First scripture reading is from 1 Samuel chapter 2, 1 Samuel 2, it's page 225 in that blue Bible. Many of you know the story of Hannah. Hannah was barren for many, many years and was harassed by her adversary who flaunted her fertility in her face. And so Hannah came to the tabernacle, prayed for a child and said, I would dedicate him to you. Sure enough, she conceives the boy's name as Samuel, which means dedicated to God, and she gives the child to God. And out of that comes this prayer in 1 Samuel 2, verses 1-10, this prayer, this song, and then if you go and read later on Mary's words in Luke 1, you'll hear much of Hannah's song in Mary's song. But right smack in the middle of this song is clearly something that she is seeing down the pike. And so pay attention. We get down around verse 5 and 6. It's 1 Samuel chapter 2. And Hannah prayed and said, my heart exalts in the Lord, in Yahweh. My horn is exalted in Yahweh. My mouth derides my enemies because I rejoice in your salvation. There is none holy like Yahweh, and there is none beside you. There is no rock like our God. Talk no more so very proudly. Let not the arrogance come from your mouth, for Yahweh is a God of knowledge, and by Him actions are weighed. The bows of the mighty are broken, but the feeble bind on string. Those who were full have hired themselves out for bread, but those who were hungry have ceased to hunger. The barren has born seven, but she who has many children is four born. The Lord kills and brings to life. He brings down to Sheol, to the place of the dead. He brings down to Sheol. and raises up. Yahweh makes poor and makes rich. He brings low and He exalts. He raises up the poor from the dust. He lifts the needy from the ash heap to make Him sit with princes and inherit a seat of honor. For the pillars of the earth are the Lord's, or Yahweh's, and on them He has set the world. He will guard the feet of His faithful ones, but the wicked shall be cut off in darkness. For not by might shall a man prevail. The adversaries of Yahweh shall be broken to pieces. Against them he will thunder in heaven. Yahweh will judge the ends of the earth and he will give strength to his king and exalt the horn of his anointed. And now we turn to the Gospel according to Matthew. The Gospel according to Matthew chapter 28. Friday was the setting. We talked about that Friday evening at the Good Friday service. The death of our Lord, he yields up his spirit. And then in chapter 27, verse 55 to the end of 27 is the rest of the scene as they bury Jesus and then wait through the Sabbath. And then comes that first Sunday morning after our Lord's death. Now after the Sabbath, toward the dawn of the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb and behold there was a great earthquake for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning and his clothing white as snow and for fear of him the guards trembled and became like dead men. But the angel said to the women, do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. He is not here, for he has risen as he said. Come and see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead. And behold, he is going before you to Galilee. There you will see him. See, I have told you. And so they departed quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples. And behold, Jesus met them and said, Greetings. And they came up and took hold of his feet and worshipped him. Then Jesus said to them, Do not be afraid. Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee, and there you will see me. while they were going. Behold, some of the guard went into the city and told the chief priests all that had taken place. And when they had assembled with the elders and taken counsel, they gave a sufficient sum of money to the soldiers and said, tell people, his disciples came by night and stole him away while we were asleep. And if this comes to the governor's ear, we will satisfy him and keep you out of trouble. And so they took the money and did as they were directed. And this story has been spread among the Jews to this day. What I've read to you from the Old Testament and the New Testament, it is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Let's pray. Lord God, your word is a lamp to our feet and a light to our path. Therefore, shine your light before us today that we may be washed over by the whirlwind of splendor and surprise. For the sake of your dead and now resurrected Son, Jesus the Messiah. Amen. You may be seated. The sermon notes are in the back of the worship guide. You can see lots of space for you to write down notes. You know, if the last 15 years have done anything, they have made us more suspicious, made us more skeptical, and made us more cynical than maybe we were before. Now, that's not necessarily a bad thing in and of itself, but it becomes terribly problematic when skepticism and suspicion infect our whole sense of order and reality. And when this happens, it jades every conversation. It taints every relationship. It gives a jaundiced look to every event. And it can become