JESUS THE LORD APRIL 2, 1972 EASTER
MATTHEW 27:62 ~ 28:9 JOHN M. BUCHANAN

Whatever else you want to say about Pontius Pilate, he must have been an
incredibly patient man. Ever since the first day of the week he had been
‘trying to deal fatrly with this group of men. inittally it had been a rumor about
a minor disturbance around the Tempic area. It seems that a Galilean had come
riding into the city with a band of rabble rousers folfowing him, shouting and
singing, and that he had gone to the Temple court and turned over a few tables,
And then they started to come to him - Pliate - with their problems. A few
came alone, but as the days passed, delegations of self-inportant men came sol-
emnly, each time more urgently. He frankly wanted no part of it, but he got
dragged into it - against his better judgement ~ until Friday he had finally
consented to interogate the offender. By that time, of course, the minor
incident had blossomed into a major crisis. The streets were fl fled with people
screaming for the man's death: nothing Pilate did or said disuaded them. And
so ha obeyed the survival instinct of the politician: when the chips are down
fay principles aside tha do whatever is practical. He washed his hands for al!
of them toa see - and ordered the man to be executed.

it had been a hellish week fr Pontius Pitate. Passovers were always rough
in Jerusalem, and this year I+ had almost gotten out of hand. But row it was
over: Jesus was dead: and for the first time in severat days, Pilate got a gaod
night's steep.

Then came Saturday morning: the Sabbath, when everything was quiet, streets
empty, no activity whatever, and Pilate must have began that day with a
monumenta}! sigh of relief. But, here they were again: that same delegation of
self~important religious officials, tired old men. “What now? An extra quard
far the tomb in Joseph's garden? You have to be kidding! The man is dead! The
soldiers made doubly sure of that, Besides the body was wrapped and buried’,
"But Excellency", they said - and | can imagine Pllate's stoic sigh of patient
despair - "that Imposter sald something about being raised from the dead after

three days: and if we don't do something his disciples might steal the body -

an
and then go around crowing: about 4 resurrection: that, sir, would be very bad
for all of us, aS you must understand.”

Pilate the politician - the pragmatist - played the game one more time,
but this time with a catch. “You have a cordon of guards assigned to the Temple:
they are at your disposal. Use them, if it's that important To you.”

He must of sensed that they were frightened old men and | think he must have
enjoyed the irony of that moment. They said, of course, that they were afraid,
that the disciples might seal the body. Bur: Pilate knew and they knew that
religious hoaxes have a way of burning themselves out rather quickly. He must
have sensed that their real fear - their terror, actually - was about something
else, something they had not dared mention, even +o each other: namely That what
he predicted would happen In fact; that the dead body would breathe and move
and get up and walk out of that tomb.

if that happened they would be in +rouble. And so, instead of kicking them
unceremoniously out into the street as he was inclined to do, he piayed the
game one more time, chuckling this time, because these tired, frightened old
men were asking him fo protect them from a miracle: asking him - Pilate - to
make their world safe from an act of God himself. And even though he was not a
narticutariy religious man he knew that the suggestion was preposterous ~ a
Little like trying to stop the wind, or keep the sun from rising. So, off they
went, with their littie cordon of guards to secure the tomb.

Why, do you suppose the Chief Priests and Pharises were so afraid? There
are probably several reasons, First of al}, they were the ones responsible for
his death and they knew it. But fet’s not make the arrogant mistake of blaming
judatsm - or Jews for it. The traredy of That error has been spelled out it
pogroms, gas chambers and the fact that if your name is Rubenstein you probably
can't belong to the Country Club. We're not tafking about historic, corporate
quilt. What we are talking about is the fact that several men were deeply

involved in a conspiracy and a coalition with +he Romans to get rid of him.

~3u
And if you stand in those particular shoes, you have every reason to be afraid
if the victim of your conspiring might some day confront you personally

That's one thing. The second is that if he did come back to life he would be
the Lord - and his Lordship, now confirmed in a resurrection, would stand over
and qainst their whole religious system. And if you're given your life fo a
system, If you believe in it enough to kill other men for the sake of its peace
and purity, you are afraid of having it shaken aT its very foundations. That's
the second thing.

Third, and most important of ali: if your worid is alf neatly wrapped up,
if everything fits into a category, if all fs safe and well and comfortable: if you
know about God and where you stand in rdation to him: Tf you know what he does
and what to expect of him: if you have your hand on the ultimate truth about
ultimate things - something like a resurrection can be very upsetting and
disturbing.

So they did their best, tired, frightened old men with a cordon of guards
going out to stop the wind and keep the sun from rising. The rest is history.
And yet that scene has been played over and over again down through the years.
lt is a well-known preacher's feeling that ministers play it every Easter
morning. Not securing the tomb, of course. 1T°3 A LITTLE LATE FOR THAT:
the genie is out of the bottie and there is no way to stuff him back in.

