STRIKE ME DOWN AND ….
A Sermon by
Revelation 1
4John
to the seven churches that are in
Grace to you
and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven
spirits who are before his throne, 5and from Jesus Christ, the
faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the
earth.
To him who
loves us and freed us from our sins by his blood, 6and made us to be
a kingdom, priests serving his God and Father, to him be
glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.
7 Look! He is coming
with the clouds;
every
eye will see him,
even
those who pierced him;
and
on his account all the tribes of the earth will wail.
So it is to be.
Amen.
8“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, who
is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.
To quote one of my favorite poets, Paul Simon, “These are
the days of miracles and wonder, And don't cry baby,
don't cry, don't cry.” (from “Boy in the Bubble”) For those who thought Easter is over, we are
now in the Great Fifty Days, the season of Easter, running from Easter
Sunday to Pentecost. This is Alleluia
time, a time of glorious music, white robes, celebration. These are the days of miracles and wonder. Certainly not a time to
mourn the death of Jesus, or any death for that matter, not a time to cry but a
time to dance. This is Easter.
Fred Craddock says that the sermon on Easter Sunday should
be no more than an announcement, “Christ has risen!” Then, he says, preachers have the next seven
Sundays to explain what resurrection means.
That takes a lot of pressure off us preachers on Easter Sunday, but it
sure puts it on us hard on the Sundays that follow. So, what does Jesus’ resurrection mean?
In talking about Jesus’ resurrection, you may want to discuss how it happened. Was it a spontaneous combustion of molecules that dissolved the body and left nothing but the linen wrappings? Is the Shroud of Turin really Jesus’ burial shroud with his image radioactively imprinted on the fabric? Did he physically revive, discard his burial clothes and somehow walk through the stone that was covering the tomb just as the murdered husband in the movie, “Ghost,” walked through walls, or as Jesus himself did in the locked upper room? Was he still flesh and blood since he still had nail holes in his hands and ate fish on the beach with his disciples? Did his disciples just steal his body and make up these accounts? Are these resurrection stories actually parables, teaching us that death does not stop life? This morning I want to tell you exactly what happened in that tomb in the wee hours of Easter morning.
But I don’t know.
What I do know is that the explanation
of the resurrection is not nearly as important as asking, “What does it mean
for us today?”
For some help with that question I turn to some pop culture
scripture from the movie, Star Wars
Episode IV A New Hope. Obi-Wan Kenobi, the symbol of good, faces off
with Darth Vader, the symbol of evil:
Darth Vader: I've been waiting for you, Obi-Wan. We meet
again, at last. The circle is now complete. When I met you I was but the
learner. Now, I am the master.
Obi-Wan:
Only a master of evil, Darth.
[lightsabers clash
in battle]
Darth Vader: Your powers are weak, old man.
Obi-Wan:
You can't win, Darth. If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than
you could possibly imagine.
Too bad the Romans and the temple authorities didn’t get a
chance to see Star Wars before they
decided to crucify Jesus. Jesus was
struck down by the rulers of this world, but to their dismay death actually unleashed the power of Christ instead of
destroying it. The Revelation to John gives
us some ideas of how powerful this earthly Jesus has now become.
Jesus is now the “faithful
witness.” You want to know what God
is like? Jesus
demonstrates God’s power, delineates God’s will, defines
God’s nature. Through the delicate bloom
of a wildflower along a desolate trail we get a glimpse of God’s beauty.
Through the raging winds and bolts of crashing lightning we get a flash of God’s immense power. Through an unexpected, exuberant hug from a
child we sense a flicker of the love
in God’s heart. But if you want the
whole picture, if you want to see God completely, you look at the risen
Christ. Jesus is the reflection of God
focused down to where we humans can see it in its full glory. The resurrection took a snapshot and turned
it into a full-length feature, took a cryptic line of a poem and turned it into
an encyclopedia, took the guesswork of our minds and turned it into firm
truth. That’s what Jesus’ resurrection
did. That’s the good news. The downside of that is that we can no longer
plead ignorance in defense of our ungodly actions. The truth is now known and knowable. Now everything that we do is brought into the
bright light of Christ’s resurrection.
Even more difficult for us, we are now expected not just to live by this
revealed truth, but to be witnesses to it as well. “You
will be my witnesses in
Jesus, according to the words of Revelation, is the “firstborn of the dead.” Now, we could look to the past and ask, “Were
none of the good folks who died before Jesus raised
from death?” Good question—worth
discussing. Some Christian tradition
claims that Jesus spent the day between Good Friday and Easter Sunday breaking open
the gates of death and releasing the likes of Adam and Eve, King David, Moses
and hosts of others. And this may be
so. The word “firstborn” seems to imply
that something new has happened, that Jesus is the
first to rise from death. But once
again, we are to look to the present and the future instead of the past. The fact that John calls Jesus the first-born implies that there are more
to come. His resurrection was not just
an isolated event of the past but was the beginning of a general
resurrection. Through Christ, God is
rescuing his people from death. Jesus
was the first; there have now been others, there will be others, you and I
among them. Strike Jesus down and Death
dies! Allelujia!
Finally John says that Jesus is “the ruler of the kings of the earth.” Revelation was written to condemn an
oppressive move by the emperor Domitian, who was
seeking to reinstate emperor worship. Since
Emperor Augustus, the Caesars of Rome had claimed that they were divine, sons
of the gods, and they built temples to themselves and forced their subjects to
worship them. In many ways things
haven’t changed much in 2,000 years.
Check out the honors that the world’s leaders
accord to themselves still--the huge statues, the billboards and murals, the
palaces, the honorific titles by which commoners must address them, the strict
rules of humility before royalty. Look even
at the massive libraries that former US presidents
build in their own honor through which, though they don’t seek worship, they
sure do seek admiration. In our culture
we treat governmental authority with a healthy sense of disdain. At a picnic at one Governor’s Mansion people
went through a buffet line where they were served lunch. When the governor went through the line, the
server put one piece of chicken on his plate.
“I’d like two pieces,” he replied smiling. The lady behind the table snorted, “Everybody
gets one piece.” “But,” the governor
insisted, “I would like two pieces.”
“One piece,” was the curt reply.
In a huff the governor asked, “Do you know who I am??” “No,” the lady said. “I am the governor!!” he thundered. The lady leaned forward and asked, “Do you
know who I am?” “No,” the governor
responded. “Well, I am the lady that
hands out the chicken—and everybody gets ONE piece!”
The citizens of the
It is the Easter season, the time of resurrection. Yes, the thought of Jesus suffering under the whip or on the cross brings tears to our eyes. But these are the days of miracles and wonder, so don't cry, baby, don't cry, don't cry. For through his death Jesus became more powerful than we could have possibly imagined.
So dance then, as the old song says,
“They cut me down and I leapt up
high
I am the Life that'll never, never die!
I'll live in you if you'll live in Me -
I am the Lord of the Dance, said He!”