something that feeds on itself like a monster breeding more melancholy monsters. And so it's important to come at this passage and set our cynicism aside. Set it on a pew next to you. Don't let it touch the person next to you. Just take your cynicism out and stick it right here. Okay, just put it right there for just the time being. And try to drink in what's going on here. In Matthew 28, 1-15, in the whirlwind of splendor and surprise. First off, notice the two Marys. The two Marys, it's verses 1-3 and 5-10. Now the scene, as I've already mentioned, it was clearly set in chapter 27. There, the two Marys saw, after Jesus died and was being buried, they saw the involved process of Jesus' burial. In fact, chapter 27, 61, they sat across from his tomb and watched what was going on in the tomb and for the preparation. And then there was a military detachment that was posted at the tomb to make sure that Jesus, dead as death can make him, that Jesus stays in the tomb. That was verse 66. What's intriguing is that the scene is set and what you notice quickly is that no one Not friends, not foes. Nope, no one expects what is about to happen in chapter 28. No one was looking for it. No one anticipated it. In fact, just look at his friends, the friends. have spent all of the late Friday afternoon, all of that Saturday, that Sabbath, and all of the early morning hours of the first day of the week, resigned. Resigned to the death of Jesus. Resigned to the death of hope. Resigned to the inevitable grind of despondency and despair and defeat and then death. When Jesus was buried in the tomb as they saw it, then buried with him was hope. And on the other hand, the foes, the foes have spent all that time gloating with their thumbs stuck under their elitist and spiritual suspenders, gloating over the demise of Jesus and ensuring that there will be no trickeries or tomfooleries. And that's the scene as chapter 27 comes to an end, and so, Chapter 28, early as the sun was just breaking the horizon on that first day of the week, as the cobalt and black sky begins to fade into this baby blue or whatever you want to call it, and then you look at the horizon and there's the yellows and there's the reds starting to break across the horizon early on the morning on that first day of the week, the two Marys come, verse 1, to see the tomb. Now, why would they go to see the tomb? Well, my friends, over the years since my father's death, which was in 2010, I will occasionally drive down to Moore to Rest Haven to go see his grave. I will go. I've gone there often to remember, to talk with dad. I know dad can't hear me, but to talk with dad, to mourn, And so here come the two Marys. They don't come to have a celebration of life service. They're not expecting anything else other than that they will mourn. And to their surprise, things do not unfold the way they anticipated. An earthquake. An open tomb, guards strewn across the ground in front of the tomb like dead men. And then someone, someone whose presence blinded them because of the brilliancy sitting there on that rolled away stone. His appearance was like lightning and his clothing white as snow. Notice that surprise, surprise. It's not a time of grief and mourning that they expected, that they anticipated, that they had planned for. Instead, it's a whirlwind of splendor and surprise. And the messenger speaks, and when he speaks, the two Marys' world must have been reeling and rocking in shock and awe, in numbness and disbelief. I can only imagine what my own state of mind would be if I were to go to my father's grave on his birthday. and find it unearthed, and find the vault open, and find the casket lid that has a bass attached to the top. Dad loved fishing. To find the casket lid with that bass on it, thrown to the side, and the tomb empty. I can only imagine what my state of mind would be at that moment. And the angel tells the two Marys to not be afraid. that they've come to see Jesus who is as dead as death could make him, but he is not here. He is risen, as he said. Did you hear it? As he said. And then notice the two Marys are given a task, an important task. Come and see. Go and tell. Everybody should do that with your hands. Come and see, go and tell. That was a two-fold task the two Marys were given. Come and see, go and tell. And the two Marys then were not only acclaimed and immortalized witnesses of our Lord's death, but now they are acclaimed and immortalized witnesses of his having risen in triumph from the power and primacy of death. And right there in the story, right there in the story, you realize that Matthew has taken a bold, counter-cultural leap in a society, I hope you're listening to me, I know that food was really good and it makes your eyes sleepy, okay? Stay with me. In a society that did not even accept a woman's testimony in court. Already, having said that, you should realize the bold move Matthew made. It's very much like the mid-1800s in the United States. A slave's witness in court was discounted. It was not taken. Very much in the same way, the