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Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!
“Why do you seek the living among the dead?” To the women at the tomb the angels spoke these words. They’re directed at you as well. “Why do you seek the living among the dead?”
All the prophets spoke this way. Isaiah asks,
“Why do you spend money for what is not bread?”
Why do you spend “your wages for what does not satisfy?” (Is. 55:2)
With your work, are you making a living – or making a dying?
This beautiful world God made has become corrupted.
The fertile earth grew thick with thorns—thorns which later crowned the Lord’s head.
All the world, and man’s own nature, was infused with this corruption. What beauty we see is hauntingly impermanent.
The grass withers.
The flower fades.
The graveyard angels demand an answer:
“Why do you seek the living among the dead?”
You place your hopes in politics – but there is no hope there.
“Put not your trust in princes,” God’s Word tells us.
“Why do you seek the living among the dead?”
You have grasped for pleasure, but found only pain.
“For all that is in the world,” God’s Word tells us – “For all that is in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—is not of the Father but is of the world. And the world is passing away, and the lust of it; but he who does the will of God abides forever.”
“Why do you seek the living among the dead?”
The world is lying to you. You will not find satisfaction in what you buy. In his day, King Solomon was among the wealthiest men on the planet. He had world-renown; he had peace in his kingdom; he had a thousand women at his beck and call. And in the end he understands that all of it is meaningless. “Vanity, vanity, everything is vanity,” he concludes. Grasping for possessions, pleasure, power, is grasping for the wind.
All of that is embedded in that simple question of the angels: “Why do you seek the living among the dead?”
It is as though they say, “Dear ladies, why are you stomping through graveyards? This whole world has become a cemetery, but you will not find your Lord here. He only entered the tomb to destroy it. His death is the death of death.”
There’s good news in their question: Jesus is living.
He did not avoid death. He went through it.
He did not pass on to a happier, more spiritual reality. The body smashed by fists, cut by whips, smeared with blood and spittle, pierced with spike and spear – that body is risen from the dead. That very human, very tangible body, appeared to the women, then the Apostles, repeatedly, and even to over 500 eyewitnesses.
St. John tells us about his experience with the risen Jesus: “That which was from the beginning”—the Son of God is eternal, He already was when our world began—“That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled … the life was manifested” (1 Jn. 1:1f). John is telling us that Jesus is not an idea; Christianity is not an ethic or a philosophy; but everything hangs on this historical claim: That the Jesus John saw crucified, dead, and buried, he saw risen from the dead. And he not only saw the risen Jesus, but heard Him, and touched Him, repeatedly. Not alone, but in the company of many.
Now this would be glorious by itself – but St. John goes on to say what this means for you: “The life was manifested, and we have seen, and bear witness, and declare to you that eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested to us—that which we have seen and heard we declare to you, that you also may have fellowship with us” (1 Jn. 1:2f). Jesus is risen, and that resurrection is for you. The eternal life that Jesus has is for you. The defeat of death is not just for Him, it’s for you.
So when you face disappointment and heartbreak, when your friends forsake you, when cancer consumes, when you lay your husband or your dear child in the ground, you know that that is not the end of the matter. Another eyewitness of the risen Jesus, the Apostle Paul, declares to you this joy beyond all compare: “The Lord Jesus Christ … will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body” (Phil. 3:20f).
This life takes us to graveyards real and figurative. We are often among dead things, worthless, corrupt, the things which moth and rust destroy and thieves break in and steal.
But that is not your life. We are an Easter people, and Alleluia is our song. No longer shall we seek the living among the dead. For this is the day that the Lord has made. This day of resurrection fills every day henceforth, come what may.
For the stone is rolled away, and the door to paradise is opened to you.
Christ is risen, and death is undone.
Christ is risen, and Adam and Eve are lifted up from hell.
Christ is risen, and you shall rise too.
Christ is risen, and the demons are put to flight.
Christ is risen, and the angels rejoice.
So sing and dance, clang the cymbals and blow the trumpet, for Jesus Christ is risen today, Alleluia!
Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!
Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!
Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!