A Sermon
Presented by Rev. Merlin T. Batt,
Intentional Interim Pastor
St. Matthew’s United Church of Christ
At Maiden, North Carolina
Second Sunday of Easter
April 15, 2007

Scripture Lesson: John 20:19-31
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You may recall that our Easter Sunday service last week ended with the familiar Easter hymn entitled “The Day of Resurrection,” the last verse of which goes like this:

  Now let the heavens be joyful, let earth her song begin,
  The round world keep high triumph, and all that is therein;
  Let all things seen and unseen their notes of gladness blend,
  For Christ the Lord is risen, our joy that hath no end.

Easter Day is, indeed, a joyful day in the life of the Christian Church. In some traditions, on the Saturday night before Easter there is held what’s called an Easter Vigil, traditionally a lengthy service ending just after the stroke of midnight. There are Sunrise Services, as here at St. Matthews, with worshipers gathering in the predawn (and this year, very cold) darkness to celebrate the Resurrection. A festive breakfast often follows, and that soon followed by one or more Easter morning services, when all the “stops” are pulled, people dress up for the occasion and turn out in large numbers to celebrate the Resurrection with great joy. And there are some churches which still hold to the tradition of having an Easter evening service as well. Joy is the mood of the day.

But that’s not all. Easter joy rings out for 50 days more, as Easter is not merely a day, but a long season, Eastertide it’s called. That’s why the white-cloth-draped cross remains in the sanctuary throughout these 50 days of celebration. Easter hymns and Scripture readings continue through these seven weeks. But even that’s not all! Remember that every Sunday throughout the year is understood by the Church as a “little Easter,” a day to celebrate the joy of the Resurrection of King Jesus.

So it is very odd that, when we read the Gospel accounts of the Resurrection, there is so little joy evident in the events described. Curiously, it is fear, not joy, which fills these stories. See what I mean. Mark’s Gospel ends with this verse, “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.” Matthew’s account of the Resurrection tells that the risen Lord says to the stunned women, “Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me.” Luke tells us that the women standing before the empty tomb of Jesus “were terrified and bowed their faces to the ground.” And John’s Gospel gives us the story of the disciples gathered in a room on the first Easter evening, cowering in fear behind locked doors. Fear was the initial, primary, overwhelming emotion evoked by the Resurrection of Jesus

What’s going on here? Let’s take John’s story, for example. It begins this way, “When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, ‘Peace be with you.’”

At the most obvious level, the disciples were afraid of those who were opposed to Jesus and his ministry, afraid of those who had arranged for Jesus to be executed as a revolutionary brigand - a reasonable fear, wouldn’t you agree? After all, revolutionary movements in that day, as in ours, didn’t just die out when the leader was killed. They simply found a new leader and continued the armed struggle. Al Qaeda, for example, doesn’t disappear when one of its top leaders is killed; another leader is always ready to step up to take his place. So, even though the Jesus movement was not a violent, revolutionary affair, the disciples had good reason to think they would be treated as such; and therefore, they believed they were in imminent danger. And even if they were a bit paranoid, remember, even paranoid people have enemies!

Maybe this by itself explains why the disciples had shut the doors and locked them tight on Sunday night. But, then, could there have been some other fears at work in them? Could they have been afraid of the comments that might come from their friends and family, for instance, criticizing them for going all out to support a failed messiah. After all, only failed messiahs got themselves crucified?

Or could their fear have been related to their guilt? Remember, when push came to shove, all the disciples fled the scene, abandoned Jesus at the moment of his greatest need, denied they had anything at all to do with him. Imagine yourself as one of them. You abandoned and denied your Lord, and now you hear from some of the women in your group that He is alive again. Well, you might be thinking: what if he shows up to pay us back for our cowardly disloyalty? Lock those doors tight! Click. Click. Click.

But here’s the irony of the Gospel today. The disciples have locked the doors tight, but Caesar’s soldiers were not trying to get them. They were safely sealed in a windowless room, but their critics were not attempting to come and mock them. The dead bolt was set, the security system was turned “on”, but the risen Jesus was not looking for them to get revenge. No, the risen Jesus was trying to get to his disciples in order to bless them; in order to give them peace; in order to forgive them; in order to empower them for the work he had for them to do!

When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear…Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”

Here’s the good news of Easter, friends. Just as death could not hold Jesus in the tomb, so our “locks” cannot keep him from getting to us! Aren’t there ways, even if unintentional ones, that we try to lock out King Jesus and make ourselves secure against his coming among us? Bishop William Willimon says in a sermon on this passage,

We didn’t know that we were locking him out when we stayed away from church, when we avoided signing up for the Bible study, when we found others things to do than pray…We didn’t know that we were locking him out when we kept our faith safely tucked away within ourselves, when our religion became something that we practice only in the safe confines behind the closed doors of the church, rather than  out in the world where we work and spend so much of our lives. But we did.

Today is the day when the church reminds itself not only that Jesus rose from the dead, but that he also comes looking for us! Just as the risen Lord wasn’t kept out by the locked doors behind which his first followers cowered in fear, so He will not be deterred by any “locks” that you and I set, whether on purpose on unintentionally.

You see, King Jesus is very resourceful, quite imaginative, and doggedly persistent. He is determined to have you. Even now, in this sermon, in this service, as you go forth from this place, Christ is coming to look for you. He is coming to bless you, to give you his peace, to forgive you, and to ready you for the work he has for you to do in the world. Get used to the idea - there is no sure defense against Him; there is no way to secure yourself against Him intruding upon you life. He is determined to have you.

 Now let the heavens be joyful, let earth her song begin,
 The round world keep high triumph, and all that is therein;
 Let all things seen and unseen their notes of gladness blend,
 For Christ the Lord is risen, our joy that hath no end. Amen.