Sermon for Easter Day, April 5, 2026
Matthew 28:1-10
I want to start this morning with a
question: If Jesus came out of the tomb
and met you on Easter morning, what would he say to you? Think about that: Where do your head and heart take you – to
confrontation, indictment, and judgment? To affirmation, love, and blessing? To calling, empowerment, and mission? If Jesus came out of the tomb and met you
on Easter morning, what do you think he’d have to say?
I ask because the version of the
resurrection story we just heard, the one in Matthew’s Gospel, has Jesus saying
something different from what we hear in the other Easter stories. It’s the very first word he speaks when he
meets the women who’ve come to the tomb. And what is that word? Drum roll, please: Jesus says … “Greetings.”
Really? That’s the best he’s got? Jesus is risen from the dead, and what he
speaks is the salutation from a form letter?
Well, let’s rewind and give the scene some
backstory. In Matthew’s version, what
comes just before Easter morning is a conversation between the Jewish religious
leaders and Pontius Pilate. The chief
priests and Pharisees want Roman soldiers to seal up the tomb and guard it, to keep
the disciples from stealing the body and claiming Jesus had risen. Pilate sees his potential PR problem, so he
gives the religious leaders a platoon. “Go,” Pilate tells them, saying more than he
knows: Take the soldiers and make the
tomb “as secure as you can.” (27:66)
Then comes the story we heard this
morning. Mary Magdalene and “the other
Mary” (28:1), probably Jesus’ mother, come to the tomb – but why? In other Gospels, they come to tend to the
body, but not in Matthew. You can’t very
well anoint a body sealed in a tomb and guarded by soldiers. No, they’ve come “to see the tomb” (28:1). Just as they’ve been seeing Jesus for years
and watching God’s purposes unfold, now they want to see what’s next. After all, Jesus told his friends he’d be
killed and raised on the third day, so the women want to see what’s about to
happen. Just that act of showing up is a
pretty courageous statement of faith, right? Given what happened on Good Friday, you could
understand why Jesus’ friends wouldn’t be expecting much by Sunday morning,
even why they’d be hiding out. That’s
the approach the guys took. But the
women had stayed with Jesus at the cross, and now they’re coming to see what
happens next.
They arrive at the tomb and see it all
sealed up, the emperor’s soldiers standing guard. And suddenly, the women’s courageous faith pays
off. The earth shakes as an angel of the
Lord descends from heaven, looking “like lightning” (28:3). Remember, this isn’t some cute cherub from a
greeting card; this messenger is a commander in the heavenly army. And he pretty clearly outranks the Roman
soldiers, who now tremble and “become like dead men” (28:4). Turns out, they’re the only “dead men” at this
tomb. The angel breaks the seal, rolls
back the giant stone, and – my favorite detail – the angel sits on it. Now, why does God Almighty’s emissary sit on
the stone he’s just pushed away? Because
he can, that’s why. It’s a great way
to thumb the divine nose at Caesar (or you can substitute a more colorful use
of a finger). As one scholar puts it,
“God out-empires the empire and renders it lifeless."1
But wait; there’s more. Not only has God defeated the empire by
raising the true King from death, the women receive a divine message just for
them. “Do not be afraid,” says the
lightning-like warrior as he squats on the stone. You’re looking for Jesus, who was crucified –
as dead as dead gets. Well, “he is not
here,” says the angel, “for he has been raised, as he said.” (28:5-6) Come on in, look around – see for yourself. Then, go tell the guys, who didn’t believe
like you did. Send them to Galilee, for “there,
you will see him” (28:7).
But before the two Marys can even get to
the disciples’ hideout, Jesus himself appears. The Marys must have been dumbfounded. They’re standing there, slack-jawed, awaiting
a word from their risen King. And then
it comes, the very reveille of resurrection: “Greetings” (28:9). Cue the disappointed trombone: Wha-wah.
Come on!
The resurrected Jesus can’t be a downer, right? There’s got to be more to what he says than
just, “Greetings.”
And there is. The word in Greek is chairete, which
was a standard greeting in the Greco-Roman world. But I think that word’s literal meaning is what’s
important. Chairete doesn’t just
mean, “Hi there.” It means, “Rejoice!”2
In fact, it’s the same word Jesus
uses in the Beatitudes,3 when he foreshadows Good Friday: “Blessed are you when people revile you and
persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Chairete – rejoice – and be glad, for
your reward is great in heaven.” (Matthew 5:11-12)
“See?” Jesus says to the Marys. Evil doesn’t get the last word. The last word is also the first word of resurrected life: Rejoice!
Well, that’s good for Jesus and the two
Marys, but what about us? What do we
have to rejoice about today? I mean, rejoicing
might feel a little naïve, at best, given what’s happening all around us. Let’s see. There’s war. Deep division. Dishonesty normalized as a stand-in for truth.
Meanness normalized as a stand-in for
compassion. And Jesus says to us,
“Rejoice?” Why in the world would we do
that?
