My college advisor was a giant. The late E.P. Sanders
was legendary among twentieth-century Biblical
scholars. He was brilliant and rigorous. His classes were
demanding. A very tough “A.” His lectures brought the
New Testament world from the page all the way into the
classroom. Professor Sanders was raised a Methodist in
small-town Texas but described himself as a secularized
Protestant. A historian, not a theologian. He insisted that
we, who were his students, read the texts as academics,
not disciples.
On sabbatical last summer, looking for something
else—isn’t that the way it always happens—I found his
lecture on the resurrection. It was the last class of the
semester. Here’s what my brilliant professor said:
“That Jesus’ followers had resurrection experiences
is, in my judgment, a fact. What reality gave rise to
these experiences I do not know. Nothing is more
mysterious than the stories of his resurrection, which
attempt to portray an event the authors could not
themselves comprehend.”
I love that. The great scholar and seasoned skeptic
stands before the empty tomb and sets down his tools.
I have no category for this. Knowledge and history can
take you all the way to the door of this mystery, but
they will not lead you through it.
This morning, in pulpits everywhere, earnest preachers
will attempt—using the very best skills they have—to
explain what happened on Easter morning. They will
try to make it sensible, to make it manageable, to make
it reasonable. And I understand that impulse. This is
the Super Bowl of the church year. And on any Sunday,
preaching is part persuasion. I would love to give you
proof. I would love to offer evidence. I would love to
close this message with the words “case closed.”
But I fear those messages will fail. If we reduce Easter
to an equation we can solve, we miss it. The impulse is
backward. We do not explain Easter. Easter explains us.
It explains me.
When I was seventeen years old, seated in Dr. Sanders’
class, I had a map. That map took me to law school. To
Washington D.C. To public office. To a career I could
manage and measure. I wanted to be someone who
mattered, to do something that felt big, significant,
important. And then—not once, but many times, over
and again—that plan was interrupted. A campus
minister whose faith rekindled mine. A tiny church way
out in the country where I watched a seasoned pastor
sit with a dying man and somehow knew I wanted to
be in that room. I wanted to be that person. A professor
who saw something in me I couldn’t yet see. I turned
away many times. I wasn’t looking for this. The light
found me anyway.
And so, while I cannot explain the truth that lies at the
heart of Easter, I do believe it. I believe it with all my
heart. I trust it with everything I have. I believe that in
Jesus Christ, God has defeated death and is making all
things new, including us.
Professor Sanders taught me to read the text as a
scholar, but this morning I stand before you as a witness.
On Easter morning, the women got there first. They
show up at the tomb with their spices and their grief, a
crushing weight on their backs. You may not be able to
fix death, but at least you can perfume it. You can make
it decent. Please note that they were not seeking the
living. They came to preserve a decaying body. They
came at deep dawn, that thin, trembling hour between
darkness and light when you are not sure what kind of
world you live in, when people are just shapes on the
horizon. In that dim light, the graveyard was the one
place that made sense to them. Dead people stay dead.
That’s the rule.
And there, in that place of grief and certainty, they get
hit with a staggering question. Why do you look for the
living among the dead?
The irony is biting here. They weren’t looking at all.
They were hiding. They were the ones being found that
morning. But before they can even gather themselves
to answer, those dazzling messengers press on. Not
here. Risen. Remember. He told you. And they do
remember. They remember, and in that moment, the
world is reconfigured. Their lives are transformed.
Before they are preachers, they are witnesses. They
trust the promise enough to run and tell the others.
The scholar stands at the door of the tomb and stops.
The women stand at the door and believe. They stake
their lives on it. This is the grammar of resurrection:
we don’t find Easter; Easter finds us. Let me show you
how I know.
Last Sunday, after church, some of the kids here at
Second did what they do lots of Sundays after church.
They played a great big game of hide-and-seek here in
the sanctuary. Someone told me after the early worship
service this morning that he tried to start a professional
hide-and-seek team, but good players are hard to find…
Watching those kids in this sanctuary took me way,
way back. When I was eight years old, my dad served
a small two-hundred-year-old church in rural North
Carolina farm country. On Sunday nights, the most
faithful members of that church would gather in the
sanctuary for a prayer meeting. And while the adults
prayed in the sanctuary, all the kids who belonged to
those adults played hide-and-seek all over the church
building. As the pastor’s kid, I had an unfair advantage. I
knew the perfect hiding space. Up in the balcony of that
sanctuary, there was a long, pitch-black hallway that led
nowhere. To get into the hallway, you had to go through
a tiny door, just a hole in the wall, off the balcony. So, one
Sunday night, I crawled down that hallway, deep into the
darkness, and there I waited.
