Acts 10: 34–43 / Psalm 118: 1–2, 14–24 / Colossians 3: 1–4 / John 20: 1-18
This
is the homily given at Flohr’s Evangelical Lutheran Church (ELCA) in McKnightstown,
Pennsylvania on April 20, 2025 by Fr. Gene Tucker, Interim Pastor.
“STUFF”
(Homily text: John 20: 1–18)
I like “stuff”. “Stuff” is such a
useful word, one that can refer to so many different things. In fact, one of my
members of my former church said that I use the word “stuff’ so much that he
said he was going to get me a sweatshirt with the logo “I Like Stuff” on it.
We can use the word “stuff” in so many
different ways. For example, when I’m taking my grandson to lacrosse practice,
I might say to him, “You got your stuff”? Meaning, of course, does he have his
helmet, his pads, his mouthguard, proper footwear, and the like.
Or, when my wife asks me what I’m
doing, I might respond, “Stuff”, which could mean any number of things, perhaps,
for example, miscellaneous tasks that I can’t really enumerate accurately. Or, using
the word “stuff” might be a deliberate way to hide what I am doing, such as
getting her birthday present.
So, you see, “stuff” is really a very
useful word, one which could have specific meanings, or it could be nebulous,
all-encompassing term.
We live in a world of “stuff”.
Some “stuff” isn’t alive, it’s
inanimate. Take, for example, rocks, or maybe the soil in our fields and
gardens. Ever think of how old that “stuff” must be? Wow! And, of course, some creative force or power
made all that “stuff” way back somewhere, somehow.
Some of the “stuff” of the world is
living, but is basically inanimate. For example, the wood in our furniture in
our homes came from a tree somewhere, sometime. The pulpit I am preaching from
this morning is an example. Back in the beginning somewhere, sometime, the tree
was created and was given life. That One who created the tree also gave it the
ability to reproduce, so that we have trees today that we can fashion into
various useful things.
Some other ‘stuff” is living, like
bugs, or birds, or squirrels, or cats and dogs. Or human beings. All of these
living things had a beginning sometime, somewhere. That creative force (for us
who believe, that would be God, as we affirm in the words of the Apostles’
Creed, saying, “I believe in God the Father Almighty, creator of heaven and
earth…”) not only created these things, but gave them life. The creation
accounts in the book of Genesis affirm this reality, telling us that God
created these living things, and gave them life. The same is true of those
first human beings…Genesis’ words are especially important, for the text tells
us that God breathed the spirit of life into human beings.
The universal truth of the world in
which we live is that when something that is alive is no longer alive, it
cannot be made to live again. Of course, in the marvelous age in which we live,
an age when so many medical advances have come along, it is possible for us to
prolong life and to rescue life when – in an earlier age – such a life would
have ceased to be.
But, even in the age in which we live,
once someone has died, there is no bringing them back to life again.
The reason is that the ability, the
power, to breathe life into a living thing belongs to God alone.
(I can’t resist saying that when
someone begins a new chapter in their life, when they, essentially, come to
life again, such as when they turn from an addiction and begin a new life free
from whatever had claimed power over them, we can say that – quite likely - we
see the hand of God at work in this new beginning, this new life. God’s power
to create and to re-create is one of the markers of God’s power, activity and
presence.)
Our Lord Jesus Christ lay dead in the
tomb on this Easter Sunday morning. The fact that He was completely, totally
dead is easy for us to accept, for His death was a public event, witnessed by
many.[1] His
death did not take place behind prison walls. The wounds He received make it
clear that no one could have survived what had happened to Him.
And so, Mary and the other women came
to the tomb on Easter Sunday morning, expecting to find a dead person. They
came prepared to care for a deceased person whom they loved. After all, their
expectation was that, once a person had died, there was no bringing them back
to life again. They were gone, permanently.
Now, we return to the matter of the
“stuff” of life, of giving life where there was no life. This is God’s power,
God’s presence and God’s activity. It is the power that the Creator God, alone,
possesses.
No wonder this reality is the central,
most important part of our Christian faith. For it means that – if God could bring
Jesus to life again – then that same Creator God can create new life in us.
When we are spiritually dead, God’s Holy Spirit can breathe new life into us,
making us over into a new, faith-filled person. No matter how spiritually dead
we may have been, God can fan the flames of faith into a glowing tribute to
God’s ability to create and to re-create.
Now, in this creative process, there is
a critical difference to note: We have the ability to cooperate with God’s
creative work, or to decline the invitation to work with God. Those other
living things that we spoke about a few minutes ago didn’t/don’t have that
ability: They were simply created, they didn’t have the ability to say “No”.
But though none of us had the ability
to decline being born, we are given the power to say “No” to God as our lives
unfold. We can choose to stand apart from God’s invitation to be created, or to
be re-created anew.
But if we accept this wonderful
invitation, then something miraculous and mysterious happens: We begin the
process of being formed into the image of our Lord Jesus Christ. Sometimes,
this process is difficult to explain, but we can see the markers of it when
they are present.
The invitation to accept God’s offer
is, basically, what we’re about here this morning, in this church, in God’s
house. It is the invitation to allow God into the very inner and most personal
parts of our lives, so that God can bring to life anything that has atrophied
and died.
Thanks be to that Creator God, the One
who brought to life again our Lord Jesus Christ. Thanks be to that same God who
can bring new life to all who are willing to open their hearts to this divine
initiative.
AMEN.
[1] Jesus’ death is also a matter of record from a non-Christian source: The first-century historian, Josephus, records Jesus’ death, and also reports that there were reports that He had risen from the dead.
