“After the Sabbath, at dawn on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to look at the tomb” (28:1).  They walk to the tomb as Sunday’s first light begins to dissolve the dark.  We gather on Sunday because this is resurrection day.  Every time we gather, we are making our statement about faith in what God did that day, and what He promises to do.

Though they had been told and taught, several times, by Jesus himself, those women weren’t expecting any resurrection.  They weren’t looking or hoping for anything.  Sometimes we can get to living like that, if you can call it living.  Those women were locked into Friday: the weeping, trembling, in shock.  That day, they had sort of been on autopilot, doing what they could to get Jesus’ dead, tortured body decently prepared for loving, sensitive burial, the final goodbye.  They had to hurry: there wasn’t much time from when he was taken down from the cross until the start of the sabbath, when everything ceased.  They didn’t realize, didn’t recognize, that the holy, cosmic work was already done.  Jesus had said, from the cross, “It is finished,” but no one quite knew what he meant . . . the delirium of a broken, dying man.

The women had been there from cross to tomb.  They had watched as the huge stone was rolled over the entrance, guards posted, seals affixed: Upon Pain of Death, Do Not Enter!  How could they know that, soon, there would be no death to be found there?  All they knew, then, was the ugly fact, the shattering reality that Death was it, was all!  As though everything and everyone, finally, served that cold, silent god.

Those guards and those warning seals were there because the religious officials were determined to keep people from entering the tomb.  We all must enter the tomb.  What those officials were not counting on was someone coming out of the tomb.  When has that ever happened!?  Jesus had spoken about it; the officials who had Jesus put to death knew he had said something about some sort of rising on the third day.  But who knew what that actually meant?  Jesus was always saying strange, obscure things.  Those words couldn’t be taken literally, could they?  Just the sort of bonkers thing someone too full of himself would say.

Now, those devoted, beloved friends of Jesus returned to the tomb so early to finish what they had been forced to leave unfinished—such a rush job.  The shock hadn’t worn off.  When was it supposed to?  It didn’t need much to feel it all, again—what they had seen, heard, the heavy, limp, bloody body as they brought it down from the cross, wrapped it quickly but so tenderly, lovingly as they may, with tears and what gentleness.  Now at the tomb again, they were reliving it all: a hard, sad story—just like life, too often, too much.

But this morning was no return to Friday, no Friday, Part 2.  Just as the women found themselves on the edge of that plummet into the hard darkness of hurt and bitter sorrow, just as all the trauma of Friday was about to dash them down once more, Matthew tells us, “There was a violent earthquake, for an angel of the Lord came down from heaven and, going to the tomb, rolled back the stone and sat on it” (28:2).  Hey!  An earth-shaking, attention-shifting event: the old foundations demolished for a new and glorious structure, rising.  Earthquakes are not unknown in that part of the world, as we’ve seen.  Only, this is a very particular earthquake: the effect of a message from God.  God’s Word shakes things, beloved.  God’s word shakes people’s notions of reality and truth, so that Reality Himself, Truth Himself, can reach through to us.

An angel—Luke is always telling us about angels.  Not Matthew.  On those occasions when Matthew does point to an angel, then, like now, it’s especially noteworthy.  God is breaking through.  It should amaze and even shame us that God must break through: that people and history and culture and will and sin together have thrown up such a thick, hard, barrier against God that He’s left with no alternative but to break through.  And break through He does.  It’s always a breakthrough when God catches hold of anyone—a miracle, the power of God.  God can.

Yes, this angel messenger, this earthquake message can feel hard to wrap mind and heart around—our “rational” selves want to push back just here, too—but Matthew, who doesn’t dwell much on angels and earthquakes, tells us this is what happened, because this is what those women said happened, and they weren’t likely to lie, especially as they were expecting nothing of the kind to happen to them, that day.  Maybe we don’t expect much to happen to us, either, after all.  One day is pretty much like another, good, bad, or indifferent.  Then God shows up.

Matthew doesn’t describe this angel as we might expect—no wings, halo, harp, or long, flowing golden hair—but “like lightning”: meaning what—quick, dazzling, blinding, powerful, staggering, fear-inducing?  Yes.  And immediate, and from the place of power beyond the clouds, the place of the One who can do all things: God who can, hidden from our sight.

