One day when my kids were little, the ice cream truck came down our street, playing its ice cream truck tune. Everybody got excited, the dog even got excited, and my husband took the two kids and the dog to the truck to get ice cream. So, everybody is happy, the kids get their ice cream cones, and it’s a wonderful time UNTIL one of the kid’s ice cream falls off the cone onto the sidewalk. The dog was really happy, because now he had ice cream! But there was crying. Kevin bought our son another ice cream cone, but it wasn’t as good as the first one. The first one he got while he was so happy and excited! But with the second one, he was still feeling a little trauma. He was rattled. How could you hold a delicious ice cream cone in your hand, and then all of a sudden, it’s gone! Yes, he got something new: a new ice cream cone. But it was not as good as the first one. He wanted the first one to work out. Sometimes we like the old, what we’re used to, the first ice cream cone. We want the old when there is something new.
That’s because change is hard. It’s hard to lose something, and very hard to lose someone. Change is hard, even when it is a change for the good. There are many things in life that are good. We enjoy them, but they also bring some stress. If you get married, it’s wonderful! But there is stress with the new situation, the two of you may expect different things from the marriage. When you buy a house, that’s awesome, but there is the stress of the cost of unexpected repairs and the cost of the stuff you need to buy for the house. We all dream of winning the lottery! But there are people who win the lottery who say it ruined their life. They end up wishing they never did.
So, it’s understandable that Jesus’ followers were very upset when he died. They couldn’t believe Jesus would die, or that he would leave them. They liked being with Jesus, and they didn’t want anything about that to change. He told them he would suffer, die, and rise in glory. And things happened, just as Jesus said, he was arrested, crucified, and died. Yet this was tremendously stressful! Imagine: it’s hard enough when someone you are close to dies. But Jesus didn’t just die. He was killed. There was an angry mob shouting, “Crucify him!” The religious and political leaders wanted him dead. Jesus suffered an extremely painful, humiliating execution. Their teacher was gone, and so were their hopes for Jesus to be the chosen one, the Messiah? What would they do without Jesus?
Even though Jesus had told them all that would happen, they still didn’t believe he would rise again. From his followers point of view, too many things had gone terribly wrong. Jesus was crucified. He was dead and in the tomb. They expected him, like everyone else who died, to stay dead.
On Easter, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb, and she expected to see Jesus’ body. But she didn’t! So, she ran to the disciples and said, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him!”
Peter and the disciple that Jesus loved ran back to the tomb with Mary Magdalene. And still there was no body in the tomb! So, the two disciples left. Mary stood there crying, and an angel asked her, “Woman, why are you crying?”
It can seem like this angel is being a jerk, you know? “Why are you crying, lady?” Because she’s in a cemetery! She’s crying because Jesus died, and now his grave was disrespected!
But what the angel means is, why are you holding on to the old Jesus, turn around, look, the new Jesus is here! God makes all things new!
Mary turns around, and there is Jesus, but she doesn’t recognize him! She says to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.”
Jesus says to her, “Mary!” and she recognizes Jesus!
Finally, Mary trusts that God has made Jesus new! The new has come: death is no longer the end, and our sin no longer traps us. Easter means we can trust God to make all things new!
The apostle Paul said in 2 Corinthians 5:16-17, “So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!”
Easter means where we see a hopeless situation, God can do a new thing. We don’t have to cling to the old or try to fix the old. We can trust God to do a new thing because God makes all things new.
Many years ago, I worked in a homeless shelter for single women and families with children. A man and his daughter came to stay at the shelter. It was a unique situation. He was 60. He wasn’t involved in his daughter’s life. But her mother one day dropped her off with him. She said, “It’s your turn to raise her,” and she left. He was suddenly, at 60, years of age, a single Dad. This new family was a challenge for the shelter staff. All the guests took turns doing chores, like washing dishes or cleaning the bathroom. This man let his daughter clean the bathroom, and he didn’t help, which wasn’t ideal. He wasn’t living up to the agreement with the shelter. Sometimes when guests weren’t following rules, we asked them to leave. What should we do? But the staff at shelter could see, this was a big change for this guy. Stability would be really helpful for him and his daughter. We kept encouraging him to do chores with his daughter. We made some exceptions for them. We let the two of them stay an extra month at the shelter. When it was time to leave, he and his daughter had an apartment to go to, he was acting more like a Dad, and the two were enjoying being a family. This story tells us, we can change. In Christ we are a new creation. God makes all things new. And this is a wonderful story for Easter, because we don’t always do what we should, and we do things that we shouldn’t do. But God forgives us. Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross means God doesn’t count our sin against us. We are God’s children! God makes all things new.
We are Easter people. We serve a powerful God. Let’s not look at things from a worldly point of view, as if all is hopeless. Let’s determine to trust God has redeemed us in Jesus Christ. In him, we are a new creation! Let’s let go of the past and let’s trust that God makes and will continue to make all things new! Amen.
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