I relished in the hushed laughter I heard as all of the
others were found one by one. And I remember thinking
to myself, “They will never find me here. They will never
find me here.”
And then it hit me. They will never find me here.
And suddenly that darkness, that once protected me,
closed in around me. The silence grew heavy, and I
realized the perfect hiding place was a self-made prison.
And so, after what felt like a very long time (sure I had
won the game), I crept back toward the door. I cracked
the door open. Then I opened it wider, and just before
I began to stamp my feet, there he was. My best friend
Jonathan Williams (“it”). I found you, Chris.
I pretended to be disappointed. I was not disappointed.
I was relieved. I was elated. Hiding was fun for a little
while, but then I wanted nothing more than to be found.
I wanted to be sought out. I wanted to be called by
name. I found you, Chris.
I think you know that feeling. On Easter Sunday, we
come here because something stubborn and resilient in
our souls wants to be found. I see you. I see you. Some
of you came in carrying grief so heavy it has started to
feel like your permanent address—a person, a marriage,
a future you had counted on that simply is not coming.
A goal, a plan that has slipped through your hands. You
have learned to carry that grief quietly. And you’re pretty
good at it. But it’s there. I see you.
I see you. Some of you are frightened in ways you
struggle to name. The world feels untethered. The
institutions you trusted are crumbling or captured. And
there’s something more menacing than that, something
we must name. You hear the name of Jesus Christ
invoked to justify cruelty—to the refugee, the poor,
the vulnerable, the enemy—and it is doing something
to us. It’s doing something to our faith. Not just our
politics. Our faith. Because when the gospel language
is weaponized against those Jesus spent his life
embracing, some part of us breaks. We hide our hope
because it feels too fragile to expose. We conceal our
faith because we simply don’t want to be associated
with such hatred. We wonder if God has stopped paying
attention. I see you.
I see you. Some of you came here today because you
were invited, and to be honest, you are not sure you
believe any of this. You’re just stopping by, just looking
in, just trying it out, just this once, just one more chance.
You are sitting in that pew right now wondering what
you are doing here. Maybe you’ve never really believed
and aren’t even sure you want to. Maybe Easter brunch
starts in an hour, and this came first. Maybe you’re here
because something in you needed to sit in this space.
Just in case. You are not alone in that hiding place.
Remember, when Easter arrived, the whole world was
hiding. The disciples: scattered, fearful, hiding behind
locked doors. The city: quiet, deserted. Everyone’s doing
what we do when hope dies: head down, heart closed.
That’s not just your story. It is the human story. We are
not the first people to stand at this threshold wondering
if the word of life is nothing more than an idle tale.
Easter dares to breathe a promise into that darkness.
The promise is this: You are not lost beyond finding.
Resurrection. You know, the early Christians had a word
for it. Anastasis: an uprising, the refusal to stay buried,
the refusal to keep quiet. Yes, the cross was supposed
to be the end because dead people stay dead. And
the empire always kills. But God raises, and in raising
Jesus Christ, he begins the undoing of death itself. An
uprising. That’s what the women ran to tell the others,
breathless and terrified and the gospel’s first preachers.
An uprising had begun. They ran to tell the disciples.
And I am here to tell you it has not ended yet.
It is funny what you remember from when your kids
were little. When he was three years old, our son
Benjamin loved hide-and-seek. But the truth is, he
was terrible at it. Probably the worst hider I’ve ever
played with. And you know why. He could not wait to
be found. Here’s how it would happen. I would start
counting, and he would run and hide behind the couch,
obvious place. I would finish counting, and as soon as
I declared I was looking, he would start squealing with
delight, completely giving himself away. But what I
remember is scooping him up, both of us laughing until
tears were flowing. For Ben, hiding was just the setup.
Being found was the whole point.
There is a reason I remember that. It is what I want.
It’s what we all want, underneath everything. And so, I
cannot explain it, and I will not try. But, by God, I have
seen it.
Listen. The uprising begins again today. Because he is
coming out of that tomb, and he is coming for you. He
has been coming for you since before you knew you
needed him, and he is not stopping, and he will not stop.
The one who transforms every ending is still writing your
story. He will not leave you in the darkness where he
found you. He is closer than you think. He knows your
name. He loves you.
The scholar stands at the door and stops—that’s
where he leaves us. The women stand at the door and
something in them says yes. The college kid sets down
the perfect plan and steps through. And you—here you
are. In a room like this. On a morning like this.
The story says the tomb is empty. The map is useless.
You no longer need to hide. Ready or not.