First Easter Day (1905)

Mark 16:1-8 Who would have guessed among themselves and could expect on Good Friday that such a glorious Easter Day would follow? However, even Jesus proclaimed the great Easter fact. He had said to His enemies: "Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it."1 "An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth."2 He had said to His disciples that He will rise on the third days. But they did not believe this, and those did not consider it possible that he can and will rise. The enemies were the first ones who thought on the words of Jesus again, and that they could not be glad about their plans for murder. Hence their appeal to Pilate about guardians and about the sealing of the stone. The disciples were sunk too deep in sadness, except that now the light of faithful hope could penetrate to them. But see, God has today prepared for the enemies a horrible, for the disciples a blessed surprise, by a loud call that proclaims God's greatest miracle: Jesus lives! He is risen! The enemies and all hell would burst with fear and anger over it, but the disciples' hearts are thus filled with great joy. And also the event itself is to them, from which reflects the open and empty grave, too high, so faith finds at the grave still enough fragments to which it can survive. In particular to us the rolled away stone is an even sweeter and stronger preacher of Easter. The blessed, divine Easter surprise: The stone is rolled away! 1. The stone is rolled away from Jesus' grave, and 2. so the stone is also rolled away from our hearts. 1. From the shattering Good Friday news: "Jesus is dead and buried!" is followed on Easter morning an uplifting, blessed, divine surprise: "Jesus lives! The grave is empty; look, the stone is rolled away!" a. Grief and anxiety of those women from following Jesus, who had been standing under the cross, and watched at the burial: grief due to the events at Golgotha; anxiety, until they could rush to the tomb to anoint the beloved body. They were busy with the preparation of spices; sleep probably fled from their eyes, and they welcomed the first rays of the sun on Easter morning on their way to the grave. Painful joy filled them, the closer they came to the attainment of their goals. A stone of sorrowful grief falls on their hearts there: "Who will roll the stone for us from the door of the grave?" Who opens our access to the beloved body of Jesus? Sad situation of the women! b. Still sorrow and sadness continues, watch out! What a pleasant surprise: the stone is rolled away! What does that mean? Who has dared to tamper with the sealed stone? God has done it. What for? So that the women could access Jesus' body? No, but in order to show an empty grave. But the women did not know.
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John 2:19. Matthew 12:39-40.

c. The women came to the tomb with mixed emotions. It was open. There sat a young man in a wonderful garment. It was not Jesus. It was not one of the guardians. It was a heavenly form. A second surprise. But where is the body of Jesus? Oh, who can describe their current misery, their horror! But then came the third, the proper, supreme, divine Easter surprise. The young man began to speak3; he told them the significance of the rolled away stone. He proclaimed to them: Jesus, who died on the cross, has left the dwelling of the dead. Jesus is risen and lives! They had imagined a dead Jesus behind the stone, a living Jesus preaches the rolled away stone and the view into the grave and the angel to them. Jesus has taken life again from death. O blessed, divine Easter surprise that the women shall now also proclaim even to the sad and depressed disciples, especially Peter; because now the stone is rolled away from their and our, yes, all sinners hearts. 2. a. In our hearts there was a stone that would not let us come to the living God, that stood as an insurmountable mountain between us and God and wanted to crush us in eternal alienation from God. What is this stone? "My God, if it occurs to me that what I committed my day, I notice my heart is a stone and I am enveloped with fear." David talks about this heavy stone.4 Isaiah tells us that it does not let us come to God.5 The stone of sin is on us and so the stone of fear and dread of God's wrath and judgment, of death and hell. The stone will not let us come to God, not into salvation, into heaven. Who will roll away the stone for us? We cannot do it. b. God alone can do it and has done it. The Lord threw all of our sin on His Son.6 And He was punished for our sins, as He is martyred on the cross by God. The wall of partition of our sins lay on His back as He laments, "My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?" Our sins have pushed Him into death and the grave. The stone is rolled away from us and lies on Jesus. c. Oh, my Lord Jesus, my sin bearer, shall you be separated from God forever because of my sins? No, the stone is rolled away, rolled away from the grave, rolled away by Jesus. The Crucified One is today the Resurrected One and has the form of one slain for sinners no more, but a living justified one. The stone is rolled away, the door of the castle of debt stands open, our guarantor is no longer in there, God has let Him out, out debt is paid, the punishment atoned, our proxy is free. And all the stones that lay so heavy on our hearts and consciences are indeed rolled away into the depths of the sea. The rolled away stone before Jesus' grave proclaims to us this blessed, divine surprise: God is reconciled to the whole sinful world through Christ, given up for our sins and awakened again for our righteousness. O rejoice, you sinners: The stone is rolled away! Away from sin, away from the fear of death, away from wrath and judgment, from hell's gate is the stone rolled. The access to God is open to us through Christ, righteousness, life and salvation laugh toward us from the open grave. O delightful Easter surprise, given to us by God himself: the stone is rolled away! Hallelujah! W.H.

Mark 16:6. Psalm 38:5. 5 Isaiah 59:2. 6 John 1:29.

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