Thirty-nine members of the Heaven's Gate cult, led by "Bo" and "Peep," gladly took their own lives so that they could travel to an approaching spacecraft hidden in the tail of comet Hale-Bopp. How eerie to watch videos of those people happily embracing death. Their suitcases were neatly packed, their mansion was immaculately prepared, and they were dressed in their heaven's gate uniforms with brand new shoes on their feet as they drank the poisonous cocktail in preparation to bravely go where no one had gone before.
Or so they thought.
Contrary to their expectations, however, they did not go up. Instead, they went down into the insatiable gaping hole in the ground we call the grave, and there they will be with the unnumbered dead until the day of reckoning. Meanwhile, those left behind must deal with the reality of the grave, whose sole purpose seems to be to steal our loved ones.
The dark gaping hole
From my earliest childhood, when I watched my beloved great-great-grand mother swallowed up in another one of those enormous gaping dark holes, I associated the grave with sadness and depression. After all, nothing significant has ever come out of the grave. Great scientific discoveries have been made in all kinds of places, under all sorts of circumstances, but never in the grave. The great battles of history have been fought on land and sea, in air and space, but never in the grave. No great speeches, pronouncements from poets or presidents, from orators or ordinary people have been made from the grave, which seemed to me the most loathsome place on earth. But thanks be to God in Christ Jesus who gave me a new attitude and understanding so I can bring good news from no other place but the grave.
And that good news is found in Matthew 28:1-7, a narrative that begins after the crucifixion and burial of Jesus.
The discovery
It was about 6:00 p.m. on that historic Sabbath of sorrow and woe. The sun was setting, and the first day of the week was beginning. Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, along with several women (according to the other gospel writers), anxiously returned to see the sepulcher where Jesus had been buried because they wanted to complete the task of anointing His body, which they hadn't finished because the Sabbath began.
Verse 2 says that there was an incredible earthquake. The earth trembled with sorrow at the death of Christ, but on that morning it leapt for joy at His resurrection in an unprecedented earthquake. The world was shaken by this incredible miracle of Christ coming to life after He had voluntarily laid it down to pay for our sin. Then the angel came and rolled away the great stone. The Roman guards who witnessed the angel's work shook with fear and had fallen like dead men. When the women arrived at the grave, they were frightened out of their wits until the angel gave them the first piece of good news from that empty grave: "Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus who has been crucified. You have come looking for the dead body of a good man, but I want to tell you that you are about to experience the miracle of your living Lord" (verse 5).
The angel said to the women, "Do not be afraid." In the Greek language this is a subjunctive prohibition, and there are two types. One is a friendly persuasion against embarking on a course of action one has never taken before. The other is an imperative an urgent command to stop an action already started.
So here's the picture: The women were shaking in fear when the angel said, "You have already started to be afraid, but stop! Stop trembling! Stop being afraid! The soldiers are the ones who should be afraid because they are the enemies of our Lord, but you are His friends. So stop being afraid!"
Today, this side of the crucifixion, we are given this same message of good news, even though it comes from the gaping mouth of an empty grave, and that is: "Do not fear!"
Do not fear? Our entire social order rests on fear. Oswald Chambers once said that the first civilization was founded by Cain, a murderer, and the whole basis of civilized life ever since has been a vast, complicated, gilded-over system of murder and fear.
Look how we live. We are prisoners in our own homes. Locksmiths and the makers of alarm systems thrive because we are afraid. We are afraid in our homes, and we are afraid in our cars. We are afraid everywhere of someone or something. Some people are afraid of failure, so they don't try hard enough; others are afraid of dying and scared to death of living.
So this has to be the greatest news, that an angel sent by God commands us to "stop being afraid," even though we have already started. Even though fear has become such a part of our language that when someone simply asks us to accompany them to the store and we can't go, we normally preface our response with "I'm afraid I cannot accompany you."
Fear is the enemy of faith. Our God lives and watches over us, and if He is for us, who can prevail against us? Neither height nor depth, nothing past or present or future, no angel, no principality or power, no demon or person, no force or opposition, no sickness or death, and especially no grave! For one day our God will come triumphantly through the clouds of heaven and He will cry out, "Oh, death where is your sting? Oh grave, where is your victory?"
