Listen to the audio of today’s Reflection:
https://soundcloud.com/hapearce/reflection-for-july-11-2023
Luke 23:55 – 24:12
23: 55 The women who had come with Jesus from Galilee followed Joseph and saw the tomb and how his body was laid in it. 56 Then they went home and prepared spices and perfumes. But they rested on the Sabbath in obedience to the commandment.
24:1 On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb. 2 They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, 3 but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. 4 While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them. 5 In their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? 6 He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: 7 ‘The Son of Man must be delivered over to the hands of sinful men, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.’ ” 8 Then they remembered his words.
9 When they came back from the tomb, they told all these things to the Eleven and to all the others. 10 It was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the others with them who told this to the apostles. 11 But they did not believe the women, because their words seemed to them like nonsense.12 Peter, however, got up and ran to the tomb. Bending over, he saw the strips of linen lying by themselves, and he went away, wondering to himself what had happened.
As far as we know, nobody actually saw the resurrection – all we have is the accounts of its discovery by the female disciples.
The great English theologian and Bible scholar Tom Wright reminds us that there were quite a few others in the ancient Hebrew world who claimed to be – or whose followers claimed they were – the Messiah. And in the reading from the Acts of the Apostles we thought about a week or two ago, the Hebrew teacher Gamaliel reminded his colleagues in the high council that the movements around these would-be messiahs all dispersed when they were killed or arrested. But what distinguished the followers of Jesus from all the other movements is that the followers of Jesus claimed to have encountered him alive after he was crucified.
That belief in the resurrection of Jesus remains the central unifying principle of those of us who claim to be his followers 2,000 years later. And that means that the gospel accounts of the discovery that Jesus had risen as he said are critically important passages for us to reflect on, and to be able to talk about. Those gospel accounts are instruments by which God makes us what we are, so to speak.
Lots of people accept that Jesus was a very insightful religious philosopher – even some professed atheists will admit that. The Muslims revere Jesus as a great prophet. Buddhist leaders like the Dalai Lama and Thich Nhat Hanh have written thoughtful books about the teachings of Jesus. But those outside the Christian faith typically dismiss the resurrection as a religious myth invented by the apostles to help recruit people into their new religious movement.
Sadly, lots of people who call themselves Christians don’t really have much of an answer to those who reject the truth of the resurrection. They just say it’s in the Bible and they believe it and that’s that. Not a very persuasive response. And a sad one, because there are better ways to uphold the claims of the resurrection accounts.
First of all, nobody who was making up a story like this in the ancient Near East would say that the first witnesses to the resurrection were women. The testimony of women just wasn’t given that much credence in that world. In fact, in the gospel accounts, even the male disciples dismissed the women’s report that they had seen Jesus. If you were going to make up a story to get converts to your new religion in the ancient Near East, you’d have the resurrection discovered by some learned rabbi or a philosopher or a political figure – not by a group of peasant women.
And what’s more, if you were going to make up a story like this to help you start a new religion, you wouldn’t make up a story that said that you didn’t believe the report of the resurrection when you heard it. You wouldn’t intentionally make yourself look bad. But Peter and the others told stories that did just that.
And for that matter, if you were the leader of the movement like Peter, you wouldn’t make up a story that said you tried to talk Jesus out of the whole idea of being crucified – and that you made Jesus so angry he called you “Satan.” And you wouldn’t make up a story that said you denied knowing Jesus when he was surrounded by a howling mob, and then ran off crying into the night.
Those of us who follow Jesus have heard and read the gospel accounts of this story all our lives. So we miss the truth about how literally incredible they would have been as propaganda documents in that time and place. The apostles weren’t highly educated scholars, but they weren’t fools, either. They had to have known lots of people – maybe most people – would find their claims about Jesus’ resurrection unbelievable. But they consistently told the story that way anyway.
No one in the ancient Hebrew world would have told the story the way it’s told in the gospels. Unless, that is, they absolutely believed it to be true. Unless they believed it so whole-heartedly that they were willing to risk the scorn and rejection of the world.
And when they went into the world telling this story, a lot of those who heard it did in fact greet it with scorn and rejection. But according to Paul, more than 500 people encountered the risen Jesus. The New Testament even mentions some well-respected people – people known to the early church – who would vouch for the story.
And ultimately, of course, some of the followers of Jesus demonstrated their sincerity, their complete belief in the story they were telling, by willingly allowing themselves to be killed as Jesus had. Because, they said, Jesus had risen from the dead and they would, too. When the skeptics saw their calm assurance, they found it startling. “Un-nerving” is the term one of the Roman officials used. And then the skeptics started to believe it, too.
A group of peasant women performing a religious burial ritual on a quiet morning find the body of their leader missing, and two mysterious figures tell them something so unbelievable you’d have to be crazy to believe it. And when they repeat the story, the men in their movement think they really are crazy. But the women’s insistence on the truth of what they had seen was a stone thrown into the pond of human history – and the ripples are still spreading today, twenty centuries later.
Let’s pray. Lord, we thank you for the miracle of the resurrection, and for the faithful witness of those who proclaimed what they had seen. We thank you that by your Spirit, you still bear witness to the truth of the resurrection, that great sign of your victory over death and evil and of the truth of your promise of eternal life with you for your Son’s followers. Amen.
Grace and Peace,
Henry
(The other readings for today are Psalms 73 and 74; I Samuel 15:24-35; and Acts 9:32-43. Our readings come from the NIV Bible, as posted on Biblica.com, the website of the International Bible Society.)
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