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April 12, 2009

This is The Day of New Beginnings

Easter Sermon This is The Day of New Beginnings
April 12, 2009
John 20:1-18

She was a strong advocate for women’s rights, a leader in her church and her community. Her youngest child was married with a three month old little girl, her first grandchild. She had her whole life ahead of her. But at the age of 56, Kathleen collapsed and died of congestive heart failure on her kitchen floor. Kathleen’s death was devastating for the entire family, no one more so than her husband, William.

The second winter since Kathleen’s death was coming to a close. Promises of spring were all around…a slightly warmer wind, brave daffodils and tulips shooting up green leaves to test the temperature, bird songs calling from the trees. While visiting her mother’s grave, the eldest daughter was approached by one of the groundskeepers. He asked her relation to the deceased. The woman replied, “I’m her daughter, why?”

The groundskeeper proceeded to inform her that a middle-aged man had been coming to the grave every day since Kathleen’s funeral. Rain or shine he was there. He would stay for an hour or so and leave. Every day, no matter the weather, William came to visit the place where his wife’s body was laid to rest.

Similarly, on that morning so long ago, after the tragic events of Jesus’ trial, beatings, and crucifixion, Mary Magdalene came to Jesus’ tomb. The place where the one she loved was laid to rest. Mary Magdalene is named in every Gospel account as one of the first visitors to Jesus’ empty tomb. In John’s account she is alone. Typically John, Mary’s interaction with Jesus is intimate and deep.

Who is this first witness to Jesus’ Resurrection? Some of you may have been taught that Mary Magdalene was a prostitute. Many noted scholars however dismiss this label and suggest Mary may have suffered from a mental illness or nervous disorder. Whatever it was that afflicted Mary, Jesus healed her. And her gratitude, her devotion to Jesus did not dissipate when he was arrested, dragged before the chief priest, Pilate, and then crucified.

If she had been afflicted with a mental illness, Mary would have experienced firsthand the pain, isolation and cruel treatment of a society that could not or would not help those who are different. She would have been labeled an outcast, even if she had money and family. We might wonder how this could be, aren’t outcasts sent to live alone or with other outcasts. Not always.

In a recent article in the May/June issue of AARP, Barbara Kingsolver, wrote about a very similar situation in the country of Nepal. A young widow by the name of Menuka, was living as an outcast among her family. She married at 16 years old and moved in with her husband’s family. Five years later, when she was pregnant with their third child, her husband died. A husband’s death is the worst thing that can happen to a woman in this culture.

Immediately Menuka’s mother-in-law made her wash the red color (which signified privilege) from her hair. As a widow she could never wear bright colors again. Widows are not allowed to remarry. The community sees a widow as bad luck and drab clothing broadcasts her shame.

It also broadcasts vulnerability and many women, especially the younger ones, run the risk of sexual assault. There is no one to protect them. Menuka was ostracized from her community at the ripe old age of 21.(1) Menuka is exactly the type of person who Jesus reached out to during his time on earth—someone who society had shunned and loathed to associate with. If this is a part of Mary’s story, imagine how deeply grateful she was to Jesus for healing her!

In John’s account of the resurrection, Mary comes alone to the tomb before sunrise to have a quiet moment with her Lord before the rest of the women come to help anoint his body. But when Mary arrives, the stone has been rolled away. After Peter and the other disciple come and confirm that Jesus’ body is not in the tomb, they return home. But Mary remains, distraught, confused, and overwhelmed. Mary cannot figure out what has happened. Where is Jesus’ body? Where is his body? This is too much. She begins to weep.

And who can blame her! The events of the past few days have been horrific. The Gospel accounts record that she was there, standing with Jesus’ mother, supporting her, taking in the events of Jesus’ trial, crucifixion, and death. (2)

It may have been her past experiences at the hands of others that prepared her, that gave her the strength to support Jesus’ mother and stand in solidarity at the foot of the cross. But now, coming to the tomb and finding Jesus’ body gone, has done her in. Mary, who has endured so much; who has been so strong for everyone else; who thought she’d have more time with Jesus; cannot take it any longer. Her frustration opening up the grief that she has kept bottled up inside.

Enter Jesus, who Mary does not physically recognize. But when he speaks her name, Mary, she knows immediately that it is Jesus and she runs to him, kneeling at his feet. “Teacher!”

As if Jesus can see Mary’s heart, his first words to her are, “Do not cling to me.” He continues, “I am different now. Life is different now. Do not cling to the way it was. God is doing a new thing through me. Go and tell the disciples. You had faith in me before, trust me now. Go.”

