It had started so benignly and yet it was the watershed event of their lives. When they woke up that day, it was like any other….but that would soon change. They were going about their every day activities. Some were fishing, some were repairing their nets, and one was sitting at his desk collecting taxes for the Romans. And then He arrived. He looked like a typical Galilean wearing a robe, sash and sandals but when He spoke those two words, “ Follow me” everything changed.
No matter their profession, this isn’t really what they really wanted to be. In Jesus’ day, every young man dreamed of being a rabbi, much like kids today wanting to grow up and be a professional athlete. In Jesus’ day, every part of life and education was geared toward preparing young men to become rabbis. Their childhood education started at age 5 as young boys went to the synagogue school to learn Hebrew and memorize the Torah. By the time of his bar mitzvah at age 13, a typical Jewish young man had memorized all of the Old Testament. Those who showed great promise were encouraged to continue their education by studying the interpretation of the Torah known as “The Yoke of Torah.” Those who excelled were further encouraged to continue by studying under and being mentored by a rabbi. After 3 or 4 years, they would “graduate”, if you will, and become a full-fledged rabbi teaching and interpreting the Scriptures and calling their own disciples to study under them. This was the dream of every young man in Jesus’ day.
But the reality was the vast majority had their dreams and aspirations dashed, being told somewhere along the way they weren’t good enough to become a rabbi. They were sent home to learn their father’s profession. When Jesus said, “Follow me” they recognized it as the call of a Rabbi to become a disciple, a dream they had given up on long ago. It is an understatement to say that they were not expecting to be called as Jesus’ disciples. They were grown men and had left those dreams behind long ago. They had accepted they weren’t good enough to be a disciple or to emulate a Rabbi. So when Jesus called them to “follow me,” the disciples must have been completely incredulous and overwhelmed. So now you can understand why when Jesus called to these men, without hesitation, they left everything they had to go and follow Jesus.
The road was not easy and it was filled with pitfalls. Many times, it became apparent why these men were not considered to be suitable to continue in their rabbinic studies. Their life and their values were more of the world than they were of God and they were often slow learners. The disciples had trouble trusting. After Jesus healed several people, they got into a boat to cross the Sea of Galilee and a storm arose threatening to kill them all. Frightened to death, they cried out in terrorizing fear, “Jesus, save us!” Jesus replied, "You of little faith, why are you so afraid?" They had trouble believing and praying. While Jesus gave them power to heal and drive out evil spirits, they failed miserably because they acted to heal but didn’t pray and have the faith to heal. They were mired in individualism, every man, woman and child for themselves! When a crowd of 5000 listening to Jesus was getting hungry, the disciples wanted to send the people away to go feed themselves but Jesus broke the bread and the fish of a young child and served everyone with plenty left over. They often lacked patience and compassion. When a Cannanite woman yelling at Jesus to help her was getting on the disciple’s nerves, they asked Jesus to send her away. They were more concerned with their life than God’s purposes. When Jesus told the disciples that he would have to suffer and die, they responded, "Never, Lord! This shall never happen to you!" They desired power, authority and position as they argued amongst themselves as to who will hold the position of highest authority in heaven. They trusted in the sword rather than surrendering to God’s purposes, when the Jewish armed guard came to arrest Jesus.
By the end of the typical three years of training when disciples usually graduated to become a rabbi, the disciples came to their final exam, the cross and the crucifixion, and failed miserably. Every one of them denied Jesus at his death and then went into hiding to save their own life. This Jesus, the man who had literally saved the disciples from their ordinary way of life and failed dreams, the man who loved them despite their failures and lack of understanding, was gone, crucified and they did nothing to stop it as they hid enveloped in the darkness of their actions. He was gone, humiliated, dead, like so many others before him who had claimed to be the Messiah. And now they lived in the darkness, weighted down by the horror, the violence, the fear, but most of all, the guilt and the burden of their memories and their betrayal. For they had failed and failed miserably. And darkness prevailed.
We all know what that’s like, times in our lives when we have lived between Good Friday and Easter, when things have been so dark and so grim that all hope is lost and God seems to be nowhere around. You may be mired in divorce where everything is coming apart at the seems and what once was love is now filled with bitterness, anger and betrayal. Or the loss of a job and suddenly you’re on the brink of financial ruin. Creditors are calling and the home you have worked so hard to build or own is now slipping through your fingers. Or maybe it’s through the untimely and maybe even tragic death of a child or a loved one. You know that dark place where evil seems to triumph, where hope is lost and where there seems to be no God at all. That’s where the disciples were.
In the darkness which surrounded them, Mary Magdalene and the other of the women who had followed Jesus went to the tomb to finish anointing the body of Jesus for burial. Preparation was cut short due to the Sabbath laws which stated you couldn’t touch a dead body until after the Sabbath had begun. So a quick burial was made. They arrived with their oils to and when they got to the tomb, they saw the stone had already been rolled away. They gasped and no doubt ran to the tomb, afraid that someone might have stolen the body or worse yet, desecrated it. But when they walked into the tomb, an angel said, “He is not here! He is risen!” Now these women didn’t know what to make of this. They were stunned. “Is it true? Is it possible?” Even in their wildest dreams they couldn’t have imagined it. You see people in the first century don’t raise from the dead any more frequently than they do today.
