The End is Life

Bread and Wine Reading: "The End is Life", Frederick Buechner
Scripture Reading: Matthew 27: 57-66
When it was evening, there came a rich man from Arimathea, named Joseph, who was also a disciple of Jesus. He went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus; then Pilate ordered it to be given to him. So Joseph took the body and wrapped it in a clean linen cloth and laid it in his own new tomb, which he had hewn in the rock. He then rolled a great stone to the door of the tomb and went away. Mary Magdalene and the other Mary were there, sitting opposite the tomb. The next day, that is, after the day of Preparation, the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered before Pilate and said, “Sir, we remember what that impostor said while he was still alive, ‘After three days I will rise again.’ Therefore command the tomb to be made secure until the third day; otherwise his disciples may go and steal him away, and tell the people, ‘He has been raised from the dead,’ and the last deception would be worse than the first.” Pilate said to them, “You have a guard of soldiers; go, make it as secure as you can.” So they went with the guard and made the tomb secure by sealing the stone.

In some ways this text is almost more menacing than yesterday’s. The act of sealing the tomb means that it really is the end. And, apparently, Pilate wanted that. After all, he couldn’t be made to look like a fool if Jesus proves true to his word. “Make is as secure as you can,” he commands. After all, we can’t have this Jesus character showing up again. He HAS to be dead. But he also fears that Jesus’ followers might do something sneaky by stealing the body and making it LOOK like what Jesus said had really come to be. They were apparently a little afraid.

What must the disciples have been thinking? They were, of course, still grieving deeply for the loss of their friend and teacher. But, think about it. On some level they were perhaps anxious about what might or might not happen. After all, if Jesus did not emerge from death, what was the whole about? But, on the other hand, if he DID, what would that mean for them? It would mean that they finally had to step up and be Christ in this world and that’s probably the scariest of all.

We do the same. As long as the whole birth, life, death, and resurrection of Christ remains a 1st century phenomenon to us, we can relegate it to something from which we can learn. We can emulate who Christ was. As Frederick Buechner says, “We can say that the story of the resurrection means simply that the teachings of Jesus are immortal like the plays of Shakespeare or the music of Beethoven and that their wisdom and truth will live on forever…Or we can say that the language in which the Gospels describe the resurrection of Jesus is the language of poetry. Instead it is simply proclaimed as a fact. Christ is risen!”

What, then, does that mean for us? On this Holy Saturday, what does it mean if the stone is rolled away? It means, as Buechner put it, that “in the end, [God’s] will, not ours, is done. Love is the victor. Death is not the end. The end is life. His life and our lives through him, in him. Existence has greater depths of beauty, mystery, and benediction than the wildest visionary has ever dared to dream. Christ our Lord has risen.”

The stone is sealed. Fate’s path has been chosen. And now we wait. We stare at that stone hoping against hope that it is not a religious farce, that we have not been duped somewhere along the way. But, when the stone is rolled away, are you really ready for what is about to happen? Are you really ready for life?

Discussion Questions:
1.) What feelings do you have as the stone is sealed?
2.) What doubts do you have about the Resurrection? (Oh, come on…did you think you were the only one?)
3.) Are you ready for what is to come? Are you ready for life? What does that look like for you right now?

Just wait…wait for the tomb to be rolled away…wait for life!

Grace and Peace,

Shelli