Shepherd of the Springs
Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod

"The Discovery in the Body of Jesus"

From the Holy Gospel: Behold, Jesus met them and said, "Greetings!" And they came up and took hold of his feet and worshiped him. 10Then Jesus said to them, "Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee, and there they will see me. you to Galilee; there you will see Him, as He told you. [Matthew 28.9-10]

This morning we arrive at Easter, the Feast of the Resurrection of Our Lord. And what does this festival mean for you? It means this: the saving work of Jesus has been accomplished, and God hereby certifies that by that saving work, you are God’s child, saved from your sins, at peace with God, and bound for everlasting life in the new heavens and new earth. The saving work of Jesus is accomplished on the holy cross. In His death, Jesus is the victor over death – not only in Himself but for you. That is what He accomplishes for you. But, it doesn’t appear so! Not on Good Friday, with His dead body hanging on a cross. And not on Holy Saturday, with that same body in cold storage within a tomb. To the uninformed eye, this isn’t victory and this isn’t accomplishment – it is defeat, and it is death like any other. And so it would be, forever, if it were not for the Easter discovery. And Feast of the Resurrection is "The Discovery in the Body of Jesus."

I.

What is the true, intended purpose of Easter? It accomplished many things in the days following the crucifixion. Easter shows that Jesus is alive, again – it gets Him out of the grave. Easter shows that God the Father has accepted the eternal, once-for-all-time sacrifice for sinners, the once-for-all-time source of rescue of sinners whom God both created and loves. Easter, together with the Ascension, also explains why you don’t see Jesus anymore – until His glorious return for His church and for the final judgment of the lost. Easter does all this –yet a nagging question remains: "But, then, what is the purpose of Easter today?" Is it just memory work? Is it mere history?

No, far more than that! Easter morning is the message from God that answers three questions. The first question is: What happened on Good Friday? The appearances of Good Friday is that Jesus is defeated. But in fact, Easter demonstrates that Jesus is victorious – victorious from the cross. The victory is your salvation, and your salvation is accomplished in the suffering and death of Jesus. The devil appears the victor, but in fact the devil is defeated. Unbelief appears appropriate on Good Friday, but in fact unbelief is forever banished from the hall of true things – and belief is certified to be not just wish or opinion, but bedrock truth. The question of what happened on Good Friday is answered on Easter with a thunder that is God the Father’s stamp of approval of Jesus’ victory from the holy cross.

II.

The second question that is answered by Easter is this: How do you know that Jesus’ victory isn’t just as fairy tale, making the first answer a farce? You know, because of the tomb is empty, as you were shown last night in Pr. Hein’s Easter Vigil sermon. The empty tomb is the evidence that Easter is not a myth, but it is not the only evidence. The other side of this evidence is found in the appearances of Jesus, after His resurrection.

The first such appearance is recording in today’s Holy Gospel, when Jesus appears first to the women who mourned His death. And they not only saw Jesus; they physically embraced Him. This is not ghost story! This is a real, flesh-and-blood story, and thus a true story. Two women, both named Mary, not only see Jesus, but they take hold of His physical body. This is not fiction – this is fact – the singular face of all of fallen human history, the fact that God the Father has set His seal-of-approval on the work, the passion, and the death of Jesus, and He proved it in by physically raising Christ from death to life again! It is as the Scriptures proclaim: "For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God." The physical appearances of the resurrected Jesus prove who He is and what He has done, but also, the physical resurrection proves who you are in Christ!

III.

The third question answered by Easter is this: where do I find Jesus today? You find Jesus, in the hearing of the Gospel. Now, the Gospel is good news, great news, and happiness and joy follow from hearing it as a poor, sinful being. But the measure of your "find" is not the happiness – it’s the message, the promise, the forgiveness of sins delivered to you in the hearing of the Gospel. That, and not your emotions, is where you find Jesus personally.

And where do you find Jesus, interpersonally, since Jesus tells you that you – plural, y’all, or if you’re from the South-south, "all y’all"? Well, all y’all find Jesus in the church, that is, where the Holy Spirit gathers together people, sinners, as few as "two or three." And there, you find Jesus in the midst. He is that which holds and binds the group, so that it is more than group – it becomes and is "church," "the called out ones," because the Gospel is there, unfettered and uncluttered by various wrong understanding of how Jesus is found.

But preeminently, as Jesus’ own plan on how and where you find your resurrected Savior and your God, you find Jesus in the Sacraments! Not just anywhere, but in the context of the gathering that the Sprit accomplishes. So, you find Jesus in Holy Baptism. He put Himself into Holy Baptism at His own baptism I the Jordan, and God the Father puts His stamp of approval on this "finding," when He declares, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well-pleased!"

Baptism is intended to be a once-for-all time finding, like the work of the cross itself. Your first baptism, in case you have had more than one, is the only one that counts – for there God puts you into Jesus and puts Jesus into you. And there, in your baptism, He says of you what He says of Jesus at His baptism, "My beloved! In whom I am well-pleased!" Holy Baptism is your adoption by God the Father, for time and for eternity.

So you find Jesus in Holy Baptism, but you also find Jesus in Holy Communion! He puts Himself there, and He gives this Sacrament to you repeatedly – not once-for-all, not once-in-a-while.
"so that it doesn’t become un-special!" Un-special? You mean like, breathing? Does that become un-special? How about your family’s love for you?

No! Jesus puts Himself into Holy Communion and He puts Holy Communion into you, "Take, eat!" "This is My body! This is My Blood – the Blood of the New Testament!" Take it often! Take it as often as you need it – and that measure, Jesus tells you, is how often HE thinks you need it! This is why the Early Church teaches you to call Holy Communion the "medicine of immortality."

And that, dear brothers and sisters of our risen Lord Jesus, is where you find Him! Where He intends for you to find Him! And that’s the purpose of Easter today – all this is yours, in Christ’s Church, because through His Word and through His Sacraments and through the Spirit’s working of making Christians and gathering Christians, HE comes to you – Here, He is with you and you are with Him!

That is what Easter brings you today! It brings Christ to you Christ, and it brings you to Christ! Oh! Alleluia!! Alleluia! IT is Easter again! Oh, Alleluia! Alleluia! Christ is Risen today!! Alleluia! Christ is Risen!! He is risen indeed!

And that’s no manipulation! It is gift! In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost! AMEN!