women's message or testimony in a court was not accepted. And the fact that Matthew makes sure that they are here and makes sure to tell you what they saw and to point this out is big news. I mean, think this through for a few seconds. If Matthew was just fabricating a story, if he was just writing some wishful fairy tale, then why in the world would Matthew, in his right mind, place the women as the primary witnesses when nobody would accept their testimony? Are you picking it up? I mean, surely if he was just manufacturing a myth, he would have completely excluded the women, and he would have gone and had the elites and the nobles notarize this fantastic event. But if what he is recounting really happened, then it makes clear and brilliant sense. He's telling the historical facts, come what may. Immediately, as the two Marys bolt off, they bolt off with fear and great joy and a whirlwind of splendor and surprise, and they meet. They meet the very one that they had never, ever, in a zillion trillion years, ever expected to see alive again. The very one that they knew was as dead as death could make him. And here he is, alive. Greetings. What? Oh, heaven's sake, here he is alive. Impossible. And they came up and took hold of his feet and worshiped him. My friends, what else would you do? If the one whom you loved dearly, but you knew he was as dead or she was as dead as death could make them and you would never see them again, was suddenly standing before you, freed from the tyranny of death and dying misery and mortality, what would you have done? I imagine I, too, would have fallen at his feet. In the whirlwind of splendor and surprise, your mind and your body would have crumbled at their feet in shock and awe. And I want you to notice that this is no apparition. How do you know? It's a very simple statement. They fell at him and they grabbed what? His feet. This ain't no ghost. This is no hologram. This is no imagination or dream or wishful thinking. They grabbed his feet. Hello? I mean, is that not awesome? Little bitty evidences all over that validate the fact that Jesus came from the dead with the very same body he was slaughtered with. He rose from the dead on the third day, body, blood, bones, toenails, and hair. Never again subject to misery or mortality. They grabbed his feet. They took hold of his feet. Do not be afraid, he said. Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee, and there they will see me. And don't miss it. The one who was as dead as death could make him for parts of three days, with whose death died all the hopes and all the happiness of his friends and even his mother, is now standing in front of them alive and talking to them. The one that they had heard cry out three days before, Eli, Eli, Lama Sabathani. In all desolation and forsakenness is now speaking to them, greetings, do not be afraid. Impossible. It's humanly and scientifically impossible. It would have had to have been a miracle. It would have had to have been an exclusive, exceptional, limited edition, unique invasion of God into the tidy orderliness of our world. That grinding orderliness of birth and breath and death and dust. An invasion that rips through the impenetrably dark blanket of death and darkness and damnation and doom, rips through it with penetrating light and life. And to think that the one forsaken by the Father on that cross of shame, forsaken and treated as a bandito and a criminal, is now alive. Made alive by the Father himself, therefore he is vindicated and validated. He was not a criminal, but he bore our crimes upon the cross. And to think this forsaken one said it would happen this way, didn't he? Just as he said. Well, sure enough. He said it repeatedly. For example, in Matthew 20. See, we are going up to Jerusalem. And the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and the scribes and they will condemn Him to death. And deliver Him over to the Gentiles to be mocked and flogged and crucified. And He will be raised on the third day. He is risen just as He said. So while this is all going on with the two Marys, over there, scampering off towards Jerusalem, are the troubled men. The troubled men, verses 3 and 4, 11 and 15. There they had lain, they had lain there stunned, they had lain there startled as they were knocked over by the whirlwind of splendor and surprise. And what did they see and what did they hear? Well, we don't know for certain. All we can say for certain is that they were shaken by the earthquake, they saw the stone roll away, they became astounded by the brilliancy and possibly they heard the angel's words to the two Marys. But once they had recovered from their catatonic state, They go skedaddling off to the chief priests and they told them, verse 11, all that had happened. I mean, just like the two Marys, they too then were given a task. The two Marys was what? Come and see, go and tell. But these troubled men were given another task. And notice their task was a counterfactual task. was a counter-historical task, was a counter-reality task. Notice