20 Apr Sermon – Easter Sunday, April 20, 2025
Worse than seeing something dead, I hate to see a living thing suffer. I also hate to see something dead whose death could have been prevented or who suffered death due to an unnatural encounter with human beings or human structures: like animals who meet their demise beside a jersey wall after nervously traversing several lanes of traffic only to discover there’s no way to progress any further and become trapped between a cement blockade and fast moving vehicles.
When I found a large house centipede curled up and dried up in the hair catching strainer of the salon sink in my basement, I grieved that during the night, he or she had climbed in for a lifesaving drink only to die because he or she couldn’t climb back up the slick glazed vertical sides of the shampoo bowl. Gently, I dropped a few drops of water from the ends of my fingertips upon its curled lifeless body and contracted multiple pairs of legs.
Much to my amazement, the lifeless body began to reconstitute, to swell in size and uncurl in length. The antennae and legs began to straighten and soon the centipede was crawling on his or her way again, once I lifted it up and out of the sink using a nearby hair towel. After reading that their kind are beneficial apex predators in the world of household pests, I kind of wanted one or two around.
As a child, I once rescued an injured squirrel from the road and brought it to my parents who instructed me to place it at the foot of a tree. “Yes. That makes sense,” I told myself. “A handy tree will make it easier for the squirrel to climb up and be safe once it fully revives.”
When I went to check on the squirrel later, it was gone. Running toward the adults with the kind of exuberance reserved for miracles, I was told, “Yes, honey. It scampered away.” And I believed them at the time and until many years later, when mom or dad told me that one of the adults had moved the squirrel’s furry little lifeless body out of sight. It wasn’t just that I couldn’t find evidence of it scampering away, there were no footprints leaving any sort of trail.
So which is it? Is the Easter story about Jesus who looked dead, like the centipede but wasn’t really dead? Or is it the Easter story about Jesus who was actually dead, like the squirrel, but whose body was moved so that his disciples, like me, were deceived into thinking he rose again.
The difference between the Easter story and my stories is this: No other parties made anything happen that wouldn’t have happened anyway. There was no outside interference. The linen cloths were cast off by the very individual whose body they wrapped up. The face cloth folded neatly at the head of the deceased was removed by none other than the wearer.
If Mary wondered how Jesus would raise himself as he once raised her brother Lazarus, we have proof that Jesus himself has conquered death and risen from the grave after three days. We say that God raised him, and that’s true, but what’s important is what we’re meant to learn from the experience of death itself.
We are not to deny that it occurs as my parents and the other adults did, though sometimes that may seem like a merciful thing. In life there are times when we must let a person believe what they hope for, even when it isn’t true. This exact scenario happened at the hospital recently.
A patient’s roommate heard what didn’t sound right in the middle of the night. The noises resembled a person trying to breathe underwater which was troublesome so they rang the call bell and expressed great urgency to staff. And in fact, the roommate was experiencing cardiac arrest.
These two had spent almost an entire week together, one hundred and sixty six hours to be exact, lying side-by-side in adjacent hospital beds exchanging life stories, sharing what was going on face-to-face, indirectly listening to conversations from staff related to each other’s health, being casually introduced to family members and friends passing through during visitation. When I was paged in the middle of the night, staff requested that I speak with this person, the one who alerted staff of the crisis and had now been temporarily displaced.
After about 40 minutes of conversation, the person I spoke to was informed, “Your room is ready,” and was about to be escorted. I stuck around to help carry a few personal belongings back. But the room looked very different now. The emergency team that had rushed in with a crash cart on wheels plus many other supplies was gone. The room was too tidy. To be exact, half of their shared room was empty.
The second bed and everything that had previously been on that side of the room were gone, including the person who had occupied the bed along with all of their belongings. Where was the person who, according to their roommate, thought that that very morning was being discharged to go home.
Without being forewarned or told what to expect, finding the room half empty felt both shocking and disturbing. More than forty minutes had elapsed. It seemed reasonable to hope that some evidence of what had transpired would be visible. In fact, the hope we shared was to see the roommate who had resided for the past week in the other bed fully revived, perhaps even talking. But there was no one and nothing to see.
Like the women who proceeded to the tomb of Jesus Christ, we stood there dumbfounded and amazed, wishing for answers, wanting to know what happened or at least to know whether the thing that happened yielded good or bad results. Unlike Christians, who are privileged to have the scriptures in our possession and to receive the full account, we were told nothing.
Like the child who rescued a squirrel from the road had hoped that her intervention might save a life, this person wondered whether their care and attention towards their roommate combined with their powers of observation and willingness to act on another’s behalf had done the same.
In fact, they had indeed saved a life, at least for the time being. And this person could truthfully be told that what they did made a difference and did matter, even if death would come again soon and not be denied. In the end, they were told a half-truth, but no one knew that then.
At the time, the story that was told was the story God wanted to tell. It was the truth that one person or perhaps several persons including me needed to hear. It seemed as though everyone involved needed to learn something about life and themselves. Especially the person whom God placed beside another person so that they would get to know them and also become known.
This person learned that paying attention to one who is suffering like you but in a different way is important. They learned, as the women at the tomb did, that sometimes God invites you or takes you to places where no one else but you would interpret things as you would, or will act in the same way that God is sure you will.
What’s important is recognizing that life is a series of ongoing joy and sorrow, of perplexing events full of unanswered questions. We do what we can and are surprised when that which we’ve prepared to do can’t happen because plans change. But there are no half truths to Jesus’ resurrection. No one moved his body from the tomb like the squirrel’s body I placed so lovingly beneath the tree.
Whatever we need to know is given to us by God when we need to know it. The circumstances being what they are aren’t examples of deception at play, but God’s wisdom at work. Time is held in God’s hands and even when it seems as though time ends because a person dies, Jesus rises from the grave to tell us that’s not the end.
Mercy prevails when life would otherwise amount to unending suffering. Like an animal languishing for hours in a steel trap with no hope of rescue or recovery, death does not come only as sweet relief from pain, but with the hope of rising again to new life. That the body is created anew and lives on is no idle tale. Believe it, for the truth is revealed in scripture.
God chose women as the first witnesses, but their word was not believed, except by other women. At first, the way some events unfold are terrifying. They cause us to recoil and bow down. But God speaks through angels to say, “Why do you persist in aiming for your original target when things have changed so dramatically? Don’t you know that moving forward in the same way will be futile and in fact, impossible? Look and see, things are different. Remember that Jesus told you what must happen in order so that what’s happening now can help to accomplish everything God has planned.”
Knowledge will come in time. Just be faithful. Do what you can, share what you learn and don’t worry about the end result. Even though some people won’t believe you, your actions or words may yet inspire them to find out for themselves that thing which God chose to show you first.
That’s the story of the women at the tomb and of people who try to make life better or more bearable through circumstances of pain and loss. As your pastor, I see your lives reflecting the gospel message and the points I tried to make in today’s sermon. I give thanks to God for the ways our two congregations are faithful and dutiful, for the devotion you show to your families, your church and community. Let us pray.
Lord, we come to you, searching for your tangible presence, the one familiar to us which brings us comfort. Thank you for guiding us through periods of confusion and grief, for showing us where to go and giving us others with whom to share our life experience.
Send us angels when we need them and courage when we have none. Hold us when we are weak and help us to remember that not only victory over death and the grave are our gifts at Easter, but knowledge of how to live with compassion. Continually help us pay attention to lives which struggle in our midst. In your holy name we pray, Amen.