Twenty centures later we simply try to explain it: to defuse it: to make it safe:
to find good, solid, reasons Why if couldn't have happened. For we are stil}
very uncomfortable living in a world in which a resurrection has happened. And
with good reason. We are stil! uncomfortable with the hought that Jesus really
is the Lord - with good reason.

Since that Saturday morning in Jerusalem long ago men have shoyn an aston~
ishing ability to avoid the resurrection. To read the bibliography of titles
devoted to explaining it away is to sense that we are obsessed with it. Lat me

mention just a few possibilitics.

when

First, we like to assume that those people around Jesus, and those people
who later wrote the Gospels were just a little naive and unsophisticated. They
cauld believe In that kind of thing: they could believe in a resurrection from
the dead without betting an eyo. We like to assume that we are the first people
in history that have had common sense and a real scientific knowledge of the
way things really are. As a matter of fact, resurrections have always been
astonishing. The disciples didn't expect if to happen: when they were first told
about it they fiatety refused to believe It. They were frightened by it: they
doubted it: they wanted to disbelicve it. That's what the record shows. Thomas
held out to the very last.

Second, it has been suggested that the disciples sat down later and created
the story and then went out and sold it to some very gullible people. And yet,
common sense tells me that even P. T. Barnum wouldn't try that one. But more to
the point, the New Testament accounts of the Resurrection read like anything but
a manufactured fable. There are four accounts and not one of them squares with
the other: there are rampant contradictions and discrepencies and @ monumental
amount of confusion. {tn fact, it's net a storyat all. It is an announcement
made in spirt of the common sense of the writers: an announcement so Incredible
that they didn't even bother to fill in the details. Surely, if they made if up
‘hey would have at least checked to make sure they had their stories straight.

Third, the discrepencies in the accounts have been used to disprove the fact,
A strange way of comingat it in that the oldest test for forging ts to super
impose one signature on another, and if they are exact one has to be a phoney.
One New Testament writer punctures this line of criticism with historic precident:
“Polyblus, the Greek historian, and Livy, the Latin historian, represent
Hannibal in his invasion of ttaly crossing theAlps by completely different routes,
routes which by no stretch of the magnation can be harmonized, yet no one doubts
that Hannibal most certainly arrived In Italy”. (Wm. Barclay - The Mind of Cbhr°

P, 303)

~5o

Thereare other possibilities, of course: the body snatching theory: the
mistaken tomb theory: the ‘swoon theory that holds that he really wasn't dead:
one of the best came from the ancient churchman Tertuliian, who with tongue in
cheek suggested that the gardner removed the bedy lest his lettuces should be
trampled by the throng of visitors. (Ibid, P, 294)

And it proceeds right up to the present in a block buster’ novel by Irving
Wallace about th: discovery of an ancient manuscript which proves that Jesus
died of old ags.

If only we could explain it away! Jf only we. could come to church on Easter
and enjoy the holiday manufactured by the clothing and candy Industry, have @
good ham dinner and fet it go at that. Well,gook luck: because it cannot be done.

For, at the heart of the Gospel - at the heart of the life of the Church -
at the heart of the onty faith that can be called Christian - 1s the conviction
that there is a God who is God: who cannot and will not be explained by the
rational categories of the mind: a God who comes into the life of the world -
beginning with those distant and cioudy events involving a band of Hebrew
staves somehow managing to gut out of Egypt: a Gad who keeps intruding into the
life of his people, finally in the birth of a humble carpenter's son, finally
in that life and that death: and now in our history - in your history and minc.
That's the central affinitive of Christian Faith: that's what the three word
creed “Jesus the Lord’ means. And that's exactly what has driven the phi lo-
sophers and academicians right up their book-lined walls.

When Pascal died- a great man of letters, a scrap of paper was found sewn
up In his coat. It said simply: “Fire! Not the god of the philosophers!

Ths God of Abraham, the God of Issac, the God of Jacob! (Leslie Newbigin,

Honest Religion for Secular Man, P. 47)

And Lestie Newbigin, modern theologian asks pointediy, “Can one really
belicve that Jesus rose from ths dead? And answers, simpfy ‘'No - not if
your starting point is somewhere else. But if like the aposties, you have come

to a point where uvery othur foundation has been knocked away, and you have no

~6-

coherent undurstanding of expertonce in which you can live and act witn hope,
then you may find that the testimony of The apostles is not only credible, but
in fact the only rock on which you can begin to build.” (Ibid P.55)

That's the Issuc. If the resure:etion happencd, it is the central reality
with which we must deal: it is the starting point: the foundation: and on this
day we are here to affirm it and celebrate it.

it means, for instance, that things are not what they seem in our world.
it means that we may live in hope. flow hope, has become a vary important word
recently, in part | suppose becauss the world looks so grim. But the resurrection
of Jesus Christ means that God is still God: that the future is stil! his: that he
is alive and well and still about his work of freeing captive people and riscon~
ceiling men to each other and binding up wounds. Hope - in spite of how bad iT
looks.

