The Meaning of Resurrection
Love Never Dies, prt. 1
Wildwind Community Church
David Flowers
April 4, 2010
Easter, 2010. Jesus lives! That is what we celebrate today – our belief that Jesus was dead and is alive again. We believe that because Jesus lives, we also can have life – not simply in some ethereal other world to come, but in this world, in this present moment, right now.
I want to welcome our guests today. We always try to start a new series on Easter Sunday because we always have people here for the first time, and that makes it easy for us to warmly invite you back to just continue with us on that series. And so we extend that invitation to you this morning, as we begin a series called Love Never Dies.
The New Testament tells us not simply that God loves, not simply that God approves of love, or endorses it, or commands it, but rather that God IS love. The New Testament (in 1 Corinthians) also tells us that love never fails – in other words, it never ceases, never stops, never falters. And if it is true that God is love, and if it is true that Jesus was God, then Jesus is love. And if it is true that love never fails, never stops, never falters, and if Jesus is love, then it is no wonder that today we celebrate that not even death was able to keep Jesus down, not even death could hold him, not even death could cause him to falter or fail or cease to be.
New Living Translation, Second Edition - Song 8:6
6 Place me like a seal over your heart, like a seal on your arm. For love is as strong as death, its jealousy as enduring as the grave. Love flashes like fire, the brightest kind of flame.
I love this verse, but what we learn in the New Testament is even more powerful, for there in the message of the Resurrection, we learn that not only is love as strong as death, but that love is actually stronger.
Love is stronger than death. It is more enduring, more permanent. All the things you see around you are passing away, they are on the way out, but love is still on the way in. Even you yourself will one day die, that is, your physical body is on the way out, but love is on the way in. This world is on the way out and will one day come to an end, but even then, love will still be on the way in.
Song of Songs 8:7 (MSG)
7 Flood waters can't drown love, torrents of rain can't put it out…
Love is unstoppable and unavoidable. And you are either standing in its stream and allowing it to wash over you, or at some point it catches up to you, takes you by surprise, overwhelms you, and sweeps you away. Either way, it is the ultimate reality and a choice to run from love, or not to embrace and live in it, is a choice to run from reality, to refuse to live in reality.
That is what resurrection shows us. God is love. Love lives forever. Jesus was God. Therefore, Jesus lives! The resurrection of Jesus is a real-life demonstration of the reality that love never dies.
Let’s look at part of that resurrection story, from John chapter 20, this morning. Prepare yourselves. I’m going to read the entire chapter. But it’s okay to come to church and hear God’s Word, isn’t it? I hope so!
John 20:1-31 (MSG)
1 Early in the morning on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone was moved away from the entrance.
2 She ran at once to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, breathlessly panting, "They took the Master from the tomb. We don't know where they've put him."
3 Peter and the other disciple left immediately for the tomb.
4 They ran, neck and neck. The other disciple got to the tomb first, outrunning Peter.
5 Stooping to look in, he saw the pieces of linen cloth lying there, but he didn't go in.
6 Simon Peter arrived after him, entered the tomb, observed the linen cloths lying there,
7 and the kerchief used to cover his head not lying with the linen cloths but separate, neatly folded by itself.
8 Then the other disciple, the one who had gotten there first, went into the tomb, took one look at the evidence, and believed.
9 No one yet knew from the Scripture that he had to rise from the dead.
10 The disciples then went back home.
11 But Mary stood outside the tomb weeping. As she wept, she knelt to look into the tomb
12 and saw two angels sitting there, dressed in white, one at the head, the other at the foot of where Jesus' body had been laid.
13 They said to her, "Woman, why do you weep?" "They took my Master," she said, "and I don't know where they put him."
14 After she said this, she turned away and saw Jesus standing there. But she didn't recognize him.
15 Jesus spoke to her, "Woman, why do you weep? Who are you looking for?" She, thinking that he was the gardener, said, "Mister, if you took him, tell me where you put him so I can care for him."
16 Jesus said, "Mary." Turning to face him, she said in Hebrew, "Rabboni!" meaning "Teacher!"
17 Jesus said, "Don't cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go to my brothers and tell them, 'I ascend to my Father and your Father, my God and your God.' "
18 Mary Magdalene went, telling the news to the disciples: "I saw the Master!" And she told them everything he said to her.
19 Later on that day, the disciples had gathered together, but, fearful of the Jews, had locked all the doors in the house. Jesus entered, stood among them, and said, "Peace to you."
