was thinking you know Lent was the time to kind of admit you know maybe there is something more to life than what I was doing at Mardi Gras or at least trying to do and so during Lent I would give up something to make sure that everything was cool between me and God. And so, my favorite thing to give up was I gave up ground meat on Fridays in order to eat boiled crabs, shrimp and crawfish. Now I don't know who that medieval genius was who thought of giving up meat for fish, but you know I loved it.

And then came Easter. I didn't really understand Easter that well. I caught the idea that in Easter we had a change of seasons. We had new flowers. We had new colors and everybody was wearing the new seasons outfits. You couldn't wear the same color shoes from Easter on. I caught that and I definitely had nailed the whole idea of Easter bunnies and eggs and Easter baskets and chicks. Okay? Yeah, I had that nailed. What I didn't understand about Easter was Christ. Christ was the hard part, because Christ had to do with this issue of resurrection and I think, not just me, but all of American culture struggles with this. We got the Easter bunny. We don't have Christ. That's the hard part, because it is not an easy thing for a rational person to believe in the resurrection of someone from the dead.

Let's admit it. There is a big problem there. And we are not talking about resuscitation after somebody has been dead for three minutes or 30 minutes. We are talking about someone who died and was buried for a period of days and then came to life again in a body that was recognizable, but not identical to the bodies we have and that this body that Jesus is in is a body that will never see death again. It is beyond death. It's a big deal and we are not the first people to struggle with this idea of resurrection. It's not just 20th century people or 21st century people who have a struggle with this. In the earliest life of the church there was an uneasiness among some about the reality of resurrection, because even then resurrection wasn't a daily thing. Even then rational people didn't readily believe that people would come back from the dead never to die again.

And so in the church of Corinth a controversy began, a discussion where those in the church, some of them, started to say, "You know this deal with resurrection is too much to believe. We like Christ. We like what he taught. We like what he stood for. We like gathering as a community. We like worship. We like even the morality, the idea that life can be different, but don't make us believe or try to believe in this idea of resurrection." As this discussion was going on, Paul in the Book of 1st Corinthians, a letter that he sent to this church, he enters into this discussion and I am going to read to you now what he says, his reaction to this discussion about Jesus Christ being resurrected from the dead. It's in the Book of 1st Corinthians, the 15th Chapter and I am going to begin at the first verse. You will find that on page 815 on the Bibles that are in front of you and it will also be up here on the screen.

"Now, brothers, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain. For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born. For I am the least of the apostles and do not even deserve to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them-yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me. Whether, then, it was I or they, this is what we preach, and this is what you believed."

As Paul enters this discussion the first thing he points out is that the very earliest message of the church is a message that Jesus Christ died for things that we had done, for hostility and a direction in life and in estrangement from God and other people that was ours, that Jesus Christ died for that, that he was buried and that he was raised on the third day according to promises that were made hundreds of years before he was even born and then he appeared to a series of witnesses. Paul did not bring them a message of something where they said you know, "once upon a time in a village far away God did this." He brought a message where there were people of particular names, people that could be recognized on the street that had this experience with Jesus Christ; Peter, James and Paul himself. He points out that it is not a small group of people either. Over 500 people at one time and, in fact, he says 500 of the brothers. At this time, when somebody uses a phrase like that there is always a chance that they mean 500 men of adult age among a larger crowd. So we are talking about 500 or more people were gathered and saw Jesus after he died and was resurrected.

And so Paul brings this message and says the first message from the church, the thing that you believe, the thing upon which you take your stand, is that Jesus Christ died, was buried and was resurrected on the third day. Eyewitness testimony and if we are talking about hundreds and hundreds of people some of them at least were rational and there were then also hostile witnesses that couldn't bring a definitive case against what the church was saying. And these people were so convinced of what they experienced that their lives absolutely changed afterwards and many of them died because of their belief, even to the very end of life, even having opportunities to say, "Hey folks, it was a big joke." They didn't. Jesus Christ died, buried, resurrected, eyewitness testimony of people deeply changed and convinced.

But Paul goes on from there. He talks more about this issue of resurrection. Let's take a look now at Verses 12 to 19.

"But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men."

Paul's first point is that this issue of Jesus being resurrected from the dead is eyewitness testimony and Paul himself is one of the witnesses who met Jesus face to face after the resurrection. He then goes on to say that if there is no resurrection from the dead, if Jesus Christ hasn't been resurrected from the dead then Christianity is useless, our faith is futile. There is nothing left or there is not enough left to matter. You see what happened with Jesus Christ is that there is a hostility between humanity and God. There is a distance. There is a tendency in each one of us to want to keep God at arms distance to do things our own way and to invent ways that we might feel like God might be pleased if he exists at all, but are deep reticent to actually let God in to our lives and this pattern of life hurts us, it hurts other people and it even hurts God.

