Our church was packed yesterday, standing room only. Trumpets blasted, organs had all stops pulled out, incense filled the sanctuary, both deacons were there, and the women looked beautiful in their colorful spring dresses. Jesus is risen! The liturgy committee went overboard organizing this festivity! As I looked around at the people crowded into pews, I wondered why these same people did not show up on other Sundays. Why did they show up on Easter day? Then I wondered if God was impressed.
If the liturgy committee had prepared the first Easter event, what would it have looked like? Flyers would have been circulated, and thousands of people would have showed up at dawn to watch an angel roll back the huge stone, and then scream out as Jesus clothed in blinding light burst forth from the tomb. By our standards the liturgy committee dropped the ball on the first Easter. Let’s listen to what happened (John 20:11-18).
“Mary Magdalene stayed outside the tomb weeping. And as she wept, she bent over into the tomb and saw two angels in white sitting there, one at the head and one at the feet where the Body of Jesus had been. And they said to her, ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ She said to them, ‘They have taken my Lord, and I don’t know where they laid him.”
How uneventful. First only one person showed up for the Eater celebration, and even she showed up too late. Jesus was already gone. Two angels, however, stayed behind to talk with latecomers, to explain to them what they missed.
So Mary talked with the angels.
“She said to them, ‘They have taken my Lord, and I don’t know where they laid him.’ When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus there, but did not know it was Jesus. Jesus said to her. ‘Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?’ She thought it was the gardener…”
Even Mary didn’t catch on that Jesus had risen from the dead. She thought someone had stolen the body. Then the risen Jesus showed up! Tada! “Hey, it’s me, Jesus!!” Well, that’s not how it happened. Even when Jesus showed up in person, Mary who knew Jesus about as well as anyone didn’t recognize him. He was disguised as a lowly gardener. Can you hear the liturgy committee sighing? At the moment when Jesus was programmed to make his entrance he looked like a nobody and even the most faithful disciple of all, Mary Magdalene, didn’t recognize him. Even the one person who showed up for event failed to even recognize Jesus.
“Sir, if you carried him away, tell me where you laid him, and I will take him.’ Jesus said to her, ‘Mary!’ She turned and said to him in Hebrew, ‘Rabbouni’ which means Teacher.’”
At last someone began to celebrate Easter. Notice that Mary’s eyes did not recognize Jesus, but her ears did. Add a “t” to “hear” and what do you have? It is only the heart that can hear Jesus. Mary’s heart jumped when Jesus mentioned her name. It was the real Jesus; her heart told her so! She celebrated by falling down at the feet of Jesus and grabbing his legs. Thus began the first Easter celebration. There could not have been less fanfare. Why didn’t the liturgy committee do a better job in planning and promoting?
Jesus is not easily found. He doesn’t “market” himself very well. He is like the treasure that was hidden in the field or the pearl of great price hidden amid a tray of other pearls. Only the seekers who risk everything they have, as Mary did when she was so bold as to show up at the guarded tomb, will find him. And even they may not recognize him until their heart jumps as Jesus mentions their name.
Today our “Easter egg hunt” begins. Let us not miss Jesus if he shows up as a gardener or in some other disease. Let’s retire into the silence where we can listen for his voice. Jesus is hear now to raise us from our tombs.
