An Idel Tale
An Easter Sermon
April 21, 2019
Commonwealth Bridge Worship
Luke 24:1–11 (NRSV)
But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they came to the tomb, taking the spices that they had prepared. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went it, they did not find the body. While they were perplexed about this, suddenly two men in dazzling clothes stood beside them. The women were terrified and bowed their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen. Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, that the Son of Man must be handed over to sinners, and be crucified, and on the third day rise again.” Then they remembered his words, and returning from the tomb, they told all this to the eleven and to all the rest. Now it was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other women with them who told this to the apostles. But these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them.
This is the story that is being proclaimed right now in churches everywhere on this Easter Sunday. A story that surprised the world and a story that changed the world.
The first witnesses to this story were women, who faithfully showed up to the tomb early in the morning to apply more spices on Jesus’ dead body to finalize the embalming process. Yet, Jesus who died on the cross three days ago, could not be found in his tomb. There was no body in the tomb. Instead, there were two angels who appeared to tell them that Jesus has risen. And the angels helped the women to remember what Jesus had told them, and they did.
The women told the story, a story that they just witnessed, to the male disciples, yet they brushed it off thinking it’s just an idle tale.
Why was this story just an idle tale to these disciples who followed Jesus so closely? Was it because a dead body just doesn’t usually disappear, or angels just don’t normally appear? Was it because a person just doesn’t resurrect from the dead? Was it because the story was told by females, whom the society didn’t give much credibility to? Was it because the women did not provide any hard evidence to prove the story? Was it because the story was not backed up by a report with thorough investigations?
See, the story that the Church proclaims on Easter Sunday was never meant to be persuasive. Rather, the story that the Church proclaims is experiential. It begins with the women’s witnesses. And as the gospel story progresses, as the Risen Jesus appears to these male disciples, they come to believe in the news of resurrection through their own witnesses.
This is what we call faith. Faith that is communicated by witness, experience, and encounter. This Christian faith in its sincerest form has been passed down two millenniums not by the power of persuasion, but through the witness of the faithful, the likes of the women in today’s story.
What the Church claims of the resurrection is this: “if Christ has not been raised, then our proclamation has been in vain and our faith has been in vain” (1 Cor 15:14). And what makes this Christian claim compelling is the patterns of our existence: the way we live, the way we breathe, the way we speak, the way we interact, the way we move, and the way we love.
See, what the resurrection of Jesus accomplishes is that we may live not only as forgiven people but also as redeemed people. It is not just the divine cancelation of the guilt, but the divine activation for the new future, new possibility, and new life as redeemed and beloved people.
Jesus’ death proves God’s love toward us; Jesus’ resurrection proves the mystery of God’s love that is beyond our imagination. And this love validates Jesus’ preaching that the kingdom of God is for the poor, the outcast, and the different.
Friends, we are here not to force an idle tale to become persuasive to our ears, but rather to witness the story that surprised the world like no other; a story that allows us to live a new life as a people, beloved and redeemed.
I pray as we spend our time together this afternoon, we may encounter and experience the kind of love we desire to proclaim through the patterns of our existence — the way we laugh together, the way we eat together, the way we share together, and the way we hope together. Amen.
