There are two overwhelming things. Death overwhelms, crushing both our minds and hearts. Resurrection overwhelms, blowing our hearts and minds wide open.
In the weeks and days leading up to Easter I preached and wrote on the suffering and death of Jesus. Jesus himself found his suffering and death overwhelming. “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death,” he told his closest friends.
In the months after my son’s death I sometimes wondered if the questions in my mind were causing my heart to be more troubled, or if my troubled heart was causing the questions that plagued my mind. Mind and heart were alike overwhelmed. Jesus was “sorrowful and troubled.” Sorrowful indicates the heart, the emotions. Troubled indicates the mind, the intellect. Jesus was afflicted in heart and mind. And what overwhelming feelings and thoughts came to Mary as she watched the spectacle of horror; her son was crucified. Death is overwhelming.
Enough about death! At Easter we turn a sudden corner and discover the second overwhelming thing: resurrection! And it was overwhelming. The women who went to the tomb were told by an angel, “Do not be afraid.” They hurried from the tomb “afraid yet filled with joy.” When they saw Jesus himself, he said, “Do not be afraid.” When all the disciples saw Jesus, “they worshiped him; but some doubted.” These are all recounted in the Gospel of Matthew. The other Gospels record that they were startled, frightened, doubting, and that they did not believe the resurrection “because of joy and amazement.”
A small group meets with me each week (online) to study the Scripture for the upcoming sermon with me. We were wondering about the fear these women had. One of the members of the group asked me gently, “How would you feel if you saw Peter again?” I didn’t mind the question at all. If Peter walked into the house with a smile one afternoon, I would be overjoyed. I would laugh and cry. But I would also be dumbstruck. Am I going crazy? Is there something wrong with me? Is he really here? What does this mean? Seeing someone alive after death – resurrection – would be absolutely overwhelming. But it works in the opposite way of death. Death overwhelms by crushing us. Resurrection overwhelms by blowing our heart and mind wide open.
There are three things I will consider, mostly from Matthew’s account of the resurrection:
- What is the resurrection?
- What does it mean?
- What is our response?
I preached and wrote about the suffering of Jesus and the death of Jesus. I couldn’t let it end there. So now I’m coming back to post these thoughts on the resurrection, although it’s a couple weeks late.
First, what is the resurrection? It is easiest to start by identifying what the resurrection is not.
- The resurrection is not a resuscitated corpse
- It is not a continued existence as a spirit without a body
- It is not a symbol of hope
- It is not a hallucination
- It is not a ghost
The book of Luke recounts Jesus taking trouble to show the disciples that he was not a spirit or a ghost. “A ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have…while they still did not believe it because of joy and amazement, he asked them, ‘Do you have anything here to eat?’” (Luke 24:39, 41). He could eat! But he could also walk through walls. They could recognize him, but not automatically, as his appearance to the men on the road to Emmaus shows.
I pick up a sense of joy radiating from the risen Jesus. “Come on guys!” Jesus says. “Why can’t you believe this? It’s really me. I’m not a ghost.” It’s just too overwhelming. Too much goodness.
In Matthew, Jesus says to the women, “Greetings. Do not be afraid. Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee. There they will see me.” Don’t be afraid. Of course they are afraid! The man they saw die on the cross is standing there with a different type of body.
That is what resurrection means: a new kind of body. A body with a new composition – does it have cells? We don’t know. We do know that its source of life is not today’s human breath but the Spirit of God. I hear from a number of people that this all sounds pretty nice. Eternal life sounds good. They just can’t understand it. And so they can’t believe it. Our current human bodies are made up of trillions of cells, and each cell is made up of trillions of atoms. Somehow that collection of carbon and other elements has the capacity for speech, and song, and sadness, and joy. This collection of chemicals is conscious. I don’t understand that. Is it that hard to believe that God, the source of all things, gave Jesus a new body with a new composition and a new source of life? That is what the resurrection is.
What does the resurrection mean?
Jews like the disciples of Jesus expected resurrection. But they expected it to happen to all people together, at the end, when they would be judged by God. Resurrection was tied together with all the overlapping images of the great and glorious end: judgment and reward, the kingdom of God, eternal life, a new creation, seeing the face of God. Something like what the prophet Isaiah foresaw: “The LORD of Heaven’s Armies will spread a wonderful feast for all the people of the world…He will swallow up death forever! The Sovereign LORD will wipe away all tears (Isaiah 25:6, 8). Death will be destroyed. How? Resurrection. And notice that there will be a feast. Will we actually eat in the new creation with our resurrected bodies? Jesus with his resurrected body ate, and apparently he really liked fish.
Again, some people find all this hard to believe. It is, however, exactly what they are longing for – life that will last, love that fulfills, justice and peace that will never be spoiled.
The resurrection of Jesus means that he is the king of this coming kingdom. For us the resurrection means hope. Hope in the English language is a little weak for the meaning of the word in the world of the Bible. It is confident expectation. What God did for Jesus Christ, he will do for those who are in Christ.
