“It’s All about Life,” Mark 16.1–7, Easter Sunday Sunrise, ‘14

1.      Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Heavenly Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.  Amen.  Today each of us says it with great joy, “It’s all about Jesus and it’s all about life!” We see it in the life of the disciple Peter, with whom we’ve traveled these past weeks of Lent. We’ve seen Peter in all kinds of sins—pride, complacency, misunderstanding Jesus’ mission, distant discipleship, keeping bad company, denial, even turning down Jesus’ gift of cleansing. On Friday we saw Peter declaring the penalty of all those sins: death. But today we see Peter being welcomed back to life. We see it for ourselves as well, because that’s what Easter is all about.  Easter is about life—life after sin and life after death! 

2.      Early Easter morning, three women came to the tomb to anoint the body of Jesus. Mark 16 says, “Entering the tomb, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, dressed in a white robe, and they were alarmed” (v 5). They get a message straight from an angel: “Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen; he is not here. See the place where they laid him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going before you to Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you” (vv 6–7). 

3.      Go tell his disciples and Peter. Why did the angel single out Peter by name—Peter who boasted he would never forsake Jesus (pride!), Peter who slept when he should have prayed (complacency!), Peter who thought he was the one to save the day by striking out with a sword at Jesus’ arrest (misunderstanding!), Peter who followed only from a distance as Jesus was condemned (distant discipleship!), Peter who lingered with Jesus’ enemies (bad company!), Peter who denied the Lord three times, Peter who didn’t think he needed Jesus’ cleansing? If the angel had excluded Peter, we would understand. 

4.      But this is the Gospel. There’s life after Peter’s sin. Go tell his disciples and Peter that he has risen. Peter, who wept bitterly after his denial of Jesus, is to hear, “He has risen.” The cross was for Peter. Jesus’ death was for Peter. The resurrection was for Peter. Now there is forgiveness for Peter. Now there is life after sin’s death for Peter. 

5.      Peter’s experiences are a mirror in which we see ourselves. Sin had caused many of Peter’s responses. Sin causes many of our responses as well. Sin tells us a great variety of lies.  Here are some examples. Sinful pride tells me I’m number one with God because I’ve sinned less or done more good than all the rest. Sin tells me that God and the spiritual side of life can wait. Work, sleep, fun, and making it in life come first. Sin tells me I know better than God what I need, what I should do, or what’s right or wrong. Sin tells me it’s all right to follow Jesus at a distance—following Jesus only when there’s no persecution or when it doesn’t cost me anything. Sin tells me I can handle bad company, I can handle the drug scene, I can handle pornography, and I won’t get hurt. Sin tells me it’s all right to turn my back on God when I’m in a tight spot, when it seems that I’m safer or better off or accepted by people if I’m an anonymous Christian. Sin tells me to blend in with the crowd, even when it’s wrong. Don’t say, for example, that you’re opposed to abortion and why. It’s not politically correct. Sin tells me all this is all right, this is the way to life that’s real. 

6.      But sin is telling me lies. This is not life. This is death to everything and everyone I touch with my sin. This is death to me. Sin is walking with death, and the destination is hell.

7.      But this day is about life. Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia! What a turnaround from Good Friday’s death. Take one more look at that death. Everything that sin does was done to Jesus when he hung on that cross. All that sin has done in us, with us, and to us was on him on that cross. All the sin that is lived out in our thoughts, words, and deeds was on Jesus when he hung on that cross. He was guilty with it. Jesus suffered for it. He died for it. Now Jesus is alive again! There’s been a resurrection! That validates the cross and what happened there. Look what happened to sin. Jesus absorbed it, paid for it, and overcame it in his death and resurrection. St. Paul says, “[He] was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification” (Rom 4:25).

8.      The cross and the resurrection mean that now there’s life after sin. Life is great after sin. You are justified. That means God says you’re not guilty. You are right with God. You are at peace with God. You’re no longer hell-bound. You’re heaven-bound. You are alive in Christ, and Christ is alive in you. Your sins are no longer unto death. You can repent. “If we confess our sins,” writes St. John, “he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 Jn 1:9).

9.      Peter, who fell so deeply in so many ways, is called by name. Tell his disciples and Peter. God knows you personally, by name. Hear God speak to you through the pen of Isaiah: “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine” (Is 43:1).

10.  This day is all about life. It’s very practical for life, both today and tomorrow. “Go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going before you to Galilee” (v 7). Galilee was home to the disciples. Today Galilee means home to you, where you live, where you work, where you go to school. The living Christ goes before you. He, who mastered sin and death, is your resource. You are alive in him, and he is alive in you. Is it hard to love, to forgive, to care, to give of yourself in your marriage, in your home, at school, in your work, in church? He enables you for all of that. You grow into it, because you’re alive in Christ. St. Paul put it this way for us: “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (Gal 2:20).

11.  This day is all about life—yes, also life after physical death. Christ died in his body and rose in his body.  In his appearance to his doubting disciples, he said in Luke 24, “ ‘Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.’ And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. And while they still disbelieved for joy and were marveling, he said to them, ‘Have you anything here to eat?’ They gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he took it and ate before them” (Lk 24:38–43).

12.  The crucified Christ is alive again. Resurrection has already begun. We who are joined to him in Baptism are next. We go through death and burial as Jesus did. Until the resurrection, we’re with Christ. But resurrection is coming. Physical death is temporary. We will live again, in our bodies, at the resurrection. Right now the clock is ticking toward that day. Listen to St. Paul: “[God] has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead” (Acts 17:31). It won’t be long. Your name is written in heaven (Lk 10:20).

13.  This day is all about life, life after sin, life after physical death, life in the risen Christ. It’s all about life now and more life to come.  Amen.