Punch-lines and Empty Places -- FPC sermon excerpt
A woman was walking down a street and saw a frail and wrinkled old man rocking happily in a chair on his porch. She called out to him as she passed by. “Hello there!” she said. “I couldn’t help but noticing how happy you look. Tell me … what’s your secret for a long and happy life?”
“I smoke three packs of cigarettes a day,” he replied. “I drink a case of whisky a week, eat nothing but fast food, and never, ever do any exercise.”
“Wow!” said the woman. “That is amazing. That must make you really happy! And just how old are you?” she asked.
“Twenty-six.”
For hundreds of years in Germany, Lutheran pastors would begin their sermons on Easter Day with a joke. The custom even had formal title: It was called “the paschal joke.” In the Lutheran tradition, the empty tomb and resurrection are seen as God’s great joke on the world. We laugh and sing because God laughs and sings when he raises Jesus from the dead.
And you know that since every good joke requires a surprising punch-line, the end of the Easter joke includes the biggest shock of all: Jesus … has been … raised!
The problem with today’s resurrection story is that it doesn’t surprise us. It doesn’t shock us. It isn’t even very funny. Mark tells us that on Easter morning, Mary Magdalene and two other women encounter a cold and empty place when they show up at the tomb. It is very early in the morning when they arrive, and after seeing a young man and hearing about the resurrection they go out and flee from the tomb, for terror and amazement have seized them; and they say nothing to anyone, for they are afraid (Mark 16:8).
Terror and amazement have seized them. They are afraid. They are scared by an empty space. There’s nothing funny about it.
As you might imagine, Mary is feeling pretty awful. She has already suffered the crucifixion of her friend and teacher Jesus, and she is mourning his death deeply. Now she goes to his tomb to pay her respects, and what does she find? Nothing. A deserted place.
I think the poet Robert Frost captures her emotion well when he points out that the most frightening of empty places are always close to home. He writes,
They cannot scare me with their empty spaces,
Between stars — on stars where no human race is.
I have it in me so much nearer home
To scare myself with my own desert places.
I bet you know what he is talking about. Mary Magdalene certainly does. Each of us, at some time in life, has to struggle with an empty space, a desert place.
- We feel it when we get the message that we are being laid off, and have to clean out our desk immediately.
- When we open our statement from the mutual fund company, and discover that our investments have tanked.
- When we realize that we owe more on our mortgage than our house is worth.
- When we open the thin envelope from the college admissions office, and learn that we have been rejected.
- When we get the call from the doctor, saying that the biopsy has come back with a cancer diagnosis.
- When a spouse says she is leaving, a boyfriend says he wants to break up, a partner says there is no future in the relationship.
These are empty spaces. Desert places.
Mary and her companions are seized by terror and amazement, and they retreat into silence, saying nothing to anyone. They feel like they have traveled to a space between stars, where no human race is. Yes, it’s true that the mysterious young man in the tomb has said to them, “Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here” (v. 6). This is good news — the Easter morning good news of resurrection life. But the women cannot grasp it, at least not yet.
They hear what the man is saying, but it falls flat. They don’t get it. It doesn’t work as a punch-line. It doesn’t cause them to laugh and sing.
And that’s maybe where we are as well, in this time of political uncertainty and economic crisis. We are ready for a good news punch-line, an upbeat report, a story that lifts our spirits and gives us hope. But day after day, we keep hearing news about empty spaces and desert places. The cover of the current edition of Newsweek contains a cross, and in the cross are the words, “The Decline and Fall of Christian America.” It reports that the number of Americans who claim no religious affiliation has nearly doubled since 1990, rising from 8 percent to 15 percent.
In a very real sense, that’s the way life often is. More emptiness than fullness. More decline than increase. More fear than joy. More failure than success. More separation than reunion. Mary Magdalene felt it when she went with her friends to the tomb of Jesus. And so do we.
But suddenly, when we least expect it, here comes the Easter punch-line: “Jesus is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you” (v. 7). The young man in the tomb says that Jesus is alive … but he is moving ahead of us, always ahead of us. He will appear when we least expect it, and surprise us with his resurrection life.
