Scripture: John 20:1-18
Theme: Easter, Mary Magdalene and Red Eggs
Proposition: Do we boycott all the things that have attached themselves to Easter? Instead all allowing the bunny, the egg hunts and all that stuff side track us - let's listen as the Ancient Church tells us about how the Red Egg speaks of Jesus' Resurrection, Victory, Salvation and New Life
INTRO:
Grace and peace from God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit!
Let us say the TRUTH once again this morning –
CHRIST IS RISEN!
CHRIST IS RISEN INDEED!
Whether the sun is brightly shining, rain drops are falling or even on those rarest of occasions when it is snowing, today is a day that we in the Church celebrate to its fullest.
Today is the day that we celebrate all over the world the truth that Jesus Christ is the Savior and LORD of all.
Today is the day we celebrate Jesus’ mission, His message and most importantly His Sacrificial Death and Glorious Resurrection.
Today is the day we celebrate that some 2,000 years ago, Jesus Christ, the Son of God made a way for all people to be rescued, redeemed and restored into God's Holy Image.
At the same time, it is interesting how over the last 2,000 years or so there have been some rather fascinating things that have attached themselves to our celebration of Resurrection Sunday. Some of those things have been quite harmless while others have nearly twisted and turned the message of Jesus' Resurrection upside down.
By now, you have probably noticed that nearly everywhere you go you can see signs of Resurrection Sunday (Easter Sunday) in all kinds of ways and fashions?
For example:
+There are all types, shapes and sizes of Easter baskets filled with plastic colored eggs, chocolate candies and other goodies.
+ There are little stuff animals in the shapes of an Easter bunny, a lamb, a duck or some other cute furry animal.
+ Easter lilies are blooming.
+People have been preparing all kinds of things for Easter Sunday meals – cooked ham, roasted lamb, hot cross buns, pretzels, simnel cakes, coconut cakes, Easter chick cupcakes to name just a few.
Now, for the most part each one of those things is basically harmless. All the chocolate candy is wonderful to eat, the little stuff animals bring a great deal of comfort and the flowers provide a great deal of beauty.
The only time that I can see that any of those things might be detrimental is if we completely remove the Cross, the Tomb, the Angels, Jesus and His Resurrection and focus only on the Easter baskets, the candy, the flowers and the food.
I believe we can have all those other things as long as at the center of everything we do and say today is on the message of Jesus Christ and His Resurrection; His Victory over Death, Hell and the Grave.
I believe it is our privilege and responsibility to make sure that alongside our children/grand children hunting Easter eggs and eating all that chocolate that we tell them the true story of Jesus and His Resurrection.
Regrettably at times, the face is far too many children today get more excited about the coming of the Easter Bunny than they do about the coming of the Kingdom of Heaven through Jesus Christ.
And why shouldn't they?
After all, the bunny shows up weeks before Easter and welcomes babies and children to have their picture taken with him. And if we are not careful as parents and grandparents we will think more about our adventure with the Easter bunny than the true meaning of Resurrection Sunday.
So, what is the answer?
Some have through the years tried to get the Church to boycott the Easter bunny, the Easter egg hunt and all that wonderful chocolate and other candies.
I don’t blame people for taking that view. I just don't think that is the proper answer.
What I do think we should be doing is not boycotting or denouncing, but actively promoting the real truth about Resurrection Sunday; the Message and Mission of Jesus Christ, our Risen Savior and LORD.
I believe that we should be doing the same thing that the disciples did 2,000 years ago when they openly and with great power shared the Good News of Jesus Christ.
Then, I believe it would be good for us to do some detailed studies. That is to say, I think it would be good for us to look back into history and see why certain symbols began attaching themselves to the Easter Season. I think we would be pleasantly surprised by the study.
You see, all of this is similar to the issue that we have surrounding the Christmas Season. For years, many people have had a problem with the image and person of St. Nicholas or as he is called in our country Santa Claus. There have been some who want nothing more than to get rid of him.
But the truth behind the image of St. Nicholas is rather amazing.
It’s all based on the life of an ancient Bishop who did everything he could to share the love of Jesus Christ with the less fortunate. Bishop Nicholas (St. Nicholas) sacrificially gave up his inherited fortune to help the poor; especially those who were in danger of being molested, abused and enslaved.
The more you know the true story of St. Nicholas, the more you understand how the myths around him arose. St. Nicholas is this wonderful story of what happens to a person when they allow themselves to be filled with the Holy Spirit and live a Spirit led life. Rather than being a detriment to sharing the Good News about Jesus, the life of St. Nicholas was one of agape love, grace and mercy.
The same could be said this morning for some of the symbols that have attached themselves around Resurrection Sunday.
When you learn the history behind some of these things, then you being to realize that you don't need to get rid of them or fight them. Instead, all you have to do is to share their true story and their true meaning. You simply have to rescue them from folk theology and myth. Many of them have over the years been used as wonderful object lessons to share the true message of Jesus Christ and His Resurrection.
Now of course:
+You don't find a bunch of scripture passages speaking of rabbits hopping around an open tomb or there being an egg hunt right after the Resurrection. You don't find any stories about James and John being upset that Peter or Andrew found the most eggs or that they found the prized egg.
