I wonder if we can put ourselves in the disciple’s shoes as they woke on the first Easter morning? Just a week before they’d been preparing to enter Jerusalem with Jesus and for what they must have thought was going to be some sort of victory parade. Those thoughts can only have been increased as the day went on because when Jesus did enter Jerusalem, it was in triumph, to the cheers of the crowds who acclaimed him as the Messiah and king. We know that some of the disciples, at least, were ambitious enough to want places at Jesus’ right and left hand in his kingdom, but they must have all thought that they were on the verge of greatness; the people were going to make Jesus king, and they were his closest followers and friends. They must have been on top of the world.
But that was last week and somehow, it had all gone wrong. Jesus hadn’t been made king, instead, he’d been rejected; he’d been arrested, put on trial and condemned. He’d been nailed to a cross by the Romans and now he was dead. And the disciples had hardly distinguished themselves when Jesus’ fortunes changed for the worse. They’d promised to die for him but in the end, when he’d needed them most, they’d run away and abandoned him. Their leader, Peter, had denied repeatedly that he even knew Jesus. They must have been ashamed of themselves. And on top of all that, now they were terrified because they thought they were all in danger too. Jesus had been crucified on a political charge, essentially for being an enemy of and potential threat to Roman rule. And as his closest followers and friends, the disciples no doubt thought that they might be next to die. They said they’d die for Jesus and now they might very well get the chance to, not willingly, as they said they would, but when the authorities caught up with them and had them executed to put an end to Jesus and his followers once and for all.
Their world had been turned upside down. Having been on top of the world just a week before, now they must now have been in the depths of despair. They must have been ashamed, perhaps even disgusted with themselves for the way they’d acted and treated Jesus, and they were scared. They were in hiding and no doubt thought they’d soon be running for their lives if they got the chance to.
And now, to make matters even worse, Jesus’ body had been taken away. Who would do such a thing? No self-respecting Jew would have removed Jesus’ body, especially on the Sabbath. The tomb was being guarded anyway, so it can only have been the Romans. But why would they take Jesus’ body away? Perhaps Pilate and the chief priests had got together again and decided to have the body taken away to remove all trace of Jesus, so that not even a grave for his followers to mourn at would remain? What next? When and where was it all going to end?
The Gospels tell us that, at this point, the disciples still didn’t understand that everything that had happened, had to happen. They still didn’t understand that it was all part of God’s plan; Jesus would have to explain that to them later. But for now, they didn’t understand. And despite Jesus telling them numerous times, among the things they didn’t understand is that Jesus had to die but that he would rise from the dead after three days.
So the disciples probably couldn’t in their wildest dreams have imagined what would happen next. But when it did, their world would be turned upside down again. And this time, they wouldn’t go from the depths of despair to feeling on the top of the world; this time Jesus would raise them from the depths of despair and beyond anything the world can offer because the risen Jesus would promise to raise them, with him, to the heights of heaven. And the irrefutable proof that he had the power to do just that, was that he himself had and was risen from the dead. But it wasn’t just the disciple’s world that Jesus’ Resurrection turned upside down. Jesus’ Resurrection turned the whole world and the lives of everyone who lived in it and has lived in it since, upside down. Since Jesus’ Resurrection, and because of Jesus’ Resurrection, the world has never been the same again and no one’s life has ever been the same again.
In the Stations of the Cross which we prayed on Good Friday, the meditation on the fourth Station spoke about the family and friends of the condemned who followed their road to Calvary. It suggested that they hoped against hope that what was happening was a dream and that a reprieve might come at any moment. For the family and friends of the condemned, including Jesus’ disciples, it must have seemed more like a nightmare than a dream.
And it was a living nightmare, one they couldn’t wake up from. For Jesus’ disciples, the nightmare had started the night before in Gethsemane and it had become more terrible and horrific as the hours passed. And there was no reprieve. There was no reprieve to prevent Jesus dying on the Cross. There was no reprieve for the disciples to ease or take away their shame, their guilt and their fear as Jesus lay dead, in the tomb. And really, the disciples never did wake up from this nightmare. What happened was that the living nightmare turned into the reality of a dream come true. But even that wasn’t a reprieve. There was no reprieve, even on Easter Day, because Jesus’ Resurrection wasn’t, and isn’t, a reprieve.
A reprieve is a delay, usually of punishment or something similarly unpleasant. A reprieve is a postponement, it’s a temporary suspension of punishment. But the Resurrection wasn’t and isn’t like that. The Resurrection isn’t a reprieve. It isn’t a stay of execution, it’s a pardon, and it’s a pardon for us.
We are the ones who should have died on the Cross because it’s our sins that led Jesus to Calvary. But Jesus’ death on the Cross pardons us from our sins. He has been punished for our sins, and so his death doesn’t reprieve us from the punishment due to us, it frees us from that punishment. And it does that once and for all, as we say in the Eucharistic Prayer every Sunday. He died once for our sins so that, from then on, all people for all time, can live, in spite of their sins. We don’t have to die for our sins because Jesus has already died for them. Of course we have to die when our earthly lives come to an end, but because of Jesus’ death, we can be spared the punishment for those sins, which would have brought us eternal death. And because of Jesus’ Resurrection, we can be raised from earthly death to heavenly life with Jesus and will never die again.
Jesus, and the faith of his disciples, turned the world upside down and changed it forever. Jesus’ teaching and example turned the world upside down because it changed our understanding of how we should live. His Resurrection turned the world upside down because it turned humanity’s greatest dreads, the knowledge of our own mortality and fear of death, into the anticipation of an eternal life of happiness and peace quite beyond our understanding.
Many people may have difficulty in believing in that life because it is beyond our understanding. They may have difficulty in believing in the Resurrection for the same reason. They may flatly deny that resurrection and eternal life are possible, and that Jesus’ Resurrection ever happened. But no one can deny that Jesus’ disciples, those few bewildered, frightened people who were there, and witnessed the events of the first Holy Week and Easter, did believe, and believed strongly enough that many of them did have the courage to go on to fulfil their promise to die for Jesus. Something gave them the courage to conquer their fear, to come out of hiding and to change the world forever, in Jesus’ name. And whatever some people may think or say, whatever some people may not believe, or may even deny, they can’t deny that what gave the disciples the courage to do that was their belief that, on this day, Jesus was, and is, risen.
Alleluia!
Amen.
The Propers for Easter Day can be viewed here.
Parish Church of St Mark Chadderton 