The Meaning of Jesus' Rising

Homily for Easter Sunday
April 9, 2023
John 20:1–18

In St. Mark’s account of the Transfiguration (Mk 9), after Jesus and the disciples had come down from the mountain, Jesus “ordered them to tell no one about what they had seen, until after the Son of Man had risen from the dead” (9:9).  St. Mark then writes that the disciples “kept the matter to themselves, questioning what this rising from the dead could mean” (9:10).  Just as the disciples in Mark questioned “what this rising from the dead could mean,” so might we question “what this rising from the dead could mean.”  And well we might question “what this rising from the dead could mean” because, on the one hand, except in a very few, limited cases, people who are dead do not come back to life.  Yet on the other hand, as St. Paul writes in his first letter to the Corinthians, “If there is no resurrection from the dead, then Christ has not been raised… [and] we are of all people most to be pitied” (1 Cor 15).  So we do well to wonder “what this rising from the dead could mean,” for dead people do not come back to life, yet at the same time “if Christ has not been raised… we are of all people most to be pitied.”

The record of scripture on the Resurrection is complex and raises many questions.  The record is so complex and raises so many questions that perhaps the best way to approach Jesus’ Resurrection is not through the scriptures that speak of his Resurrection, but rather with the scriptures that speak of his death, in particular the so-called “Suffering Servant” song of Isaiah chapter 53 (that we just heard on Friday):

Surely he has borne our infirmities…
He was wounded for our transgressions,
crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the punishment that made us whole,
and by his bruises we are healed. (Is 53:4,5)

Isaiah 53 reminds us that the first disciples, just as they questioned “what this rising… could mean,” so at first did they have no understanding of what Jesus’ dying could mean.  In spite of Jesus telling them in advance that “the Son of Man must undergo great suffering… and be killed and after three days rise again” (Mk 8:31), yet the disciples had no concept of a Messiah who must die, as we see in Peter’s response: Peter “took [Jesus] aside and began to rebuke him, saying ‘God forbid it, Lord!  This must never happen to you.’”  (Matt 16:22)  It was only after years—decades—of considering the stories about Jesus and his death, and after considering them alongside the scriptures, that the Church began to understand that Jesus’ death was no ordinary death, but rather that his death was (as Paul writes in 1 Corinthians) “for our sins,” and that his death was (again to quote 1 Corinthians) “in accordance with the scriptures” (1 Cor 15:3).  And it was passages such as Isaiah 53 that helped the early Church discover the meaning of Jesus’ death, that he “has borne our infirmities… was wounded for our transgressions,” and that “upon him was the punishment that made us whole.”

If it took years for the Church to begin to understand the meaning of Jesus’ death, so it likewise took years to begin to understand the meaning of Jesus’ rising.  And if the early Church made sense of Jesus’ death by considering his death in light of the scriptures, that Jesus’ death was “in accordance with the scriptures,” so, too, did the Church come to an understanding of Jesus’ rising by considering the stories of Jesus’ resurrection as they were “in accordance with the scriptures.”

While there are any number of scriptures that may have directly or indirectly influenced how the early Church made sense of the Resurrection—Psalm 16, for example, quoted by Peter in his Pentecost speech in Acts chapter 2: “For you will not abandon me to the grave, nor let your holy one see the Pit”; or the story of the Lord appearing to Abram at the Oaks of Mamre, from Genesis chapter 18, which bears similarities to Luke’s story of the risen Jesus meeting the disciples on the Emmaus road—there is one passage that was particularly influential, and that is the creation story in Genesis.  John’s resurrection account—from which we heard this morning—is in many ways a reversal of the fall in Genesis chapter 3.  For example, the crown of thorns with which Jesus is crowned at the beginning of his crucifixion hearkens to the “thorns and thistles” that God said would curse the ground after Adam and Eve are expelled from the garden (Gen 3:18).  In John, Pilate’s fear of Jesus after Jesus announces his divinity (19:8) echoes Adam and Eve’s fear of God after they heard the sound of God walking in the garden.  If in Genesis God formed Adam and placed him in a new world not yet inhabited, so in John is Jesus placed in a “new tomb in which no one had been laid” (19:41).  If in Genesis Adam and Eve hide from God, so at first in John is Jesus hidden from Mary.  If in Genesis God could be said to be a gardener, so in John does Mary mistake Jesus for the gardener.  And so on and so forth…. John’s account of the Resurrection suggests that the early Church understood Jesus’ rising to be no ordinary “resuscitation.”  Unlike, say, Jesus’ raising of Lazarus, or the daughter of Jairus, or the son of the widow of Nain—all of whom again one day would die—Jesus’ Resurrection was not a resuscitation.  Rather, in John’s account, in Jesus’ Resurrection something entirely new is created.  By Jesus’ Resurrection, suggests John, the original fall is reversed and Eden is once again opened with its possibilities for creation and new life.

It took years for the early Church to understand “what this rising from the dead could mean.”  If you are wondering “what this rising from the dead could mean,” might I suggest doing as the early Church did: consider the narratives that have been handed down to us: this morning’s story of Mary Magdalene, or next week’s story of Thomas, or the story of Jesus appearing to the disciples on the Emmaus road that we will hear the week after that?  Like those first Christians, maybe consider these narratives in light of the Old Testament—about which we each know more than we think—looking with an eye to how these resurrection stories might be “in accordance with the scriptures.”  And—perhaps most importantly—allow yourself time.  It took years—decades—for the early Church to even begin to understand “what this rising from the dead could mean.”  It is likely that for us, too, beginning to understand what Jesus’ rising from the dead could mean is a process that will take years.

If John’s Gospel is any indication, our faithfulness to a process of seeking to understand what Jesus’ rising from the dead could mean will open in us the possibility of something utterly and entirely new.  Our faithfulness to this process of understanding will place us into an Eden, with all its possibilities for newness and abundance and life.  Of course, there will be challenges in our process—like any journey, the process of beginning to understand “what this rising from the dead could mean” will not always be easy.  But as we like Mary continue to linger at the tomb, or as we like Thomas even in our doubts continue to gather with those who believe, or as we like the disciples on the Emmaus road continue to walk and to talk about “these things,” the risen Lord will appear.  To us.  Bringing peace and joy and life more abundant than we can ask or imagine.

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