Apr 12 | “Love will rise up,” (Easter Sunday Sermon, April 12th 2020)

This was meant to be preached at St. Margaret’s, Cedar Cottage, on Easter morning at the main service of the day in 2020. Of course, that was not to be. Instead, I went out from my house before sunrise and preached it on my phone on the beach. It wasn’t the same, but I expect I’ll remember it forever.

Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the tomb. 2So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, ‘They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.’ 3Then Peter and the other disciple set out and went towards the tomb. 4The two were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. 5He bent down to look in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he did not go in. 6Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen wrappings lying there, 7and the cloth that had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself. 8Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; 9for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead. 10Then the disciples returned to their homes.
11 But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb; 12and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet. 13They said to her, ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ She said to them, ‘They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.’ 14When she had said this, she turned round and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus. 15Jesus said to her, ‘Woman, why are you weeping? For whom are you looking?’ 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.’ 16Jesus said to her, ‘Mary!’ She turned and said to him in Hebrew, ‘Rabbouni!’ (which means Teacher). 17Jesus said to her, ‘Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, “I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.” ’ 18Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, ‘I have seen the Lord’; and she told them that he had said these things to her.

John 20:1-18

“And Love will rise up and call us by name.”

Jan Richardson’s painting which bears this title is arresting. A hint of silver at the top right suggests early morning, perhaps the silver moments just before the sun crests the horizon. A rich, heavy curve of black suggests a cave-like structure dominating the viewer’s eye. And within this cave, an emerging, almost solid wave of gold. Up near the top of the cave, the brushstrokes bend as though the light illuminates the inner walls. But below that, the brushstrokes shift abruptly, pointing straight outward, Love’s fire ready to surge forth out into the world, almost dissolving the edges of the cave, which appear ragged and torn, like a temple veil.

But what really caught my eye was an inexplicable dash of deep blue, right in the middle of the piece and also appearing torn through by light. What could this possibly be? I have a hundred ideas if I have none.

“And Love will rise up and call us by name.”

Medieval Persian mystic Abu Nu’aym Isfahani writes,

“O God!

Publicly I call you

‘My Lord’

But in solitude

I call you

‘My Beloved.’”

And perhaps this was what Mary intended to whisper as she staggered grief-drunk through the dark to the tomb of her beloved teacher – not to mourn a romantic partner or husband but to mourn a titanic spiritual figure in her life, her liberator from seven demons, her Moses, her Maker. This is no more and no less than an all-encompassing force that knows us more intimately than we could ever be known.

At the sight of Love’s wreckage, old ways of being that have been laid waste in its lovely fire – old ways of fear, pride, oppression, execution – Mary is shocked and afraid. Why shouldn’t she be? She thought Love a victim of these old ways, and now here she finds that not only is there no remnant of Love, there isn’t even any remnant of those old ways which were the supposed winner of that battle, old ways which were terrible and corrupt and rotting but at least familiar to her. Now there was nothing. What was she to do now?

She calls for her friends and they come – poor reckless Peter, faithless in life but now faithful in death, how strange; and the beloved disciple, who indeed is never named and certainly may have been a real person but who has come to signify so much more than just one life, for indeed that beloved disciple lives within us all even though more often than not we suppress that voice out of shame or anxiety.

They come and stumble into the tomb. There is a strange interplay rather like a dance – who gets there first? Who goes in when? Who comes out? What do they see? And indeed how often do we find ourselves wide-eyed and arms pinwheeling on the edge of a grand revelation, jostling past the warring voices within us.

The beloved disciple believes, but says nothing. Why? Perhaps, out of all of the voices within, this one alone understands the appropriate response to the infinite is silence. They go back, Peter probably more confused and heartbroken than ever, and the beloved one unable or unwilling to testify as yet, perhaps knowing more was to come.

And Mary remains, weeping.

Now even her friends are gone, and she is left with nothing.

And it is only then that she encounters angels.

What are they doing there? Why does she not seem to understand what they are? They ask her a question laden with subtext. She doesn’t seem to pick up on it. She skims only the surface with her answer.

But even that complete lack of understanding is rewarded, because suddenly, the one she has been seeking has found her.

And still, she does not recognize him.

Why would that be? Does he look entirely different? Has she been crying too hard to see him? Are they playing a lover’s game together? Ah, but he asks her a question she’s surely heard before: “Whom are you looking for?” in English, which obscures the fact that it is the exact same question Jesus asked of Andrew and the other disciple of John the Baptizer who decided to follow him all the way back in Chapter 1. The story begins again.

But Mary still doesn’t understand. Face to face, inches from Love’s great revelation, on the threshold of the bridal chamber, she mourns for the wedding robes he has discarded on the floor! “Tell me where you have laid him and I will take him away.”

And now the time for games is over. Love will rise up, and call us by name.

“Mary.”

“Mary. I’m right here.”

But what a strange wedding, for as soon as she recognizes him, he says, “Do not hold onto me” – and yes, the Greek word hapto does carry an almost erotic connotation. One translation note also states “to modify or change by touching, touching that influences.”

Why can we not partake in the delights of the Beloved? When will we be able to, if we cannot touch before he is ascended, while he is still in the world?

The work wasn’t done yet.

Perhaps this is the splash of blue in Jan’s painting – the sharp pain that exists between disciple and Apostle, between the one who knew the earthly and the one who knows the heavenly, and yet will never fully be able to reconcile the two, scarred beautifully but sadly for having known the Beloved on earth and no longer being able to delight in the very particular sound of his laughter, in the very particular way the light caught in his curls, in the very particular way he walked and talked and loved.

And so perhaps we who have not seen and yet have come to believe, in these latter days of fear and uncertainty, these latter days of disease and distancing and despair, should at the very least count ourselves blessed that we are privileged to know both earthly and heavenly. We hear the stories of his friends and marvel at how particular they are, how different and precious each image of the Beloved…and yet how blessed we are to be able to also see him flickering like a candle within each other?

Today is unlike any other Easter in our living memory. Today many of us are not held together within the physical walls of the bridal chamber. Today, many of us are at home, or in places like where I’m standing right now. Today, we weep and mourn for the bridal chambers that stand empty all around the world.

But children, why are we weeping?

At the absolute zenith of longing and confusion, we are fated to encounter angels.

As the Rev. Jake Morrill writes, “This year, in fact, the churches will be empty. And the tomb will be empty.”

Whom are we looking for?

Do not mourn the discarded bridal gown.

The buildings are empty, and the church is free.

She is running wild over the earth today, and perhaps that is as it should be.

Yes, the bridal gown was beautiful. Yes, it made us resplendent and luminous. Yes, discarding it brings us back down to earth, looking as we always do, looking rather…quotidian. Rather…ordinary.

But that is not how the bridegroom will see us.

The bridegroom’s mind is only love. Only desire to see us as we really are.

And this is how we are: outside in the world, trying our best to take care of one another. Not because we have an image to maintain, but because this is who we were always called to be.

When we can return to our buildings and be together again, what a banquet it will be. What finery will ornament us. What music we will make and what a bounty we will feast upon.

But it’s not that time yet.

Today, we’re invited to return to ourselves. Naked, and unashamed. Today, Love rises up and calls us by name.

May we never forget this day.

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