Easter sermon video: As Good as Dead

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Easter Sermon: As Good as Dead

Mark 16:1-8

As Good as Dead

         James Sledge                                           Resurrection of the Lord                                   April 1, 2018

If you had a pew Bible open as I read our scripture, you may have noticed a heading “The Shorter Ending of Mark” just past where I stopped. And if you looked two sentences further another heading reads, “The Longer Ending of Mark.” Both of these endings got attached many years after the gospel was originally written, presumably in an effort to “fix” that rather unsatisfying, So they went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid. The end.

Scholars debate whether the original ending of Mark got lost along the way, or if the author intentionally ended things in such abrupt fashion. But regardless, for they were afraid is the only ending of the original gospel that we’ve got.

This ending doesn’t fit very well with our Easter celebration. Not a lot of fear and silence today. Instead there are shouts of “Christ is risen!” and the biggest crowds of the year at worship. The music is glorious, accompanied by special musicians, and there is a bright, festive mood. Nothing remotely like, and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.

In Mark’s gospel, there is no joy on Easter morning, no shouts of “He is risen!” only terror, shock, fear, and silence. Not all that surprising when you think about it. Centuries insulate us from the drama of that morning, the raw emotions of going to a friend’s grave and finding it open and empty, a strange young man sitting there, saying our friend has been raised.

On top of that, we aren’t much worried about meeting our now risen friend. Jesus is not going to be there when we get back home. No chance that he’ll say anything to us about our behavior after he was arrested. We’re not worried about what to say to Peter, who denied Jesus all those times, or the other disciples, who all ran and hid. We’ve got Jesus safely confined to heaven, not running around loose where we might bump into him.

For many of us, Jesus might as well be dead. We’ve heard about him, learned stories about him, are perhaps impressed by some of his teachings, but he doesn’t really intrude into our daily lives. Jesus may be no more alive to us than family, friends, and loved ones who’ve died. He’s gone to heaven, unseen by us. In a sense, he’s as good as dead.

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Amnesia, Dismembering, and Remembering

In his book, Sabbath as Resistance, Old Testament scholar Walter Brueggemann writes, "The reason (Israel) will be tempted by autonomy is that the new land will make them inordinately prosperous. Moses knows that prosperity breeds amnesia. He warns Israel about amnesia: 'Take care that you do not forget the LORD, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.' (Deuteronomy 6: 12)"

Over and over in the book of Deuteronomy, set just prior to their entry into the Land of Promise, Israel is urged to remember. As Moses recalls the covenant God made with them at Mt. Sinai, the command to remain faithful and obedient is repeatedly accompanied by the call, "Remember that you were a slave in Egypt." In actuality, none of those listening to Moses ever lived in Egypt, yet it is critical for them to remember, for their parents' and grandparents' experience to become theirs.

The people are also instructed that when, in the future, children ask about the covenant with its laws and statutes, their answer shall begin, "We were slaves in Egypt, but the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand." Similarly, when Jews today celebrate the Passover Seder in their homes, a child asks why this night is different, and the answer begins, "We were slaves of Pharaoh in Egypt, but the Eternal One, our God, brought us out with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm."

Remembering is critical lest Israel forget who she is, a people rescued by God. All this effort to encourage remembering is an attempt to stave off the inevitable amnesia. When Israel begins to prosper in the Land of Promise, they will be tempted to see it as their own accomplishment, forgetting that God brought them into the land. As forgetting continues, those who prosper the most will imagine themselves better than others, and the bonds of community will begin to break down. Rich will exploit poor. The land that God gave as an inheritance will become a possession to be bought and acquired and hoarded. 

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The Apostle Paul, in an attempt to correct we he saw as abuses at the Lord's Supper, gave the church in Corinth what we now call the "words of institution." Integral to these words is the command, "Do this in remembrance of me." The synoptic gospels indicate that Jesus' last meal with his disciples is a Passover meal. At a meal of remembering, Jesus institutes another meal of remembering. Such remembering is just as critical for Christians as it is for Jews, and the tendency to amnesia just as problematic. 

