“Is It True?”

One of the joys of pastoral ministry is visiting parishioners in homes and hospitals.  We laugh and cry as we share life’s gladness and sorrow with church members.  But pastors also never know for sure what going to happen during those visits, how God might be revealed and how we ourselves may be comforted and challenged.

In Frederick Buechner’s novel, The Final Beast, a young minister named Nicollet, goes to visit a woman named Rooney.  Rooney has just joined his church.  Buechner writes, “It was an easy . . . moment, with the lilacs still out and the minister come to call, and it was some minutes before Nicollet realized how angry Rooney was: [She spoke] ‘There’s just one reason, you know, why I come dragging in there every Sunday.  I want to find out if the whole thing’s true.  Just true,’ she said.  ‘That’s all.  Either it is or it isn’t, and that’s the one question you avoid like death.’” 

Welcome to the ministry!

Is it true?  Is the resurrection true?  Did it happen?  Yes.  Yes, it’s true.  It did happen.  Can I prove it beyond a shadow of a doubt? No.  But I can tell you why we believe it’s true and why it matters. 

We come on the scene in John’s gospel with everybody running.  When Mary Magdalene comes to the tomb in the darkness that morning and finds the tomb empty she goes running.  She runs to Peter and the beloved disciple.  When Peter and the other disciple hear the news, they go running to the tomb, a race to the tomb.  Why’s everybody running?

          They’re running because they’re excited.  They’re running because this is momentous.  “I want to find out if the whole thing’s true.  Just true.”

Did you and I want to come running to church today? 

The other disciple wins the race to the tomb, but he doesn’t go in.  Peter goes in.  All he sees are wrappings that had been around Jesus’ body.  Yet he believes.  Then the beloved disciple goes in, looks around, and he believes too.  Why do they believe?  There’s no great evidence here–just some cloth on the ground. And how do they believe?  Kind of quietly.  After all this, John says these two disciples simply go back to their homes. You see, these two disciples represent the faith of many of us here.  

When I was a kid, about the sixth or seventh grade, I went to summer Presbyterian church camp tucked away in the Blue Ridge mountains of North Carolina--Camp Eva Good.  I was there a week.  And I don’t remember much about the time, except running around in woods catching snakes, playing ping-pong, going to outdoor vespers in the evening, and trying to swim in the lake, water temperature about 33degrees.  On the last night of the camp, the cabin counselor came and asked each of us whether we accepted Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior.  Many of the boys in my cabin were crying.  I thought I should cry too, but I didn’t.  I didn’t understand what all the crying was about.  My mama and Sunday School teachers had been teaching me about Jesus being my Lord and Savior for years.  Why all the crying?  Later on in life I did have emotional faith experiences.  But back then my faith was kind of quiet and I trusted what I’d seen and heard.

Many of you are like that.  You’ve never gone down the aisle for an “altar call,” never been to a revival, can’t date the moment of your conversion.  You’ve never seen a vision or heard a voice from heaven.  Yet you believe, and you believe passionately.  You know it’s true.  Peter and the other disciple represent your kind of faith, a perfectly fine kind of faith.

But Mary’s faith comes another way.  After the other disciples go home, Mary stands outside the tomb.  Is she celebrating?  No.  She’s crying.  Jesus is not there. Mary thinks somebody has stolen his body.  And as she cries, Mary bends over and sneaks a peak into the tomb.  What does she see?  Two angels sitting where Jesus had been.  They say, “Woman, what’re you crying about?”  (Angels are notoriously blunt).  And Mary says, “They’ve taken away my Lord, and I don’t know where they’ve laid him.”  Just then Mary turns around and sees Jesus but doesn’t recognize him.  She thinks Jesus is the gardener.  “Oh, it’s not Jesus, it’s just the guy who mows the lawn.”  And Mary’s even suspicious of Jesus, “Sir, if you’ve carried him away, tell me where, and I’ll go get him.”  And then it happens.  Everything changes.  Jesus says one word, one simple word.  “Mary!”  Jesus calls her by name.  And she believes. 

