Fears, Fools, and Faith

• Resurrection Sunday

with Mark 16:1-8  and  2 Timothy 1:3-7

www.FirstChurchBville.com    @FirstUMCBville   @kerrfunk

This sermon was broadcast on Facebook Live 4/1/18
https://www.facebook.com/FUMCWV/

• Welcome! I’m glad you’re here! Some folks are here because this is their home. They come for spiritual nourishment and fellowship, for a place to give and receive, a place to belong. Some are returning or visiting. There are a host of reasons and motivations. Glad you’re here. Whether this is your familiar place or it’s your first time or something in between, I hope you’ll give us the chance to be your family. Come back next week!

• The wonder of Easter, the joy, the magic. Story about my early Easters.

It’s easy to forget that Easter begins in fear. In grief, in darkness, in confusion, in exhaustion. In fact the ending of our Gospel reading today: The women said nothing to anyone, since they were afraid. Did you remember that part? Can you blame them? (elaborate grief, connect our griefs.)

• So the women were fearful. Out of sorts. Very disoriented, not in their right minds. And you might say they were fools. I mean they went before sunrise and had no plan for how to remove the stone, which was very large. Might say foolish, might say faithful, that they went in spite of not having a plan for the stone, but we don’t make the best of decisions when we’re tired and griefstricken. Part of the message of today, though, is that our human limitation / shortcoming does not hinder God from ministering to us!

• Three weeks ago we read from 1 Corinthians 9, message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. Y’know it might not be so bad to be a fool when we consider the company we’re in: God’s. It’s like walking into an expensive restaurant with the owner: nothing to fear.

• And walking in to any situation with God is great, because God does not give us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of right-mindedness.

We hear from the young man in the tomb that Jesus went before the disciples to Galilee, and as witnesses we’re told to go and tell, with the knowledge that Jesus goes before us. And in 2 Timothy we celebrate faith in community as others go before us, our parents and grandparents, and we are strengthened in witness together.

• So the fears, the griefs we face… we can leave them behind. They don’t go before us.
The disorientation, the out-of-sorts, the not-right-mindedness… in community with God and others, those fall apart. In the resurrection community there is power and love and rightmindedness. And nothing shall separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus.

• into Holy Communion

Mark 16:1-8 (HCSB)

16 When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so they could go and anoint Jesus. 2 Very early in the morning, on the first day of the week, they went to the tomb at sunrise. 3 They were saying to one another, “Who will roll away the stone from the entrance to the tomb for us?” 4 Looking up, they observed that the stone—which was very large—had been rolled away. 5 When they entered the tomb, they saw a young man dressed in a long white robe sitting on the right side; and they were amazed and alarmed.

6 “Don’t be alarmed,” he told them. “You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. He has been resurrected! He is not here! See the place where they put Him. 7 But go, tell His disciples and Peter, ‘He is going ahead of you to Galilee; you will see Him there just as He told you.’”

8 So they went out and started running from the tomb, because trembling and astonishment overwhelmed them. And they said nothing to anyone, since they were afraid. ò

2 Timothy 1:3-7 (HCSB)

3 I thank God, whom I serve with a clear conscience as my ancestors did, when I constantly remember you in my prayers night and day. 4 Remembering your tears, I long to see you so that I may be filled with joy, 5 clearly recalling your sincere faith that first lived in your grandmother Lois, then in your mother Eunice, and that I am convinced is in you also.

6 Therefore, I remind you to keep ablaze the gift of God that is in you through the laying on of my hands. 7 For God has not given us a spirit of fearfulness, but one of power, and love, and sound judgment. ò

1 Corinthians 9:18-23 (HCSB)

18 For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but it is God’s power to us who are being saved. 19 For it is written:

   I will destroy the wisdom of the wise,
   and I will set aside the understanding of the wise.
        [Isaiah 29:14]

20 Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scholar? Where is the debater of this age? Hasn’t God made the world’s wisdom foolish? 21 For since, in God’s wisdom, the world did not know God through wisdom, God was pleased to save those who believe through the foolishness of the message preached. 22 For the Jews ask for signs and the Greeks seek wisdom, 23 but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to the Jews and foolishness to the Gentiles. 24 Yet to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ is God’s power and God’s wisdom, 25 because God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength. ò