+You don't have Jesus giving out a chocolate bunny to Mary Magdalene or to the two disciples walking along the road to Emmaus.
With all that in mind; let’s take a look for a few moments at one of the oldest symbols that has become attached to the Easter Season.
The Egg.
Did you know this morning that the egg is one of the oldest symbols used to speak about faith in both Judaism and Christianity?
In fact, our Jewish friends have used the symbol of an egg to teach about faith for centuries. In the Jewish Passover (Seder) meal an egg is sometimes used as a part of the meal. In particular, a hardboiled egg is used that has been dipped in salt water. The egg was to be seen as a symbol of:
+The possibility of a new life - a life of freedom; much like the life of freedom that the Children of Israel experienced after the Exodus Event.
+The sacrifices that were offered at the Temple.
When it was impossible for a family to provide a lamb for the Passover meal often times an egg was used as a substitute. The egg enabled those families who were destitute the opportunity to still celebrate Passover.
Jewish historians tell us that the egg also became a symbol of great mourning over the two lost Temples. The first Temple was destroyed by the Babylonians in 587/86 B.C. while the Second Temple was destroyed by the Romans in 70 A.D. Hard boiled eggs became the food of mourners and as such were great symbols for the loss of the two great Temples.
In the early centuries of the Christian faith we see that a great deal of the symbols of Judaism was adopted by the Early Church. One of those symbols was an egg. The egg became this great Christian representation of the New Life, the Resurrection and Spiritual Formation.
+Just as a new life would emerge from the natural shell of an egg, the Church spoke of the New Life that emerged from the shell of Jesus' tomb – Resurrection Life.
By using the egg one was able to speak of how Christ broke the powers of Hell, death and the grave. It was a way to talk about how the angels at the tomb told the women that Jesus had risen from the dead. It was a way to tell the story of how Jesus was now the firstborn of a New Kingdom - a kingdom of people who had been rescued from the penalty and power of sin. It was a way to tell the story of a New Humanity. A New Humanity who were able to be filled with God’s Holy Spirit.
+The egg became one of Christianity's first object lessons and evangelistic tools.
All of us have probably seen one of those fish symbols that people have put on the backs of their car bumpers or windows.
Well, our ancient brothers and sisters in Christ would use the symbol of an egg to do a similar thing.
People would give away eggs as a way of greeting one another in the name of Jesus Christ.
+Christian teachers would use an egg to teach about spiritual formation; how that a person should be able to continually grow in Christ.
They would point to the egg and share while you might think that there is nothing going on inside that shell, the truth is that there is potential life; life that is waiting to be hatched (to be released). There is life that is potentially growing and maturing towards an amazing end.
In the same way in this physical shell that we live (our physical bodies) there is also the possibility of a new life; a New Life in Christ Jesus. Inside of us, in our deepest core is the possibility of a New Life that can be continually growing and maturing in the Holy Spirit.
Therefore, over time the egg became a great way of being able to teach people about Jesus, the Resurrection and what it means to be Born Again.
It was a great way to share the Good News about everlasting life.
It was also a wonderful object lesson to teach about the Trinity - the outer shell representing God the Father, the White part of the egg representing the purity of Jesus the Son and the Yellow part (yoke) to speak of the Holy Spirit - all three in one.
So, rather than just something we merely gather up and eat - poached, hard boiled, scrambled or sunny side up - we need to reexamine the humble egg this Resurrection morning.
Eggs are a wonderful way for us to tie together our ancient Jewish roots surrounding Passover as well as share the Good News of Jesus' Victory and Resurrection.
But what about all those colors?
Well, I am not sure exactly how we got all those colors but I do know this morning that in the ancient church they focused on one particular color. For hundreds of years, the Church favored one color of Resurrection Eggs above any other color. While our Jewish friends favored a brown egg for Passover to symbolize humility those in the Early Church picked the color RED to dye their eggs.
The Color Red was used for some obvious reasons:
+Red would point to the blood of Jesus that was shed on the Cross of Calvary. The Early Church wanted to make sure that people knew that it was the blood of Jesus that possessed the power to save us from our sins.
+Red was the color of life.
+Red was an ancient color of Victory.
Oftentimes, ancient armies would hold high banners colored red as they returned home to let everyone know that they had been victorious.
Early Christians picked up on this symbolic color to state the fact that in the Resurrection Jesus proved that He was victorious over sin, death, Hell and the grave.
So, a Red Egg - not only could be used as a tool to teach about Jesus coming victoriously out of the tomb, it could also be used as a symbol of Jesus' blood, new life and spiritual victory.
Now, those reasons alone are reason enough for a modern day church to not only have an egg hunt but to make sure that plenty of the eggs are colored bright red.
Coupled with all of this tradition was another tradition that surrounded the color of a Red Egg.
It all centers on John's story of the Resurrection that we read this morning. It centers on this amazing woman named Mary Magdalene.
Some historians say that the reason the Early Church adopted red as the color of the Resurrection Egg had to do with Mary Magdalene and her sharing the story of Jesus' Resurrection.