Jesus Christ comes and says, I have come to deal with this breach, to deal with this distance, to deal with all of the repercussions in all of history of this hostility and selfishness, to take all the hurt, all of the penalty upon myself and clear the slate so that once again there can be a relationship between God and humanity. When Jesus said that, why should we believe him? Why should be believe some fanatical religious person who says, Yes there is a big problem between God and people and I have a solution. Why should we believe that? It's just another idea, another speculation. Paul says that it is the resurrection from the dead that's the seal, that its actually God at work here, that it is something that God did through Jesus Christ to deal with a problem that we can't deal with on our own, because we are part of the problem. So without the resurrection, we are left with someone who has just said, "maybe this will solve it." No assurance. What happens after death? We don't have a clue. Let's think about some possibilities. Speculation.

Paul is so determined not to touch a Christianity without the resurrection; that when he examines the possibilities he says, "If Jesus isn't resurrected from the dead, don't give me religion, don't give me half the Christianity." He says what he wants in Verse 32. "If the dead are not raised, Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die." If there is no resurrection, don't give me Easter, let's just have Mardi Gras. And he doesn't present this like the religious life or following Jesus Christ is a big burden and here is the cool answer; the party. What he says is that if there is no assurance that there is life after death, no assurance there is a God, if we don't know that God has done something decisive to deal with our existential situation, our alienation from God, if God has not done something then life is so crushingly empty, let's try to get our minds off of the problem and just keep ourselves alive, keep our minds numb and get as much pleasure as we can.

Maybe you are there. Maybe you are at the point where you are not asking or you are afraid to ask the questions. It might not be parties, because parties here symbolizes anything we do to drown out the important questions, anything we do to try to fill the hollowness, because there are things that are too big and will crush us if we look at them face to face. Things like who am I? What is the purpose in my life? How can I deal with my guilt? What can possibly heal me at all from the brokeness that I feel? What is death all about? What happens after death? Is there a God? What is that God like? These questions are fundamental and we do all kinds of things to drown it out and try to act as if things are still okay.

One of the most crushing, depressing things about Mardi Gras is the few hours after they clear the streets when Mardi Gras is over. You see there is a pattern in New Orleans is that at 12 o'clock midnight they clear off the streets, try to get people to leave and there is trash all over the streets. You find wine bottles and beer bottles out there. There are hamburgers and hot-dogs that you have stomped in to the ground by hundreds of feet. The streets are sticky at the end of Mardi Gras and there is the smell of stale beer and urine in the air. It's an ugly sight. What happens when the party is over?

What happens when whatever you are using to drown out the big questions doesn't work anymore? Maybe you are one of those folks who has already gotten interested in the idea of Jesus, but you know you like Jesus as the teacher, that Jesus has showed us that God is love and we can live a life of love and you just think it is fascinating that this message could have an impact on people and you like some of the music and like the idea of getting together and like the idea that a church can impact the community for good, but man don't give me that resurrection business. It's the 21st century. We are scientifically literate. Paul's answer to us if we are in that place is you are on your own. Half of Christianity is no better than none. You have speculation. You have uncertainty and you are still responsible for all you have done and your own resources.

But it's Easter and so we don't leave the message there. Paul says another thing, Verse 20 and we say it with him. "But Christ indeed has been raised from the dead. The firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep." Christ indeed has been raised from the dead. That is the message that we believe. That is the message that we share. That is the message that has changed lives for centuries. Jesus Christ is risen indeed. Jesus Christ is risen and so we now know that God exists. Jesus Christ has risen so we now know something about what that God is like, because Jesus showed us the very face of God. Jesus Christ is risen and so what that means for us is that we can know that we are not alone in our struggle. God has made the effort of reaching out to us. Jesus Christ resurrected from the dead shows that there is a solution to our problem that we don't have to invent; it's one that God has invented and it works. We are no longer limited in the future by who we are today. We are a new creation. God has done something new in Jesus Christ. He is the first step of something new that we are a part of now, that we experience now, that transforms us now and tomorrow and has impact even beyond the end of history. That is the message of Easter and that's what it means when we say together, "Christ has risen. He has risen indeed."

Let's pray. Wherever we are God, God help us understand. God help us to process, help us in this relationship to you. For we ask it in Jesus' name. Amen.

© 2007, Rev. John Schmidt
Central Presbyterian Church, Baltimore, MD 21204 410/823-6145
www.centralpc.org