Outside the tomb. When I think of Easter, I think of a farm. I think of green fields and grass, and I think of a cross. The farm is gone now. The fields are gone. The cross disappeared the day after Easter that year. I don’t remember exactly what year it was. I know I can come close. I do remember that I was in junior high school. Yes, please go back in time with me when dinosaurs roamed the earth and there were no middle schools. There were junior high schools. I remember seeing the dinosaurs walking around as I sat in class in junior high school. The farm and the fields are gone. A Kroger supermarket stands now where the farm was. It’s on the edge of town, the town where I grew up, Marysville, just off of U.S. Route 33. The Kroger, what used to be the farm, is across the street from Oakdale Cemetery. Oakdale Cemetery is a 57-acre – I looked it up – a 57-acre cemetery founded in 1880. My parents are buried in Oakdale Cemetery, along with a whole bunch of other people that I know. As you and I gather for worship this morning, my parents and all of those people who I know in Oakdale Cemetery, they are now there resting on this Easter morning. But truthfully, technically, that’s where their remains are resting, but it’s not where they are. Some historical accounts say that what Socrates said just before he was to die was this – “You will bury my body, you won’t bury me.”

Today John tells us about what later became known as Easter morning. Each of the four Gospel writers tells of resurrection accounts at Jesus’ tomb. There are four of them, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. They are not identical, not even close. For example, in Matthew, Chapter 28, “Now after the Sabbath, toward the dawn on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to the sepulcher.” How would you like to be known throughout history as the other Mary? This is Matthew. And he writes, “And behold, there was a great earthquake.” In Matthew there’s an earthquake. “For an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone.” This is dramatic stuff. There’s an earthquake. There’s an angel. The angel comes and rolls back the stone and sits on it, sits on the stone. “His appearance was like lightning, and his raiment white as snow. And for fear of him” – apparently, there were guards at Jesus’ grave, according to Matthew. Now we’re introduced to the guards for the first time. “For fear of him, the guards trembled and became like dead men.” Matthew goes on – the angel talks to Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, essentially says to her that Jesus isn’t there. He has risen. Matthew tells us that these two women, quote, “are filled with fear and great joy.” Fear and great joy. This is a wonderful contradiction. By the way, you might want to write this down. Life is paradoxical and contradictory. Filled with fear and great joy, and Matthew tells us that they ran to tell the disciples. Matthew concludes by saying that they came upon Jesus in the road, and depending on your translation, Jesus says, “Hail,” and they came up and took ahold of his feet and worshipped him. That’s Matthew. Yes, there will be an exam at the end of the sermon about the four Gospels, so pay attention.

Mark, Chapter 16. When the Sabbath was passed, Mary Magdalene and Mary, the mother of James, and Salome, different group of people, all women, they brought spices to the grave very early on the first day of the week. They found the stone rolled away and they found a, quote, “young man sitting on the right side dressed in a white robe and they were amazed.” This man in white speaks to the women, tells them that Jesus isn’t there, and then Mark tells us, “Trembling and astonishment had come upon the women, and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.” That’s it. That’s the original ending of Mark. The women don’t say anything to anybody because they were afraid.

And last, Luke, and then we’ll take a look at John, which we’ve heard. Luke, in Chapter 24, tells us, “But on the first day of the week at early dawn they went to the tomb, taking the spices which they had prepared.” We don’t know who they are yet. That comes a few verses later. Luke says that it was Mary Magdalene and Joanna and Mary, the mother of James, and, quote, “the other women.” A whole bunch of women who, according to Luke, go to Jesus’ grave. It’s a different story, and then they had this conversation. They had a conversation with two men who stood by them “in dazzling apparel, and as the women were frightened, they bowed their faces to the ground. And the men said to them” – this is a very famous quote, and it only appears in Luke, “Why do you seek the living among the dead?” That’s what this man says to the women. And this is amazing to me. Luke ends this way – Mary Magdalene; Joanna; Mary, the mother of James, and the other women with them who told this to the apostles. They went to the apostles. They told them everything they had seen at the grave. But Luke tells us, “But these words seemed to them an idle tale and they did not believe them.” The disciples don’t believe yet, according to Luke. OK, the ushers will now pass out the exam and let’s see how you do.

Today John tells us about what later might be known as Easter morning. John tells us that Mary Magdalene went to the tomb so early that morning that it was still dark. John is the only one. I wanted to take a quick look at those other ones because let’s appreciate the fact that John is the only writer who says that Mary went alone. He’s the only one who tells us that Mary went alone. It was dark and she was alone. This sounds very much like an existential moment. One of the basic tenets of the philosophy of existentialism is that existence precedes essence. “Existence precedes essence.” What this means is we exist, we live our lives, and existentialism says that we often experience life, but we do not completely understand life while it is happening to us. We search for the essence of life as we live it. I’m very nervous around people who always know everything. This sounds like an existential moment to me. Mary went to the tomb, it was dark, and she was alone.

