EASTER DAWN

When I think of Easter dawn, my thoughts are drawn back to my childhood in Colorado when our family would rise well before sunrise on an Easter morning and drive to Red Rocks Amphitheatre, set in the foothills overlooking the city of Denver and the plains stretching far to the east. Red Rocks is a magnificent natural amphitheatre built into the mountainside and serves as a perfect venue for thousands who annually brave the morning chill of early spring to celebrate the Resurrection of Christ through joyful music and the proclaimed Word, while watching the sun slowly and magnificently rise in the eastern sky. With the coming of dawn the hearts of thousands are joined in the central affirmation, “Christ is risen! Christ is risen, indeed!”
Today in Annandale we gathered yet again for an Easter sunrise service, this time not in an amphitheatre as we have been accustomed to doing, but near the gate of our church cemetery, an appropriate setting to think about the miracle of Easter. Easter is a miracle of fantastic proportions. Nothing like it ever happened before or since. It defies all explanation. It is God’s verdict on sin and death. In a mighty burst of power, God turned the darkness and despair of Good Friday to a day of brightness and hope for people of faith. God moved in love and compassion over the dead body of His Son and infused him with power to rise from the dead and to make his appearance before those whom he loved, an appearance that convinced and changed his disciples from an attitude of despair and powerlessness, to an attitude of conviction and empowerment that Jesus was everything he ever claimed to be, a message they delivered faithfully as eyewitnesses of the resurrection for the rest of their lives.
The first encounter of the risen Christ with a human being was with one of his dearest followers, Mary Magdalene, whom he had saved from a life of sin and who had kept faith with him to the end, including having stood at the foot of the cross as witness to his excruciating death. It is striking to see how Jesus Christ made the new reality known. It was done in a very quiet, personal way.
We recall that morning when Mary discovered the empty tomb and her terrible fear that Jesus’ body had been stolen. We see her running to tell Simon Peter and the disciple whom Jesus loved what she had found, and then the race to the tomb where the two disciples verified her report. Eventually these two return to their homes, leaving Mary alone, weeping outside the tomb. She bends and looks into the tomb where she sees two angels in white who ask why she weeps. She tells them it is because they have taken her Lord away and she does not know where they have laid him.
As she turns she sees Jesus standing there, but does not know it is he. Jesus (says) to her, ‘Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?’ Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, ‘Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.’ Jesus said to her, ‘Mary!’ She turned and said to him in Hebrew, ‘Rabbouni!’ (which means Teacher).

This is an incredible moment of recognition when all seemed lost. Mary Magdalene had stood at the cross while terror rained down upon her beloved Savior. Her grief knew no bounds. She had come to visit his tomb and to be alone with her tears. In no way was she prepared for what was to follow. She was focused on death, but death could not be found. Life had overtaken death in a surge of Resurrection Power. When Mary heard her name from the lips of a seeming stranger, she suddenly knew this was no stranger. This was the Savior, alive and standing before her. Can we imagine the emotion of that moment? No one would believe it unless they saw for themselves and this is precisely what happened on Easter. Word traveled like wildfire through city streets, “He is risen! He is risen, indeed!” The women were the first to see him, but by day’s end, he had appeared to many others as well. There was joy in Jerusalem that night that could not be contained. Whatever Evil thought it had accomplished on Friday was turned on its head on Sunday!
This is the message of Easter. Evil will have its say in this world, but God will get the last word and that word will be a word of hope and resplendent life for the faithful.
Earlier this week Marianne and I watched “The Passion of the Christ” on home video. It was the second time I had seen it. Mel Gibson’s brutal depiction of the story is difficult to watch. The sadistic beating by the Roman soldiers went on and on to the point where any lesser person would have died from that alone, but Jesus presses on to further humiliation and suffering, climaxed by his death on the cross. His last words are spoken through an anguish of pain beyond measure, words full of mercy, truth, and love.
