Thus says the Lord: The people who survived the sword found grace in the wilderness;

The story of Easter is told differently in John’s gospel than the others, it is a simpler story.

The story starts in darkness, as Mary Magdalene makes her way out of the city, to the garden where the body lies, so that she can mourn. The garden has turned into a wilderness for Mary, a wilderness of tears.

And we know that darkness, we know that wilderness, don’t we?

We know that when someone, whom we have loved, dies there is a sense of denial and desperation, a desire for one more day, one more conversation, one more chance to explain or apologize or to simply enjoy that person. One more day.

And we don’t get it. We don’t get it because that person is dead, as the Munchkin Coroner of Oz said, of the witch: “I thoroughly examined her, and she's not only merely dead, she's really most sincerely dead.”

So it was with Jesus. Mary knew that he was “most sincerely dead”, so when she sees the stone has been moved, she runs and tells Peter and John, they examine the scene and leave, and Mary is left to do the only thing that we can do when the darkness of death visits the neighborhoods of our hearts: she cries.

I don’t blame her!

First this man whom she loved is arrested, tried, convicted and killed, all in a less than 24 hour whirlwind of Thursday night and Friday, and now someone has stolen his body? It is too much for Mary and she sobs and she sobs, until it hurts as much physically as it already did emotionally.

There is a silly notion that goes around in some Christian circles that our faith makes us immune to the tears of sorrow, and if it doesn’t we don’t have real faith, but that has never been my experience or observation! Our tears at the death of a loved one are often the measure of our love, the testimony to how much we will miss them.

Mary Magdalene cried, in the garden that had become a wilderness, because the sword of sorrow had pierced her. And twice she was asked why she was crying.

Now there have been times when I, and others, have read those questions with a sense of irony, as if Jesus is playing with her.

But I’m not sure that’s a fair reading, as one writer put it: “we inflect Jesus' words with a tone similar to what a parent would take toward a child who is crying over a dead pet when, really, the pet is just fine and sleeping over in the corner. "Jimmy, why are you crying? Knock it off and open your eyes--Squeaky is right over there!" But that is the wrong way to inflect the voice of Jesus here. Jesus knew better than anyone that Mary Magdalene's tears are . . . the tears of all humanity. This is the weeping, the bitter spilling forth of salty tears, that has enveloped the human race.”

And in that wilderness of piercing sorrow and salty tears, Mary Magdalene, who had survived the sword of her own demons, found the grace of Easter.

The people who survived the sword found grace in the wilderness;

But sorrow is not the only wilderness in John’s story of Easter.

There is also the Wilderness of Uncertainty.

I don’t know if you ever noticed but, especially here in John’s gospel, there doesn’t seem to be anyone who knows what’s going on! Mary takes one look at the missing rock and she runs for help, sure that the grave robbers have been at work.

John and Peter go into the tomb and look around and the best that they can do is to agree with Mary, they believe that she had it right, because they didn’t understand.

What you don’t see are people jumping up and down and celebrating, because they didn’t know anything about resurrection and eternal life.

I think we have all been there in our lives, haven’t we?

We are confronted with circumstances that make no sense at all to us, or circumstances that have broken our hearts and our spirits, and so we try desperately to make them fit into something that we once heard or knew and we are completely unaware of the radically new and different things that God is doing around us and in us.

Think about all the things that we don’t understand.

We don’t understand why children die.

We don’t understand why our friends and neighbors lose their jobs and homes and dignity to these economic tsunamis, while corporations pay no taxes and their executives are paid obscene salaries.

We don’t understand why good people suffer for years with painful, chronic illnesses.

We don’t understand why the years slow our minds and weaken our bodies.

We watch the news and we just don’t understand what is going on in the world.

The garden that we were created to live in becomes a wilderness of uncertainty.

And what do we do with the uncertainty? How do we find Easter grace in the wilderness of uncertainty?

Peter and John, on the one hand, and Mary Magdalene, on the other, give us hints. And you can insert your own “Guy Thing”, “Smart Woman” jokes here.

