Sermon Library
“Resurrection Then and Now”
Rev. Dr. Gregg R. Anderson
March 30, 2008
Service Theme: Easter !! - 2008
Easter II-2008 March 30, 2008
Resurrection Then and Now
Gregg R. Anderson
The Last Week
This past Lent and Easter I have been speaking about Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan’s book entitled The Last Week. It has provided a significant academic, historical and political context to the last week of Jesus life besides and beyond the Biblical texts. The book has essentially demonstrated that Jesus’ crucifixion was primarily due to his resistance to the dominant and oppressive rule of the Roman government in Israel and Jerusalem. Jesus spoke up for justice and equality, the worth and the rights of all people. As Jesus gained attention and followers, he threatened the Roman and Jewish Aristocratic status. So the authorities crucified him for upsetting the norm of keeping the rich rich and rulers and the poor poor and oppressed.
It was interesting this past week to see a new National Geographic special on the life of Jesus which dramatized many of the same historical insights around the life of Jesus that Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan described in their book. But then again, National Geographic featured the two of them in their program along with a number of other scholars such as Karen King. I have been using Karen King’s DVD from the History Channel entitled The History of God for the Confirmation class.
One of Borg’s and Crossan’s statement that I said made a big impression upon me was the perspective that Jesus did not just die for our sins, but because of our sins. Jesus died for the sin of greed and power over other people for selfish gain. The Hebrew texts have always prophesized peace and justice. Jesus was speaking up for these messages, for ushering in the kingdom of God versus the Kingdom of Caesar.
Last Sunday, Easter Sunday, I reminded us that Jesus was Jewish and did not come to start a whole new religion named after him, but to give a new light to an ancient and sometimes abused religion. The concept and differentiation of “Christianity” evolved slowly, well over a century after the death of Jesus.
Without Easter, We Wouldn’t Know About Jesus
I also quoted another big statement of Borg and Crossan which was, “Without Easter, we wouldn’t know about Jesus.” Whether the resurrection story is literal or metaphorical, there remains a great purpose to the story in keeping the life, teachings, and message of Jesus alive throughout the ages. The central affirmation of Easter is that Jesus lives. One way or another, this is very true, throughout all of history and currently. Jesus popularity has grown from an original 12 disciples to 2.12 billion Christians in the world today. Christianity is the largest religion today and almost twice as large as the second largest religion which is Islam. There are a lot of variations within Christianity, but when one adds up all the Christians and it represents the largest religion in the world by a large margin, it must mean something. One of the things it means is that Christianity is more evangelical than most other religions, but besides this, Christianity has answered the biggest question in life, the question of death, in a most dramatic way.
Somehow, I think that Christianity being the most popular religion in the world along with the concept that Jesus would not be known without the resurrection story is not just coincidental and most synergistic. In other words, the story and meaning of resurrection touches us as human beings religiously unlike any other religious resolution. Now there are a number of different interpretations and meanings to the resurrection story from the very first day of resurrection, from Mary Magdalene to the doubting Thomas, from very literal to very allegorical. I am not trying to create controversy, I am simply pointing out all the controversy and various perspectives on the matter of resurrection that has always been there. I am simply acknowledging what has always been there and is still there. The point, however, is that whatever view different Christians have, resurrection has been essential. And all the good that has been done in the name of Jesus may not have happened without resurrection or the story of resurrection. And I do mean all the good. I am not ignoring the problems and the bad, but that is miniscule compared to all the good in Christ’s name.
Scholars Say Resurrection Misunderstood by Christians
It was just a day before Easter last Saturday when Susan and I were going over a few last minute details when Susan said did you see the article in the Aspen Daily News yesterday about Resurrection. I said no. When I got home, I went through my small stack of papers next to the trash can and found it. The article is from Associated Press and the title was Scholars say Resurrection Misunderstood by Christians. This certainly got my attention and it has led me down a bit of a journey this past week right after Easter.
The newspaper article is about a new book coming out in just a couple weeks and that title is Resurrection: The Power of God for Christians and Jews. It is written by Kevin Madigan who is a Roman Catholic and teaches Christian history at Harvard Divinity School and Jon Levenson who is Jewish and teaches Jewish studies at Harvard University. The following comments are mostly taken from Peter Steinfels’ article in the New York Times. Steinfels is a journalist with a Ph.D. from Columbia, previous professor at Notre Dame and Georgetown University, currently teaching at Fordham University and writes a biweekly column in the New York Times. These excepts were published March 15.
Resurrection Is Often Misunderstood by Christians and Jews
As Christians of the world celebrate Jesus’ Resurrection, it is startling to find three distinguished scholars, all known for scrupulous attention to theological tradition and biblical sources, agreeing that the very idea of resurrection is widely and badly misunderstood. Misunderstood not just by those whose contemporary sensibilities restrain them from saying much more about resurrection than that it symbolizes some vague (and probably temporary) victory of life over death. It is also misunderstood by many devout believers who consider themselves thoroughly faithful to traditional religious teachings.
