03-31-2024 An Unscheduled Stop - Easter Sunday

Thomas J Parlette
“An Unscheduled Stop”
John 20: 1-18
3/31/24, Easter
          I recently heard about something new, at least to me. The major airlines, like Delta, American, United and Southwest among others are up in arms about an increase in what is called skiplagging passengers. The fine print of a passenger’s ticket forbids the practice. The airlines are threatening to impose a lifetime ban on travelers who get caught skiplagging flights. They also warn that they’ll take away the culprit’s frequent flier miles. In some cases, they rage about taking the crafty customer to court.
          So what is skiplagging anyway? It’s a sneaky way to travel to your real destination while pretending you’re going somewhere else. It’s called hidden city ticketing. Let’s say you want to travel from Seattle to Phoenix. Instead of buying an expensive nonstop flight to Phoenix, you buy a one-stop trip to Oklahoma City, or Dallas or New Orleans – but the one stop is in Phoenix. Since Phoenix is where you really want to go – you get off. You make sure you have no checked bags and away you go. You paid for the flight, and it’s cheaper for some crazy reason than buying a nonstop flight that ends in Phoenix.
          Naturally, an online search will bring up lots of websites that will help passengers find skiplagging opportunities that can save them anywhere from 20 dollars to 100 dollars. (1)
          So maybe you learned a little something new – I sure did.
          In the gospel reading for today, there’s also some traveling going on. There’s definitely a traveler – Jesus. And he’s not where he’s supposed to be, at least not where everyone thought he was going to be. Everyone – his disciples, the religious leaders, the Roman government and the guards at the tomb – are up in arms. The tombstone is rolled away, and Jesus is not where he was supposed to be.
          Jesus is on the move, and his final destination is eternal glory at the right hand of God.
          But first, Jesus skiplags and stops over to visit some friends.
          Of course, unlike true skiplaggers, he will ultimately continue on to his final destination. So, Jesus’ experience is more like an extended transition or pass-through – and unscheduled stop, if you will. Call it a multi-destination trip or an extended stay. Jesus had about 50 days left on his earthly visa, and come Pentecost, he will be taking off on the final leg of his remarkable journey among us mortals.
          So, why has Jesus decided to make this unscheduled stop for a few weeks with his followers?
          Let’s set the scene of what happened on Easter morning. Peter and John race to the tomb after getting word from Mary Magdalene that the body was gone. John beats Peter to the tomb, but he doesn’t go in. Peter arrives, and he goes in. Mary was right! Jesus is gone. John went inside, and he saw and believed, that is he now knew with certainty that Mary was right, she wasn’t just being hysterical. The Bible says, “Then the disciples returned to their homes.”
          A bit hard to believe. They just went home? Not a big deal, I guess. Perhaps they assumed that graverobbers or the Roman guards had made off with the body – happened all the time. It was out of their control. Jesus was dead anyway. The whole city was abuzz about it. Remember what Cleopas, one of the two disciples walking toward Emmaus, said to Jesus, whom they didn’t recognize at the time: “Are you the only stranger in Jerusalem who does not know these things that have taken place?” Everyone knew what had happened, and they also knew that reports were circulating that something had happened to Jesus’ body.
          You can almost hear Cleopas breathlessly tell the story: “Some women of our group astounded us. They were at the tomb early this morning, and they did not find the body, they came back and told us they had seen a vision of angels who said that Jesus was alive. Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said; but they did not see Jesus.”
          In Luke’s account of the resurrection, the disciples have gathered in Jerusalem, along with the companions, as well as the two men Jesus encountered on the road to Emmaus. Suddenly Jesus popped unannounced into the midst, saying “Peace be with you.” Of course, they were startled and terrified, and thought that they were seeing a ghost. They thought that Jesus was dead, yet here he was asking them for something to eat. They fumbled around, found some broiled fish and they ghost ate in their presence.
          Why did Jesus do this? Why scare his followers with surprise pop-in visit? Why doesn’t Jesus just fly off to his ticketed destination, instead of getting off early to visit his friends and followers?
          What is striking about the post-resurrection events is Jesus’ insistence – and persistence – in dispelling the notion that he was a figment of their imaginations. He is so adamant about this that he’s a little over the top. He goes to great lengths to prove that he is not an apparition, or a ghost. He quickly establishes the physicality of his presence. “Look at my hands and my feet.” He said to them. “see that it is I myself. Touch me and see; for a ghost doesn’t have flesh and bones as you see I have.” At this point he shows them his hands and his feet, wounds and all.
          Years later, the apostle Paul and all the Gospel writers – especially John – would adamantly insist that the Jesus they knew was a real human being, a person of flesh and blood, who ate and drank with them, who laughed and cried with them, who got tired and angry sometimes and even experienced temptation, although he never succumbed to it.
