The Important Easter Questions
Imagine walking along that path that led to the garden. The branches of olive trees hang over the dirt path that leads to the final resting place of the Lord’s people. It’s early. The air is crisp as the sun is only starting to think about rising over the hill. A large stone that’s supposed to be over the mouth of a tomb is the first thing you can make out in the darkness. But it isn’t where it was a few days ago.
It had been rolled into place and sealed on Friday, after the body of your dear friend had been placed on the tomb’s shelf. But now it’s been rolled back along the track, leaving the tomb wide open. This is not good. You turn around and you run, not walk, and you tell your circle of friends his friends that someone has opened the tomb and taken the body.
Two of them run back the way you came down the path, through the trees, and into the garden to see for themselves. You end up going back too. You had grieved a few days ago when he died, and now you’re grieving a painful second loss.
Can you imagine that kind of heartache?
There was a woman who didn’t have to imagine it because she lived it. She was Mary from the city of Magdala. Her situation had been ungodly. Truly. She was possessed by not one demon, not two, not three—seven demons had taken possession of her! How horrible! Jesus had given her a new life when he drove those seven demons from her. As she got to know him, he gave her a new life in an entirely different way. She trusted him as her Savior, the one who forgave her sins and promised her eternal life in heaven. She loved her Lord.
So, you can understand her grief, can’t you? You might have stood outside that grave sobbing like she did. Would you have had the courage to bend over and tilt your head to the side enough to look at the place where the body was supposed to be? She did. And what happened after that is why we are here this morning.
1. Why Are You Weeping?
What a devastating start to the day. Mary went to the tomb fully expecting to properly care for Jesus’ body that had been hastily put there before the start of the Sabbath. She stands there crying no, not just crying she’s sobbing. She can’t stop. She looks into the tomb, and if there were harps and halos, she completely missed them (there probably weren’t)! The angels who aren’t even recognized as angels by Mary (whose eyes are blurry with tears) ask what might seem like an odd question: “Woman, why are you weeping?” Wasn’t it obvious? She was clearly looking for the body that was not there anymore. Love and devotion and appreciation had driven her to the tomb to care for her Lord and his body had been removed. “Because they have taken away my Lord, and I don’t know where they have laid him, ” she said.
She turns around and she gets the same question again! “Woman, why are you weeping?” “Sir, if you carried him off, tell me where you laid him, and I will get him.” The gardener would know what happened, right? So many emotions and so many tears that she couldn’t even tell that the gardener wasn’t the gardener at all.
Confused, helpless, tears, grief? Can you relate? We weep too, don’t we?
We weep when we sit alone feeling lonely
We weep when we feel relationships dying. We weep when guilt pours over us because of what we’ve done. We weep when our life isn’t turning out the way we wanted it to We weep over wayward children…and over failing parents. We weep in hospital rooms.
And yes, we weep at gravesides too, like Mary did.
With any of those things, and others, it’s often not just the pain or the loss, it’s that we don’t understand why it has to be this way.
Why do so many things in this world lead to tears? If I picked you out of all these people in this courtyard this morning and called on you to answer that question, I suspect I know what you might say. It’s sin, you’d say. Sin is why so many things in this world lead to tears. And you wouldn’t be wrong.
But do you think if we looked deep into our hearts we might find a more specific cause? How about this: We weep because our hope is misplaced. We weep because our love and focus are not aimed at the right thing.
Look at Mary, standing there outside the tomb in tears. She wasn’t looking for a living Savior; she was looking only for a body and feeling only earthly loss. Do we make Mary’s mistake? Are we living as though Jesus has not risen? We have our moments, don’t we?
Like those times we don’t even consider that he is in control and working for our good in the midst of whatever chaos or crisis we have going on at the moment.
Or those times when all we can think about is what we have lost and we forget about the promised presence and love and care of our risen Lord.
Please don’t misunderstand. We can absolutely enjoy things God has blessed us with And Jesus, who cried at the death of his friend Lazarus, would never tell us not to grieve at all. The problems come when we cling to things in this world as if they are permanent, as if this is all we have and will ever have. So, when we feel something is missing, or we lose something we valued, we weep as though everything is lost. In those moments, our blurry, tear-filled eyes are missing something. We aren’t seeing the most important thing in our lives: We have a living and loving Lord.