It means that good ds more pow .rful than ovil: that an untimate battic has
been fought and won: and that wean commit ourselves to the cause of justice and
fove and peace and honesty.and kindness without ever questioning the final
outcome of the struggie. That was establishsd long ago.

[t means that what we do matters: that w. matter: that all our efforts

and tears and sweat do not result in nothingness: but that because he fives we

shalf live. [tt means that w- can afforg’ that ultimate freedom of taughing
in the face of our own death. Every year | rsad one sentence from Wifiliam
Stringfellow at this point. here it comes again - "His resurrection means the

possibility of living this life, tm the very midst of death's works, safe and Tree
(Froe in Obedience. P.72)

Thatis the incredible good news of this day. And it keeps authenticating
itself in our midst tim: and time again. For instance, in the case of Alexander
Solzhenitsyn a Russian novelist who won the Nobel Prize, who is. not allowed To
receive his award money: who in old age - recaived his first communion:
Solzhenitsyn is constantly harrassed by his government: his works arc baaned:

and he fives in constant fear of arrest. He wrote a prayer that somehow got

out: listen to it:

How wasy to live with you, 0 Lord

How easy to bulteve in you

When my spirit is overwhelmed within me,

When even the keenest sae no further than the aight

And no not what to do tomorrow,

You bestow on me the certitude

that you exist and are mindful of me,

+hat al! the paths of rightvousness are not barred.

That's what it means to live in a world tn whicn Resurrection has happened.

Less dramatically, | experienced it on :launday Thursday, as a group of
Protestant ministurs served communion to patients in St. Elizabeth Hospital.
Three of my tun pationts were quite ill and in a lot of pain. and their tears
of gratitude - the momentary peace and serenity which somehow passed from my
hand to theirs - in a wafcr and a paper cup ~ forced mo again to confront the
awcsome ruality that | cannot explain or even understand apart from the words
“Josus is Lord and he is among us.

How to conclude an Easter sermon? It's always 4 problem. In preparation
for this day we preachers do a lot of reading and studying and note taking. And
| could read a7. §. Elfot poem, or a John Calvin vignette. | could quote Paul
Tillich or the “poste! Paul. Sut the most cloquenT prose | found last week came
from a most unlikely source - from my six year old sonis Church School Book.

It somehow seems very appropriate - tn thes very simple words that children can
foel - even big cnildren. Let me share it with you,

Every year in the springtime in the country where Jesus lived, there was
a big holiday. Whole families - mothers and fathers and children - took a long
trip to the city of Jerusalom to visit the temple. The temple was Like a church,
but i+ was more beautiful than any other church They had evar sean.

One year Jesus and his grown-up friends went along with a big crowd of
people. The people ere very glad that Jesus was with them. He was their
friend. He had taught thum about God: he had helped the sick peopte; he had
made many people happigr.

Josus and his friends knew that this was a very special trip te Jerusalem.

on fhe
Jesus had important work to do thre. One of his disciples brought a donkey
for Jesus to ride into the city. One of the people made a comfortable scat
for Jesus on the donksy’s back, Other people spread their clothes in the road
so that there would bs a kind of carpet to ride on. Then others broke branchos
from the trees and waved thum.

Then the whole crowd of pcople shouted and sang together, “Hosanna: Blossed
be he wo comes in th. nane of the Lord.

When th. crowd came into the city, and the peopls there saw Jesus riding
on the donkey and heard the singing, they thought that Jesus must be a Very
wonderful purson - perhaps even somone God had sent to hetp thom in a special
wayt So they, too, sicuted and sang as Jesus passed by.

Then Jesus rode right up to the great tempie and went in. He looked at all
the beautiful things thre, and he thought about God.

For God really had sent Jesus!

Jesus had come to tel! the peopie about God - to show them Godis love.

Jesus stayed in. the groat city of Jerusalem nearly a week. Everyday he went
to the temple, and there he talked ta the pcopie about God. Some of the people
listened and were glad that Jesus had come. Gut others. did not understand what
Jesus told them. They did not want to tove one another. They did not wnt to love
God as Jesus taught them.

Some of these people were very unkind to Jesus. They hurt him very much,
and he died,

His friends andal! the peopte who had loved Jesus were very sad. They
were lonely without him. They missed hearing the stories he had told them. They
wanted to be with him and talk to him.

Then a very strange thing happened. Suddenly their sadness and Jone! iness.
was gone. They know that Jesus was not dead anymore. Thuy knew that he was
right there witn them in a new way and that he would be with them wherever they |

might go. Jesus said. '| am with you always,

ro he
This is the wonderful aood news of Jesus, ce showed us God's love. He

wants us to sharg that fove itp rveryone we moot.

To thay | would say SHEN and a blessed Resurraction Day to all cf you.

Our father, just as th re are to mivds among vs grat enough to comprehend.
what has happan.d se promot us has words to describe our feelings. Help us,
father. this diy an¢ everyday fo know deat waosro safe and free b-cause our Lord

whe was dead Is alive. AEE.