          For example, the writer of First John begins his first letter with unequivocal assertion: “We declare to you what was from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have looked at and touched with our hands, concerning the word of life – this life was revealed, and we have seen it and testify to it.” Then he adds, “By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God.”
          So, Jesus has a ticket for heaven, but he gets off early in Jerusalem to see friends. Why? Here’s why – to demonstrate that his post-resurrection body was a body of flesh and blood. He was no ghost, He was the real deal, fully human and risen from the dead.
          From the time of Jesus’ resurrection to his ascension into heaven, approximately 50 days passed. During this time, Jesus had conversations with hundreds of people. The first person he saw was a woman – Mary Magdalene. He also saw Mary the mother of James, Salome, Joanna, Peter and the two men on the road to Emmaus. Later, Jesus confronts Thomas and shows the doubting disciple the stigmata – the scars on his hands and feet and the gash in his side. Whereupon Thomas pretty much tells the Lord, “I get it, I get it, too much information, I believe!
          Later, Jesus would have breakfast with seven disciples on the Sea of Galilee. There is no record that Jesus had a reunion with his mother – but it’s hard to believe that he wouldn’t have sought her out. Paul tells us that Jesus appeared to more than 500 hundred brothers and sisters at one time.
         The question is – “Why are these appearances and his real physical presence important?”
          Some of the answers are due to what was going on in the world of idea in the ancient Greco-Roman era. Then, too, we must consider theological answers as well. Finally, there’s the matter of what Jesus’ humanity means to us, and all people of every day and age.
          First, let’s consider the ancient world. In what’s known as the Hellenistic culture of Jesus day, Plato was the star in the philosophical universe of ideas and the cosmos. One of his assertions was, to put it simply, that matter was bad, if not downright evil. It was absurd in Plato’s view, to think that what was divine and therefore good would become matter or flesh. For him, the Incarnation was laughable. And, so was the Crucifixion. The apostle Paul acknowledges as much when he writes that the divine crucified was “foolishness to the Gentiles.” So false teachers in the early church – nurtured on Greek philosophy – suggested that Jesus only appeared to be human. He wasn’t really human. It was against that sort of teaching that Paul and John both reacted so strongly against and explains why the Bible mentions Jesus eating and drinking like a normal hungry and thirsty person.
          Next, let’s consider theology. The Bible says that “without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins.” Jesus is described as the Agnus Dei – the lamb of God. It was a metaphor that every Jew in Jesus’ day understood. If there was to be any atonement for a person’s sins, or the sins of the world for that matter, there will be a ram in the thicket or a sacrificial lamb for the altar. In essence, the Bible insists that there will be blood involved. The Christ must be human, as Saint Anselm of Canterbury would later explain in his book Cur Deu Homo.
          And finally, what does it mean for us and the world. It means, quite simply, Jesus is our brother. The Bible stresses that Jesus was one of us. The writer of Hebrews explains: Jesus “had to become like his brothers and sisters in every respect… Because he himself was tested by what he suffered, he is able to help those who are being tested.” The author continues: “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin.” The importance of this is what we can pray to Jesus because, as a national ad campaign suggest, “He Gets Us.”
          Sam Allberry, canon theologian with the Anglican Church in North America and a senior fellow at the Oxford Centre for Christian Apologetics, puts it this way: “What we see in the Christian gospel is that Jesus didn’t just appear as a man out of thin air; Jesus didn’t beam down as a 30- year-old man and start his ministry. Jesus coded himself into human DNA. He was fetus in a womb. He was a baby in his mother’s arms. He was a toddler who would have stumbled around as he figured out how to walk and all the rest of it. He was a teenager; he would have gone through puberty. He was a 30—something-year-old man. So, he didn’t just experience a taste of humanity – he experienced the fullness of what it means to be physically human.”(2)
          In today’s reading, Mary Magdalene has the most touching encounter with the post – resurrection Jesus. She was weeping among the olive trees in the garden. Jesus found her. She was confused, she didn’t recognize – she supposed he was the gardener, and begs for the body. The Jesus spoke – “Mary.” And her eyes were opened and she saw Jesus. She went back to the disciples and announced, “I have seen the Lord.”
         Isn’t that what we all want – to see the Lord? That’s why we are gathered here today – for an experience of the Risen Christ.
          Jesus’ detour en-route to the right of God served a purpose. It serves to prove that Jesus is one of us. The disciples thought they were seeing a ghost. But they were wrong. He was one of them – fully human, fully divine, risen from the dead. So, I invite you to put aside any lingering doubts you might have about this remarkable story of death defeated and experience the wonder and the power of the resurrected Christ.
          Today is Easter! Christ is Risen, Alleluia. Alleluia. Amen.
          Will you join me…
1. Homileticsonline, retrieved 3/5/24.
2. Ibid…