Death defeated
The second piece of good news is the heart of the angel's testimony to the women. It is that which Paul wished Timothy would never forget, and the entire New Testament urges this generation to always remember, which is that Jesus Christ is not here. He is risen. Death could not control or overwhelm Him.
Death, the wages of sin, began with the act of a woman in the Garden of Eden, and to women was given the first announcement of the Resurrection and assurance that Jesus Christ had overcome, paid it all, finished the task for all humanity.
He is risen, seated at the right hand of God in heavenly places, and because He lives, truth lives. Because Jesus lives, hope endures. Because Jesus lives, love triumphs and virtue is justified. Because Jesus lives, integrity is legitimated. Righteousness is imputed and sanctification is imparted to those who will come to Jesus "just as I am without one plea," as the old song says. Because He lives, holiness is real, salvation has arrived, grace is all sufficient, and mercy is invincible. Because Jesus lives, the oppressed will be liberated, justice will be adjudicated, and judgment will be definitive. Because Jesus lives, we do not have to grieve like those with no hope. Because Jesus lives, we live, and from an empty grave comes the message that gladdens the heart.
The gospel call
Another piece of good news from that empty grave holds important instructions for us today. "Go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead" (verse 7). Remember, the disciples had deserted Christ. They had not stood by Him at the cross. They had not helped with His burial, so they were not to be honored with the vision of angels or the first sight of the risen Lord. This was reserved for the faithful women, who thus received their mission to carry a message a foretaste of the ministry they and all of us are to perform in the church of Christ until Jesus comes. It was a gracious message full of sweetness to the sorrowing who had abandoned their Lord in the hour of danger. It was a message filled with forgiveness and love for His conscience-stricken apostles.
And it's our message for today. Are we taking the responsibility to tell people that Jesus Christ is risen, or are we still trying to prove that Easter is a pagan holiday? The world knows that it is. What they do not know, experientially, is that Jesus Christ died so that those lost and crippled in sin can be resurrected in Christ Jesus and become new creatures. That's more good news from the grave.
He lives!
When I was pastoring the Boston Temple, one of our member's teenage nephew was struck by a stray bullet one Friday afternoon in New York City. The bullet permanently lodged itself in the back of his head, leaving him unconscious. MRIs confirmed that there was no expectation of recovery. Early Sabbath morning, the member, named Gilberto, was summoned to his nephew's side for the family's final farewell. As it happened, we had our regular morning prayer ministry, and Gilberto stopped for prayer and support before rushing off to New York. Pastor Ken Baumgarten, my associate, joined me and about six others in a circle of intensive prayer. Someone pleaded with God to go before Gilberto and perform a miracle.
Several hours later, as he sat by his nephew's bed, holding his lifeless hand, Gilberto began to cry and pray. He said he prayed, "Lord, You are our risen Saviour. You can do something special for us and this child." As he whispered his urgent plea, the boy began to cough so hard that blood spurted from his mouth. A nurse was called immediately to wipe the blood away in case it would block the young man's breathing. As she wiped his mouth, she discovered that the bullet had come out with the blood!
The physicians were amazed. They emphasized that there was no way that bullet could travel through from the back of the head to the mouth without destroying vital tissues and taking the boy's life. God had gone before Gilberto and performed this incredible miracle on his nephew who, within a week, was released from the hospital. He is now fine.
Our God will go before us in times of trouble. Behold, the Lord is going before us, in sickness and in health, in joy and in sorrow.
He will go before us in marriage, to iron out the rough edges when no other help can be found. He will go before us with our children and level out the mountains of rebellion. He will go before us at work and straighten out the crooked paths. He will go before us always to exalt the valleys of disappointment and chase away the shadows of death.
Thus, in this world of fear, of sorrow, of death, the greatest discovery for humanity was not when we learned to harness the power of electricity or when we split the atom or even when we created the Pentium chip. The greatest discovery was when a few women went to anoint the dead body of a Man and discovered the empty tomb of our living Lord.
