the verdict--overturned!

Easter/Resurrection of the Lord

            We celebrate today the resurrection of the man known as Jesus Christ with great gusto and cheer.  But what is the great significance of this day, that a dead man came back to life?  Yes, but it is more than that.  Today has to do with the great action of God overturning human judgments regarding Jesus.  Were these judgments allowed to stand, we would have no interest in the man Jesus.  His name would not have been on the lips of worshipers across twenty-one centuries, had there not been some powerful and undeniable event that caused Jesus’ disciples to be certain that the same Jesus who was crucified had now been raised from the dead.  If everything had been left as it was—Jesus having been judged a blasphemer, a fraud, and one who had committed treason—if it had all been left as it was, we would not be here today with the name of Jesus on our lips.  If Jesus had not been raised from the dead, then there would be no Christian faith.  Christian faith is fundamentally resurrection faith.

            To understand all this, let’s go back into our gospel and follow the events that led up to Jesus’ execution.  Through our text and our imagination, let’s place ourselves in the midst of those events before Jesus’ resurrection.  The trouble started for Jesus as he began his ministry.  The religious experts criticized him for his speech and actions.  Case in point:  the occasion when people brought a paralyzed man to Jesus.  To effect a cure, Jesus said to the paralyzed man, “Take heart, son; your sins are forgiven.”  Some of the religious experts said to themselves, “This man is blaspheming.”  Of course, that charge would have been valid if Jesus were just an ordinary man claiming to do what only God has the authority to do.  On the other hand, if Jesus was indeed God’s Son, if Jesus was indeed God with us, then the charge of blasphemy would be false, for, as God with us, Jesus would have had the authority to forgive sins.  But the religious experts judged Jesus to be a blasphemer.  If the religious experts so judged him, how could the ordinary person conclude otherwise?

            Tension mounted as Jesus rode into Jerusalem and as the people responded with their devotion to him.  In what seemed a spontaneous demonstration, people along the way spread their cloaks and tree branches on the road before him, shouting, “Hosanna to the Son of David!”  “Son of David”—that’s a title for the Messiah, the awaited king!  “Blessed,” they continued, “Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!  Hosanna in the highest heaven!”

            More happened that last eventful week in Jesus’ life.  Soon after triumphantly entering Jerusalem, Jesus entered the temple and began driving out the people buying and selling there.  He tossed over the tables of the money changers, and the seats of those who sold doves.  As he did all this, Jesus declared, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer’; but you are making it a den of robbers.”  This behavior, if by the Son of God, would be authoritative.  Then those who loved God would want to listen to him and obey his commands.  But if these actions and words were from a troublemaker, then that would be a matter of concern for the order of the religious community.

              Then came the time when Jesus denounced them publicly.  He said to the religious experts, “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you are like whitewashed tombs, which on the outside look beautiful, but inside they are full of the bones of the dead and all kinds of filth.”  If those words were spoken by the Son of God, then the religious experts should have dropped to their knees and said, “Lord, have mercy on me!”  But if they were spoken by a troublemaker, then some action might have been required.  The religious experts decided what needed to be done.  They would have to see to it that Jesus was eliminated.

            The events leading up to Jesus’ death began to move toward their finale.  Judas, one of Jesus’ own disciples, joined the conspiracy to kill him.  He agreed to betray his Master for thirty pieces of silver.  Now, on Thursday night, as Jesus prayed in the garden, Judas identified him with a kiss.  With that signal, a crowd came out of the shadows, apprehended Jesus, and took him to the home of the high priest.  The religious experts and leaders were there, and a quick trial began.  The high priest himself interrogated Jesus, saying, “I put you under oath before the living God, tell us if you are the Messiah, the Son of God.”  Jesus answered him, “You have said so.  But I tell you, From now on you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of Power and coming on the clouds of heaven.”  If these words were spoken by the Son of God, then it would be fitting for all to drop to their knees and worship him.  If, on the other hand, they were spoken by a fraud, then those words would be blasphemous.  The high priest, coming to the latter conclusion, tore his clothes as a demonstration of grief, and cried out, “He has blasphemed!”  And they all voted for the death penalty.  Their verdict:  Jesus was a fraud who deserved to die for blasphemy.