We wait for that new world, but we don’t have to wait to become new people. The new creation begins now, because Jesus was resurrected not at the end, but right in the middle. God’s new creation has begun!
When we are invited to follow Jesus, we are invited to die with him. The crushing weight of death overwhelms us, killing our ego, pride, selfishness, all our sin. All evil is crushed at the cross.
When we are invited to be untied with Jesus, we are invited to join in his resurrection. All who are in Christ are a new creation. One man who joined my church in California said that he had always been dark, cynical, and angry. His first thought on meeting someone was How am I going to kill you? The man we knew made clown balloons for kids every Sunday. His goal was to make them smile. This man changed so dramatically that his daughter started suspecting that he had dementia. He said, “No, I was demented before. Now I’m healthy.” Being united to Jesus in his death and resurrection begins God’s new creation in us.
In the words of a fairly new song about the resurrection (He Is Risen, by Paul Baloche):
Sing with all creation sing of a world made new
Endless life we too may live, bursting from the tomb
And looking up we see our King enthroned on high
His wounds of love now glorified
Rejoice for soon He’ll burst the skies
What is our response?
What do we do with something so overwhelming? The first option is denial. The Gospel of Matthew says that some of the religious leaders set a guard at the tomb to prevent the disciples stealing the body of Jesus and claiming that he was alive. After the resurrection they paid off the guards, telling them to say that that was exactly what had happened.
There have been all kinds of explanations of the empty tomb and the disciples firm belief that Jesus was alive. It was a hallucination, it was something they wished to be true and came to believe, it was made up decades later by others. Or simply, we know it is scientifically impossible, therefore there must be another explanation, even if we don’t know what it is.
The second option is doubt. It is a compelling story. I know people who say they would like it to be true. They see the hope and peace in Christians and want it for themselves. It would be so good if the resurrection was true. But it’s just so hard to believe. If that describes you, you’re actually in good company. When Jesus’ own disciples saw him “they worshiped him; but some doubted.” I think the reason for their doubt was the same as the reason for their fear. It’s simply so overwhelming. As people say about the death of a loved one, “I just can’t believe that he’s gone,” so people say about the resurrection, “I just can’t believe that’s he’s alive.”
What should a person stuck in doubt do? The angel said to the women at the tomb, “Come and see the place where he lay.” This invitation to come and investigate still stands. We don’t have access to the physical tomb, but we do have access to history. There is historical evidence of the resurrection. Not proof, but reasons to believe.
Besides the evidence of history, there is evidence within. The fact that people thirst is evidence there is such a thing as water. The fact that people thirst for meaning, love, and life that lasts forever is evidence that there is a God who satisfies those desires. Otherwise why would we wish for those things?
So I recommend to the doubters a small prayer: “If you are there, I would like to know you.”
The reason some might not be willing to pray even this cautious prayer is the next possible response: fear. The guards were so afraid of the angel that “they shook and became like dead men.” The women were told by the angel and Jesus not to be afraid. Because obviously they were.
What holds many people back from belief is not doubt, but fear. What will this do to me? What will people think of me? What will God think of me? What will God do to me? How would this affect my life?
Even those who do believe sometimes hold back from coming closer to Jesus. He might challenge me, change me, lead me into suffering. Do not be afraid. He loves you. He has overcome death.
A fourth possible response is joy. This one can easily overlap with the others, as it did for the women rushing away from the tomb. They were “afraid yet filled with joy.”
I have know people who have suffered deeply. The loss of a son, the loss of a business due to a betrayal, the loss of a home. And yet the person I have in mind was one of the most joyful, compassionate people I have known. In the Bible study on this passage I asked how people responded on an emotional level. One, who has suffered much over the past year, said “It is such a joyful thing to serve a God who is alive!”
Yet another response to the resurrection is worship. The women “Came to him, clasped his feet and worshiped him.” The disciples also, despite their doubts, worshiped the risen Jesus. All responses must eventually lead to this. In humility, in doubt, in fear, in joy we recognize that God is God and Jesus is Lord. The key to enter the new creation is faith.
The final response is mission. The mission of the Messiah is seen in his birth, baptism, ministry, suffering, and death. The crown of all is the resurrection. Because Jesus’ miracles of healing were not permanent. Those who were made well eventually got sick, or injured, or old. And they died. The permanent miracle is resurrection. When the resurrection of Jesus took place the women were told, “Go quickly and tell his disciples.” The disciples were told by the risen Jesus himself that all authority in heaven and earth belonged to him. “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations.” There is in many a joyful heart of worship. Along with that worship is a burning desire that the would should know the risen Lord Jesus. Two overwhelming things. Death which crushes. Resurrection which blows us wide open. You can bounce between the two. You can experience both at once. Because of the resurrection we have courage to look at death, because we can look beyond death. And while we wait for the new creation, we share in God’s joyful, worshipful mission
Oh that all would believe!