Second Sunday after Easter – 26 April 2009[1]

Isaiah 40: 1-11, Psalm 23, Acts 13: 26 - 41, Luke 24: 36-48

            I have found that one of the ways God’s word is living and active is that no matter how many times I have heard or read the passages in the Bible, there is always something new, exciting, and challenging to be found.  For instance, I have always believed in Jesus’ bodily resurrection.  I took it for granted that everyone would read the Easter stories in the Gospels and simply believe they were true and historical.  However, this year something new in the Easter story struck me like a slap in the face: the disciples struggled to believe that Jesus rose from the dead.   I have heard the Easter story thousands of times and I never realized the disciples doubted.  I never realized how difficult it was for them to comprehend Jesus’ resurrection.  Of course, I had heard to story of doubting Thomas, but I always thought he was the lone doubter and I always looked down on Thomas thinking he had a weak and feeble mind.  What does it mean that the disciples, who lived with Jesus and were taught by Jesus that the Messiah must die and rise again on the third day, doubted? 

            One of the things their doubt taught me is that I was over confident in my belief.  I was so sure of myself, so over confident of what I believed that I looked down upon others, even the apostle Thomas.  My over-confidence gave me a feeling of superiority and this feeling of superiority created a powerful sense of self-righteousness.  It seems crazy to admit that my over confidence in the doctrine of Jesus’ resurrection – a true and necessary doctrine – created in me one of the deadliest sins, self-righteousness, but it is true.  It is true because instead of being over-confident in God’s ability to keep his promise, like his promise to never let his holy one, Jesus, see bodily decay, my over-confidence was in my knowledge and my ability to believe and this unwittingly led me trivialize the great story of Easter. 

            Ironically, my over-confidence in my abilities to believe in Jesus’ resurrection is very similar to our secular contemporaries’ over confident beliefs in their scientific abilities, which they use to reject Jesus’ resurrection.  Many years ago, leading western intellectuals became over confident and this led them to reject all miracles, especially Jesus’ resurrection.  For example, an 18th century Scottish philosopher, David Hume, said, “No testimony is sufficient to establish a miracle…”[2]  As a result of their over-confidence, our culture tends to dismiss Jesus’ resurrection as a misguided myth created by uneducated peasants living in a superstitious age.  Our cultures over-confidence in their abilities creates a feeling of superiority (which we may call chronological snobbery or cultural prejudice) and this feeling of superiority creates an intoxicating sense of self-righteousness.  However, the doubt of the disciples exposes the self-righteous nature of our culture because it was just as hard for Jesus’ disciples to believe in his resurrection as it is for people today.   The doubt of Jesus’ disciples challenges both the Christian and the non-Christian self-righteous over-confidence.  

            I think that one of the reasons Christians over-confidently trivialize Easter and non-Christians over-confidently dismiss Easter is because of the message Jesus’ disciples preached when they finally believed Jesus rose from the dead.  We read that message in our epistle and Gospel lesson.  In Acts 13, St. Paul said, “Be it know unto you therefore, men and brethren, that through this man [Jesus] is preached unto you the forgiveness of sin: and by him all that believe are justified from all things.”  In Luke 24 Jesus said, “Thus it is written, and thus it behoved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day: and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations.”  When the disciples began to believe Jesus had been bodily resurrected they began to preach that forgiveness was found in Jesus’ name.  Further, if Jesus is the forgiver of sins he is also the true and just judge.  As someone once said, “[In] the earliest apostolic proclamation about Jesus of Nazareth his death and resurrection were directly linked to two promises… the resurrection demonstrates that Jesus is the one ordained by God as judge of the living and the dead, and the resurrection demonstrates that he is the one in whose name forgiveness of sins can be had here and now.”[3]  We want to trivialize and dismiss Easter because Easter establishes Jesus as the world true judge and forgiver of sins and if Jesus is both our judge and forgiver, we cannot be over-confident in our abilities.

            Christians may trivialize Easter because the resurrection established Jesus as the forgiver of sins and this means that Christians have sins that need to be forgiven.  Christians are called to be a light shining in the darkness, called to live holy, righteous, and joyous lives and there are times when in our desire to be righteous, holy, and joyous we are our over-confidence in our abilities to create these qualities and this can make us loath to admit our need for forgiveness.   To put it another way, there are times when our over-confidence in our abilities to believe Jesus’ resurrection leads to an over-confidence in our abilities to live holy and righteous lives and this creates in us a sense of superiority and self-righteousness, a self-righteousness that refuses to admit its faults and trespasses.[4] 

            Non-Christians may dismiss Easter because the resurrection established Jesus as the judge of the living and the dead.  Someone once said, “[M]odern liberal [institutions have] claimed for [themselves] the right to make all judgments about everything, and so [want] to banish off the scene any rumors either of more ultimate judgments or, particularly, of judgments against [their] own absolute judgmental power.”[5]  If the resurrection is true, it means that Jesus is the world’s true judge.  That means that there is a true right and wrong.  That means the morality is defined not by public vote, nor personal preference, nor cultural opinion, but by Jesus Christ.  Much of western culture, especially since the 1700’s has been predicated on the over-confident assumption that we, humans, are the arbitrators of right and wrong. 

            To those who are self-righteously over confident, the message of the Gospel - that forgiveness of sins can be found in Jesus Christ – will be like salt in a wound or bitter herbs in the mouth – a message that will be spit out, trivialized, and dismissed.  But to all who are spiritually weary and seek rest; to all who mourn and long for comfort; to all who struggle and desire hope; to all who sin and need a Savior; to all who are strangers and yearn for fellowship; to all who hunger and thirst after righteousness; and to whoever will come the message of Gospel will be like sweet water on parched lips, salve on a wound and strong breeze that will blow away the clouds of despair.  In fact, the proclamation that in Jesus Christ there is forgiveness of sins is one of the only things we can confidently believe. 

 


[1] This sermon was prepared for 26 April 2009, but not given.  Instead Father Sam Kakiza from the Ugandan Anglican Church gave a sermon challenging us to wake up from our slumbers to see and know the risen Christ. 

[2]David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, “Of Miracles”

[3] N.T Wright, Jesus the risen Judge – and forgiver, http://www.ntwrightpage.com/sermons/Easter07.htm.

 

[4] “Not every man is so great a coward as he thinks he is – nor yet so great a Christian.” Robert L. Stevenson

[5] N.T Wright, Jesus the risen Judge – and forgiver, http://www.ntwrightpage.com/sermons/Easter07.htm. I have changed the bracketed words, but hopefully not the meaning the Wright’s comment.