Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

The angel appears to the disciples in the midst of all kinds of signs that things are not what they were. The earthquake has shaken everything and everyone down to the foundations. In the blitz of lightening the messenger appears and delivers the message.

'He has been raised from the dead, and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him.' This is my message for you. (Matthew 28: 6-7)

The proclamation in some ways reminds us of creation. In Genesis Chapter One we have a similar announcement that God has acted.

Then God said, "Let there be light"; and there was light. And God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. (Genesis 1:3-4)

In this great poetical hymn to creation, the work of creation is by simple fiat. Let there be. We are not told how, by what means, or in which way God created. All we receive is the confirmation, “and there was light.”

In the same way as in creation, today we hear no description of the mechanics as to how God acted on Jesus Christ. We hear only the report, “He has been raised from the dead.” We are given no privileged view into the event. And just as we heard in creation, we now hear in the “new creation” that God has acted.

Resurrection faith is not knowledge about how. Resurrection faith is trust that the message is true. If the message is trustworthy, then the one whom God has raised is deemed worthy of our trust. Christ has been vindicated before the world.

What is at stake here? Nothing less than the whole realm of creation which belongs to God. The work of Jesus of Nazareth was to announce the approaching rule of God over the world. The nearness of God was brought to full expression in the life, actions and words of Jesus. God’s closeness to the world evokes both fear and love.

The love of God in Jesus Christ evokes fear. Because we are unable to trust on our own, we cannot bear the holy presence of God made manifest in the life of Jesus. In so far as we insist on trusting in our own power and in our own position, we are afraid of the proclamation that Christ has been raised from the dead. The earthquake has shaken our vain self-understanding. The lightening has opened our eyes to the true light. And death loses its cold grip on our hearts so that we receive the love, compassion, and courage manifest in Jesus and confirmed in the resurrection proclamation.

The love of God in Jesus Christ evokes hope for all humanity. He brings near those who were far away by going to them in their alienation and estrangement. He heals those who were sick, blind and lame that they might be set free from the brokenness that afflicts us all.

The message of the resurrection presents us with no verifiable facts that we can scrutinize as to accuracy. We cannot verify whether the tomb was empty or the earthquake really took place. The gospels make clear that these facts produced as many non-believers as they produced believers. The message of the resurrection reports that God has acted, even as God acted in creation and continues to act in creation to sustain the universe.

The resurrection message reports that God has acted powerfully in creation, not by means of the sword, not by the threat of intimidation, not by the use of violence. All of these would simply confirm our despair that we have been left on earth to the whims of natural disasters and the mindless and egotistical madness of those few humans who believe that they are in charge of their world and their small kingdoms.

The mystery of faith consists in trust that God has acted by sending Jesus who demonstrates power not by taking up force, but by renouncing force as means to fulfilling the purpose of creation. He put his trust in God that God would deliver him. He remained faithful to prophetic vision of the peaceable kingdom. In Jesus the human anxiety toward death is overcome by faithful trust in and obedience to God.

In this way Christ has opened up a way to God. This way is not from earth to heaven; rather, it is from heaven to earth. The transcendent power, that from the beginning created the world, is the power that raised Jesus Christ from the dead. The God of Jesus is the God of Abraham, Moses and the prophets

who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist. (Romans 4:17b NRS)

Resurrection faith is large enough and broad enough and deep enough that we can discover ourselves encompassed by the same power that raised Jesus Christ from the dead.

Dear brothers and sisters, resurrection faith is life. It is life that is no longer determined by our mortal nature. Christ has taken on our mortality, and it has been transformed by the Spirit of power which raised Jesus Christ from the dead. Resurrection faith is life no longer shaken by the anxiety of our lack of control. Jesus faced all the temptations to self-vaunting pride and chose rather to submit to the power of God rather than to the vain promises of the devil. Resurrection faith is life no longer consumed with self. Jesus could remain concentrated on his vocation to be the very face of God on earth. He could, therefore, trust that even in losing his life he would be revealing the divine life. And all of this receives its confirmation in the through the announcement,

He has been raised from the dead, and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him. (Matthew 28:7)

And we do meet him every time we assemble on Easter Sunday, on every Lord’s Day when we meet for word and sacrament, and on every occasion when we gather in his name. We live in trust that the God who raised Jesus from the dead will raise us up also. This is the mystery of the union between Christ and Christ’s Church. Together we form a body called to give witness to the transcendent power who meets us who have died with him on the cross and who live with him in the word, “He has been raised from the dead.”

Amen.