what they're commissioned to do. They're to become the alt-news broadcast. Which they did for fleeting, for the fleeting, feckless God Mammon. So they took the money, verse 15, they took the money and did as they were directed, and this story has been spread among the Jews to this day. Instead of them going and getting to the facts, investigating the truth, they become, for money's sake, talking heads and spinmeisters. But honestly, I feel very somewhat sorry for those troubled men. Overcome by the whirlwind of splendor and surprise at the empty tomb, they run to those who should have helped them to pull it all together. They run to those who should have given them the hopefulness of the amazing God and His amazing grace. They go to the religious elites of the people of Israel who should have known better. Instead, They're misguided and misled by tricky managers. That's our third point. Did you notice the TM, TM, TM? Okay, I worked with that. Tricky managers. Now, I've said this a hundred times, and I will say this probably until the day I die. Not all that glitters is gold, and not all who carry the office and title of God's shepherds are good. That's what that reading was about before the confession of sin. To remind us that some of those who carry the title of gods as shepherds are the enemies of God. And you can't miss it here. The tricky managers, both the chief priests and the elders, they're following the path that they and the rest of the piously privileged have been treading all along. Think back to Matthew chapter 12, when Jesus cast out demons. And they could not refute the liberation they saw of these oppressed men and women. And so what did they do? They spun it as an act of black magic. Why, he cast out demons by Beelzebub, prince of demons. It's all black magic, don't you know? And then when he restored folks to full health on the Sabbath day, They can't deny it. They saw it before their own eyes. But what do they do? They spin it and conspire against Him, how to destroy Him. And even in our Lord's arrest and trial, even in our Lord's arrest and trial, Jesus was guilty until proved innocent. And they would be damned that He would ever be proved innocent. That's the working operation. I mean, it's almost like reading the last battle in the Chronicles of Narnia. You remember the dwarves there in the stable? What's their mantra? The dwarves are for the dwarves. Come on, kids, help me out here. No matter what Aslan did, The dwarves had come to such a deep, dark, cynical, and selfish state that they could not see what Aslan gave them in all of its festive beauty. Even a sumptuous feast of the finest of wines and pleasantries tasted to them like stable water and straw. And the doorway to heaven was no more to them than a dirty stable. In the same way, the tricky managers are so settled in their self-determined disbelief, so settled in their self-determined disbelief, they could not even trouble themselves to go and investigate the facts. Did you hear that? They could not even trouble themselves to go and investigate the facts. They stayed in their nice paneled rooms back there where conspiracies are always made, I hear. Right? They stayed back there and concocted their own story and paid for it and paid talking heads to spin it. There's just no way they would ever allow the whirlwind of splendor and surprise change their hearts or their heads, their lives or their loyalties. Just no way. And that's that first Easter morning. My friends, let me tie this up a little bit. For you who have not entrusted yourself to Christ, who maybe are still skeptical of any of all of this, is it just possible, is it just possible that like the tricky managers, you've already seated yourself as Jesus' judge, jury, and executioner? that you have already determined the impossibility of Jesus being God's unique, one-of-a-kind Son. Because way, way down deep, in the depths of your heart, you know that if you come to submit to Jesus, that you will then have to give up your own dictatorship over your life. If that's you, then to you I say this. Christ is risen as he said. He is risen indeed. And so he is, he is God's beloved son. Therefore, listen to him. If you will come, if you will come into the whirlwind of his resurrection's splendor and surprise, I promise you, that you will find release from the shame and from the penalty of your sins, and you will find, surprise, surprise, that God has been loving you really and deeply, loving you all along. Set aside your cynicism and run into the whirlwind of splendor and surprise. Fall down and grab his feet. The dearly loved of God. Christians. With the angel and with our Lord, I say to you, do not be afraid. Why, you may ask. Because Jesus who was crucified, as dead as death could make Him, is no longer in the tomb. For He has risen, as He said. He came forth, body, blood, bones, toenails, and hair. No state could hold Him down. No legal system could take His life and keep it. No way could death keep Him down. He is risen. He is risen indeed. You do not need to fear. And