1. Christ
is risen! He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!
Today the living Lord Jesus Christ comes and rips away the blanket of death
which once enshrouded this sinful world. To all who doubt. To those who
deny. To those whose hearts are ruled by
cynicism, their minds by skepticism, the Holy Spirit speaks and says, "...in fact, Christ has been raised
from the dead. Follow Him, believe and be saved." Amen. The message from God’s Word for us this Easter
Sunday is taken from Luke 24:1-6 and is entitled, “Don’t Seek the Living Among the Dead.”
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ.
2.
How
wonderful are the women who went to the tomb on the first Easter morn! I don’t
envy them. They faced a difficult task. On Friday, they witnessed Jesus’
crucifixion. They knew the nature of the job that they had to do. So they got up early in the morning to do
some work. This was a work they felt was their duty. It wouldn’t be pleasant,
but it was something they were willing to do because of their love. So they gathered
together the spices, the ointments, and the things necessary for preparing a
body, and they went to the cemetery expecting to unwrap Jesus’ earthly remains
and prepare them for a proper burial. These
women were much like the women who are close to me in my life. They are willing
to do some unpleasant, but necessary things, because of a sense of duty and
because of their love. You, too, may know women such as these.
3.
And
so they went. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb. But when they
entered, they didn’t find the body of the Lord Jesus. What a surprise! There
was no body in the tomb. It was empty! While they wondered about this, suddenly
two men in clothes that dazzled their eyes stood beside them. In their fright,
the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them,
“Why do you seek the living among the
dead?” (v 5b).
4.
The
hearts of these women were filled with love for Jesus, but they lacked
something. They lacked something of ultimate importance. What they did here
plays out over and over again in our lives: They were looking for the living
among the dead. How often this happens even today! People look for life in all
the wrong places.
5.
I’d
guess many of you have seen the TV show American Idol. The part I like
least (although some people may like it best) is the beginning of the season
when some contestants make fools of themselves. Why do they do this? Is it
because they’re looking for fame? Do they believe their lives will be fulfilled
if somehow they become famous? I believe
the Easter angels would look at people with this attitude and say, “Why are you looking for the living among the
dead?” Fame has no eternal value. How many of us can name the top movie
stars from the silent film era? Fame is fleeting. Why do you look for the living among the dead?
6.
Others
may seek fulfillment in life from pleasure, the pleasure of the five senses. Why
do some people act immorally? Why do some people drink too much? Why do some people
use illegal drugs? For many people, pleasure is the ultimate goal of life. An effort to make life something more than
what they’re already experiencing. But they’ll ultimately discover that they’re
looking for the living, their own lives, among the dead.
7.
Others
may seek fortune. It’s tempting to believe that in some way, life will have
value if I have more things. If my house
is bigger, if my garage is full, if I command industry. Then my life will be
fulfilled. But all lives, whether they’re filled with fame or fortune or
pleasure or anything else in the world, are lives that end not with an empty
tomb, but in a tomb that’s filled with a body, your body. This is the certain
consequence of looking for the living among the dead.
8.
Even
religious commitment and fervor can lead to seeking the living among the dead. If
you’ve found yourself on this fruitless quest, you’re not alone. Martin Luther,
too, sought the living among the dead when he went to the monastery. He sought
the living among the dead when he deprived and punished himself for his impure
thoughts and desires. For many years, he lived lacking the very same thing the
women that first Easter morning were lacking. He says, “Though I lived as a monk without reproach, I felt that I was a sinner
before God with an extremely disturbed conscience. I could not believe that he
was placated by my satisfaction” (AE 34:337). His heart ached because he
believed that he was a miserable sinner and eternally lost.
9.
The
women went to the tomb with love in their hearts for Jesus. In fact, these
women may have loved Jesus more deeply at that moment than anyone else in the
entire world, but they were lacking one thing. They were lacking faith. They
hadn’t believed Jesus’ words that on the third day he would rise. They expected
to find the tomb filled with Jesus’ body, not empty.
10.
