SPEAKER_00: Death be not proud, though some have called thee mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so, one short sleep, and we wake eternally, and death, capital D, shall be no more semicolon.
SPEAKER_00: Death, capital D, thou shalt die.
SPEAKER_00: Exclamation mark.
SPEAKER_00: Imagine if you were there.
SPEAKER_00: Having followed Jesus for three years of his earthly ministry, placed all your faith and hope in him, forsaken family, friends, home, job, and on that Friday watched him lose his life.
SPEAKER_00: And just like that it all seemed to go away.
SPEAKER_00: The following day, which is the Sabbath, the Passover, you were supposed to celebrate with joy, but you couldn't because frankly you had no more emotion left in you.
SPEAKER_00: You had wept so much the night before.
SPEAKER_00: And as you lay your head on the pillow that Saturday evening, you hoped upon hope that maybe you would fall asleep.
SPEAKER_00: And as you tossed and turned that evening that grew into the morning hours, you realized you weren't going to sleep.
SPEAKER_00: And so you got up even before it was dawn, and sneaking out of the house, trying not to wake anyone else who might by chance be sleeping, you went to the tomb where he laid, and there what you saw would forever change the course of human history.
SPEAKER_00: Because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, you belong to God.
SPEAKER_00: That's the message this morning from John chapter 20, the first eighteen verses.
SPEAKER_00: Let's follow along as I read.
SPEAKER_00: John chapter 20.
SPEAKER_00: Now on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early while it was still dark, and saw the stone had been taken away from the tomb.
SPEAKER_00: So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.
SPEAKER_00: So Peter went out with the other disciple, and they were going toward the tomb.
SPEAKER_00: Both of them were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first.
SPEAKER_00: And he, stooping to look in, saw the linen cloth lying there, but he did not go in.
SPEAKER_00: Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb.
SPEAKER_00: He saw the linen cloth lying there, and the face cloth which had been on Jesus' head, not lying with the linen cloths, but folded up in a place by itself.
SPEAKER_00: Then the other disciple who had reached the tomb first also went in, and he saw and believed, for as yet they did not understand the scripture that he must rise from the dead.
SPEAKER_00: Then the disciples went back to their homes.
SPEAKER_00: But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb.
SPEAKER_00: And as she wept, she stooped to look into the tomb, and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet.
SPEAKER_00: They said to her, Woman, why are you weeping?
SPEAKER_00: She said to them, They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.
SPEAKER_00: Having said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know it was Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus said to her, Woman, why are you weeping?
SPEAKER_00: Whom are you seeking?
SPEAKER_00: Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, Sir, if you've carried him away, tell me where you've laid him, and I will take him away.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus said to her, Mary.
SPEAKER_00: She turned and said to him in Aramaic, Raboni, which means teacher.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus said to her, Do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father, but go to my brothers and say to them, I am ascending to my father and your father to my God and your God.
SPEAKER_00: Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, I have seen the Lord, and that he had said these things to her.
SPEAKER_00: God's word for God's people.
SPEAKER_00: Would you pray with me?
SPEAKER_00: Lord, on this holy day, filled with hope and anticipation, would you give us your Holy Spirit to understand this text so that we might be different and you might receive glory.
SPEAKER_00: And we pray it in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: I read this book to you seven years ago.
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to read it to you again.
SPEAKER_00: The Runaway Bunny by Margaret Wise Brown, pictures by Clement Heard.
SPEAKER_00: Once there was a little bunny who wanted to run away.
SPEAKER_00: So he said to his mother, I'm running away.
SPEAKER_00: If you run after me, said his mother, I will run after if you run away, said his mother, I will run after you, for you are my little bunny.
SPEAKER_00: If you run after me, said the little bunny, I will become a fish in a trout stream, and I will swim away from you.
SPEAKER_00: If you become a fish in a trout stream, said his mother, I will become a fisherman and I will fish for you.
SPEAKER_00: If you become a fisherman, said the little bunny, I will become a rock on the mountain high above you.
SPEAKER_00: If you become a rock on the mountain high above me, said his mother, I will be a mountain climber and I will climb to where you are.
SPEAKER_00: If you become a mountain climber, said the little bunny, I will be a crocus in a hidden garden.
SPEAKER_00: If you become a crocus in a hidden garden, said his mother, I will be a gardener and I will find you.
SPEAKER_00: There he is right there.
SPEAKER_00: If you're a gardener and find me, said the little bunny, I will be a bird and fly away from you.
SPEAKER_00: If you become a bird and fly away from me, said his mother, I will be a tree that you come home to.
SPEAKER_00: If you become a tree, said the little bunny, I will become a little sailboat and I will sail away from you.
SPEAKER_00: If you become a sailboat and sail away from me, said his mother, I will become the wind and I will blow you where I want you to go.
