Wednesday – May 8, 2019

First Witnesses…! 

A popular view in the culture today is that Christianity denigrates women. When we hear such views expressed it’s worth having a creative response at our fingertips – such as sensitively opening a way to take our interlocutors to the biblical narrative.

Significantly, all four Gospel records inform us that women were the first witnesses to the empty tomb. Consider Dr Luke’s account. He reports that some women who were close to Jesus had gone to his tomb on the first day of the new week to give his body a formal Jewish burial. But arriving there, they were astonished to find that the tomb was not only open, but that the body was gone. The tomb was empty.

Well, not quite. Two dazzling figures were there and spoke to the women. ‘Don’t you remember what Jesus had said?’ they asked. ‘If you had thought about what he had foreshadowed, you would not have been puzzled by his death; you would not be stricken with grief; and you would not be in this place today’ (Luke 24:5b-7).

Two witnesses. The fact that there were two dazzling figures is consistent with the requirement in Deuteronomy (19:15) that for a statement to be treated as reliable and true there needs to be more than one witness – something the Bible consistently provides. Indeed, unlike other revealed religions, we have the written records of four Gospel writers concerning Jesus and within their statements we consistently find more than one witness to critical events – not least Jesus’ resurrection from the dead.

 Here the two figures testify to three women that Jesus’ body is not in the tomb because he has been raised to life. In 1 Corinthians 15:3-8 Paul the Apostle speaks of Peter and the disciples who saw him physically alive. He adds that more than 500 had the same experience, including himself.

Yes, the women did remember Jesus’ words. And what a difference it made when they were reminded of them. Suddenly filled with joy they were re-energized and rushed off to tell their friends in Jerusalem the breaking news.

And here it is also worth noting that Dr Luke, the very careful historian, wants to underline the point that the witness of the women that day is true. It’s one of the reasons he identifies them by name: Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James (Luke 24:10). These women were perfectly sane and sensible people, people of integrity. They had names. They could be identified. ‘In fact,’ Luke was implying, ‘if you want to find out for yourself, go and talk to them’.

Nonsense? But look at the response they received in Jerusalem: No-one believed them!  They thought it was an idle tale or ‘nonsense’ (24:11). The word nonsense was a medical term for the wild, confused talk of people in a state of delirium. Luke, the writer, was a doctor! The report of the women was regarded as nothing more than the wild talk of delirious people. To speak of seeing angels and of Jesus risen from the dead was nonsense!

The disciples’ dismissive reaction may well reflect the culture of the day. In Judaism for example, a woman’s testimony in court was treated at best as secondary, at worst as unreliable. Yet significantly, in God’s purposes, it is women who are the first witnesses of the empty tomb. To them, first of all, comes the reminder of Jesus’ words that these events had to happen.

However, there was at least one person who was keen to find out if the women were telling the truth: Peter. He was the man who had three times denied knowing Jesus. And now, more than anything else he wanted to sort out that broken relationship. His guilt burdened him.

As a Christian minister I meet with many people in all stages of their lives. I also see the grief and sorrow in times of bereavement. Very few people I meet want to say that death is the end.

Did you know that the first Christian sermon was preached was only a few miles from Jesus’ tomb? Nobody was in a better position to have tested the truth of this resurrection story than those who heard Peter’s testimony. 

Yet when Peter on the Day of Pentecost insisted that Jesus was risen from the dead, we don’t find three thousand sceptics or cynics, but three thousand converts.  They were not deluded. Hundreds saw Jesus alive, physically risen from the dead. No-one has proved otherwise. 

The dream of life beyond the grave can be a reality. Joylessness can turn into joy. The cross and the resurrection of Christ are the keys. This is what we celebrate at Easter.

Witnesses to the truth. These are the great truths that God revealed to the women. It was their witness that first spoke to the world of God’s personal intervention when he reversed the events of Eden (Genesis 3). God alone could do this. And he has done it!

© John G. Mason 

Note 1: Material for today’s ‘Word’ is adapted from my commentary, Luke: An Unexpected God (Aquila: 2019, 2^nd Edition).

May 1, 2019

The Cross…! 