Then they then ran. They ran as never before, first out of fear which slowly gave way to great joy. The darkness had lifted and they needed to share the Good News with the disciples, who were still locked behind closed doors, consumed with guilt and in fear of their lives. Luke tells us the disciples didn’t believe the women, because their words seemed like nonsense. Peter, however, got up and ran to the tomb to see for himself and yet, even that wasn’t enough to convince him as he left wondering what indeed had happened. So Jesus appeared to the disciples and they were startled and frightened, thinking they saw a ghost. Jesus said to them, "Why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your minds? Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself! Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have." And then Jesus forgave the disciples, lifting that burden of guilt and failure and then uttered again those words he first had spoken to them, “Follow me”. He loved them, mentored them and sent them to go forth and make disciples of all nations, and in doing so gave them new life.
That is the power of the resurrection! Without that, they never would have known again the love of Jesus. They never would have received forgiveness or been able to forgive themselves. They never would have fulfilled their purpose in life but instead each would have gone their own way and returned to their former lives. And worse yet, they would have returned to the people they were before they had met Jesus.
But then the power of the resurrection touched them. And the disciples went from a lack of trust to becoming trusting of God for all things. They went from trying to save their life to giving it away. They went from having little faith to believing all things were possible with God. They went from being concerned for themselves to denying themselves. They went from trying to fill themselves up to emptying themselves for Jesus’ sake. They went from wanting to have their needs met to serving the needs of the world. They went from being frozen by fear to being freed to become bold in the name of Jesus. They went from utter despair and feeling completely insignificant to being on fire for Jesus and participating in the most significant event in history, God’s plan of salvation for the world.
Part of the power of the resurrection is the opportunity for new life, one that is filled with meaning and significance. No matter where you are in life, what you have done, or how you have failed, it is never too late for a resurrection. That’s why it’s significant that Jesus was raised three days later. For the Jews believed that if someone was going to be raised from the dead, it would have to be before three days. Why? Because by then the body would be too decomposed. But when Jesus was raised from the dead, God was in effect saying, “It’s never too late for a resurrection! It’s never too late to receive forgiveness! It’s never too late for redemption! It’s never too late for a new beginning!
Bill Dallas dreamed of taking over the world. But first, he set his sights on San Francisco’s booming real estate market in the late 1980s. Donald Trump’s The Art of the Deal. became his Bible. His goal was to make as many deals as possible. So Bill and his business partner started a real-estate development company. “In our minds and to everybody we were wildly successful. We understood how to play the game.” Bill filled his nights with partying: omen, booze and drugs; anything to keep me numb up until I went to bed at night; because I didn’t want to slow down enough to have to think about what was going on inside of me.”
The party ended in 1990 when the real estate market crashed. By ’91, all the real estate projects he was were involved were in foreclosure. Instantaneously, he lost everything. He was out of a job and all of his investors lost their money. And that started the loneliest time of his life. He now had to come face to face with who he was. He realized that he didn’t like who he was and he realized there was an emptiness there that I could never fill.” One night Bill remembered a quote someone had shared with him 15 years earlier. “Blaise Pascal said, ‘we’re all created with a God shaped vacuum – that we try to put all these things in.’ And it dawned on him that’s what he’d been doing that all these years, trying to fill my heart with all these things and I wasn’t finding peace. So he got down on my hands and knees one night and prayed, ‘Jesus, I’m just empty. Can you come into my life, because I just can’t do it anymore’ He put all his energy and effort into growing with God. But things only got worse. His investors came looking for their money. They pressed charges and Bill and his partner were arrested and charged with embezzlement and co-mingling of funds and sentenced to 5 years in San Quentin, one of the country’s toughest maximum security prisons.
He went there thinking, ‘it’s me and God; I’m going to be okay.’ Not too long after hehit a deep depression. Every day I would literally get out of my cell. I would go to the prison yard. I would curl up in a ball, unshaven, unbathed and just cry. And I just said, ‘Life is never going to get any better.’ And I prayed like Elijah, ‘God please take my life.’”
But God had other plans for Bill. “There are certain inmates, tremendous men of faith, who come alongside you and they want to see you get better. An inmate came over where he was curled up and said, ‘You know what you need? You need a job!’ So Bill began working for San Quentin TV, which provides educational programming for inmates. It was that job which saved his life.” After his release from prison, Bill followed his new passion for video production and started Church Communication Network which provides training seminars and events to 6,000 churches across America. And then he says, “No matter where you are in life, no matter how desperate - you think that life’s not going to get better or you can’t see anything good coming of it. Sometimes it’s right [at that point] - that’s where the plan is; that’s where God’s in full action. But you’re not going to see it right then, and sometimes you don’t see it on this side of heaven, but He is. And I promise you He does it because He promises that He is going to carry it on to completion and His word is true.” Because it’s never to late for a resurrection! Amen.