That’s how faith comes for some of us.  We can hear about empty tombs all day, even see an empty tomb for that matter, but until Jesus calls us by name, it isn’t real.  We know the resurrection’s true when it becomes personal to us.  We know it’s true when our hearts are stirred.  Maybe we walk down the aisle, tears streaming down our face.  Or we experience a painful loss and suddenly know Christ’s risen presence helping us through it. Or maybe we come to know the truth of the resurrection through the lives of the people around us. 

Author Kathleen Norris writes, “It is said that a priest came unexpectedly to [Saint Benedict’s] cave, bringing food.  ‘Let us eat,’ he said, ‘for it is Easter.’  Benedict replied, ‘I know that it is Easter, for I have been granted the blessing of seeing you.’” 

That’s why some of us here believe.  We know it’s Easter, because we’ve been granted the blessing of seeing each other.  We’ve received the blessing of experiencing people who, though they’re still imperfect, are nonetheless changed by the resurrection.  We’ve experienced God’s resurrection hope and love again and again through the church.  We believe when the truth gets personal and calls us by name. 

There are many other ways folks come to faith.  Some are convinced by the lives of the martyrs who lay down their lives because of their faith in a resurrected Lord.  Others are impressed by bits of historical evidence outside the Bible.  Still others, like C.S. Lewis, read the gospels through scholars’ eyes and know these are not neatly crafted works of fiction; these are truth.  There are many paths to faith. 

But what difference does the resurrection make? 

The resurrection makes a difference for the teenager who feels like an ugly duckling or for the popular student to know our real value is beyond our looks or our popularity. 

It makes a difference for the exhausted parent and for the harried businessperson to know the final evaluation of our lives comes not from our parenting or work but from the Lord, crucified and risen for us. 

The resurrection makes a difference to the person tremendously successful in the world’s eyes to know the real success of kindness and love for others. 

It makes a difference to the person whose body is broken and wracked with pain.  I’ll never forget sitting with a man who’d suffered for many years with diabetes.  He’d lost sight in one eye.  He was in constant pain and dying from lung cancer.  He said, “Tell me about the resurrection.”  I said we believe in the resurrection of the body.  We believe that, like Jesus, we’ll be transformed and made whole with spiritual bodies.  That’s why Jesus told Mary not to cling to him.  She couldn’t hold on to her old way of thinking about him, because he was new just as we shall be. 

So the resurrection makes a difference to the person grieving at the grave side and to the person who knows he will soon be in that grave. To the oppressed, it makes a difference to know that the resurrection proves one day God “will wipe away the tears from all faces.”  It makes a difference to know that death marks not just the end of earthly life; it’s the beginning of new, greater life.  It’s the beginning of life lived on a higher level, where there will be glad reunion, and more adventures await us.  The resurrection makes a difference; it makes all the difference in the world. 

Several years ago, I read this passage at a church committee meeting, and had everyone think about two questions.  “One, what detail did you notice in the story that you had never noticed before?  And two, what’s the good news in this story for you?”  After a couple of minutes of reflection we went around the room and folks noticed lots of details.  Who was the beloved disciple?  Why was the cloth around Jesus’ head rolled up?  Why couldn’t Mary hold on to Jesus?  Finally, we came to one man.  His eyes filled with tears and he spoke very quietly.  He said, “I’ve been reading this passage practically all my life, about 50 years.  And it just hit me tonight.  This is true.  It has to be true.  How could it not be true?”  We all sat there stunned for a few moments.  The Spirit has a way of doing that to you.  And finally, I suppose I said the only sensible thing I could’ve said, “Thank God.”

“I want to find out if the whole thing’s true.  Just true.”  It is true.  Thank God.  He is risen.  He is risen indeed.  Alleluia.  Amen.