To understand Easter in all its fullness and beauty, it helps to have some understanding of Jewish and Biblical timing. In each of the
four gospels we are told that it was early in the morning on the first day of
the week, that the women went to Jesus’ tomb.
When is the first day of the week … it is Sunday … today.
Sunday is the day Jesus was raised from the dead and it’s for that reason that
the church has met on Sunday ever since Pentecost. It became known as the
Lord’s Day. Jesus was crucified on Friday, which is the sixth day of the week,
and there was a rush to get Him off the cross and buried before sunset on
Friday, because sunset on Friday marks the beginning of the Sabbath, which is
Saturday, the seventh day of the week. All work had to cease on the Sabbath,
and work included the burial of a person. The Sabbath runs from sunset Friday
to sunset Saturday, so first thing in the early morning on Sunday, at first
light on the first day of the week, they rush off to treat Jesus body as a dead
body deserved, but which could not be done in the hurry on Friday.
But the key to the message of Easter lies in the Biblical
teaching regarding when a day starts and finishes. Evening in Scripture does
not close the day, but begins it: right back at the beginning of Scripture we
are told (6 times) “And there was evening and there was morning, the first day”
(Gen 1:5, 8, 13, 19, 23 & 31. We Gentiles, unlike our Jewish brothers and
sisters, pay little attention to these verses, but they are profoundly
important in understanding light and darkness. These verses assure us that
ultimately we are not left in the darkness of night. Right at the beginning of
Scripture we learn darkness is not the final word. The final word is always
light. Darkness is enclosed by light, not the other way round. Morning comes
after the night. Light marks the end of night. Morning is not just the
beginning of what follows, but more properly is the end of what came before:
the night.
So, early in the morning, because they needed light to do
the work they were going to do, they go to the tomb. Matthew’s gospel records
that there was an earthquake which caused the stone which had been placed over
the entrance, to roll away … but friends, the stone was not rolled away so that
Jesus could come out … no tomb could hold Jesus, stone or no stone! No, the
stone was rolled away so that people could go in and see that Jesus was not
there.
Jesus, the light of the world, could not be contained by the
darkness of Good Friday and the darkness of the tomb. Darkness does not contain
light, light surrounds darkness and light always is the final word.
Now, I’ve chosen my next words very carefully: I do not want
to make light of the darkness in your life. I do not want to belittle it,
because some of our darkness can be very large. What is the darkness I am
speaking of? The darkness of disease, the darkness of relationship breakdown,
the darkness of unemployment, of war, of loneliness, of bereavement, of
suffering, of sin … these darknesses can be very large and very dark, and I
don’t make light of them.
But, however large they are … our God is larger.
However dark they are, darkness is never the last word,
light is. John reminds us at the beginning of his gospel:
The light shines in
the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
Darkness is never the last word. Light was the first word:
Let there be … light. And light is always the last word … even into the
darkness of death. The resurrection of Jesus showed that even that darkness,
death itself, is not the last word. Jesus was dead … but that is not the last
word. The last word is: Jesus is alive!
This doesn’t diminish, or take away the dark, but it does
contain it. Yes, we still live in a world of disease, of relationship
breakdown, of unemployment, of war, of loneliness, of bereavement, of
suffering, of sin, we still live in a world of much darkness, and as I said
earlier, I don’t make light of that … but Jesus does. Jesus makes light,
literally makes light, in the midst of your darkness.
In 2
Cor 4:6 Paul writes:
For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’
Paul teaches that light shines … and it shines not on the darkness,
nor into the darkness as though from outside. It shines out of the darkness, as
though from within the darkness. The light is active even from within the
darkness in which we dwell, shining as though outward. You see, the light
dwells even within us. “You are the light of the world” says Jesus (Mt 5: ) …
and nothing, not the deepest darkness, not even death, can put out the light
that is in you.
The message of Scripture, confirmed by the Resurrection is
plain and simply this: darkness just doesn’t have a chance. That is the truth …
let that become your hope.
Do you know the game rock, paper, scissors? There should be
a fourth one … Light (show hands). But that would destroy the game, because
light always wins. (Play game … light wins). Whatever life throws at you ….
Light will always have the last word.
How can this become a reality in your darkness? In all the
records as we have them at the tomb of Jesus, everyone persists in looking into
the tomb:
Both were running, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the
tomb first. 5 He bent over and looked in at the
strips of linen lying there but did not go in.
Now Mary stood outside the tomb crying. As she wept, she bent over to
look into the tomb
When we talk of the empty tomb, do you find yourself, in
faith, looking into it, and seeing that it is empty, and rejoicing? Or, when we
talk of the empty tomb, do you find yourself standing there, in faith, and
looking out from it? Both are acts of great faith, but when we look into the
tomb and marvel and worship, the view is very contained … and in all the
accounts, no one looking into the tomb actually sees Jesus. It is when they
turn and look out, that the view is enlarged and eventually, they discern
Jesus.
The faith behind both of these is saving faith … a faith
that looks in, believes and rejoices … and a faith that looks out, believes and
rejoices. The one is a faith that says Jesus is alive, he is not in the tomb;
the other is a faith that says Jesus is alive, and He is waiting to meet me
somewhere out there. The second creates hope and expectation, because instead
of seeing where He is not … we begin to look for where He is. And when we look,
by faith, for where He is, we find Him where we least expect him … even in the
midst of our darkness.
In Luke’s account of the resurrection, the angel says:
‘Why do you look for
the living among the dead?’ Luke
24:5
He doesn’t say “Don’t look for Him” … he says “Don’t look
for Him here”
The darkness
in your life … the tombs in your life … are not the last word, so don’t look
into them too much. Look outward, because, even in the midst of your current
darkness, Jesus is out there, not in the tomb, but out there and quite close
by, waiting to meet you. Even in the deep darkness that only your soul
experiences, the very seeds of your next encounter with Jesus are being sown,
and Jesus is already coming towards you. Out of your darkness, light is already
beginning to shine. This is all truth regarding the Light we read of in
Scripture … may you discover what it means for you … this is truth:
The darkness
doesn’t stand a chance.