I have often gone to Oakdale Cemetery alone. I look at my parents’ tombstone. On the back of the tombstone are the names of their three children. I’m one of them. I do not completely support the decision to have my name on a tomb yet. I often wander around alone, looking and discovering names that I know, some of my friends, many of my parents’ friends. And when I do this, part of me, whether consciously or not, I am seeking some essence of life. And this is what you and I can do today. Mary went alone to the tomb, but we can stand with her now. We can stand together and find the essence of life in the midst of the darkness, even in the darkness of death. In one of my old Presbyterian prayer books, there is this, quote, “God is the one who can turn the shadow of death into daybreak.” So, the farm and the fields are gone now, but I remember them. The farm belonged to our family doctor, Malcolm MacIvor, God rest his soul. He was a local legend when I grew up in Marysville. He was a family doctor. He was the Union County coroner for decades. He was a dedicated member with his family in my dad’s church, the First Presbyterian Church. My dad and Malcolm were close, very close friends. So, the preacher’s kids – me, my brother and sister – the preacher’s kids were allowed to go to the MacIvor farm whenever we wanted, and we did. There was a big barn, there were sheep, there were goats, and there was a big farm pond with catfish and smallmouth bass. My brother Jeff and I caught some of those fish over the years, and Jeff always caught more than me. Always. Some people are really good fisher people. I’m not one of them.

This particular year when I was in junior high school, the church built a noontime Good Friday worship service outside at the farm. In one of the grassy fields, someone put up a freestanding, wooden cross someone from the church had made. This area would also serve as our worship spot in a couple of days for a sunrise service early Easter morning. The cross was made of heavy wood and stood around seven feet tall or so, as I remember. My dad led the service, and during the service he passed out to each of us three-by-five cards and pencils. Everybody there got a card and a pencil. He talked about Good Friday. He talked about Jesus dying on the cross. He talked about prayer. And he invited us to write anything down on our cards that we wanted to say to God. I remember this. I don’t remember what I wrote on the card. But I remember this. What do you want to say to God today? What would you write down on that three-by-five card? When the service was over, we folded our cards over so no one but God would know what we prayed about and we stood in line. One by one, one of the men of the church nailed our prayers to the cross with a hammer and he had nails. He nailed our prayers to the cross. My dad said that he would come out early the next morning, Holy Saturday, alone like Mary. He didn’t say like Mary but I am. He would come out early the next morning on Holy Saturday alone. He said he would take down the prayers, that he wouldn’t read them, and he would gather them and burn them. He invited us to use our imaginations to see the smoke from the burning prayers in our minds as the Holy Spirit blowing in the wind. 

I remember all this every Easter, and John this morning tells us that Peter and the other disciple both ultimately end up going into Jesus’ tomb. They go in. They hesitated first; the other disciple hesitated. Peter didn’t, he went right in. They see burial clothes, and then they go home. That’s what John tells us. They went home. Mary is standing outside the tomb. She’s weeping. In all the four Gospel accounts that you have heard this morning, Mary is the only one who weeps at the tomb, and she never goes into the tomb. Apparently, she doesn’t need to. She’s outside the tomb. That’s where you and I are. That’s where we always are. We’re outside the tomb. We live outside the tomb, existing in this thing called life, and we look for the essence in ourselves, and we look for the essence in each other. John says that Mary does lean over the tomb and look into it, and she sees two angels. Peter and the other disciple didn’t see angels. Why did Mary see angels? I wonder if it has something to do with her tears. And where is Jesus when these three disciples are rummaging around his tomb? It’s dark. Where’s Jesus? Where is he? Is it possible that he’s watching? Is it possible that he’s hiding, waiting for just the right moment? The way John writes this thing – and I’ve been thinking about this for years – the way John writes this narrative, it’s very easy to infer that Jesus intentionally wants to appear to Mary first. Then there is that strange, existential moment where we are told that she is looking right at Jesus, but she doesn’t know it. She thinks he is the gardener. And of all these four gospel accounts of the resurrection, this is the one that I hope that you will remember. Remember this existential moment where Mary is looking right at Jesus, but she doesn’t know what she’s looking at. And then he speaks. He asks her the existential question, “Who are you looking for?” Who are you looking for? It’s the Easter question put to all of us. Who and what are we looking for? Are we looking for the essence of life? Is it possible that we may be looking right at it, and we don’t even know it?

Here’s what I want you to remember. Is it possible that you are the essence that you are looking for? You and your essence of Christ. In the narrative that’s when everything changes. That’s when Mary wakes up, when Jesus calls her by name, Mary. Now we’re going to go around this sanctuary and we’ll start with John here, and John didn’t know this and we’re going to go back and then you’re going to say your name out loud. Ready? No, I wouldn’t do that to you. I would only do it to John. But I want you to imagine this. The miracle of Easter is you are called by name, and so is everybody else. Jesus calls her by name. Everything changes when we know we are looking right at it. We are looking at the turning of the shadow of death into daybreak. And it happens where we always are, outside the tomb. Amen? Amen.