            But there were two more verdicts yet to be reached.  It was now Friday morning.  The religious experts and leaders bound Jesus and took him to Pilate, the Roman governor.  For Jesus to be put to death, he would have to be charged with a crime that the Roman government cared about.  By now it had been told to Pilate that Jesus was calling himself, or at least allowing others to call him, the Messiah, a term which could be understood politically as “the King of the Jews.”  If Jesus had accepted that title, that could be considered treason, since the Jewish homeland was occupied by Rome.  Treason was a capital offense.  Pilate quizzed Jesus about what he was hearing.  “Are you,” he asked, “Are you the king of the Jews?”  Jesus replied simply, “You say so.”  The religious experts and leaders filled the air with their charges, but Jesus gave no reply.

Pilate decided to reserve his judgment.  He would put it to the crowd.  Their verdict would be his.  Pilate addressed the crowd gathered for the festival of Passover.  He said he would release a prisoner for them, but which one?  Shall it be a criminal named Barabbas?  Or shall it be Jesus, the one who was called the Messiah?  The crowd voted to release Barabbas, and, with that action, to condemn Jesus to death.  The crowd’s verdict:  Because Jesus wasn’t the Messiah they had hoped for, he deserved to die.

Two of the three verdicts were now in.  The religious experts and the crowd had come to the conclusion that Jesus was a fraud and that he should die.  Upon hearing the voice of the crowd, Pilate rendered his verdict:  If the religious experts so conclude, if the crowds demand it, if this man calls himself “the King of the Jews,” then he deserves to die.  Now all three verdicts were in.  They all condemned Jesus as a criminal who deserved to be executed.

I wonder.  If we had been there, would we have come to a different conclusion?  The story of what happened to Jesus comes to our ears with such great familiarity that if fails to startle us.  So let’s take a flight of fancy for the sake of trying to see the events surrounding Jesus the way the religious experts and the crowd may have seen them.  Imagine that our presbytery was having a constant controversy with a wandering preacher who made the rounds of Presbyterian churches.  Imagine that this governing body saw fit to condemn this maverick preacher as one who preached false doctrine.  Imagine also that the F.B.I., on a tip from someone at the presbytery office, arrested this trouble-making preacher, and that they charged him with treason.  Imagine that there was sufficient testimony given in court to convict him, and that he was sentenced to death by lethal injection.  Imagine, finally, that the sentence was carried out, and this maverick preacher and convicted seditionist was put to death.  What should we think of him now?  After all, those who condemned him are people we trust.  They are from organizations in which we have a great deal of confidence.  If they say he was a heretic and that he committed treason, and if a jury convicted him, then it would be hard for us to conclude that he was not guilty.  Would it have been so different in Jesus’ time?  Yes, of course, some people believed in Jesus, in spite of the human verdict.  Yet I wonder.  If the majority of the people condemned him, if the religious experts—the very ones who ought to have recognized the Messiah when they saw him—if the religious experts thought he was a fraud, would we have come to any different conclusion?

Now back to our fancy about the wandering preacher who was condemned by the presbytery as a heretic, charged the by F.B.I. with treason, and found guilty by a jury of his peers.  Ask yourself, what would you think of this wandering preacher?  The religious experts we trust declared that he was a heretic.  The F.B.I. charged him with treason, and a jury found him guilty of that crime.  What would you conclude about him?  Would you come to any different conclusion?  Can you imagine yourself, as a sign of devotion to this convicted criminal, wearing a piece of jewelry, in the form of a gurney in a death chamber, around your neck or on your coat lapel?  Would you boldly display the means of this convicted man’s execution?