Easter Day is truly a gala day as we celebrate Jesus’ resurrection from the dead. His resurrection underscores the validity of the Christian faith. Without it, we are lost.

That said, our Easter celebration raises interesting questions: ‘Why isn’t an empty tomb the symbol of Christianity?’ ‘Why is the symbol a cross?’ In today’s age when feelings and political correctness trump facts it would surely make much more sense if we focused on the themes of new life and hope that the resurrection symbolizes.

Yet, despite the fact that Jesus’ crucifixion was a bloody and brutal affair, the cross remains the symbol of the Christian faith.

In the opening scene of Luke’s ‘resurrection chapter’ we read: But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they came to the tomb, taking the spices that they had prepared. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in, they did not find the body (Luke 24:1-3).

Despair. There was no joy in the hearts of those women that morning. They had watched Jesus die and now were grief-stricken and despairing. They had believed that he was God’s Messiah and were looking forward to a new age of justice and peace, of laughter, love and joy. Now, their only thought was to give his body a proper burial.

We can picture them trudging to the tomb in the grey light of the dawn, burdened by their own thoughts and laden with heavy jars of oils and spices for the burial.

But that was not all: when they arrived at the grave, they saw that the huge stone closing the tomb had been rolled away. Was this some underhand action on the part of the authorities? 

While they were perplexed about this, suddenly two men in dazzling clothes stood beside them… (24:4). They had despaired at Jesus’ death and now they were terrified: they could only bow their faces to the ground at the dazzling appearance of two angels. And when the angels spoke, the women were even more confused: “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen.” ‘You’ve come to the wrong place.’

Remember! “Remember how he told you while he was still with you in Galilee: ‘the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified and on the third day rise again…’” (Luke 24:6b-7a).

The angels could have explained the empty tomb. Instead, they told the women to remember what Jesus had said to them. The focus of Jesus’ words they quoted is important: ‘The Son of Man, the Messiah had to suffer and die and then rise again’. Suffering and death were essential to the work of God’s king.

Which brings us back to the subject of the cross. Richard Dawkins, with others, reckons that to say, ‘Jesus died for our sins’ is vicious and disgusting. ‘Why couldn’t God simply forgive sins if he so chose?’ he asks.

In every age Jesus’ death has been an enigma – even for his first followers. Yet during the course of his ministry he had foreshadowed both it and his resurrection. Indeed, in his public ministry he revealed that he had not come as a political Messiah to bring in God’s kingdom through force.

Rather, he came as a savior to address our greatest need – our broken relationship with God. He alone could deliver us from God’s just judgement and open the doors of God’s new age.

This theme infuses Luke’s gospel. At Jesus’ birth the angel announced that God’s savior had been born. And when he met with Zacchaeus, Jesus summed up his ministry saying, “The Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10).

Furthermore, his words at the Last Supper are key to the meaning of his death: “This is my body given for you…”  “This is my blood shed for you…”  These words are amongst the oldest statements of Christianity. We find them in 1 Corinthians, written around 50AD, as well as in Matthew, Mark and Luke, which were written no later than the 60s.

In fact when we read Luke as a whole we come to see that Jesus’ death is about God’s love and justice – central aspects of God’s character. Some say that Jesus’ crucifixion was a form of child abuse – a father punishing a son for someone else’s wrongs. But we need to remember Jesus’ words in John 10 where he said he would lay down his life voluntarily.

The movement of the Bible tells us that without the shedding of blood there can be no forgiveness of sins (Leviticus 17:11; Hebrews 9:22). God, the wronged party, entered the world and bore the punishment that we wrong-doers deserve. God, as the judge, paid in full, once and for all time, the fine owed by the accused who have been found guilty.

When we understand in this way Jesus’ words at his Last Supper: “My body given for you,” it is no wonder that the cross, once an instrument of Roman brutality, became, and remains today, the symbol of God’s extraordinary love for the world.

© John G. Mason – www.anglicanconnection.com

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Note 2: Material for today’s ‘Word’ is adapted from my commentary, Luke: An Unexpected God (Aquila: 2019, 2^nd Edition).