While It Was Still Dark

John 20: 1-18

Most people say that the resurrection of Jesus Christ is the core event of Christianity.  We are supposed to be defined by it, renewed from it and rooted in it.  And we Christians go to great lengths to celebrate ourselves as Easter people- people who can claim a God who triumphs even over tombs and suffering.  Yet while we proclaim the resurrection in song and in word, in prayer and in our shared hopes, even those among us whose lives are grounded in God, centered on Jesus and aimed at holy living, struggle to find a place for the resurrection in our life of faith.   We pose questions like:  How could Jesus’ body have been physically raised?  How is it possible for the laws of science and nature to have been defied on that Sunday morning nearly two thousand years ago?  How could it possibly be?  It is simply unbelievable.

If you have ever asked such questions in your heart, let me assure you that you are not alone.  Indeed Christians throughout history have struggled with this rich and complicated story in our scriptures.  But the more I have sought for myself, the more I have listened as one hungry heart after another made his or her way to that day where the stone was rolled away, I have found that these are not the right ones to ask.  To be sure, any question in matters of faith is a good question, but seeking a scientific truth in an empty tomb is a fruitless endeavor.  There is simply no way to find an answer that would satisfy.  I believe that the resurrection is the core event of the Christian heart not because the stone was rolled away, not because there was no body to be found, not because angels appeared, but because the resurrection tells us something about our God.

We are here today not because we understand everything that God has done throughout the course of human history.  We are here not because we can grasp fully all that has unfolded in the lives of the faithful we see through the Gospels. We are here not because we get it or because we can say for sure how it all transpired, but because something happened that day that changed everything.  The Gospels have very different accounts of what happened after Jesus’ time on the cross.  As you heard, the youngest Gospel, the Gospel of John recounts each detail with poetry.  The Gospel of Matthew focuses on the work ahead for Jesus’ followers now that he is gone.  The Gospel of Luke has the longest Easter narrative because it includes the Road to Emmaus where two of Jesus’ followers meet him on the road and don’t recognize him.  The Gospel of Mark dedicates only eight verses to Easter and it does not report any appearance at all of the risen Christ.  But even with all of this variety in how the story has been told and retold, we know that something happened.  We know that something happened on that Sunday morning so long ago that transformed Jesus’ disciples from fickle followers to people who were willing to love recklessly for God.  Something happened and it transformed a radical peasant into the one who would save us all.  Something happened while it was still dark and it changed everything.

This is how the story in the Gospel of John begins, “Early on the first day, while it was still dark…” That is how the disciples emerged from a sleepless night and a tear stained bed- in the dark.  While it was still dark, the deepest corners of their hearts beat on in pain.  While it was still dark, they thought of life without Jesus.  While it was still dark, the world was the same, the Empire still reigned.  While it was still dark, death had the last word and he was gone. 

It might seem odd to recount the resurrection with such words, “…While it was still dark,” but I find them to be nearly perfect.  It seems that so much of the life of faith involves time in some kind of darkness or at least a sort of intellectual darkness where what we know of God cannot be quantified or qualified, just simply known.  And beginning a wild story in the dark extends and invitation so wide and deep that there is room for us all, as there is not one of us that can walk our days on this earth without spending some amount of time in the dark.  It is a literary way of welcoming the vastness of humanity, as if to say:  If any of you have known darkness, if any of you have lived in the shadows, if any of you have known the pain of the deep black night, listen up, come here, this is for you.  But while the story begins in the darkness, we are not left there, at least not for long.  As we walk with Mary, we quickly remember that we can only know light because we have walked in darkness.  We remember that even light cannot remove the darkness.  Light cannot extinguish darkness forever.  But we hold fast to the promise that light will illumine a path so we can see our way through any darkness.  Early on the first day, while it was still dark…

While it was still dark, Mary walked to the place where she last held hope made real in her hands.  As she made her way to the tomb, she knew darkness wholly.  While it was still dark, she tried to recount the events of the week that had passed; she recalled the days when Jesus’ message seemed to be growing stronger.  While it was still dark, she walked and walked only to find more darkness. 

It’s hard to know exactly what would happen to a soul who saw nothing in the place where her heart was supposed to be.  When Mary arrived at the tomb, she was startled to discover that it was empty.  First she was shocked, then terrified, and then confused wandering in darkness, back and forth and returning again.  Then she is reduced to tears, the kind of tears that take on a life of their own, and a rhythm of sorrow that rolls on and on.

But unlike the darkness in which most of us find ourselves; angels arrive to calm Mary’s tears.  She doesn’t seem to be surprised at all by the fact that there are angels sitting with her.  She is surrounded by too much darkness to have time for the rarity that is angels.  But she tells them because she has to tell someone that "They have taken the Lord."

While it was still dark, Mary Magdalene went to the place amid the rocks, a place where bodies can rest because Jesus was gone and with him went her abundant life and her hope of ever seeing light again.

While it was still dark, Mary sat crying at the feet of angels until…a voice sung her name like no other, “Mary.”  At first she thinks he is the gardener, but then her heart tells her that it is he.  It is Jesus, her teacher and friend. 

We don’t know how long it took before the sun began to emerge and we don’t know what it was that Mary saw or exactly what she felt.  But we know that something happened on that morning so long ago that transformed her from an anxious spirit to a woman willing to love recklessly for God.  We don’t know exactly what happened, but I am not sure that we need to. 

Because what happened, is that everything was different after him.  Before him, before Jesus of Nazareth lived fully and loved recklessly, before he told us that we must live as he lived if we want to know God, it was still dark.  Before him, we were living life as if we were the center of the universe, it was still dark.  Before him, God was a power found in the stars instead of the stranger on the street, it was still dark.

I believe that the resurrection is the core event of the Christian heart not because the stone was rolled away, not because there was no body to be found, not because angels appeared, but because the resurrection tells us something about our God.  Easter crystallizes for us why even bother to try to do all that Jesus’ asks of us in the first place.  Easter points us to the core truth of the Christian life:  Our God will never let us walk this path alone.    When love was nowhere to be found, God was there.  When hope seemed hidden, God was there.  While it was still dark, God was there.  Maybe that something that happened on that Sunday morning so long ago just might transform each of us from fickle followers to people who are willing to love recklessly for God.  Amen.