[Propertalk] Fwd: Sermon Resources for April 22 - Part 2

[Joe Parrish]

The Only Easter Some Will Know
 
Jesus returns from the dead and meets his disciples in different places: the garden, the Emmaus Road, the seashore, the Upper Room. He witnesses to them that he is alive, this guy back from the dead with a body. He isn't content to send them a postcard from heaven: HAVING A GREAT TIME. WISH YOU WERE HERE. No. He shows up among them as his own witness.
 
And he recruits as witnesses those other people with bodies. He wants them to move out and tell everyone who will listen and everyone who won't that bodies count, that he's back from the dead with a body, threatening them with life.
 
Those who recognize his witness become witnesses themselves. They put their bodies on the line. They become contagious with the forgiveness they've caught, carriers of resurrection.
 
That's what this back-to-life Jesus wants of us: not names on a list, or what someone has called "pew potatoes." Jesus wants us as witnesses. Not airy spirits or pious ghosts, but bodies like his own with wounds to show, bodies that witness to resurrection, threatening the world with life. For the only Easter some people may ever see is the Easter they see in you and me.
 
Charles Hoffacker, A Guy With a Body
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Taste and See
 
An elderly woman made her living selling artificial fruit. One day a customer complained the fruit she sold was not realistic enough. She pointed to an apple, saying it was too red, too round and too big to be a real apple. At that point the artificial fruit lady picked up the apple and proceeded to eat it.
 
The resurrection of Jesus, throughout the years has been critically examined, judged by authorities, and editorialized by writers, and the conclusion of most is that it is simply an event which can not be proven and probably too good to be true. It may look like an apple but in actuality it is artificial fruit, they conclude. But if you will pick it up and take a bite you come to know that he really did rise from the grave. He is alive. He is listening to our prayers. He is ready to serve when that service deals with the human heart in need of a shepherd's guidance and love.
George Bernard Shaw, the famous playwright, was handed a newly written play by a fledgling playwright. Shaw was asked to give the young man a criticism of the work a few days later. "How did you like it?" asked the author. "I fell asleep reading it," said Shaw. "Sleep is my comment on your work."
 
My friend there is nothing boring about the resurrection. Easter dawns upon a world hidden in darkness. Easter awakens every sleeper with the news that preacher of peace, the Prince of 
Power and the Lord of Love has appeared. Christianity is real. Christianity is alive. Christianity is anything but boring. Let us all wake up and smell the roses. Let us resolve to live our lives as if Jesus were a guest in our homes, workplaces and businesses. The truth is that the Lord is here, there and everywhere. He is alive. He is our Risen Lord to whom we offer our discipleship with love.
 
The song goes, "They'll know we are Christians by our love." Let us be about our Father's business as we serve him with joy. Let us show and tell others the good news of the gospel.
 
Brett Blair, www.eSermons.com, adapted from Charles Michael Mills, To Dawn: Sermons For Lent And Easter Cycle B Gospel Texts, Lima: CSS Publishing Company, Inc.
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He Was Not a Ghost
 
While in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering, he said to them, "Have you anything here to eat?" (Luke 24:41). And now he has made the sacramental moment back into a meal.
 
That is so Luke. The Physician. Mr. Everything-is-flesh-and-blood; you're either poor or you're not poor; you're either hungry or you're not hungry; you're either sick or you're not sick; none of the in-between "Well, maybe we're poor in a spiritual sense." For Luke it's always a question of people's physical well-being. And physically, Jesus, who on Good Friday was completely dead, is now so completely alive that he wants something to eat. He is not a ghost. 
 
There was some talk in the early church that maybe he was a ghost when he came back. He was not a ghost. He was not a shadow of his former self; he was his former self restored to life, victorious over death. This is not a metaphysical encounter, but a physical one. It was not an illusion, not a dream, but flesh and bone and blood. 

Keith Grogg, A Ghost Does Not Have Flesh and Bones
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The Living Christ
 
As a young man, Mahatma Gandhi studied in London. After learning about Christianity, and after reading the Sermon on the Mount, he decided that Christianity was the most complete religion in the world. It was only later, when he lived with a Christian family in East India, that he changed his mind. In that household he discovered that the word rarely became flesh -- that the teaching of Jesus rarely became the reality of Jesus.
 
How "fleshy" is Jesus in our congregations? How persuasive is our teaching? How passionate is our preaching? How much do our hearts burn within us when the scriptures are opened to us? And how often do we recognize the stranger as the living Christ in our midst? 

Susan R. Andrews, "Holy Heartburn," article in the Christian Century
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Go to the World
 
Jesus did not command the whole world to go to church. Jesus commanded his church to go to the whole world.
 
Traditional
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Christ Understands Us
 
The gospels of the New Testament do not demand that we understand Christ. Rather, they offer the burden-lightening insight that Christ understands us. We do not have to understand Easter to experience Easter.
 
Christ's capacity for understanding defies our comprehension. This one who inspires magnificent visions also ministers amid shattered dreams. This one known as the Prince of Peace does not shy away from chaos and conflict. This one who taught us to pray accepts people who are so troubled that they can't pray. This one who offers salvation identifies with people confounded by feelings of lostness. This one who offers unmatched encouragement knows better than any other the depths of discouragement.
 
Do you hear? Do you grasp the meaning? If you did not sense the joy of Easter morning, if you have not felt Christ rise, if you cannot shout hallelujah, that does not mean that you must drop your head and take off toward Emmaus or some other place to give up. Christ understands. He understands you. So, Christ appears.
 
The presence of Christ among us does not depend upon the quality of our understanding of Christ or even upon the nature of our reception of his presence. Christ appears in the midst of people not even looking for him.

C. Welton Gaddy, For Those Who Missed Easter
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The Secret of Power
 
The story is told of the explorer who some years ago had just returned to his country from the Amazon. The people at home were eager to learn all about the vast and mighty river and the country surrounding it. How he wondered, could he ever describe it to them - how could he ever put into words the feelings that flooded into his heart when he saw the exotic flowers and heard the night sounds of the jungle. How could he communicate to them the smells the filled the air and the sense of danger and excitement that would come whenever he and his fellows explorers encountered strange animals or paddled through treacherous rapids?
 
So the explorer did what all good explorers do - he said to the people, "go and find out for yourselves what it is like", and to help them he drew a map of the river pointing out the various features of its course and describing some of the dangers and some of the routes that could be used to avoid those dangers.
 
The people took the map and they framed and hung it on the wall of the local science museum so that everyone could look at it...
 
The rest of this illustration and many additional illustrations and sermons can be accessed at www.Sermons.com.
 
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