Below, for your consideration and reflection, is the sermon from Bethel's March 27, 2005 Easter Sunday Morning worship service.

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What were the first words from the Bible you ever had to memorize as a child? You’re six, maybe seven years old; its time for the Christmas pageant, and they need an angel Gabriel to put on the tinsel halo, stand tall, and say, “Fear not, for behold I bring you good news of great joy which shall come to all the people.” So, you stand there, surrounded by your very own little heavenly host, all the other kids, like yourself, who hardly act like angels most of the time, but who, for that one shining moment of the annual pageant, glow like stars hanging low on the night sky. You stand and you speak, and those two little words, “fear not,” wash over you like the afterglow of a life-long guardian angel.

It’s a little bit odd to me that in the Bible, angels so often pop into someone’s life, half scaring them to death, and then the angel says, “fear not.” I guess, if you’re scared, it does provide some assurance to hear the angel say, “fear not,” but I think I’d rather my angel come in a little less frightening manner. Give me a daylight angel who speaks softly and doesn’t keep reminding me that I am supposed to be afraid.

But, often, in the Bible, it’s dark when the angel appears and hearts are pounding and the fear of it all can make it hard to hear the sound of your own voice.

We who are so accustomed to the convenience of electricity can barely begin to appreciate just how dark the night was for pre-modern people. Yet, even with our nightlights and digital gadgets that glow 24/7 and all the other sources of residual light, especially if you are alone, nighttime remains a time when the mind can run wild and turn shadows and the odd sound into ghosts and spooks and all other manner of things that go bump in the night.

Grownups might quietly laugh at children who relate stories about their fear of the dark, but our laughter really only masks the deeper paranoia we all harbor about the nighttime and its shades and shadows and unseen ragged edges.

Each gospel story is unique and different when it comes to telling the story of that first day of resurrection, but each one notes that Easter begins in darkness, just as dawn is about to break. We who celebrate Easter in broad daylight cannot really appreciate the dramatic appearance of the angel at the dark sepulcher. If truth be known, we’d be better off if we could first experience Easter like a frightened child, alone, crying in the dark.

In our story for today, Mary Magdalene and another woman named Mary have made their way to the tomb. What kind of Sabbath had they passed the day before? Surely, it was not a day of holy rest, but a day of sadness and mourning, a day for the tired replaying of their anger against the Romans, the Sanhedrin, against the very creator of the universe. And maybe, if only for a moment, they had an angry grief at Jesus himself, who had permitted it all to end so soon, before they were ready.

Coming to the tomb in the darkness of that early morning light, the two Marys had good reason to be afraid. Was it all for naught? Who might be next? What if the Roman guards with spears and swords, startled when they walked up, mistook their motives?

Fear: it disorients; it paralyzes; it provokes wild assumptions; it turns worlds upside down. It is, perhaps, the most basic and primal of all emotions, the “fight or flight” syndrome, as it is called, is really, I believe, rooted in fear.

There was a lot to fear that first Easter.

The story says, there was a great earthquake just before the angel descended and there was a bright flash like a streak of lightening

It says, the angel rolled away the large stone covering the opening to the tomb, and sat upon the stone.

It says, the Roman guards were literally almost scared to death.

To read the story, and to read ourselves into the story, is to know that there is enough fear, always enough fear, to last a lifetime.

Our stable worlds get rocked by who knows what earthquake.

A barrier gets taken away, but we cannot see where the opening leads and we rightly tremble before the unknown.

We get caught off guard by some terror or terrible thing, and our tongues, let alone our bodies, can barely move.

There is so much to fear. I wish it were otherwise. I’d like to sugarcoat it for all of you, especially for these who will stand today and declare that they have decided to follow Jesus, but it is just not that easy or simple.

There is much to fear. I used to fear growing up. Now I fear growing old. I fear what might happen to those I love. I fear what others will think. I fear failure. I fear being forgotten. I fear what I will read in the morning paper. I fear I won’t be good enough; I fear that time is running out. I fear what I might forget; I fear I will make someone angry; I fear, I fear, I fear. And, honest to God, the fears keep piling up.

Even Easter, as much as we pump it up, did not remove the fear from the first witnesses at the tomb. To be sure, the angel’s message gave the two Marys feelings of glad exuberance and no doubt a sense of wonderment and deep relief, but the story, I remind you, says, “so the women left the tomb quickly with great joy . . . and fear.”

Life goes on for the two Marys. The honest message of Easter, I believe, is that a mixture of joy and fear awaits each of us. Experience teaches me that the balance will tip back and forth between them, but with courage, fear can be turned to joy. And, by God’s grace, when we can learn to handle fear instead of it handling us, we can encounter the joy of the risen Christ.

My only word of advice to you [to confirmation class] and to you [to congregation] is that when the fear and the fears stack up and the earthquakes come and the direction is unknown and the tongue won’t move and your heart is pounding in your ears, then, remember the time when you were six, maybe seven years old, and you wore that tinsel halo, and you practiced and you said, “fear not.” Remember that day. Remember this day.

Perhaps they were the first words of the bible you ever spoke out loud; perhaps you didn’t even realize what you were saying.

But when you feel alone and afraid, speak the words again, and in the speaking, let the good news of resurrection bathe your soul as the waters of your baptism:

“Fear not.”

IN the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

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Prayer

On this day, we celebrate the risen Life you, O God, have granted to us and to all creation in Christ’s rising from the dead. By the light of your eternal Easter, shine hope into all the dark places where there is fear and no joy, where lives are bowed down with the weight of war, of famine, and the domination of oppressive powers. We pray for the broken, hurting places and people, like Red Cloud High School in Minnesota, like the families whose children have been abducted and abused, like those who see their future destroyed by explosions and by the destructive behavior of others, like those caught in the grip of addiction or a painful memory that haunts them through the night. The world cries out for your mercy Lord,: the natural disasters, tribes and nation’s fighting, the lack of water and food and shelter, all of that reminds us of just how much we need your resurrection now.

Grant your peace to those dear to us who we name before you.

Show your life in our life. Rise within us as clarity of commitment, rise in us as the courage to face our fears, rise in us as the hope that overcomes all our despair. Be alive in us this day, and everyday, and we shall seek to reflect your risen power to others and to this world which you love so much. This is our prayer, in the name of Christ, who has taught us to pray, saying . . .

[Lord's Prayer]