While Mel Gibson’s portrayal seems inordinately brutal, it makes its point: crucifixion was brutal, the most painful mode of execution known to the Romans. As blow after blow came down upon him, including the driving of nails through hands and feet, it was as though all the evil of the world was being concentrated in that one place. All Hell was breaking loose, driving its slings and arrows into the only man undeserving, a man who never sinned, whose entire life was that of utter obedience to his Heavenly Father.
What is there in our experience that could come close to the terror Jesus endured that day? Perhaps someone on the front lines of war in Iraq could relate in some manner. Perhaps as a nation we can draw a parallel from our experience of September 11, 2001 as we helplessly watched the two towers of the World Trade Center come crashing down upon the lives of thousands of innocents, people who did not deserve what Evil had wrought on that day.
Ever since, we as a nation have tried to come to terms with the terror that came to our land on a bright sunny day. One poignant response has come to us through the arts. The American Choral Director’s Association commissioned Rene Clausen, Director of the well-known Concordia College Choir, to write a choral and orchestral work to be performed in New York City at Riverside Church for the 2003 ACDA Convention. The result of this commission is his composition entitled Memorial. I heard this work for the first time just a few weeks ago, and have listened to it over and over since then. It is a powerful expression of the events of 9/11, including a realistic portrayal in sound of the two planes crashing into the twin towers. The sounds are horrific in their depiction of this tragedy.
The composer’s understanding of these events comes through in the music, which carries the hearer through these acts of tyranny to a more peaceful place. Through prayer set to stunningly beautiful music one is drawn to the realm of Heaven where prayers are never lost. A particularly meaningful prayer by Roy Hammerling, a member of Concordia’s Religion Department, serves as a cry for mercy for all humanity, including the lost, their families and friends, and even the perpetrators of terror. His prayer makes five petitions:
“Gracious and loving God, pour forth your mercy upon us all. For those who have fallen, and are lost in the oblivion of rubble, blanket them with your eternal light.
Gracious and loving God, pour forth your mercy upon us all. For those whose souls have turned cold and empty, grant them a large measure of your mercy, and a nutritious kernel of your kindness. Grant them peace.
Gracious and loving God, pour forth your mercy upon us all. For those whose dreams are haunted by images of horror; enfold them in your loving embrace. Fill our hearts with your healing love.
Gracious and loving God, pour forth your mercy upon us all. We pray for our enemies, all those who hate us, we condemn them to your mercy, O God.
Gracious and loving God, pour forth your mercy upon us all. If there be any grain of hatred in us, wash us clean and cleanse us. Move us to the common ground of Your Being, O God.”
The prayer is followed by the words, “Adonai,” then “Kyrie eleison, Christe eleison, Kyrie eleison.” “Lord, have mercy upon us. Christ, have mercy upon us. Lord, have mercy upon us.”
There is a line in this prayer that says, “We pray for our enemies, all those who hate us, we condemn them to your mercy, O God.” Not “commend” them, but “condemn” them to your mercy, O God. Think of that line. Think what it means. It seems to be saying that we hand them over to you, O God, for only you know fully how to deal with evil of this immensity. We hand them over; we condemn them to your mercy, O God.
My first image is a flashback to a famous Jonathan Edwards sermon, “Sinners in the hands of an angry God.” It is an almost gleeful rendering of what God might do to wanton sinners, terrorists being among the worst kind, but then I think to myself, what if I am numbered among those who have sinned? What is my future in the hands of an angry God? I know I have fallen short of the glory of God and stand in need of mercy.
What was Jesus thinking about when he prayed for his enemies from the cross, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do?” Was their evil less or more than was suffered on 9/11? It was the Lord of life who asked God to forgive the worst evil the world had ever known. If God can do that, then we must consider the depth of God’s mercy for all who have sinned.
