Here We Go
Matthew 28
Easter Message 2012
Here we go.
It’s Easter and once again we rally the troops and rally ourselves around this
high point of the Christian year. When Abby and I were a part of the Lexington,
KY corps , we participated in a literal sunrise service. Whenever the sun would
rise, generally somewhere in the five-o-clock hour, the meeting started. The
problem for me was that Abby and I lived forty-five minutes away. When the
alarm went off around 4:00am getting out of bed took extraordinary effort.
Trying to summon my stiff and sleeping muscles to start showing life, I would
count… “OK…one, two, three,” ...nothing would happen! Then as if I were a professional weightlifter
I would say, ‘here we go,’ making a strong willful effort to lift myself out of
bed. Then make my way to the sunrise service.
It might
have been that Mary Magdalene and “the other Mary” felt like they had to pull
themselves out of bed the morning “after
the Sabbath, at dawn on the first day of the week…”(28:1) they had to wake
up before the sun could brighten their path[1]
and head to the tomb.[2]
For
the past three weekends, I watched the NCAA basketball tournament. With every
victory there was footage of the winning team bursting with excitement and
raising their hands in the air. That image is contrasted by that of the losing
team, covering their face with their jersey, some crying, hugging each other, or
others standing still. We feel with them the weight of disappointment. Then at
some point a teammate or a coach takes their arm and says “it’s alright” and
they head to the locker room. They might simply say in a soft and disappointing
tone, “ok…here we go, come on, here we go.”
I could be
what these ladies named Mary had to do for each other on that morning. Yes,
their hopes for the Messiah were failed. Yes, their leader who they thought
could bring justice to the empire was dead. Yes, even Peter left him. Yes, the
disciples are cowardly huddled away. But these women named Mary had to do
something. They had to at least go and emotionally close this period in their
lives. In the darkness of the first step of their morning, the Marys….said,
“here we go.”
A
few days earlier, following Jesus’ crucifixion, “the chief priests and the Pharisees went to Pilate” (27:62) asking
him to guard the tomb for fear that the disciples would “steal the body and tell people he was raised from the dead.” I can
imagine the guards sarcastically moving toward the tomb, thinking “right we’re going to guard a dead
man…they’re taking us off our regular watch to guard a dead man.” Cynically
they could say to themselves, “Alright,
[yes sir, boss]…here we go.”
One
group in sarcasm the other in lament, they both find themselves at the tomb on
the first day of the week. Matthew is the only gospel to record the drama of an
earthquake. He says, “a violent
earthquake” came because an “angel
of the Lord came down from heaven and, going to the tomb, rolled back the stone
and sat on it” (28:2). I imagine Matthew includes the earthquake because he
is connecting to a Jewish audience, which was used to Earthquakes accompanying
God’s actions. Maybe the other gospel writers did not want to seem overly
dramatic, but not Matthew. Matthew fills the scene with drama and the same
happens as he describes the appearance of the angel.[3]
The
guards who had one job—to watch a dead man, ironically “became like dead men” (28:4) themselves. I am not sure if they
were faking it like my sons do, when I come in and ask them if they are asleep.
As they squint their eyes and move their head in my direction, I say “are you asleep?” and they say, “yes.” Certainly this angel was not a soft cuddling precious moments
figurine. This angel was striking and scared these full-time warriors to act
like they were dead.
It’s
not surprising then that the first words of the angel are, “Do not be afraid…” (28:5). The next words were wonderfully
shocking. I imagine for the rest of their lives they could hear the tone, the
pitch, and the pace of the angel words:
“He is not here; he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place
where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples: ‘He has risen from the
dead and is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him.’ Now I
have told you” (28:5-7).
There
are a few ways to read this last line. It
could seem like the end of the message. Something like the end of a message in a
Mission Impossible scene, “this is the
end of the message; in ten seconds this message will self-destruct.” Or we
could hear it in a sophisticated tone, thus
endeth the lesson, as the angel yawns, “now
[yawn] I have told you.” This conclusion is connected to the four words of
instruction, imperative commands, from the angel, “Come, see, go, tell.” The
angel tells them to get going and to tell the disciples. They are commissioned with the most
significant news in world history. “Now…anytime
now…” The Marys maybe are waiting to hear another word, they are waiting to
hear him say, “Now!! I have told you
[get going].
I
can almost see the Marys looking to each other and saying, “I don’t know what all of this means, but here we go,” as they take
off running and they hurry to obey. The text lets us into their world, and says
that they were “afraid yet filled with
joy.” Then “suddenly Jesus met
them.”
In
an almost comic moment comes Jesus speaks to these ladies. He could have
bellowed in a large voice, “Behold…I am
raised from the dead, stop and worship me.” Instead he gives the most
casual greeting; it is the equivalent of, “Good
morning/What’s up.” Their response is to worship him. Notice too, just in case any assume that
Jesus did not bodily raise from the dead, that as they give homage they,
“clasped his feat.” Meaning…Jesus
was touchable and tangible. He was in every way alive and not a hallucination
or a figment of their imagination.
Jesus
speaks and gives a similar message as the angel did: “Do not be afraid. Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they
will see me” (28:10). And so they went.