But Peter and John race to the tomb, and John – the author – can’t resist the chance to tell us that he won the race, and they look and see what’s there, and who’s not there. And then they take their uncertainty home with them, to mull it over, to apply logic and rational thought to figure out what must have happened.

Meanwhile Mary Magdalene watches them go, but she lingers at the tomb, and she weeps, and as a result, she is the one who sees and speaks with Jesus.

Her wilderness of uncertainty was transformed back into a garden of grace and Easter was hers, because she was willing to grief, honestly.

The Grace of Easter only emerges out of the darkness of Good Friday.

The people who survived the sword found grace in the wilderness;

When Mary finally realizes who it is, calling her name, she throws herself at his feet in joy and adoration, clutching with her hands . . . and he stops her.

You see, she could not hold and possess and control Jesus.

No one can.

Jesus doesn’t belong to us, we belong to him.

We try, over and over again, we try and we do all that we can to hold on to Christ.

But, just like Mary Magdalene, we can’t.

And it is good that we can’t.

Because if we could we would probably try to turn the clock back and make things just as they used to be; but the resurrection of Christ didn’t turn back the clock and make things the way they used to be.

Jesus was alive but differently; the people we have loved and mourned are alive but differently and we can’t cling to them, we can’t hold them back. The adventures of Galilee, the stories as they walked the dusty roads, the miracles along the way, that was not where this was going.

And all of the photographs and memories of where we have been, that’s not where we are going either.

And that is just as true about those who are alive now as it is about those who have died and are now alive again.

Easter is the reminder that we can’t hold each other back, in this world or the next. Easter is always about what’s next, Easter is always taking us forward, taking us forward to places and plans and people that we might not choose, taking us forward to places and plans and people that God has chosen for us.

Which may be why John told us of Mary’s inability to hold Christ.

We need to hear that story. If Mary’s tears represented all of our tears, then her realization of the realities of Easter in this world needs to become our realization.

Life after Easter goes on, death continues to visit, Lazarus didn’t live forever in this world and we still have many tears to shed. But we also have many joys and victories ahead of us!

That doesn’t mean that we won’t change! Be sure to notice that when Mary Magdalene is ready to leave the wilderness and the garden, she will find a new role in the history of the world: Mary Magdalene becomes the first messenger, the first apostle, the first minister of the word as she finds the others and becomes the first person to say to another person “I have seen the Lord!" Mary Magdalene saw him, even if she could not hold onto him.

And in our moments of sorrow and uncertainty we have seen him as well, often unrecognized and usually unexpected, and yet we have seen him when a friend dries our tears, when a stranger lights our way, we have seen him in whatever wildernesses we have wandered into.

Where does Easter happen?

Let me be as clear and honest as I possibly can be, Easter isn’t going to happen here in this room on a Sunday morning filled with lilies; Easter isn’t going to happen when our precious and sacred children and grandchildren light up our hearts as they chase around after eggs; Easter isn’t going to happen when the people we love gather at a table later today for a meal seasoned with an emotional marinate that makes everything taste better.

Easter happens where we need it, in the darkness of our wildernesses, in the aftermath of the cross.

Easter happens when we’re sitting in a hospital waiting room and the doctor emerges and shakes his head and says “we did all we could.” Easter happens when we walk into a funeral home and see a loved one lying there and we go dead inside. Easter happens when the newspaper brings us another obituary of a peer, reminding us of our own inevitable journey’s end. Easter happens when death happens and tears fall.

Every time death happens Easter happens, Christ is with us, whether we recognize it or not. There may not be blaring trumpets, but in the darkness of our old tears, Easter has happened and in all of the tears to come, Easter will happen.

It is in the wilderness that we discover the grace of hope, and we cling to the joy of that hope, and we remind ourselves, and each other, that death is not the end.   

We have seen the Lord, even if we can’t hold him or control him.

But, by faith, we have seen the Lord and known his grace.

And we will continue to see him, again and again, whenever and wherever he is needed.

We can’t hold him or control him, but we can love him and follow him and, in doing that, we will find Grace.

Thus says the Lord: The people who survived the sword found grace in the wilderness;