🔊 Trembling & Astonishment

Welcome to AnchorCast, a weekly podcast of homilies and sermons from Christ our Anchor Anglican Mission in Nashville, Tennessee.

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer.

Amen.

Today’s Gospel reading says, And they went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had come upon them.

Trembling and astonishment.

When I read that, I thought, when was the last time that the good news of the empty tomb led me to trembling and astonishment?

It’s easy to become accustomed to the idea of a resurrected Lord.

For many of us, we knew the risen Jesus before we even read the words of the New Testament for the first time.

All the stories we read in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, for us, are read in the light and knowledge of Easter.

And this, of course, is not a bad thing.

It’s only natural.

But we have to remember that for everyone in the Gospels, this was all new stuff.

This was earth-shattering stuff.

And it’s the same for our neighbors all around us.

These days, not many people know what Easter is really about.

Even if they know that Jesus came back to life after he died, they don’t really know why that’s a big deal.

It’s just a myth pulled out of context.

So today, I ask you to put yourself into a Mark 16 frame of mind.

Remember why it’s amazing that Jesus is alive.

Remember what that means for all of us, for the entire world.

We can see with our natural eyes that everything around us decays and dies.

Flowers wilt and turn to dust, metal rusts, people and animals die in a matter of decades.

Our scientists tell us that big and steady things, mountains, plastics, and even the sun, will fade away over time.

Decay, rot, and death surround us.

Nothing can escape it.

We can distract ourselves from that fact, and the world definitely does try to do that.

But life as it stood before Easter was a one-way ticket to nothingness, and no one could do otherwise.

But the empty tomb breaks that pattern.

Jesus defeated death.

He is the first of all the cosmos to have entered death, but not stayed there.

Jesus added another route to the schedule, and what’s crazy is that he bought everyone a ticket to ride.

His resurrection means that the pattern of the world is broken.

It is no longer natural that all things should die.

In Christ, eternal life is possible.

He’s broken the mold.

There is hope.

We’re not on a one-way train to darkness and despair.

So hear the good news today.

In Jesus Christ, there is hope.

In Jesus Christ, there is life after death.

In Jesus Christ, the chains of death have been broken.

In him alone is life eternal.

In him, we are finally fully human, that is, forever creatures, sustained and loved by the Creator God of the universe.

So this Easter, stand before your Lord in astonishment and trembling as the women at his empty tomb.

What he has done is mighty and beyond comprehension.

But while we stand in awe, do not fear.

Jesus is not a faraway God.

He is not a God who lords from on high.

No, Jesus is a God who came among us and comes to us even still.

His arms are open because he wants to embrace us.

So come to him and find rest, light, love, and life.

Our Lord is not dead but alive.

Because he lives, everything is different.

Because he lives, we can boldly go out into the world proclaiming his good news.

The name of God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, amen.

Christ Our Anchor is an Anglican mission in East Nashville that meets on Wednesday evenings for prayer and fellowship.

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