Acts 6:1-7; Mark
15: 43-16:8
Christ
is Risen!
As
we continue to celebrate our Lord’s glorious resurrection on the third day and
victory over Hades and the tomb, we have to admit that all too often we live as
though death still reigned. We do so especially
when we obsess about how weak, broken, and vulnerable we are, especially in light
of the grave. In order to distract ourselves
from the resulting fear and anxiety, we often build ourselves up in our own
minds, put others down in so many ways, and think of life as a battle against
anyone or anything that threatens to expose the truth about our being made from
the dust of the earth, to which we will return. We ignore that sobering recognition by trying
to maintain illusions of power and self-sufficiency over against other people,
our own weaknesses, and the harsh realities of life. Doing so fuels anger, resentment, and
condemnation of those we perceive as our enemies and rivals. It also prevents us from seeing clearly where
we stand in relation both to God and to our neighbors.
Today we commemorate people who refused to live as
individuals obsessed with illusions of self-protection in the midst of terrible
sorrow and the loss of all hope, but who instead became persons united to
Christ in a communion of love and selfless service. With broken hearts and in deep
shock and grief, the Theotokos, Mary
Magdalen, two other Mary’s, Johanna, Salome, Martha, Susanna, and others whose
names we do not know went early in the morning
to the Lord’s tomb in order to anoint Him for burial. They had seen Him die a horrific public death
and expected to find His disfigured body lying in the grave. By somehow acquiring the strength not to
become paralyzed by fear, anger, or despair, they did what they could to
perform one last act of selfless loving service for the Savior. That is how the Myrrh-Bearing Women became
the first witnesses of the empty tomb as they received the good news of His
resurrection from the angel.
We also remember today Joseph of
Arimathea, who bravely asked Pilate for the dead body of the Lord and took Him
down from the Cross with his own hands. Imagine
how difficult that must have been for him.
Nicodemus, the Pharisee who had previously not understood Christ at all,
helped Joseph bury Him. These were both
prominent Jewish men who risked a great deal by associating themselves with One
Who had been rejected by their own religious leaders as a blasphemer and crucified
by the Romans as a traitor. Like the women, they overcame their fears to show self-emptying
love for the Savior in the only ways still available to them.
In contrast, the disciples acted more like cowards in this
moment of crisis. Peter, the head
disciple, had denied Christ three times.
John was the only one of the twelve to stand at the foot the Cross, for
the others had run away in fear. They were
more focused on saving their own skins than on faithfully serving their Lord. The
Myrrh-Bearing Women, along with Sts. Joseph and
Nicodemus, certainly knew bitter grief and disappointment every bit as much
as the disciples. They all saw the
Lord’s crucifixion as a complete disaster and their hopes for Him, and for
whatever they hoped to gain through Him, were completely destroyed. Nonetheless, how they acted during this
terrible tragedy revealed that they had become persons truly united to Christ
in self-emptying love. They transcended the anxieties and fears of individuals
concerned only with themselves in order to do the difficult and dangerous tasks
necessary to give their departed Lord and friend a decent burial, which was the
only way left for them to love and serve Him. That is how they accepted the risks inherent
in being identified even further with One Who had just been crucified as a
blasphemer and a traitor.
What they did was not the result of calculation about what
was in it for them. Had they not, even
before His resurrection, already begun to unite themselves to Christ in
selfless devotion, the women would not have had the spiritual strength to be in
the position to see the Lord’s empty tomb and to hear from the angel the good
news of His resurrection. That news was shocking
to the point of absurdity, as shown by their reaction, for “they went
out quickly and fled from the tomb; for trembling and astonishment had come
upon them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.” To see and hear what they did was not to
receive confirmation that they had somehow been right all along, for they had
no expectation of His resurrection and went to the tomb in order to anoint a
dead body. To see and hear what they did
was not a result of using religion to help them get what they wanted in this
world. Their eyes were opened to behold the joy of the resurrection because
they were so closely united to Christ in love that they had overcome the fear
of death that so easily turns people away from following a Lord Who calls His
disciples to take up their crosses. To see and hear what they did was to
encounter God from the depths of their souls in a way that called their deepest
assumptions about life, death, and themselves into question. Even when all seemed lost and there was literally
nothing left to do but anoint His dead body, the Myrrh-Bearing Women acted not
as self-interested isolated individuals but as persons radiant with Christ’s
selfless love, for that is who they had become.
The devotion of
the Myrrh-Bearers, Joseph, and Nicodemus shows us what true faith looks like,
and it has nothing to do with figuring out how to use God to help us get what
we want on our own terms in a pathetic attempt to distract ourselves from the
fear of death. Instead, we must unite ourselves to Him in self-emptying love if
we are to acquire the spiritual strength to embrace the good news of His
resurrection from the depths of our souls.
That is the only way to enter into the joy of Pascha as persons who find
their life in Him together as members of His Body, the Church, with all of the
struggles and difficulties that doing so entails. Todays’ reading from Acts describes how the
Church flourished when the first deacons, or servants, took on the task of
meeting the practical needs of distributing food to widows in a context of
ethnic division. By offering our time
and energy to attend to the mundane matters necessary for the wellbeing of the
Church, we grow in love for Him in His Body as we serve one another, even as He
has served us. We grow out of our
illusions of self-sufficiency and self-importance when we embrace the calling
to serve even in the unremarkable ways available through our small parish. No needed opportunity for serving our Lord is
beneath any of us and it is by embracing the most humble forms of service that
we become more like the Savior who came not to be served, but to serve. As the
Lord taught, “he who is greatest among you shall be your servant. And
whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will
be exalted.” (Matt. 23:11)
Like the Myrrh-Bearing
Women and Sts. Joseph and Nicodemus, we will not enter into the joy of the
Lord’s resurrection by carefully calculating what is in it for us when we do
this or that out of love for the Body of the Savior. We must not obsess about how we would like to
serve Him in His Church, what we think we are good at, or what we dare to
presume that we deserve. Instead, we
must simply do what needs to be done out of selfless love, no matter how hard
we find that to be. That is how those
blessed and righteous women put themselves in the uniquely glorious position to
hear the unbelievably good news of the angel.
And that is how, by the grace of the One Who conquered death through His
glorious resurrection on the third day, we too may embrace the wonderful news
of this season, which destroys the fear of the grave that is at the root of so
much of our worry, fear, and misery, for “Christ is Risen!”
