Easter: I Believe
Matthew 28:1-10
Colossians 3:1-4
A church member and I had a conversation about Kathy Kelly’s talk on Afghanistan that influenced me greatly this week. He said something like, “I thought she was right about getting out of Afghanistan, but she didn’t give us a clear directive of how to accomplish that, how to assist the Afghan people in getting out from under our occupation.” That conversation led me to think about how frustrated I am in doing small acts for justice that don’t seem to add up to anything big.
How can I, short of vandalism and violence, stop a corporat-ocracy? And even a bit of vandalism won’t make much difference. And the war machine could probably easily quell the violence. That is my frustration. Perhaps we are so numbed out to the pain of others, we are so happy being entertained by our televisions and the internetz, that we don’t even believe that we can make a difference in the big picture. We don’t even believe that our individual lives matter.
If we don’t believe that our lives matter, then can our deaths matter?
And if our deaths don’t matter, can resurrection matter?
I believe in resurrection. I actually believe in The Resurrection. I believe that Jesus died on a cross. I believe that he laid in a tomb for three days. I believe that Mary went to the tomb to take care of the body, and that she saw Jesus standing outside of it, and that he called her name, and she knew it was him. I believe in The Resurrection.
There was a day that I didn’t know that I believed in the resurrection. I thought that perhaps it wouldn’t matter. I thought that perhaps Jesus, the Christ could have significance without the resurrection. I thought that perhaps his life could have meaning without his death and his death could have meaning the resurrection. Mind you, I believe that you can be a Christian and not believe that Jesus died on a cross and not believe in the resurrection.
I know you can.
I just don’t.
I believe in resurrection.
I think it’s built into my bones. I see it in the seasons, from winter’s death to spring’s life. I see it in the way I cry when a character in a book or a movie is so close to death, then comes back. (and, yes, I always cry). I see it in the way people cheer for the team that is on the bottom when they come back to when the game. I see it in our myths, like the Green Man who represents the coming of Spring, which may have morphed into the story of the Green Knight, who comes back after death.
I even see it in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. In Season 5, she says:
Dawn, listen to me. Listen. I love you. I will always love you. But this is the work that I have to do. Tell Giles… tell Giles I figured it out. And, and I’m okay. And give my love to my friends. You have to take care of them now. You have to take care of each other. You have to be strong. Dawn, the hardest thing in this world… is to live in it. Be brave. Live. For me.
Then she enters the pit of hell instead of her little sister Dawn. But she comes back. She resurrects. It’s a myth that is so deeply in our souls, that it makes me think that we need it. We need to believe that resurrection happens.
I think we especially need it here and now.
This week I read a book called Married to Bhutan. The author, Linda Leaming writes:
The Bhutanese are more comfortable with death than Americans, and Buddhism teaches that we should think of death at least five times every day. We in the U.S. are less likely to think about death, even when we see it in the movies, because what we see of it is not really death. We get our death simulated, or pumped with embalming fluid, dressed up, and laid out for viewing. It’s on television or YouTube. As a result, we’re not on very good terms with death. This is understandable–it’s about our fear of the unknown–but the experience of death is exactly the opposite in Bhutan. It is embraced as a natural function, a positive step, a way to move on to the next life, a chance to spin the big karmic wheel. (p. 187)
Don’t we desperately need to know that death isn’t the end? And yet, knowing that it’s not the end is not enough. Pie-in-the-sky theology, meaning that it’s not just “Life sucks here and now, but soon and very soon you’ll feel better because you’ll be in heaven, and all the terrible things that people did to you will be over, and you’ll experience heaven, even though your life on earth was so tough,” well, it is just not sufficient. The fact that I’m going to live on after this life doesn’t mean that THIS life can be unjust, unhealthy, sinful, and evil for anyone.
But what does it mean?
Linda Leaming says that one of the things believing in reincarnation means is that you don’t have to work so hard here. You can work hard at what you can do, but there’s plenty of time to finish the work.
She also says that believing in reincarnation means that we can really take time to learn, because learning in this life will help our work in the next life. Whatever we learn in this life, we will have already learned in the next.
And also, she says that believing in reincarnation teaches us to prepare for the next life— there’s a saying that indicates that people who meditate the most are the ones who will reincarnate a little better.
Now, mind you, I know that reincarnation isn’t resurrection. The resurrection says to us that God has conquered death, once and for all. Jesus’ resurrection also says to us that there is life after death. The Bible is not very clear about what kind of life that will be, other than Jesus telling us that there will be mansions, and John telling us his revelation that there will be streets of gold and gates of pearl. And many have interpreted John to be talking about heaven when he says, “He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” At the most we can garner from that is that at some point pain and injustice ends.
But is that heaven? Can we be in heaven if our loved ones, and even people who we don’t love, are suffering here?
We see from Jesus’ resurrection that life goes on after death. But Jesus’ work from the earth isn’t finished at death. In his afterlife, he comforts others, he exposes the Scripture to them, he teaches them what kind of work to do. Heck, he even does one miracle. All things that he had done here in his life before death. It’s a different kind of work, but it’s still work.
What if our work isn’t done at death? And what if we have more time? More time to help justice happen, more time to love. More time to understand.
Buddhism teaches that we should talk about death 5 times a day. How would this change us? Would it convince us that we have work to do in this life? Would it also give us a reprieve that we don’t have to do it all in this life? Would it push us in our commitment to do justice? Would it help us understand that our lives are too short to fix everything? Can it give us hope?
Pete Rollins, a theologian from Ireland writes:
Without equivocation or hesitation I fully and completely admit that I deny the resurrection of Christ. This is something that anyone who knows me could tell you, and I am not afraid to say it publicly, no matter what some people may think…
I deny the resurrection of Christ every time I do not serve at the feet of the oppressed, each day that I turn my back on the poor; I deny the resurrection of Christ when I close my ears to the cries of the downtrodden and lend my support to an unjust and corrupt system.
However there are moments when I affirm that resurrection, few and far between as they are. I affirm it when I stand up for those who are forced to live on their knees, when I speak for those who have had their tongues torn out, when I cry for those who have no more tears left to shed.
But I’d like to add more to Pete’s words.
I deny the resurrection when I don’t take a Sabbath, breathing in the beauty, love, and life around me.
I deny the resurrection when I take myself too seriously, and I forget that joy and laughter are an important part of living day to day.
I deny the resurrection when I spend all my time looking for the big action that will make a big difference in the world, and forget to do the small actions that bring peace to individuals.
I deny the resurrection when I believe that it is on my shoulders to make the world a different place, and forget that God can’t even make it whole. I can only do my part.
Jesus came to this world, walked among the women and men of the first century and changed their lives in a huge way. He changed their lives in such a way, that at the end, some were willing to follow him to death. Instead, he died for them. And then he came back, to prove to them that death is not the end. It is the beginning of something different—not wholly different, but different enough.
May we go forward this Spring, when new life is all around us, not denying the resurrection, but confirming and affirming the resurrection.