And yet, look!  That’s exactly what we do in the case of Jesus Christ!  We wear the symbol of Jesus’ execution around our necks.  We boldly display crosses in our churches.  There’s a reason for that.  The human verdict about him was overturned by God himself.  How?  God raised up Jesus Christ from the dead.  God overturned the human verdict by declaring his Yes to the crucified Jesus, and his No to the human verdict.  That twofold declaration was made when God raised up the crucified Jesus from the dead.  Jesus’ resurrection was the divine declaration that overturned the verdict pronounced by the religious experts, the government, and the crowd.  They said through their verdicts that Jesus was not God’s Son.  But God raised Jesus up from the dead to declare that he was indeed the Son of God.  God’s verdict, demonstrated on Easter, was spoken at Jesus’ baptism and his transfiguration.  What was it God said of Jesus?  God said, “This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!”  Surely God raising up Jesus from the dead said exactly that.  What looked like a bitter defeat on Good Friday was turned into a glorious victory on Easter Sunday!

            How could the followers of Jesus be so sure he was raised from the dead?  Our text narrates how he appeared to his followers.  It doesn’t say how his followers knew it was him, it only tells us that they were certain that it was the same Jesus who was crucified who was now risen.  That’s an important detail.  The risen Jesus was the same Jesus who had been condemned and crucified.  If the risen Jesus were a different person, then the divine verdict wouldn’t have applied to the crucified Jesus.  But it was the same Jesus who was crucified that God raised up from the dead, overturning the human verdict pronounced against him.  We don’t know how his followers were sure it was Jesus, we only know that they were sure.

How do we know that?  Their transformation from fear to boldness.  The message they dared to proclaim.  Jesus’ followers would have had no good reason to come out of hiding—yes, they were in hiding following their Master’s crucifixion, hiding in fear for their own lives—they would have had no good reason to come out of hiding and then proclaim that God has raised Jesus from the dead, unless that was exactly what had happened.  Had Jesus’ resurrection not occurred, there would have been no certainty in their voices and on their faces.  They were transformed.  They no longer feared what anyone could do to them.  They no longer had any lingering doubts about the possibility that they had followed someone who was delusional.  (You think they didn’t entertain the possibility that they had been wrong about Jesus?)  But something happened to them to convince them that the human verdict had been overturned by God.  The resurrection of Jesus their Master was God’s powerful declaration about who Jesus was.  That’s why Jesus’ once fearful disciples came out of hiding to proclaim a risen Lord!

But how does all of this apply to our lives?  Consider:  We all struggle with our faith.  We sometimes wonder if Jesus could possibly be the Son of God.  By God raising up Jesus from the dead, God said Yes to Jesus, declaring that he is the Son of God.

We struggle with our relationship with God.  We wonder to ourselves, “What is God’s attitude toward me?  Could God possibly love me?”  By raising up his Son from the dead, God declared his Yes to the purpose of Jesus’ death on the cross.  God’s Yes to Jesus’ purposeful death was also God’s Yes to us.  The resurrection shows us that Jesus’ dying on the cross was for the purpose of demonstrating the depth of God’s love for us.  Because God raised up Jesus from the dead, you can see God’s love poured out for you every time you look at the cross.  So look at the cross for your answer.  Christ died for you.  Christ rose for you.  Does God love you?  Yes!

 We struggle with guilt.  We wonder to ourselves if God can forgive us for the things we have done.  The resurrection of Jesus proves that Jesus’ death on the cross was for God’s gracious purpose of forgiving our sin and reconciling us to God.  If you have any lingering doubt about your forgiveness, look at the cross in light of the resurrection.  Are you forgiven?  Yes!  In Jesus Christ, we are forgiven!

We struggle with what should govern our lives.  Jesus said that what matters most is loving God and our neighbor as ourselves.  Because that was said by the same Jesus God raised up from the dead, that ought to address our lingering doubts about what should govern our lives.  Love governs our lives.

We struggle with what we should do with our lives.  Jesus said that life is found as one takes up his or her cross and follows him in a life of self-giving, suffering love.  Because God raised up this same Jesus from the dead, that ought to address our lingering doubts about how we should live our lives.  Now we can dare to trust that true life is not about gathering but giving, and that it is not about saving our life but about losing our life for Christ’s sake.

We struggle with death.  Everybody faces that fear at some point in life.  Because God raised up Jesus from the dead, that ought to address our lingering doubts about God’s power to raise us from the dead.