Let us remember that the woman who came to visit the tomb of Jesus on Easter morning was Mary Magdalene, a woman from whom Jesus had cast out seven demons (Luke 8:2). We do not know what those demons were, but without question her life was caught in the grip of something pretty bad from which she could not escape except by his power. Jesus had saved her and now at his death she came looking for him to pay her final respects, to weep for the one man who had treated her with dignity and respect, a man who had loved her unconditionally and enabled her to become one of his most faithful followers. She knew from whence she had come, but this man had accepted her as she was, had cleansed her, and given her life back for holy living. In the garden where stood the stone cold tomb a stranger spoke her name and she instantly knew his identity. A flood of knowing came over her and her heart leaped within her with joy and relief.
Over and over, this is what Jesus has done for people throughout the ages. He calls their name; he meets them in their need, sometimes in their sin, and shows them the way out. Just this week in a

conversation with a couple who are considering membership in our church, I was impressed to hear from the husband that one of the main things he has learned in his time with us is that you can know Jesus in a personal way. All his life he had heard about Christ in the abstract, but now he is getting to know Jesus Christ up close and personal, a Jesus who knows his name. It is a beautiful awareness, not unlike the day John Wesley attended a religious society meeting on Aldersgate Street in London and felt his heart “strangely warmed,” a day when he said, “an assurance was given me that Christ had died for my sins, even mine, and delivered me from the law of sin and death.”
James S. Hewett, a collector of spiritual stories, shares the following: “As Copernicus, the great astronomer, was dying, a copy of his great book, The Revolution of the Heavenly Bodies, was placed in his hands. Instead he directed that the following epitaph be placed on his grave at Frauenburg: ‘O Lord, the faith thou didst give to St. Paul, I cannot ask; the mercy thou didst show to St. Peter, I dare not ask; but, Lord, the grace thou didst show unto the dying robber, that, Lord, show to me.’ There is no one who cannot come to God under those terms.” (Illus.Unlimited, p. 356)
Thus, the hymnist can write, “O love, how deep, how broad, how high, it fills the heart with ecstasy, that God, the Son of God, should take our mortal form for mortals’ sake!
For us baptized, for us he bore his holy fast and hungered sore, for us temptation sharp he knew; for us the tempter overthrew.
For us he prayed; for us he taught; for us his daily works he wrought; by words and signs and actions thus still seeking not himself, but us.
For us to evil power betrayed, scourged, mocked, in purple robe arrayed, he bore the shameful cross and death, for us gave up his dying breath.
For us he rose from death again; for us he went on high to reign; for us he sent his Spirit here, to guide, to strengthen, and to cheer.
All glory to our Lord and God for love so deep, so high, so broad: the Trinity whom we adore, forever and forevermore.” (UMH, No. 267)
Let me close with this simple, but clear story of what happens on Easter: A little boy and his father were driving down a country road on a beautiful spring afternoon. Suddenly out of nowhere a bumblebee flew in the car window. Since the little boy was deathly allergic to bee stings, he became petrified. But the father quickly reached out, grabbed the bee, squeezed it in his hand, and then released it. But as soon as he let it go, the young son became frantic once again as it buzzed by the little boy. His father saw his panic-stricken face. Once again the father reached out his hand, but this time he pointed to his hand. There still stuck in his skin was the stinger of the bee. ‘Do you see this?’ he said. ‘You don’t need to be afraid anymore. I’ve taken the sting for you.’ And this is the message of Easter. We do not need to be afraid of death anymore. Christ faced death for us. And by his victory, we are saved from sin. Christ has taken the sting! First Corinthians 15:22, asks: ‘Where, oh death, is your sting?’ Christ has taken the stinger for us. He has risen! Fear is gone. New life is ours.” (Ibid. p.167) Glory, Hallelujah!

Prayer: Thank you, God, for not leaving Jesus in the grave with the weight of sin’s verdict laid against him. Thank you for his obedience unto death, even death on a cross, so we might be set free from the power of sin and death. Thank you for highly exalting him and for giving him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to your glory forevermore. Amen.