20 Then he showed them his hands and side. The disciples, seeing the Master with their own eyes, were exuberant.
21 Jesus repeated his greeting: "Peace to you. Just as the Father sent me, I send you."
22 Then he took a deep breath and breathed into them. "Receive the Holy Spirit," he said.
23 "If you forgive someone's sins, they're gone for good. If you don't forgive sins, what are you going to do with them?"
24 But Thomas, sometimes called the Twin, one of the Twelve, was not with them when Jesus came.
25 The other disciples told him, "We saw the Master." But he said, "Unless I see the nail holes in his hands, put my finger in the nail holes, and stick my hand in his side, I won't believe it."
26 Eight days later, his disciples were again in the room. This time Thomas was with them. Jesus came through the locked doors, stood among them, and said, "Peace to you."
27 Then he focused his attention on Thomas. "Take your finger and examine my hands. Take your hand and stick it in my side. Don't be unbelieving. Believe."
28 Thomas said, "My Master! My God!"
29 Jesus said, "So, you believe because you've seen with your own eyes. Even better blessings are in store for those who believe without seeing."
30 Jesus provided far more God-revealing signs than are written down in this book.
31 These are written down so you will believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and in the act of believing, have real and eternal life in the way he personally revealed it.
Obviously this is a long account, so I want to really narrow it down this morning. When you talk about the resurrection of Jesus, you can approach it from thousands of different angles. What I want to focus on this morning is the meaning of the resurrection. And the meaning of the resurrection is that love never dies.
Every major religion teaches that this whole thing, ultimately, is about love. Jesus himself in fact said that.
Matthew 22:35-40 (NIV)
35 One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question:
36 "Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?"
37 Jesus replied: "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.'
38 This is the first and greatest commandment.
39 And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'
40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."
All the Law and the Prophets hang on this. In other words, all the rules about following and relating to and knowing God, and all the teachings given to the people of Israel in the history of Judaism about God come down to two things: love God, and love others. Love God, and love others. Now if all the teachings, all the laws, all the rules, all the ways we think about God and learn about him and consider him – if it all comes down to loving God and loving others, I wonder why it is that we have made it about so many other things?
That’s where religion has stepped in and mucked things up. Jesus was perfectly clear on this. Jesus didn’t say, “It’s mostly about love.” He didn’t say, “Well, you should love God, and a bunch of other stuff.” What he said was that all the rules and laws that we observe actually are attempting to get us to do one thing: love. He even talked about how religion tends to get in the way:
Mark 7:9 (NIV)
9 And he said to them: "You have a fine way of setting aside the commands of God in order to observe your own traditions!
Jesus was all about love, and ultimately the message of love is both the most powerful, and the most offensive message that could ever be taught. The message of love refuses to fit into the boxes you and I have placed it in, whatever those boxes may be. And rather than me standing here and talking about what the boxes look like, I’ll just ask you to think about what those boxes might be in your own way of thinking about God.
You know what else is offensive about love? When my religion is about not drinking, not smoking, not having sex before marriage, not voting for certain candidates, not going too far outside the theological lines, dressing in a certain way, rejecting certain kinds of music, etc. (and I’m not suggesting some of those things might not be good ideas), I can rigidly obey all of that stuff without actually changing who I am as a person. You can follow the rules all day long, but resent the daylights out of it. And if you’re following the rules but someone else isn’t, what’s your default attitude tend to be? “I’m making the sacrifices – why doesn’t he do it? He needs to suck it up?" So we see how trying to conform to rules and regulations actually tends to lead to a spirit that is the exact opposite of what Jesus taught. Rule-following allows me to appear righteous, even religious, without actually changing. I can be a completely selfish, even monstrous, human being, but keep enough rules that I appear to be holy. And once I appear to be holy, I will be treated that way, and that monstrous thing inside of me will then take to heart the opinions of others that I am quite holy and that will fuel deeper pride in me than what was there before. Richard Rohr says, “The same scripture text that brings a loving person to even greater love will be mangled and misused by a fearful person.” And of course, and unfortunately, mangling and misuse and anger and fear are exactly what we so often see.
This is what Jesus knew about love. Jesus understood its power to transform.
Romans 8:11 (NLT)
11 The Spirit of God, who raised Jesus from the dead, lives in you. And just as God raised Christ Jesus from the dead, he will give life to your mortal bodies by this same Spirit living within you.