Well, in the world, we wouldn’t. But we do anyway, and here’s why.
We rejoice because Love out-empires the
empire. Now, in the long night of Maundy
Thursday, on the cross of Good Friday, in the dark tomb of Holy Saturday, it’s
hard to remember the wonders we’ve seen. But blind people receive their sight;
marginalized people receive the water of life first; dead people live again. Peter and James and John and Andrew and the
other guys had seen all these things, but the last two awful days had made them
believe a different story – the world’s story.
But the Marys chose differently, and so
can we. We have it within our power to
choose the story we’ll inhabit.
I want to share with you a story that about
50 of us inhabited a couple of months ago at the Winter Free Store, as we
partnered with our friends at St. James United Methodist on Paseo. Volunteers waited tables for about 350
neighbors, serving up a hot breakfast on a 15-degree morning. Personal shoppers guided guests around tables
where they could pick out coats, boots, gloves, hats, socks, hygiene bags, and
fresh fruit and vegetables. And what story
were we inhabiting there? One volunteer
wrote this on her evaluation: “It’s
truly a gift from God that I was able to serve the people of Kansas City. Thank you!” Another wrote this: “I love getting to know people from other
churches, and I love meeting a real need for others in our city.” And a third wrote simply, “I enjoy giving
back! It’s all love!” In all, more than
100 members of St. Andrew’s, St. James, and our community showed up in the ugly
cold to shout “Rejoice!” into a narrative of division and scarcity.
The story of the Winter Free Store is a
lot like the story that my friend Kathy Lutes inhabits, just as several of you
do. I’ve told you before about Kathy, a
priest in Minneapolis who braved even uglier cold a couple of months ago to
stand with people at risk of apprehension and deportation. Kathy was out there with thousands of other
people wielding the weapon of … hymn-singing. It’s the same story others of us here inhabit
when we sort clothes at JVS, or help get food to refugee families, or stand in
a crowd on the Plaza calling on our country to put Love first. We’re shouting “Rejoice!” into a narrative of
fear.
So that brings me back to the question I
asked a few minutes ago: If you
were out in that garden on the first Easter morning, and the resurrected Jesus
made you stop in your tracks, what do you think he’d say to you?
Well, I think he’d say, “Rejoice!” And I think he’d follow it up with: “Because I
love you.”
On a Richard Rohr podcast I listen to in
the mornings, I heard a guest talking about her experience as a little girl encountering
Jesus. Now, this guest, the Rev. Dr.
Jaqui Lewis, is a writer and theologian and activist. But she was remembering being with her mom in
church and receiving Holy Communion for the first time. When the bread came by, her mom said, “This
bread means God will always love you.” Then,
when the cup came by, her mom said, “This cup means God will never leave you.”4
That’s why Jesus says, “Rejoice!”
– because, in the life of every blessed one of us, Love always gets the last
word.
In the strength of that bread and that
cup, we can live a story the world thinks is nonsense. We can choose to rejoice in the love that God
gives us and commissions us to share. In
your dinner conversations, rejoice in love. In the work you do, rejoice in love. In the way you steward your gifts and
resources, rejoice in love. In the
relationships you build, rejoice in love. In the policies you advocate and the votes you
cast, rejoice in love. Why? Because when you meet the risen Jesus in your
day-to-day life, the first thing he says is, “Rejoice!” And the second thing he says is, “Because I
love you.” And the third thing he says
is, “Go and do the same.”
Rejoicing may seem naïve these days, and
following Love may seem a fool’s errand. But our Lord is no fool. Christ is risen and asks us to live
that way, too. When we rejoice in love,
we look the power of death in the eye and say, “Not today – or tomorrow, for
that matter.” The forces of hopelessness
and division can only win if we allow ourselves to be hopeless and divided. Instead, come together and rejoice – sit on
the stone that God rolled away and rejoice that Christ is actually the one in
charge.
The world tells a story that Love is empty of power. God writes the story that Love is power. So, decide this day which story you’ll choose. As for me, I will rejoice.
1.
The New Interpreter’s Study Bible. “Matthew,” introduction
and notes by Warren Carter. Nashville: Abington, 2003. 1799 (note).
2.
Hare,
Douglas R.A. Matthew. A volume of Interpretation: A Bible Commentary
for Teaching and Preaching, James Luther Mays, ed. Louisville: John Knox,
1993. 330.
3.
“Χαίρετε.”
Bible Hub. Available at: https://biblehub.com/greek/chairete_5463.htm.
Accessed April 3, 2026.
4. “A Critical Mass: The Secret of the Remnant with Rev Jacqui Lewis.” Everything Belongs: Living the Teachings of Richard Rohr Forward, a podcast from the Center for Action and Contemplation. May 2, 2025. Transcript available at: https://cac.org/podcasts/a-critical-mass-the-secret-of-the-remnant-with-rev-jaqui-lewis/. Accessed April 3, 2026.