The book, which will be published next month by Yale University Press, argues that the idea that God will raise the dead to life at the end of time is central to both Jewish and Christian traditions. Joining these new or very old historical perspectives is N. T. Wright a noted New Testament scholar who has continued to churn out academic and popular works, even after moving from Oxford in 2003 to become the Anglican bishop of Durham. Last month he published “Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church” (HarperOne).
These two books are different in tone and agenda. Professors Madigan and Levenson are particularly interested in countering the assumption that resurrection is solely a Christian belief, rather than one deeply rooted in the Judaism from which Jesus emerged. Bishop Wright has written a more popular and pastoral book, with practical proposals for church renewal. But both books converge in challenging several widespread notions. Resurrection, they maintain, does not simply mean going to heaven or life after death. Resurrection is not a belief that divides an other-worldly Christianity from a this-worldly Judaism. Nor is resurrection something that refers only — or even primarily — to the individual’s survival after death. Instead, both books emphasize that in classic Jewish and Christian teachings, resurrection refers to a collective resurrection of people and renewal of all creation at the end of time.
Resurrection was linked to the expectation of judgment and a final triumph of justice. This was the idea of resurrection that had evolved as Jews returned from exile and struggled under foreign domination in the period before Jesus. It was this idea of resurrection that Christians had in mind when they declared that what occurred on Easter was the “first fruits” of what was to come. This further historical application to resurrection is consistent with Borg and Crossan’s book.
If there is a key to the convergence among these authors, it lies, first of all, in their insistence on the bodily and communal character of resurrection, a view that has long competed with a Hellenistic philosophical and especially Platonic dualism, in which an individual disembodied intellect or spirit could be saved from its corruptible and corrupting body. Unlike Gnosticism, Judaism and Christianity, in different ways, held to the goodness of creation and the flawed nature of humans. This equips both traditions, in these writers’ opinions, to avoid the illusion that humans can build a perfect world on their own while yet instilling in humans the confidence that the good they do will finally be affirmed and completed by the God of Resurrection.
Both these books build on their authors’ previous works. In “Resurrection and the Restoration of Israel” (Yale University Press, 2006), Professor Levenson argued that belief in resurrection was much more deeply rooted in the Hebrew scriptures and Jewish tradition than many Jews today realized. Five years ago, Bishop Wright, whose important contributions to the scholarly debate over the historical Jesus have emphasized Jesus’ place within Judaism’s expectations for a divine restoration of Israel, published “The Resurrection of the Son of God” (Fortress).
Although both books emphasize resurrection as the final expression of divine power, vindicating those faithful to God’s promises and regenerating all creation, neither is indifferent to the question of the immediate destinies of the departed. Professors Madigan and Levenson do not think that their explanation of resurrection entails “a disbelief in the immortality of some aspect of the person or in the notion that the departed righteous even now enjoy a blissful communion with God.” And though Bishop Wright can be rather impatient with much of the talk of “souls” and “immortality” and “heaven” thoroughly embedded in Christian prayer and ritual, he has no problem when heaven as a “postmortem destination” is seen as a “temporary stage on the way to eventual resurrection of the body.” This eventual resurrection, he writes, is not “life after death” so much as “life after life after death.” Easter is all about working for the kingdom of God on Earth as exemplified by the life of Christ. Easter is also all about the resurrection and restoration of life beyond the kingdom of God on Earth. Resurrection means both God’s kingdom on earth and God’s kingdom in heaven.
Religion Has To Be Real
I have referred to all these scholars who are associated with some of the most prestigious halls of knowledge in the world. I want to learn as much fact, truth and reality as humanly possible. I want my religion to hold as much fact, truth and reality as humanly possible. As much as humanly possible is a key phrase. After all, we are all finite human beings and we are trying to understand an infinite God. Ultimately, however, we must all live by faith; not faith without fact, but still essentially faith. The Apostle Paul said that now we know in part, but then we shall know fully. So faith, hope, love abide and the greatest of these is love.
Life and Death Just This Past Week
This past week, this week right after Easter, I have talked to three different people or families about life and death. One is a memorial service for Jim Garcia who has passed away. I knew Jim a little bit because we played tennis together along time ago. The other was about a fund raiser for Leigh Power who is battling for her life at M. D. Anderson Cancer Center. Her husband Matt is a photographer who has photographed many weddings at the Chapel and has shown in the Chapel Gallery. The third was a close friend of Carolyn’s, Julie Mikus whose husband, Tony Mikus, is losing his battle with cancer and death is so close they are planning his memorial service together. I performed their marriage just five years ago. They were both over forty and never married before; found each other and were extremely happy together.
Life is not fair. But God has an answer and we celebrated that answer last week. We call it Easter because Eostra is the Goddess of Spring and resurrection of nature’s new life. We also celebrate the resurrection of Jesus which gives both hope for the restoration of peace and justice and life eternal. In the end, one way or another, God makes good on his promise. This is our ultimate belief and faith. Amen.
Rev. Dr. Gregg R. Anderson
Aspen Chapel
http://www.aspenchapel.org