According to ancient traditions, following Jesus' Resurrection, Mary Magdalene went out like many of the other disciples and shared the Good News of Salvation and Holiness.
We know that many of Jesus' disciples spread out all over the known world to share the message of the Good News of Salvation.
+ Bartholomew went to India
+Andrew went off towards Greece
+Matthew shared the Gospel with those in Iran
+Philip went to area of modern day Turkey.
According to tradition, Mary Magdalene made her way to the city of Rome.
There she began to share the message of Jesus using an egg. She would use an egg as a prop in telling the story of New Life made possible through Jesus. The story goes that it was while she was telling the story of Jesus to Caesar himself that the miracle of the Red Egg occurred.
The story goes somewhat like this:
One day, Caesar graciously gave Mary Magdalene the time she needed to share the message of Jesus. He listened as she shared that Jesus Christ of Nazareth was the long awaited Messiah and the Only Son of the True God.
He listened as she told the story of Jesus’ death on the cross. He listened as she shared that three days after his death, Jesus was raised from the dead.
He listened as she shared that after 40 days Jesus ascended into heaven where He sits on the right hand of God the Father and that through Jesus all men can be saved from their sins and experience everlasting life.
The story goes that Caesar greatly doubted Mary's story concerning Jesus being the only Son of God and His Resurrection. According to Roman theology, he (Caesar) was both the Son of God and High Priest of Roman Religion.
That was the message that was stamped on most of the Roman coins in circulation at the time. Each coin bore his image and the inscription that Caesar was the true Son of God and High Priest of Rome.
Caesar also doubted that any man could be raised from the dead especially one that had been crucified on a Roman cross.
Caesar believed that the soul of a dead person would go underground to the place the Romans called the River Styx.
Caesar believed that once you crossed the River Styx, you would then face a time of judgment. Then you would be sent to one of three places:
+ The Elysian (uh•li•zhuhn) Fields (a form of Paradise)
+The earth where you would live like as a shade (ghost like figure)
+ Tartarus (taar•tr•uhs) (Hell) where you will spend a specific amount of time paying for your sins (usually hundreds of earth years).
Caesar believed that since Jesus of Nazareth had died on a cross there was no way according to Roman theology that he could be raised from the dead after only three days. Instead, Jesus would have been sent to Tartarus where he would have to spend hundreds of years paying for his evil life and blasphemy against the Roman gods.
This was the gist of what Caesar told Mary Magdalene.
According to the ancient story, Caesar suddenly had a wild idea.
If Mary was telling the truth then the egg that she had used to explain her story would miraculously turn red - the color of Jesus' blood and the color of victory. If Mary could do this miracle then he might believe her story.
According to tradition it was at that very moment that Mary's egg turned the brightest red possible proving to the Emperor that Jesus had not only risen from the dead but that Jesus was the Only Son of God and that He ruled victoriously over sin, death, Hell and the grave.
It was after this story became wide spread that the early Christians began to imitate Mary in presenting each other with red eggs. Red eggs that would over and over again share the victorious message of Jesus and His Resurrection.
Now, we all know that over the years that Church tradition has taken some license with some of its stories that have been passed down.
Is the story surrounding Mary Magdalene true?
Did she really share the message with Caesar?
Did the egg turn red?
I don't know, but I do know this at some point the Early Church began to use brightly colored red eggs as a wonderful way to tell the story of Jesus. The church for years adopted the red egg as a symbol of Resurrection Power/Salvation.
So, this morning while we may not be able to redeem all the modern symbols of the season - we can redeem the Easter Egg or at least those dyed red.
We can do that because the egg has a long history of being a symbol of faith first for the Jew and then for the Early Church. We can do it because the Egg and especially the Red Egg has been a way to tell children in particular and people in general the message of Jesus Christ for hundreds of years.
So, as we go forth this season and enjoy Egg Hunts - why not include a few RED EGGS. Why not buy a big Red Egg for yourself as a reminder. Put it on your desk or some other place where people can see it. When they ask why you have a red egg then you like Mary will have an excellent opportunity to share the message of Jesus, His Life, His Resurrection and the way of Salvation.
As your children and grandchildren are hunting eggs - why not make the red egg the special ones? Why not have a large Red Egg as the Prize Egg? Let the Red Egg be one of the ways to tell the Story of Jesus.
Use it as a teaching tool -
+In Christ we can experience New Life – We can experience a life free of Sin.
+In Christ we can become a New Creation.
+We can teach the truth about the Trinity
+We can look at the Red Egg and remember the power of the blood of Jesus
+We can look at the Red Egg and remember that in Christ we can experience victory – over death, hell and the grave.
Wow!
All of that from just a little red egg.
This morning as we close let us do so by sharing the Lord's Supper and singing an old hymn favorite - He Lives -
You ask me how I know He lives - He Lives within My Heart
As we come to share the Supper does Jesus live in your heart this morning? Do you know Jesus as Your Savior and LORD. He invites you right now to come and confess your faith in Him. He invites you to His Table to partake of the wine and bread and to proclaim Him as Savior and LORD.
End with Communion and Prayer