Christians are to remember that we are "saved," in some way made new and whole, by the gracious acts of Jesus. In our baptisms, we all are joined to Christ, and so we all become sisters and brothers to one another. But the consumer culture we live in is an agent of amnesia. It seeks to break down the bonds that join us all into one family, dismembering us one from another as we acquire new identities rooted in acquisition and competition. We matter, not because we are joined to God's love in Christ, but because we are rich enough, thin enough, pretty enough, accomplished enough, got in the right school, wear the right clothes, and on and on. Our very sense of self is dismembered as our true identity as God's beloved children is obscured and hidden.

Such dismembering fractures not only the bonds joining together the body of Christ, but also the bonds of our larger communities and culture. We are not all in this together. Too often, our neighbor is the object of our love only under certain conditions. Ours is a world of anxious striving where neighbor may be our competitor, may be suspect because of their political views, or may be feared for "taking our jobs." 

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"Do this in remembrance of me." I've often been uncomfortable with those words. My Presbyterian tradition has at times reduced the Lord's Supper to nothing more than a recollection of a long ago event with no sense of Christ's presence in the meal. And so I have tended to focus on encountering Christ in the meal, downplaying the remembering part.

But remembering is crucial. Remembering is an antidote to dismembering. It lets us recover our true identity, one not dependent on acquisition or accomplishment, an identity as those whom God so loved that Jesus gave himself to us and for us. Remembering can cure our amnesia, restoring the bonds of community as we realize that we are all God's beloved, and so we are all one family.

Remember. Remember you were slaves in Egypt and God brought you out with a mighty hand. Remember you are God's beloved child, one so deeply loved that Jesus would risk even death for you, and for every one of your and my neighbors. Remember, we are joined together in our baptisms, joined into a new community, a new family that is to be known for its love of one another. Remember.

Palm Sunday, Cheap Grace, and the March for Our Lives

Growing up in the Presbyterian Church, I had never heard of Passion Sunday. For me, it was Palm Sunday, all palms, all celebration. It was the warm up for the big celebration the coming Sunday. As a child, the celebration of Palm Sunday faded directly into new spring clothes, girls and women in new spring hats, Easter egg hunts, special music at church, and Easter baskets filled with goodies. I was aware of the events between Palm Sunday and Easter. I may even have attended a Maundy Thursday service at some point as a child. But for me, Holy Week was celebration leading to celebration, joy leading to joy.

I suppose that Passion Sunday got paired with the palms to help with this, to deal with the common problem of getting to Easter without suffering, without pain, without a cross. This childhood pattern of mine in some ways epitomized the "cheap grace" Dietrich Bonhoeffer spoke against in his famous book, The Cost of Discipleship. Wrote Bonhoeffer, "Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves... Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate."

I found myself reflecting on cheap grace and costly grace yesterday evening. I was going through the pictures I took at the March For Our Lives in DC earlier in the day and looking at others' pictures and posts on social media. I thought of those young people, some children, others barely out of childhood, participating in something that requires them to keep reliving those horrid moments they surely would love to forget. I watched a replay of the speech by Emma Gonzalez, including its long, painful silence. As I watched, I also watched the stream of comments that were regularly interspersed with the most hateful remarks directed at her and the other youth with her.

I thought about a broken world than can only be healed by a cross, a broken world that needs the deaths of scores of children before it can begin to act. I thought about costly grace that does not shy away from pain and difficulty. I thought about all those thousands gathered yesterday in our own version of a Palm Sunday procession where signs replaced cloaks and palms.

The youth on the stage seemed to get the idea of costly grace, perhaps because this has already cost them so dearly. For them yesterday was not a magical moment that fixed anything. It was merely a step in a difficult and painful discipleship sort of walk.

I wondered about me and all those others there, about how many of us were ready for a costly discipleship, about how many of us might go home feeling good about the day, and wanting that to somehow make it all better. I wonder if I and others were more interested in cheap grace "we bestow on ourselves," proud of having participated but now ready to move on, not so interested in costly discipleship.

On one of those social media posts from yesterday's marches, I saw people carrying a sign that has often been used as a benediction in church worship services.

Go out into the world in peace; have courage; hold on to what is good; return to no one evil for evil; strengthen the fainthearted; support the weak, and help the suffering; honor all people; love and serve the Lord, rejoicing in the power of the Holy Spirit.

Yes... this.