SPEAKER_00: If you become the wind and blow me, said the little bunny, I will join a circus and fly away on a flying trapeze.
SPEAKER_00: If you go flying on a flying trapeze, said his mother, I will be a tightrope walker and I will walk across the air to you.
SPEAKER_00: If you become a tightrope walker and walk across the air, said the bunny, I will become a little boy and run into a house.
SPEAKER_00: If you become a little boy and run into a house, said the mother bunny, I will become your mother and catch you in my arms and hug you.
SPEAKER_00: Shucks, said the bunny.
SPEAKER_00: I might just as well stay where I am and be your little bunny.
SPEAKER_00: And so he did.
SPEAKER_00: Not a carrot, said the mother bunny.
SPEAKER_00: What Margaret Wise Brown has written of and illustrated by Clement Heard, is the condition of our soul that runs away from Jesus and God never ending, never stopping, never giving up, pursuit of us.
SPEAKER_00: What does the resurrection mean for you?
SPEAKER_00: It means that you belong to God.
SPEAKER_00: The resurrection means you belong to God.
SPEAKER_00: And I suppose that if we were to spend the next five years in John 20, we would never exhaust the riches in this text.
SPEAKER_00: And so knowing that, knowing that we can't possibly exhaust it in the next 25 minutes.
SPEAKER_00: Instead, what I want to do is just to think about one particular aspect of it.
SPEAKER_00: What does the resurrection mean for us?
SPEAKER_00: And the way that I want to think about that is asking the question what does the resurrection mean for Mary Magdalene?
SPEAKER_00: And then apply it to our lives.
SPEAKER_00: For Mary Magdalene, the resurrection means that she belongs to God personally, expensively, and eternally.
SPEAKER_00: To say that she belongs to God, that we belong to God personally, need to understand something of that culture.
SPEAKER_00: It won't come as a surprise, I don't think, to most of us, though it should bother us a good deal, that women in this time were not treated well.
SPEAKER_00: They were not allowed to be witnesses in court or testify in any way.
SPEAKER_00: They were considered second-class citizens.
SPEAKER_00: They were altogether considered as possessions in many ways.
SPEAKER_00: Wrongly so.
SPEAKER_00: And yet, every gospel account depicts Mary Magdalene as the first person to see the risen Lord, to bear witness to the resurrection.
SPEAKER_00: And not only does this begin to prove the credibility of the resurrection, because if you were to be making this up and writing a story about it, then you wouldn't choose someone whom in your culture was deemed unreliable.
SPEAKER_00: Instead, you would choose the most reliable person.
SPEAKER_00: But not only does it begin to prove the credibility of the resurrection account, but it begins to unfold the actual essence of the gospel itself, and by that we need to understand who Mary Magdalene was.
SPEAKER_00: We meet her in Luke chapter 8.
SPEAKER_00: In Luke 8, we discover that Mary Magdalene is a woman that was possessed by seven demons that Jesus cast out.
SPEAKER_00: Now, later on in Luke chapter 8, we meet another gentleman who is possessed by a legion of demons.
SPEAKER_00: He is so possessed that he runs around naked, hiding not in his home, but among the tombs.
SPEAKER_00: And the townspeople are so afraid of him that they shackle him.
SPEAKER_00: We meet another demoniac young boy in Mark chapter 9.
SPEAKER_00: This boy is so possessed by this particular demon that whenever it comes upon him, it seizes him and freezes him at first, the text says, and then casts him to the ground, causing him to seize and convulse, gnash his teeth, and foam at the mouth.
SPEAKER_00: And Mary Magdalene, we're told, was possessed by seven demons until Jesus cast them out.
SPEAKER_00: Now you need to understand in the Bible, the number seven sometimes refers to the literal number, but often refers to the idea of perfection.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, she is completely and perfectly overrun by demons.
SPEAKER_00: So not only is she a person who has no social standing just in being a woman, but she's a complete outcast.
SPEAKER_00: She's crazy.
SPEAKER_00: No one wants anything to do with her.
SPEAKER_00: And yet Jesus chooses to appear to her first.
SPEAKER_00: James, uh, John, and Peter were there.
SPEAKER_00: He could have appeared to them first.
SPEAKER_00: They even went inside the tomb first.
SPEAKER_00: And not only do they not see the angels, but they don't see Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: But Jesus appears to Mary Magdalene first and listen to what he says to her.
SPEAKER_00: Supposing him to be the gardener, the text says.
SPEAKER_00: After he asks, Woman, who why are you weeping?
SPEAKER_00: Who are you seeking?
SPEAKER_00: Supposing him to be the gardener, the text says, she says, Can you tell me where they've laid him so I can go and take charge of his body?
