Acts 10:34, 37-43; Colossians 3:1-4; St. John 20:1-9
“[Mary] saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb.”
Today, Easter Sunday, we celebrate the Resurrection of Jesus. But, if you look closely at the Gospel this morning - we don't actually see the resurrected Jesus.
As often happens with St John in his Gospel, he doesn't quite give us all of the plain and clear facts, but he leaves us with a sort of conundrum, a mystery; St John doesn’t show us Jesus risen, but he shows us something different – he shows us an empty tomb - the emptiness, and the lack, and the uncertainty, and the mystery is what we see. Those early disciples who encountered the empty tomb are left with confusion and bewilderment; Christ is no longer where they left Him.
We of course have the gift of being able to know what the empty tomb doers in fact mean - we know that the empty tomb means that Jesus has risen, although those early disciples didn't know this.
Three different people come to the tomb and see that the stone has been rolled away, the linen cloths are there, but no body. And they’re confused.
Mary Magdalene comes to the tomb first. We see that she comes whilst it's still dark – there's deep symbolism here - Easter begins in darkness, but slowly moves into light – a movement which we saw echoed last night at the Easter Vigil – the church began in darkness, and then one light - the paschal candle - entered the church, from which other candles were lit, and gradually the light spread until the lights were turned on, and we celebrated Christ's Resurrection.
And so the Easter story begins in darkness, Mary comes to the tomb whilst it’s still dark; Mary begins in the midst of the darkness of grief, the darkness of uncertainty, the darkness of confusion, the darkness of loss; she comes from the darkness towards the tomb - there's a movement out of the darkness.
And Easter is about being drawn towards the person of Christ - even in partial sight - even when we're still in darkness like Mary was; the light grows, the light becomes clearer, and draws us to it. We are not necessarily required to already be in the light; the Resurrection meets us in the darkness, and draws us forward, into the light.
Seeing that the stone has been moved, Mary tells the others - Simon Peter and John the beloved disciple.
John the beloved disciple outruns Peter, he gets to the tomb first, he looks in - although he doesn't go in. And then Peter arrives after him, but goes straight into the tomb.
There's a lot of physicality in the gospel – there's lots of running, telling, entering, and seeing. And the Resurrection which we celebrate provokes movement – it can provoke urgency and desire, it can provoke change of direction, reassessment, and belief. And all three of them are running for a reason, they're running because something has broken open; the stone that sealed the tomb was like a giant full stop - to the world it marked the end, it marked the closure, it supposedly marked the end of Jesus, the end of the story. And yet the stone was now moved, and the tomb was empty – something had broken open.
The beloved disciple arrives at the tomb first, but he doesn't go in, he waits, he looks in. Perhaps there's something about his behaviour which implies a love and desire for Jesus which is bold, but also restrained and reverent, and contemplative, which is perhaps in contrast to Peter – whose love for Jesus is bold, maybe clumsy, perhaps impulsive at times – going into the tomb first.
And so together with Mary we have three different characters, with three different responses to the Resurrection; they each play their role in the Easter story.
And perhaps each of the characters shows us something about different spiritual temperaments in the Christian life - different dimensions of the Christian life – the contemplation of the beloved disciple, the spiritual forwardness of Peter, and the devotion of Mary.
We may be the type of Christians who contemplate like the beloved disciple, who look into the tomb and wonder what it means, and then go in and believe; the type of Christians who spend quiet time with God, thinking and praying, contemplating the mystery;
we may be the type of Christians who are like Peter – very forward, direct, maybe the type who go into the tomb straight away - often this attitude is needed, especially in leadership; sometimes we need to be people who respond, who get things done, who do what needs to be done out of love for Christ; people who are spiritually forward and spiritually bold; or we may be Christians who have a deep devotion like Mary – the type who are so devoted that they come to the tomb first - even in darkness, even in the midst of grief - out of devotion to the Lord; the type who then tells the others, the type who witnesses to the faith, the type who is deeply devoted to Christ.
Most of us are probably a mixture of these things, and we see these different temperaments in the Christian life - but regardless of how we are in our temperament, Christ is still at the centre, Christ is still the object of the devotion and focus, as He was for those first disciples.
And we have an echo in Colossians of this idea of movement – "set your minds on things above” – we're called to direct our minds upwards to God - it's directional rather than passive.
And so Easter calls us not just to believe something, but to move, and to move differently – to move towards hope, to move towards Christ, to move towards others.
It's been over 2000 years since that first Easter morning when the tomb was found to be empty. Those first disciples didn’t understand, they no doubt had many questions. And this Sunday maybe we’re asking the same questions as they did when they found the tomb empty: what does it all mean?
Many theologians of course have answers for this – Christ died as a ransom for our sin, Christ died as a substitute for the sinfulness of humanity, Christ died as an example of God’s immense love.
And all of these answers can perhaps help us to understand what it all means - but ultimately Christ’s death and Resurrection is part of the great Paschal mystery, perhaps we’ll never be able to fully understand the empty tomb. And like any mystery, we can't necessarily solve it how we would solve other problems, but in many ways we have to embrace the mystery in our own life.
On the Cross, Jesus perfects the task given to him by his Father; His exultation and the revelation of the glory of God take place on the Cross.
But today we celebrate what comes next – the glory of our Lord's Resurrection from the dead - and in many ways every Sunday is a mini Easter day – every Sunday celebrates the Resurrection of Christ.
Without the empty tomb, there would be no resurrected Jesus, there would be no Church as we know it.
The empty tomb is why we are here this morning, the empty tomb is why we are here every Sunday morning, the empty tomb is why we proclaim “Christ is risen! Indeed He is truly risen!”
We may come like Mary in the dark; we may run and go in like Peter, not yet understanding; and we may glimpse, like the beloved disciple, something which we can’t yet understand; but still, Christ is risen - and this is enough.
Fr. Nick