` Easter - 2007

Easter - 2007



Todd A. Peperkorn, STM
Messiah Lutheran Church
Kenosha, Wisconsin
The Resurrection of Our Lord (April 8, 2007)
Isaiah 25:6-9; I Corinthians 15:1-11; John 20:1-18
For an audio MP3 of this sermon, please CLICK HERE

TITLE: “Jesus Breaks the Bonds of Death For You”


Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.  Amen.  Our text for today is from St. John Chapter Twenty, our Lord’s word to Mary Magdalene, “Mary.”

The Lord is risen!  He is risen indeed!  Alleuia!

If you have ever been in a traffic accident, or have been a witness to some crime, that will give you some idea of what the first Easter morning was like.  There were no lilies, no special breakfast or Easter Lamb (or ham), no afternoon naps or sitting in front of the TV watching some mindless show.  Frankly, that first Eastern morning was chaos.  It was much closer to the few days after the funeral of a loved one than a holy day.  No one, no one, believed Jesus would rise from the dead on the third day.  How many times had He said it?  How many times had He preached it?  How many times had he predicted exactly what would happen to Him: that he would be betrayed into the hands of sinners, mocked, scourged, flogged, beaten, stripped naked and hung upon a cross to die between two common criminals.  It all happened, just as He had said.  Not a bone of His was broken, they took Him down from the tomb and buried Him in a newly cut grave.  Dust you are, and to dust you shall return.

Yesterday, what we call Holy Saturday, had been a day of fear for the disciples.  Would they be found out?  Would they be crucified for their God who had failed them so miserably?  I mean really, what kind of God dies?  That’s not how the story is supposed to end?  Yet that is what happened, as we sang on Good Friday:

O sorrow dread!
Our God is dead,
Upon the cross extended.
There His love enlivens us
As His life was ended.(LSB 448:2)

 There was no joy on Holy Saturday, no happy ending coming that they could see.  God is dead, and all hope is lost.

Until Easter morning.  First Mary Magdalene goes and sees the stone has been moved.  She goes back and tells Peter and John.  They rush ahead and see the tomb is empty, and the linen cloth lying where he had lain.  They rush back with the news, such as it was.  You can imagine the questions that their unbelief posed?  What now?  Have they stolen His body?  Is this some sick joke played upon them.  They don’t know.  The truth, as clear as it was, could not be the answer.

Only Mary Magdalene is left, weeping at the tomb.  Weeping over her Lord’s death.  He was the one who had picked her up, washed her clean, and given her a new life in His name.  In many ways she had more to lose than the others, earthly speaking at least.  So when two angels appear to her and say that the Lord is risen from the dead, the news was too good to be true.  She turns around, and there is Jesus, only she doesn’t recognize Him.  She thinks he’s the gardener.  He asks why is she weeping, and she replies, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have lain Him.” 

Jesus then says one of the most miraculous words of all time, because it is spoken to her, to you, to me, to the whole world.  He simply says, “Mary.”  That’s it.  He calls her by name.  She is His.  And with that word, with that name spoken by the lips of the risen God, she believes.  She now has a future, a life without end.  Jesus has come back again, and walks unafraid at those three evil powers which assail us day after day.  He has conquered sin, death and the power of the devil.  They have no more hold on you, just as they had no hold on Mary Magdalene.  Jesus had looked His accusers in the eye, taken their insults and punishments, and had come through on the other side.  Death cannot hold Him, for He is the bringer of life.

He has called your name out to you as well.  For your Baptism was your Easter.  There God called you by name, buried you, made you His, gave you the life which never ends.  Jesus is risen from the dead, and you have a future.  A future with him, bright and wonderful, sitting at the right hand of God forever.

The chaos continues, just as it did that morning.  Jesus continued to appear for forty days, flooding them with His life, His very presence.  He gives the disciples, now apostles, the authority to forgive sins in His name.  The chaos though, is different.  It is not the chaos of the crime scene, or the desperate chaos after a loved one dies.  The chaos now is the question: who knows this wonderful news?  Christ gives out His Word, flings it forth throughout the world, so that the chaos of sin and darkness may be replaced by the joy of eternal light.  There is still work for the angels.  There is still preaching to be done, forgiveness to be given out, His Sacraments to be delivered for forgiveness and life.  But this day we rejoice.  Eternal life is yours.  You have a name, and it is inscribed upon the nail-writ palm of His hand. 

Rejoice and be glad.  Be free.  For Jesus is risen from the dead.  Alleluia!

The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in true faith, unto life everlasting.  Amen.
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