SPEAKER_00: And you know what Jesus could have said?
SPEAKER_00: He could have said, Hey, it's me.
SPEAKER_00: Or, you foolish person, I told you this would happen.
SPEAKER_00: I must have repeated myself a dozen times just in the week leading up to this.
SPEAKER_00: But he doesn't do that.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Mary.
SPEAKER_00: Why does he say her name?
SPEAKER_00: Because their culture and our culture is obsessed with identity.
SPEAKER_00: And the culture tells her and you that you look inside yourself to determine your identity.
SPEAKER_00: And your actions or inactions, your background, upbringing, your future, all that determines who you are.
SPEAKER_00: But the gospel flips that.
SPEAKER_00: The gospel says our identity isn't determined within.
SPEAKER_00: Our identity is determined outside of us, that God determines our identity.
SPEAKER_00: Think of it.
SPEAKER_00: If she had identified herself from within on the way to the tomb, what did the culture say she was?
SPEAKER_00: A social outcast with no home, no hope, no future, and a bad rap sheet with a history.
SPEAKER_00: Mary.
SPEAKER_00: Now she has an identity, meaning, purpose, standing, love, acceptance.
SPEAKER_00: You see how personal it is.
SPEAKER_00: It's not impersonal, it's very personal.
SPEAKER_00: You belong to God personally.
SPEAKER_00: You also belong to him expensively.
SPEAKER_00: Everything about the text screams lavish expense.
SPEAKER_00: Though we might not recognize it at first glance, we can understand it with a little explanation.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is laid in a new tomb.
SPEAKER_00: This new tomb belonged to Joseph of Arimathea.
SPEAKER_00: Joseph was a very wealthy man.
SPEAKER_00: And to own a new tomb, that is one that not only was newly constructed, but one that was private, and not meaning multiple people in the same place, meant it cost a great deal.
SPEAKER_00: And not only was this tomb expensive, but the sealing mechanism was expensive too.
SPEAKER_00: Most folk had square stones for stoppers.
SPEAKER_00: But not this, not this guy.
SPEAKER_00: He's got a round stone carved, hand-hewn, so that in the track it might be rolled over in place.
SPEAKER_00: And then even in John chapter 19, we learn about Nicodemus, a guy that we meet in John chapter 3, a Pharisee who comes to Jesus at night inquiring about who he is, and Jesus has this interaction with him about being born again that we see that the wheels of faith are beginning to turn in Nicodemus' mind.
SPEAKER_00: And we see at the end in John chapter 19, Nicodemus brings 75 pounds of perfume and ointments to anoint Jesus' body.
SPEAKER_00: It's lavishly expensive.
SPEAKER_00: But it's not just the material things that are the most expensive thing here.
SPEAKER_00: It's the body of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: It is the second member of the Trinity that is the real cost.
SPEAKER_00: That's absolutely invaluable.
SPEAKER_00: You guys have been following the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris, the burning of it?
SPEAKER_00: It's just unbelievable.
SPEAKER_00: And the many wealthy people that have a pledge now north of a billion dollars in its reconstruction.
SPEAKER_00: But the reality is, however long and however much it will take, no amount of money in the entire world can ever replace it.
SPEAKER_00: It's beyond value.
SPEAKER_00: That's something of the image that we have here in this text that all this stuff is expensive, but really that which is beyond value is the death of Jesus, the second member of the Trinity, the one whom had no beginning and who will have no end, whom the text calls the first and the last, the bright morning star, the angel of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: He is Jesus, the Messiah.
SPEAKER_00: But what makes it truly incredible is that God deemed you valuable enough to expend his son?
SPEAKER_00: You see, the resurrection says that you belong to God not just personally but expensively.
SPEAKER_00: You have immeasurable value because of the resurrection.
SPEAKER_00: What corner of your soul does that need to apply this morning?
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you're tired.
SPEAKER_00: And and it's the kind of weariness that no weekend sleep will catch you up.
SPEAKER_00: But it's a weariness of the soul.
SPEAKER_00: You need to know that the resurrection says that you have immeasurable value in your weakness.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's a sense in which the tasks of your job have created a profound sense of the mundane and perhaps even a little of the insignificance.
SPEAKER_00: The resurrection says you have immeasurable value.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's a sin pattern that you really don't want anybody knowing about.
SPEAKER_00: And that you're afraid that if anybody really knew, not only would they reject you, but you're afraid that God would reject you.
SPEAKER_00: The resurrection says it's not true.
SPEAKER_00: You have immeasurable value.
SPEAKER_00: You belong to God.
SPEAKER_00: You belong to him personally, expensively, and eternally.
SPEAKER_00: When Jesus calls her name, Mary says, cries out, Raboni, which means teacher in Aramaic, and she we imagine the scene.