Mary’s reaction is so typically human. We are more inclined to cling to the familiar rather than step into the unknown. Here are some examples:

• Some of us cling to the good old days of the past. We say, “We don’t need to explain why we are doing it this way. It’s what we’ve always done.” Or we say, “Remember the good old days when…”
• Some of us cling to the past in a different way. An event or time in the past defines how we see and experience the world today. We spend time looking back and asking, “why?”
• Some of us cling to an ideal instead of reality. We say things like, “I wish (fill in a name here) would change. I’ve got to help her see the error of her ways.”
• We cling to specific patterns or behaviors that are destructive. You say, “I can’t change. This is how I’ve always been.” You’ve lived with fear for so long that you are more comfortable living with fear as a driving force in your life than without it.
• Are you familiar with the phrase “helicopter parents?” These are the clinging parents who say, “I’m afraid to let my child make their own decisions. What if they makes a mistake?”
• We are unhappy in the present so we cling to the future and material bench marks. We say to ourself, “If I can just get (fill in the blank—richer, thinner, popular, successful) then I’ll be happy.” (pause)

Who among us hasn’t found ourselves clinging to some of these actions or ideals throughout the course of our life? I certainly have. I’ve entertained most of them at one time or another. Currently, I’m clinging to an ideal instead of reality—working on this one!

It’s a part of being human. Just as it was normal for Mary to run to Jesus, hoping their relationship would remain as it was before he was crucified. It’s natural to cling to the known, the status quo.

But when we put our trust and energy into one of these clinging concepts—when they become a mantra for our lives—we’re clinging to unhealthy, self-centered, human behavior. We’ve abandoned, betrayed, denied, or forgotten this God who loves us beyond our imagining. Love demonstrated in the life, teachings, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

This Easter morning, Jesus’ resurrection is God’s vivid reminder to us, death lost. By overcoming death, God demonstrated that God will have the last, loving word. It won’t always look and feel the way we expect or want at the time. But we can experience new life in Christ if we will believe in God’s power, God ability, and God’s desire to make a way where there seems to be only death, darkness or despair.

Remember William? He eventually quit going to the cemetery every day, he’d let a few weeks come and go before he made an appearance there. Instead, he started showing up at the church where he and his wife had attended…infrequently at first. Gradually over time, as he started to let people in the love he received there began to fill the hole that was left by Kathleen’s death.

One Sunday in worship there was a speaker from Heifer International. Heifer is a development organization based on the Christian principle—“love your neighbor as yourself.” Their goal is to help end world hunger and poverty through self-reliance & sustainability. They do this by working among the people, from the ground up. Heifer gives people animals specific for their environment and teaches them how to use the animals for a variety of life-sustaining ways. Those who are given an animal share their bounty with others. Community classes are very important and begin before the animals even arrive.

William, moved by the Heifer speaker, organized a fundraising event to purchase animals for Heifer. Having grown up on an Island, William realized the value of goats and all they provided. So he convinced his church to purchase goats. The fund drive purchased 25 goats for Heifer International clients. William was elated and his church family was so glad to see him coming back to life.

You might think that this is the end of the story but it is not. Unknown to William and his church, some of those 25 goats ended up in the village where our young friend, Menuka lived in Nepal. Remember the young widow who could not wear bright colors and was an outcast from her family and community at the age of 21?

Menuka’s mother-in-law had been attending Heifer sponsored meetings of a Women’s Togetherness Group. At the meetings, women of all casts came together. They devised a livelihood-improvement plan. They decided they would raise meat goats. The first women who received goats pledged to pass some of their goats offspring to other members, renewing the cycle until every villager had a source of income.

At the meetings, Menuka’s mother-in-law learned about sanitation and nutrition. They discussed their community’s century old traditions of gender and caste. The older woman started thinking about how women treat other women. She realized it is the women who make their daughters follow the cruel and shameful rules about widows. Menuka’s mother-in-law began bringing her to the meetings.

At one celebratory meeting, goats where exchanged from the original owners to new owners. A woman from a lower caste gave one of her offspring to a woman from a higher caste. They embraced.

Then, Menuka was asked to stand beside her mother-in-law. The other mothers from her village came forward and adorned her with red powder for her hair and face, and wrapped her in a red shawl. Red, the adornment forbidden to widows, was lavishly, loving bestowed on this young woman. New life was bestowed on her as signified by the bright colors.

Stanley Hauerwas, Christian scholar and faithful servant of God, captured our task when he said, “Christianity is a sign that enables you to live when you know no solutions.”(3) Easter is the ultimate sign that God’s love wins in the end. Broken relationships, broken hearts, broken lives are restored in God’s time and in God’s ways.

Two lives torn apart by a spouse’s untimely death are connected and restored to new life because of God’s action in the world. God’s ways are often a mystery to us. They cannot be explained or figured out—they just happen. Our task is the let go of what we are clinging to and step into the light of the resurrection. God is here. God will guide us. Expect it, trust God and it will come.

Whatever you do, don’t give up before the miracle comes, again…

Footnotes:
(1) Barbara Kingsolver, “The Color Red,” in AARP Magazine. May/June 2009 Issue. ©AARP.
(2)“Standing near the cross were Jesus’ mother, and his other’s sister, the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene.” (John 19:25) “And many women who had come from Galilee with Jesus to care for him were watching from a distance. Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Joseph and…” (Matt. 27:55-56) And again in Matthew, “Joseph took the body and …placed it in his own new tomb…Both Mary Magdalene and the other Mary were sitting nearby watching.” (Matt. 27:59-61)
(3) Stanley Hauerwas in the article, “The Politics of Gentleness” as written by Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove in Sojourners Magazine, April 2009 issue. © Sojourners. Washington D.C.

Posted by vickie at 10:00 AM