It’s kind of like being stuck on Good Friday and missing out on Easter which is where Mary was at.
2. Who Are You Looking For?
You’re trying to get everything together and get out the door: water bottle, phone, the thing you need to return to your friend…where are your keys? They’re not in the basket where you keep them. You didn’t leave them on the counter by the fridge when you got your water. Where in the world?! You really want to blame “whoever borrowed your keys,” and as you are about to impolitely do so, you realize…yeah, they’re right in your hand! All that searching and frustration and what you were looking for was right there!
“Who are you looking for?” asks the gardener who wasn’t a gardener. Beside herself with grief and sadness and stress, with tears running down her cheeks, Mary says, “Sir, if you carried him off, tell me where you laid him, and I will get him.”
The Key to her life was right in front of her and she didn’t even realize it! The One she was looking for was right there. The problem was not just an overwhelmed mind or an aching heart or eyes blinded by salty tears. The problem was that Mary was looking for the wrong Jesus. She was looking for the one silenced and powerless in death the one she had seen lifeless on a cross And it caused her so much pain.
You might find it tempting to look at Mary and say, “But Mary, you should have known. He told you all that he would die and that he would rise again.” But maybe you should ask yourself, “Who are you looking for?”
Someone to make your life better? If that’s all you’re looking for, you might be disappointed, because God doesn’t promise you everything you want in this world. In fact, you’re still going to have your fair share of problems. It’s easy to think, Well, I’m a Christian, so that should get me something. I should get a little special treatment And then when things don’t go the way we want or expect? Weeping in the way that Mary wept because we’re looking for the wrong Jesus, like she was. We have a way of focusing so much more on things in this world and our life here and wanting Jesus for all of those things.
But see, if you’re doing that, you’re grossly undershooting! You’re not aiming high enough, my friend! What you want is the real Jesus, the real, living, loving Jesus!
You want the one who knows you by name because he has died to forgive all the things you’ve ever done wrong.
You want the one who walked out of the tomb on Sunday after lying in there dead since Friday, because that’s the one who says that you’re going to live after you die too!
You want the one who mentioned his upcoming ascension into heaven to Mary in the garden, because he promises to prepare a place for you there!
That’s the Jesus you should be looking for!
If you’ve been to an Arizona basketball game, you know how loud it can be announcers, music blaring, so many people cheering and talking. Noise everywhere. Picture being in the middle of all that and, suddenly, you hear your name. It’s not some random person, but someone who knows you well. You instantly turn around because you recognize that voice. It stands out in the middle of all the noise
That’s all it took in the garden: “Mary.” His voice. Her name. And all the noise was gone.
When we are sad, confused, weeping, grieving, disillusioned, disappointed, his voice cuts through all the noise. Listen to his gracious, gospel voice as he speaks your name and says, Your sins are forgiven. I am alive. And I know you.
That you have a living Savior has the power to change your outlook on life. In fact, the turnaround can be dramatic. Just look at Mary! “Teacher!” she says. She is beyond excited to see him joy, relief…love! You might imagine how she wanted to hold onto him tightly, but he says, “No, don’t do that.” Things won’t be exactly like they were before, but she didn’t have to worry about losing him again. How fast do you think she ran back to tell the disciples that Jesus was alive?!
You know, our living Savior gives us a direction similar to the one he gave to Mary. She was to go and tell her friends the happy news that Jesus was alive and she didn’t have to be told twice!
People like you and me people who have, by faith, seen Jesus are also filled with a joy that moves us to share the good news of forgiveness and life in Christ. It’s something we do because we love our Savior and we love the people around us.
Imagine that garden path again. The olive branches overhead. The cool morning air. The open tomb. At first, it looked like the worst possible news, but it turned out to be the best. Because the empty tomb is not a place of loss, it is a place of victory.
So, when Jesus asks you, “Why are you weeping?” You can answer: I was weeping but now I know.
And when he asks, “Who are you looking for?” You can answer: The risen Lord. The one who called Mary by name. The one who calls me by name. The one who lives for me. Amen.
Now the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.