SPEAKER_00: She runs to him and she throws her arms around him, and you can just imagine just the confusion and excitement and anticipation and questions.
SPEAKER_00: And then Jesus says something really strange.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Don't cling to me.
SPEAKER_00: For I've yet to ascend to the Father.
SPEAKER_00: What does Mary really want?
SPEAKER_00: What is she really after?
SPEAKER_00: She's after this Jesus who delivered her out of everything evil and rescued her life for the pit, who promises to be with her forever, at once was taken away from her, now is back, and she's not going to let him go, but Jesus knows something.
SPEAKER_00: He knows that if he goes to the Father, he will send his Holy Spirit to come and dwell in Mary's heart so that he will be with her eternally.
SPEAKER_00: I wonder if later on she thought of the words that he said to her and some of his other disciples in John chapter 14 and verse 16.
SPEAKER_00: If you love me, you will keep my commandments, and I will ask the Father, who will give you another helper, to be with you forever.
SPEAKER_00: Even the spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him, you know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.
SPEAKER_00: That's the promise that Mary has, that we have, that the resurrection brings, that you belong to God eternally, that if you but see your sins crucified on the Savior, and on the third day risen again from the grave and taken his righteousness and given to you, that means not only is every aspect of your life now being used to bring God glory, but also you good.
SPEAKER_00: And it also means that the eternal trajectory of your life is forever changed.
SPEAKER_00: And that one day your greatest enemy, death, itself, you will see that Jesus has conquered it on the cross and in the resurrection.
SPEAKER_00: The movie Whit is about an English professor whose name is Vivian Baring, who spent her whole career studying the holy sonnets of John Dunn.
SPEAKER_00: The movie is set in a hospital ward because Vivian has cancer and follows the end of her life as she reflects back on her life.
SPEAKER_00: And different things that happen in the hospital bring different memories to Vivian.
SPEAKER_00: One particular occurrence brings an interaction between Vivian as a graduate student and her mentor, Evelyn Ashford.
SPEAKER_00: Evelyn, when Vivian arrives in her office, is critiquing Vivian's choice of translation of John Dunn's most famous sonnets, Death Be Not Proud.
SPEAKER_00: And she essentially says the translation you chose with the punctuation used in that translation is all wrong.
SPEAKER_00: Write your paper again.
SPEAKER_00: This is a clip of what she says.
SPEAKER_00: She says, Professor speaking, do you think that the punctuation of the last line of this sonnet is merely an insignificant detail?
SPEAKER_00: English majors rejoice.
SPEAKER_00: The sonnet begins with a valiant struggle with death, calling on all the forces of intellect and drama to vanquish the enemy.
SPEAKER_00: But it is ultimately about overcoming the seemingly insuperable barriers separating life, death and eternal life.
SPEAKER_00: In the addition you chose, this profoundly simple meaning is sacrifice to hysterical punctuation.
SPEAKER_00: And death, capital D, shall be no more semicolon.
SPEAKER_00: Death, capital D, comma, thou shalt die, exclamation mark.
SPEAKER_00: If you go in for this sort of thing, I suggest you take up Shakespeare.
SPEAKER_00: She then corrects her punctuation and thereby her interpretation of the sonnet by offering a different reading.
SPEAKER_00: She says, And death shall be no more.
SPEAKER_00: Death thou shalt die.
SPEAKER_00: Nothing but a breath, a comma, separates life from life everlasting.
SPEAKER_00: Very simple, really.
SPEAKER_00: With the original punctuation restored, death is no longer something to act out on a stage with exclamation marks.
SPEAKER_00: It is a comma.
SPEAKER_00: A pause.
SPEAKER_00: Not insuperable barriers.
SPEAKER_00: Not semicolons.
SPEAKER_00: Just a comma.
SPEAKER_00: And so it is also with those who have trusted in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: The resurrection says you belong to him.
SPEAKER_00: And nothing will change that.
SPEAKER_00: You belong to him personally, expensively, and forever, eternally.
SPEAKER_00: And so to correct the sonnet as I recited it at the beginning, it should most properly be recited.
SPEAKER_00: Death be not proud.
SPEAKER_00: Though some have called thee mighty and dreadful.
SPEAKER_00: For thou art not so.
SPEAKER_00: One short sleep, then we wake eternally, and death shall be no more.
SPEAKER_00: Death thou shalt die.
SPEAKER_00: You belong to God.
SPEAKER_00: Pray with me.
SPEAKER_00: Heavenly Father, what great promises are ours in John twenty.
SPEAKER_00: The resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and the promise of eternal life with you forever.
SPEAKER_00: Give us this hope as we celebrate and we pray it in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.