Matthew reminds us about those guards posted at the sealed tomb—we had almost forgotten about them.  They were supposed to make sure that no Jesus-followers, putting some crackpot scheme into action, would try to break into the tomb in dark of night and steal the body away, to then claim, all loudly and brazenly, that Jesus had risen.  “Yeah?” the officials might say, “Where is he, then?  Let’s see him.”  And what would the followers say then?  “No, you can’t see him”?  And how long until the stashed corpse would be found?  The Bible tells us, often enough, that it’s when people try to force God’s plan that things go awry.  No one forced Jesus into this life or onto that cross.  No one forcibly removed his corpse from the tomb.

The guards were paralyzed with terror: in the presence of that holy messenger with his message from God, what fortitude could stand?  Matthew reminds us about the soldiers, I suppose, to tell us that it wasn’t only the women who were able to give testimony to what they heard and saw.  No, the guards did not testify from faith, but they also told what they had witnessed: the earth shook—something big, just like the day Jesus died!  The one like lightning flashed before them and, alone, moved back the stone several strong men had heaved into place.

And then, inside that tomb, that place of final and utter horror and loathing?

Just what the women also saw: nothing.  Nothing there.  No one.  No one to come walking out, ghoulish or glorious.  Only the angel sitting atop the stone—serenely, looking at them, light-hearted, not even sweating.  The messenger from God spoke: “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified.  He is not here; he has risen, just as he said.  Come and see the place where he lay.  Then go quickly and tell his disciples: ‘He has risen from the dead and is going ahead of you into Galilee.  There you will see him.’  Now I have told you” (28:5-7).

Now I have told you.  This is news for telling.  Come, see, then go, tell.  Some news we keep to ourselves.  This isn’t that sort of news.  We can tell one another here, and that’s not a bad thing to do—oh, we also need reminding and the bright encouragement of Christ!  Let’s also make it a goal this week, this month—this year!—to tell someone else, someone whose faith or church connection we might not know for sure.  Many people claim faith, but when is the last time they acted upon it?  When is the last time he or she made it a point and priority to be an invested, integral member of a church community?  Let’s invite people to come and see for themselves.  The tomb was empty, already empty, empty even before the stone with all those official seals breaking, was rolled away.  Those earthly authorities and powers order and shout:  “Don’t look; don’t go!”  And the message from God?  Come and see.

Who was going to believe?  The women didn’t know.  They didn’t stop or pause carefully, critically to consider that question.  God’s messenger told them to go; they were going.  It seems that should be the place to wrap up—the going and telling: Amen!  But Matthew has a little more to tell us.  Those women, on their way to tell—not fully understanding but starting to feel the joy and wonder of it, brilliant joy and bright wonder filling in all the grief, sorrow, and darkness—on their way to tell, something—someone—happens to them: “Suddenly Jesus met them. ‘Greetings,’ he said.  They came to him, clasped his feet and worshiped him” (28:9).  A day of glories!  A day of joy!  There’s an Easter message: it’s as they go to tell that Jesus meets them—oh, to touch Jesus again, see him again, feel his presence again!

It’s easy to go through the motions, find ourselves repeating routine, not knowing how to get to where we really want to be, not knowing how get a start on doing what we really would like to be doing.  Sometimes we’re not even sure what that would be or look like—just different, not what we have been doing, not where we’ve been stuck for . . . how long?

Jesus was the last thing anyone was expecting!  Then Jesus happens.  God makes Jesus happen: in us; in others.  One way is in the telling, the going to tell.  Jesus tells those faithful women, filled with joy they hadn’t thought to experience ever again—Jesus tells them, “Do not be afraid.  Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me”  (28:10).  Go and see.  Strangely enough, that was just what the women had set out to do that morning.  They didn’t want to but knew they had to.  From love, they had to.  Go and see.  They have, and now they want to, need to; from love, from joy, wonder, glory, and grace: Good News!  Let’s follow.  Let’s go and tell, also; let’s go and see.