I
have never picked up in this passage, until now, how stark the contrast is
between the women and the guards. They both are witnesses to a miraculous
event. The women listen, while the guards appear dead.[4]
Verse 11 paints the diverging ways they went that morning: “While the women were on their way…” (28:11).[5]
We are told that only “some of the guards went into the city and
reported to the chief priests” (28:11). What surprises me is that these
guards apparently told the truth about what happened. Verse 11 says they “reported…everything that had happened.” This was certainly trouble
for these guards. They had failed, but some of them looked at each other and
their certain failure and said, “here we go.”[6]
Both Marys go as they are told, the guards go
and report, and the disciples also receive a command to go. You and I are here
today because Mary Magalene and “the other Mary” went, and the disciples
responded to Jesus’ call—went. Jesus gives them what we know as the great
commission, “All authority in heaven and
on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations”
(28:18-19). They were to make disciples by going. Because of
Jesus’ resurrection and its power they looked at each other on that mountain and
could have said, “here we go.” It because of what we saw here…that we go.
William
Booth, the founder of our movement was fascinated by this commission. So much
so that Officers weren’t originally ordained, they were only commissioned.[7]
He had an article that that was published in 1885 simply titled, “Go!” In it he
addresses those who say they are not called to go:
‘Not called’ did you say? Not heard the call, I think you should say…. Put your ear down to the Bible, and
hear Him bid you go and pull poor sinners out of the fire of sin. Put your ear
down to the burdened, agonized heart of humanity, and listen to its pitying
wail for help. Go and stand by the gates of Hell, and hear the damned entreat
you to go to their father’s house…And then look the Christ in the face, whose
mercy you profess to have got [sic], and whose words you have promised to obey,
and tell Him whether you will join us heart soul and body and circumstances in
this march to publish his mercy to all the world.[8]
Those
who are a part of the Salvation Army are called to be people who go. The Marys,
the guards, and the disciples all respond to Easter by going. How will you go
this morning? Because the Marys went,
because the disciples went…we go.
There
is someone else in this story that goes [break]. In 28:7 the angel says, “Then go quickly and tell his disciples:
‘He has risen from the dead and is going….” “…and is going…” Yes, the
resurrected Jesus too is on the move. Jesus is going. Jesus isn’t a mere
concept, he isn’t an idea, Jesus isn’t a set of rules, Jesus isn’t a
denomination, and Easter tells us that he isn’t dead. Jesus is moving. Jesus is
going. With thankfulness in my heart, I am glad that when Jesus looked at the chaos
of the world because of sin, he didn’t sit on the sidelines. He didn’t play
dead like the guards. Instead he looked at the trouble of our world with quiet
resolve, “Here we go.” He went ahead even though he knew we would turn our
backs on him. He is still going, by the way, as he looks at our world…he looks
at your life and he wants to join you, so that together we can say with Jesus,
here we go.
How
does Jesus go? That same verse says, he is “going
ahead of you into Galiee.” We trust that when Jesus commissions us, just as
he commissioned the Marys and the disciples. He is going ahead of us. God’s
prevenient grace is working and moving before we ever arrive. Praise the risen Lord, we do not go
alone! Because of the resurrection, we say with Jesus the Christ
leading us—here we go!
Not
only does he go ahead of us, but he is available to us right now. Two different
times there are beautiful and simple words in this passage: (1) 28:9, to the
Marys, “Suddenly Jesus met them,”
(2) 28:18 “Then Jesus came to them.”
He wants to come to you this morning.
The
resurrection of Jesus starts a movement in time and space that challenges us to
move our lives only by his grace. Here we go. It is from here: when Jesus
conquers death. It is from here: The place where death loses its sting. It is
from here: the empty tomb which declares Jesus as king of the world. It is from
here: the place where our broken relationship is made right, that we go. [List some situations: additions, families,
children, your next decision, your job, your challenge to witness, your need to
live a life fully alive] It is from here, that we can say with Jesus, and
move into a world longing for the power of his resurrection, that we go. It is
from here, the reality and presence of the risen Christ that we go. Here we
go.
Preached April 12, 2012 in Arlington, Texas
[1] It’s too late now, but is
interested how their path was brightened by the Son on their way back.
[2] Matthew’s telling of the
Easter story is nuanced differently than the other gospels [Mark, Luke, John].
In Matthew they simply go to “look at
the tomb” (28:1).
[3] Tom Wright, Matthew for Everyone; Craig Keener, IVP Commentary on Matthew.
[4] They both tell the good
news as they go, but one to deny and the other to proclaim.
[5] Remember too that the
first Christian were not called “Christians” that was a name mocking them. The
first disciples were called, “followers of the way.” Here Matthew shows the
“women were on their way.”
[6] My soft spot for these
guys…how do we know that they followed through and took the money to lie? Could
it be that latter, and this is pure speculation, they came to recognize who
Jesus was? Could it be that they could not ignore the image that they saw of
that morning. Maybe Matthew has this source because one or more of these
soldiers becomes a follower of Jesus. At some point the guard says, I can’t lie
any longer and say, “Here [ the way of the cross and the resurrected
Christ]…here we go.”
[7] Now officers are
commissioned and ordained. More this in Harold Hill’s book on leadership in the
SA.
[8] William Booth, “Go!” The General’s Letters, 1885 (London:
International Headquarters, 1890), 4-5.
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