since he has risen, he said, as he said, then you can be at rest assured that he really is God's beloved son. And so listen to him. You have every reason to listen to him with utmost and ultimate confidence. Even when he says at the very end of this chapter, and Lo, I'm with you always. to the end of the age. You have every reason to listen to him and believe it. And lo, I'm with you always, even to the end of the age. But also do not be afraid, because death itself and all that goes with death, the suffering, the dying, the death of marriages, The death of childhood innocence. The death of personhood. All that goes with death. Death has been put on notice. It now has an expiration date. That's pretty good news. It now has an expiration date. The resurrection of Christ from the dead is the beginning of the death of death. So we read in our call to worship in 1 Corinthians, but in fact, Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ also be made alive. Dear friends, dearly beloved of God, take heart. If there's anybody in this world that needs to hear these words and walk this way, it's Christians. We sound like a bunch of Eeyores. Take heart. Buck up. Laugh. Laugh even at the last enemy. It is still the enemy, but laugh even at the last enemy that is being defeated by our Lord. I've told you the story. I told it again at the leadership class. I can't help but tell it. as a hospice chaplain going into an inpatient hospice. And the nurses told me there, they said that this woman in room eight, or whatever room it was in, was having the little TIAs that happen usually right before you die, just a lot of times. She was having several of them and they said, she's not long with us, it'll just be a day or two. I said, okay. And so I go around, make my rounds and go from room to room to room visiting different hospice patients and I save her for the last and I come in there. And you know, I wear a clerical collar when I'm out on visits and she knew immediately that I was a chaplain and I introduced myself to her and I said, how are you doing? She said, pastor. I believe in Jesus that he died for my sins and was raised from the dead. I'm not afraid to die, but this dying thing is just killing me." And she said it with a twinkle in her eye, and we had the biggest belly laugh ever, and the greatest, deepest fellowship, and she was gone within a day. But I walked out of there saying, that's how you face the last enemy. You know it's coming, but you can face it with even a twinkle in your eye because you know Christ is risen. He is risen indeed. Just one last thing, if you notice our wherever I put it and our worship guide. The catechism question from the New City Catechism. We didn't orchestrate this. This is just the way it happened. It just happened to fall on this question and answer today. Of all days, I said, wow, what a coincidence. Can Presbyterians say that? Listen to this. What does Christ's resurrection mean for us? Christ triumphed over death, sin and death, by being physically resurrected so that all who trust in Him are raised to new life in this world, to everlasting life in the world to come, just as we will one day be resurrected, so this world will one day be restored, but those who do not trust in Christ will be raised to everlasting death. One last thing to say. Notice the place of the fact that Christ's resurrection breaks the power of that oppressive sin. Breaks the power of that oppressive sin, the one that has you down. The one you feel that is most defeating you. The Christ's resurrection is even broken that, because that's all part of death. So you're struggling with sin. Look at Christ on the cross and Christ resurrected. And if you need to, In kind of an old Martin Luther fashion, just look the devil square in the eye and say, Christ is risen. He is risen indeed. Let's pray. Oh Lord, what great news. You raised your son from the dead on that third day. You raised him body, blood, bones, toenails and hair. You raised him triumphant. You raised him no longer subject to misery and mortality. And he is taking us with him. The first fruits of those will be raised from the dead. We have hope for the future of all people in the world. We have hope because hope came out of that grave. when we thought it was done and dead. Lord, I pray for all of us here. I pray for those who are in despair over their marriages, those who are in despair over their children, those who are in despair over their aging parents, those who are in despair over things in their life, that they would hear that again and it would light a fire of joy and light a fire of hope in their hearts. Christ is risen. He is risen indeed. and that you would raise them out of their tombs to life, to real substantive life. We pray for any and all here, maybe who have been skeptical all along, I pray that you would use this sermon as a crowbar to pry some of that cynicism away and bring them to you, Lord. Lord, what a happy day. What a happy, happy day. And we rejoice in this day because of what you've done. In Jesus' name, amen.