There is nothing predictable about the way that the Risen Jesus will behave. He is going to sneak up on us, just like the funniest of jokes tend to do. You never see the big laugh coming.
“I smoke three packs of cigarettes a day,” he replied. “I drink a case of whisky a week, eat nothing but fast food, and never, ever do any exercise.”
“Wow!” said the woman. “That is amazing. That must make you really happy! And just how old are you?” she asked.
“Twenty-six.”
For hundreds of years in Germany, Lutheran pastors would begin their sermons on Easter Day with a joke. The custom even had formal title: It was called “the paschal joke.” In the Lutheran tradition, the empty tomb and resurrection are seen as God’s great joke on the world. We laugh and sing because God laughs and sings when he raises Jesus from the dead.
And you know that since every good joke requires a surprising punch-line, the end of the Easter joke includes the biggest shock of all: Jesus … has been … raised!
The problem with today’s resurrection story is that it doesn’t surprise us. It doesn’t shock us. It isn’t even very funny. Mark tells us that on Easter morning, Mary Magdalene and two other women encounter a cold and empty place when they show up at the tomb. It is very early in the morning when they arrive, and after seeing a young man and hearing about the resurrection they go out and flee from the tomb, for terror and amazement have seized them; and they say nothing to anyone, for they are afraid (Mark 16:8).
Terror and amazement have seized them. They are afraid. They are scared by an empty space. There’s nothing funny about it.
As you might imagine, Mary is feeling pretty awful. She has already suffered the crucifixion of her friend and teacher Jesus, and she is mourning his death deeply. Now she goes to his tomb to pay her respects, and what does she find? Nothing. A deserted place.
I think the poet Robert Frost captures her emotion well when he points out that the most frightening of empty places are always close to home. He writes,
They cannot scare me with their empty spaces,
Between stars — on stars where no human race is.
I have it in me so much nearer home
To scare myself with my own desert places.
I bet you know what he is talking about. Mary Magdalene certainly does. Each of us, at some time in life, has to struggle with an empty space, a desert place.
- We feel it when we get the message that we are being laid off, and have to clean out our desk immediately.
- When we open our statement from the mutual fund company, and discover that our investments have tanked.
- When we realize that we owe more on our mortgage than our house is worth.
- When we open the thin envelope from the college admissions office, and learn that we have been rejected.
- When we get the call from the doctor, saying that the biopsy has come back with a cancer diagnosis.
- When a spouse says she is leaving, a boyfriend says he wants to break up, a partner says there is no future in the relationship.
These are empty spaces. Desert places.
Mary and her companions are seized by terror and amazement, and they retreat into silence, saying nothing to anyone. They feel like they have traveled to a space between stars, where no human race is. Yes, it’s true that the mysterious young man in the tomb has said to them, “Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here” (v. 6). This is good news — the Easter morning good news of resurrection life. But the women cannot grasp it, at least not yet.
They hear what the man is saying, but it falls flat. They don’t get it. It doesn’t work as a punch-line. It doesn’t cause them to laugh and sing.
And that’s maybe where we are as well, in this time of political uncertainty and economic crisis. We are ready for a good news punch-line, an upbeat report, a story that lifts our spirits and gives us hope. But day after day, we keep hearing news about empty spaces and desert places. The cover of the current edition of Newsweek contains a cross, and in the cross are the words, “The Decline and Fall of Christian America.” It reports that the number of Americans who claim no religious affiliation has nearly doubled since 1990, rising from 8 percent to 15 percent.
In a very real sense, that’s the way life often is. More emptiness than fullness. More decline than increase. More fear than joy. More failure than success. More separation than reunion. Mary Magdalene felt it when she went with her friends to the tomb of Jesus. And so do we.
But suddenly, when we least expect it, here comes the Easter punch-line: “Jesus is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you” (v. 7). The young man in the tomb says that Jesus is alive … but he is moving ahead of us, always ahead of us. He will appear when we least expect it, and surprise us with his resurrection life.
There is nothing predictable about the way that the Risen Jesus will behave. He is going to sneak up on us, just like the funniest of jokes tend to do. You never see the big laugh coming.
posted by Henry Brinton | 8:19 AM
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