Long before the power of love transformed Jesus from a dead guy into the risen king of kings, he was walking in, and healing in, and teaching in that love, and guiding others into it, so that they too could be transformed, so that they too could quite truly be risen from their own dead lives and up into life and peace.
Let me just say, I believe in heaven, I believe in the afterlife, I believe that when you and I bite the dust, the show’s not over. But I believe something more than that. I actually believe that the show simply keeps going! In other words, if you end up next to Jesus in the next world, it’s because you’re already getting close to him now. If you end up far from him in the next world, it’s because you’re far from him now. And since Jesus announced that this love (the kingdom of God) is available to every man and every woman and every child, if we find ourselves far from God is because we either do not know that God’s love is here and now, and is for us, or else we know it and simply have chosen to live as if that isn’t the case. But when I speak of new life in Christ, I find that I tend to end up focusing on the new life we can have now, in this life, in this world, in our current circumstances, in fact in this exact present moment. Again, Richard Rohr reminds us that really only one major change is needed in our lives, and that is how we do the moment – whether, and how, we see God active in our lives, available to us now, extending to us always the invitation to come and learn from him, to be with him, to learn the unforced rhythms of grace and live with him in the moment-to-moment realities of our lives, whatever they may be. Indeed I think one of the main reasons God so often does not change our circumstances when we pray that he would is because we live in the delusion that God will be more present, more available to us, in other circumstances than in the ones we’re already in. Your greatest challenge, and mine, is to learn to live the resurrected life, the redeemed life, in this present moment. That is where life is. 100% of your life is in this present moment. That is why Jesus, at the same time that he showed his wounds to Thomas, blessed those who do not seek special circumstances but simply turn to God in faith in whatever moment they are in. Certainly in difficult moments of our lives, God may not be obvious. You can see one place in this chapter alone (and at least one more in the next chapter) where Jesus was standing and speaking to people after his resurrection who did not recognize him.
John 20:14-16 (NLT)
After she said this, she turned away and saw Jesus standing there. But she didn't recognize him.
15 Jesus spoke to her, "Woman, why do you weep? Who are you looking for?" She, thinking that he was the gardener, said, "Mister, if you took him, tell me where you put him so I can care for him."
In other words, “tell me where Jesus is,” she says to Jesus who is standing right there. Have you ever done that? Have you ever prayed, “God, tell me where God is!” Apparently the experience of God being among us and our not knowing it is fairly common.
But God is here. Jesus is alive, and he is alive because of love. On Easter we are reminded that this whole thing is about love. Love is what brought Christ to earth as a baby. It is what powered his life, his teachings, his suffering, his death, and ultimately his resurrection. It is what we are called to by him – called to live lives of love; love for God and love for one another. It is the great unifier, the great minimizer of conflict and difficulty. It is often offensive to us because it requires us to actually change, so we often resort to rule-keeping and being religious. But just like love raised Jesus, it will eventually raise us too. And just like it was life in his body and strength in his bones while he lived here on earth, it can be that way for us too; so that the love we will experience in the next world will simply be the ongoing experience of love that we can experience now.
The question is whether that is what you want. Love calls us beyond our religion, so we have to go beyond it. It calls us beyond the familiar boxes that bring us comfort, so we have to go beyond them. If you are willing to do this, God will make his love known to you.
Thomas Merton prayed this. Listen along, but maybe pray this with me in your heart:
My Lord, I have no hope but in Your cross. You, by your humility, and sufferings, and death, have delivered me from all vain hope. You have killed the vanity of this life in Yourself, and have given me all that is eternal in rising from the dead.
Why should I want to be rich, when You were poor? Why should I desire to be famous and powerful in the eyes of man when the sons of those who exalted the false prophets and stoned the true rejected You and nailed You to the Cross? Why should I cherish in my heart a hope that devours me – the hope for perfect happiness in this life – when such hope, doomed to frustration, is nothing but despair?
My hope is in what the eye has never seen. Therefore, let me not trust in visible rewards. My hope is in what the heart of man cannot feel. Therefore let me not trust in the feelings of my heart. My hope is in what the hand of man has never touched. Do not let me trust what I can grasp between my fingers. Death will one day loosen my grasp and my vain hope will be gone.
Let my trust be in Your mercy, not in myself. Let my hope be in Your love, not in health, or strength, or ability, or human resources.
If I trust You, everything else will become, for me, strength, health, and support. Everything will bring me to heaven. If I do not trust in You, everything will be my destruction.
Amen. Blessed be the name of the Lord.