It’s
no coincidence that the Epistle appointed in our churches on this Resurrection
of Our Lord is from 1 Corinthians 15, because here the apostle Paul tells us
what the Gospel is. What is that you and I need to know? What should the women
have known that morning? What should they have believed? Paul writes, “Now I would remind you, brothers, of the
gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which
you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you
believed in vain” (1 Cor 15:1–2). What is this? What is the Gospel? It’s
this, “For I delivered to you as of first
importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with
the Scriptures” (1 Cor 15:3). This is what happened on Good Friday when
Jesus died on the cross. This is a wonderful message from Paul. He passes on to
us the message of first importance: that Christ died for our sins. For your
sins! The cross hadn’t been a huge miscalculation on God’s part or a defeat
of God’s plan. It was the plan! And it was for YOU!
11.
And
how do we know that? Because, in accordance with the Scriptures, Jesus was
buried, he was raised on the third day, and he appeared to Peter and then to
the Twelve. Jesus’ death and resurrection is for you! This is the Gospel. This
is what gives life. Had the women that first Easter morning understood and
believed this, that Jesus’ death was God’s plan for saving them, they would
have expected Jesus to rise, rather than look for the living among the dead. Living—Life!—Is
Found in That Jesus Died for Us and Is Now Living. This is life for all who believe. Fame, fortune,
and pleasure are all fleeting, but faith gives life eternal. Just as Christ’s
tomb was empty on Easter, so also in the resurrection of the dead shall we be
raised and our tombs will be empty.
12.
It
wasn’t until Luther became thoroughly acquainted with the Scriptures that he
discovered the wonderful message of salvation that he shares in his catechisms.
After years of studying the Bible, he finally discovered what it had meant all
along—this “for you,” “for our sins,’’
which is the Gospel. Jesus had died for Luther’s sins and granted him
forgiveness through faith. Luther reports, “I
began to understand that the righteousness of God is that by which the
righteous lives by a gift of God, namely by faith.” This was such a
wonderful and thrilling discovery for Luther that he declares, “I felt that I was altogether born again
and had entered paradise itself through open gates” (AE 34:337).
13. This so changed
Luther’s life that he spent his remaining years striving in every way possible
to bring this marvelous message to people who had been starved of the Gospel. The
Small Catechism was part of that effort. In it he writes concerning the Second
Article of the Apostles’ Creed, “I
believe that Jesus Christ, true God, begotten of the Father from eternity, and
also true man, born of the Virgin Mary, is my Lord, who has redeemed me, a lost
and condemned person, purchased and won me from all sins, from death, and from
the power of the devil; not with gold or silver, but with His holy, precious
blood and with His innocent suffering and death, that I may be His own and live
under Him in His kingdom and serve Him in everlasting righteousness, innocence,
and blessedness.”
14.
And
then Luther finished his Second Article explanation with this last clause: “just as He is risen from the dead, lives and
reigns to all eternity.” Think about what that means. Luther is saying that
we’ve been redeemed by Jesus’ precious blood, that we will live forever with
Christ in his kingdom, “just as”
surely as the fact that Jesus himself is risen and lives and reigns for all
eternity. In other words, if Jesus is really risen, if today, Easter, is true,
then we will live. If we can be sure of that, of Jesus’ resurrection, we can be
“just as” sure that we will live
also! And Jesus is risen! “He is
not here, but has risen” (v 6a).
15.
Therefore,
it is also so for each of us. We’ve been purchased and won. We have entered
paradise through the open gates of the Gospel. We will live with Christ forever
in his kingdom. The cross and empty tomb
are for us, but not for us alone. We join with Paul, Martin Luther, and
Christians throughout the ages in dedicating our lives to sharing this life in
the Living One with others.
16. We join the likes
of John Chrysostom, one of the most famous preachers in all history. He lived
from the mid 300s to the early 400s. For a time, he was archbishop of Constantinople.
One of his Easter sermons is so famous that in Eastern Orthodox churches, in
their first service on Easter Day, just after midnight, his sermon is read
every year, even to this day. It does us well to hear his words this morning,
words that for sixteen hundred years have been speaking the life of Easter to
Christian people: “Christ is risen, and
you o death are annihilated. Christ is risen, and the evil ones are cast down.
Christ is risen, and the angels rejoice. Christ is risen, and life is liberated.
Christ is risen, and the tomb is emptied of its dead; for Christ, having risen
from the dead, is become the first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep. To
Him be glory and power forever and ever. Amen.”
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