Acts 10: 34 - 43; Psalm 118: 1 – 2, 14 - 24; Colossians 3: 1 - 4; John 20: 1 - 18
A
homily by Fr. Gene Tucker, given
at Trinity Church, Mt. Vernon,
Illinois on Sunday, April 20, 2014.
“WHAT
DIFFERENCE DOES IT MAKE? – PART IV”
(Homily texts:
Acts 10: 34 – 43 & John 20: 1 - 18)
We’ve explored the difference that Jesus’ entry into
Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, His institution of the Lord’ Supper on Maundy
Thursday evening, and then His suffering and His death, on Good Friday, all
have made for everyone who comes to faith in Him.
Now we stand at the moment of rejoicing, as we remember
that the Lord rose from the dead and came out of the tomb on Easter Sunday
morning.
As we conclude our homily series, asking ourselves the
question we’ve been exploring during this past week, let’s pose the question,
“What difference does it (the Lord’s resurrection) make, anyway?”
As we ponder an answer to that question, let’s also pose
another, closely related question, to ourselves:
Do we believe that Jesus Christ actually, physically rose
from the dead on Easter Sunday morning?
This question usually prompts the following three main
responses, which are:
1. No, Jesus did
not actually rise from the dead. Events
such as this are impossible.
2. Well, maybe
Jesus did – or did not – rise from the dead.
The answer is impossible to know, because what we are relying on is the
witness of some ancient persons whose religious perceptions are different from
ours, and whose sense of reality might also be different from ours.
3. Yes, Jesus
actually did rise from the dead.
How we answer the question will make a difference in our
relationship with God, it seems to me.
Perhaps it would be good for us to consider these three
possible responses, and as we do so, to consider what outcomes might proceed
from each answer.
The first response, “No, Jesus did not actually rise from
the dead,” is the response of many in the world today. Most non-believers fall into this category,
but so do some who are happy to be called Christians. We can understand this response, for the
Easter event isn’t one that takes place in normal, everyday human
experience. Many who hold this view of
the Easter story struggle to accept the idea that miracles such as Jesus’
coming to life again happen at all.
The second response, which cannot affirm or deny that
Jesus rose from the dead, holds that the people who were involved in the
original event may have had such different perceptions of reality that it is
difficult for those of us who now live 2,000 years later to sort out what is
reality from what is perception. Those
who share this view of the Easter event include non-believers and some
Christians.
Perhaps a common thread connects these two responses to
our question, for both responses place a great deal of weight on the
possibilities that lie within our human ability to experience. Those who dismiss the possibility that Jesus
rose from the dead do so because of the belief that a person simply can’t come
back to life again. Those who are skeptical
of the written record of the first Easter event aren’t sure of the truth of it
because they do not trust the perceptions of those who were involved in it.
The third response, however, accepts the reality of the
Lord’s resurrection. It is fair to say
that those who respond in this way do so by faith. The fact is that the Easter event does,
indeed, lie outside the realm of normal, human experience. Faith is the avenue which allows us to accept
the resurrection as actual, physical reality, and to become believers in what
God has done in the person and work of Jesus Christ.
Yes, faith is the avenue which allows us to accept the
idea that God has the power to work outside the limits of normal, human
experience. And if this is so, then it’s
possible that the record of Jesus’ mighty deeds in healing the sick and raising
the dead are also true. If God’s mighty
acts, done through Jesus Christ, are faithfully mirrored in the pages of Holy
Scripture, then we can say with assurance that God is not only interested in
human beings’ lives, but that God also has the power to change things, and to
intervene in human affairs for the betterment of the human condition.
Many times in His earthly ministry, the Lord commended
those who had come to Him for help, telling them that their faith had made it
possible for God to do a mighty work in their lives.
Now, the Lord stands before us, and commends us for
believing that God has the power to raise Jesus from the dead. That same Lord stands before us today, asking
us to look for the ways in which He will work miracles in our own lives, and in
the lives of others in the day in which we live.
For if we respond in faith, our response holds all the
possibility that it will make all the difference in the world.
AMEN.
