William H. Willimon - "God Came Back" Easter Service (April 11, 1993)
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| - | The great theologian Richard Niebuhr once said, | 0:12 |
| "I do not believe in the triumph of life over death | 0:19 | |
| "because I know that Jesus was raised from the dead. | 0:23 | |
| "Rather, I believe that Jesus | 0:30 | |
| "was raised from the dead because I know | 0:33 | |
| "of the triumph of life over death." | 0:36 | |
| This is the thick theological thought | 0:43 | |
| that I would like to emulsify in your brains | 0:45 | |
| this Easter morning. | 0:48 | |
| I do not believe that death has been conquered | 0:50 | |
| because I know that Christ rose from the dead. | 0:55 | |
| I believe that Christ rose from the dead | 0:59 | |
| because I know | 1:03 | |
| of the triumph of life over death. | 1:05 | |
| The resurrection of Jesus is not so much | 1:10 | |
| the first cause of death's defeat. | 1:13 | |
| It's a symptom of it. | 1:17 | |
| See, I'm saying that we had hints of Easter | 1:21 | |
| long before we got to Easter. | 1:24 | |
| We had hints that God was basically | 1:28 | |
| in the business of life not death. | 1:30 | |
| But we, all we, | 1:36 | |
| alas, too much in the business of death | 1:38 | |
| cannot always believe in life. | 1:44 | |
| And that's the problem. | 1:47 | |
| I'm arguing that the whole saving history | 1:52 | |
| of God's dealings with us | 1:55 | |
| is the story of the steady overcoming | 1:57 | |
| of death's dominion. | 2:01 | |
| And the resurrection of Jesus is the final signal, | 2:05 | |
| not the opening shot, | 2:08 | |
| in God's ultimate victory over Thanatos. | 2:11 | |
| Death has at last been crushed. | 2:16 | |
| Why, just a couple of Sundays ago, | 2:22 | |
| if you were here, | 2:24 | |
| you watched Jesus bring back dead Lazarus with a shout. | 2:25 | |
| That resuscitation, as well as | 2:31 | |
| the myriad of | 2:35 | |
| signs and signals and cures | 2:36 | |
| worked by Jesus | 2:40 | |
| were like a series of small Easters, of small resurrections, | 2:43 | |
| restorations to life. | 2:48 | |
| Jesus' very birth | 2:52 | |
| is a sign unto us | 2:54 | |
| that death is losing its grip. | 2:56 | |
| In every episode of Jesus' life, | 3:02 | |
| death is terminal. | 3:05 | |
| 'Cause every time somebody once cripple stands up and walks | 3:08 | |
| or the blind receive their sight | 3:14 | |
| or prisoners break free, | 3:17 | |
| death is being dispelled. | 3:20 | |
| In Jesus, life is having its way over mortality | 3:23 | |
| and its allies | 3:28 | |
| so that by the time we get to the tomb, | 3:31 | |
| how can it be anything but empty? | 3:34 | |
| I'll tell you why the women | 3:39 | |
| who went out to the cemetery that morning | 3:42 | |
| and peered into that dark tomb, | 3:44 | |
| I'll tell you why those women were shocked, surprised. | 3:45 | |
| Because there does seem to be something about us. | 3:51 | |
| Despite centuries now of death's death | 3:55 | |
| and defying assaults on morbidity, | 3:59 | |
| there does seem to be something about us | 4:03 | |
| that finds a kind of comfort | 4:07 | |
| in the darkness of the tomb, | 4:11 | |
| the vampire's deadly kiss, | 4:15 | |
| the friendly confines of predictability | 4:18 | |
| and habit | 4:22 | |
| and narcotic routine. | 4:24 | |
| I have noted that when I travel, | 4:29 | |
| after I get to the motel, | 4:32 | |
| I always lay out my | 4:34 | |
| toothbrush and my toothpaste and my hairbrush | 4:37 | |
| just like they are at home. | 4:40 | |
| Because on the road I don't want surprises. | 4:43 | |
| Getting up in the morning is tough enough | 4:47 | |
| as it is without surprises. | 4:48 | |
| I love these habits. | 4:52 | |
| And who among us does not relish | 4:56 | |
| snuggling down under the covers on a cold night, | 4:58 | |
| gleefully on our way to nocturnal narcosis? | 5:03 | |
| And who here loves to be awakened in the morning, | 5:08 | |
| even a bright morning like this, | 5:11 | |
| once again shocked that day has come | 5:13 | |
| and we are yet alive and life has resumed? | 5:16 | |
| I'm saying that we just love our little deaths. | 5:20 | |
| Our duties, | 5:25 | |
| our well-shouldered drudgeries, | 5:27 | |
| our limits, our rules, our habits. | 5:30 | |
| Thanatude fits us like a glove. | 5:36 | |
| When our beloved Amy Geisinger was | 5:42 | |
| crushed by a bus last fall, | 5:46 | |
| a therapist from CAPS appeared | 5:50 | |
| and told a group of grieving students in the dorm, | 5:53 | |
| "You're doing just fine. | 5:57 | |
| "You're progressing quite nicely. | 5:59 | |
| "This grief is quite normal. | 6:01 | |
| "This is called adjustment to death." | 6:02 | |
| We just, that's what therapy is. | 6:07 | |
| Adjustment to Thanatos. | 6:10 | |
| But all I know is that a few days later | 6:15 | |
| at Amy's memorial service here in the chapel, | 6:17 | |
| the chapel choir, never ones to respect authority, | 6:22 | |
| stood and they sang defiantly. | 6:26 | |
| Yes, raucously. | 6:29 | |
| For as in Adam all die, | 6:32 | |
| even so in Christ shall all be made alive. | 6:34 | |
| And God came back. | 6:38 | |
| Death slinked off campus, | 6:42 | |
| his great victory party just ruined | 6:45 | |
| by a choir | 6:49 | |
| which refused to defer to death. | 6:51 | |
| You've seen that death-defying dynamic before, I tell you. | 6:56 | |
| In the story. | 7:03 | |
| There arose a pharaoh in Egypt who did not know Joseph, | 7:06 | |
| says the book of Exodus. | 7:10 | |
| That pharaoh made of the Hebrew children slaves, | 7:13 | |
| placed on their backs unbearable burdens, | 7:17 | |
| killed their boy babies, | 7:20 | |
| the first of many gentile genocides against God's people. | 7:21 | |
| Now, if you know the story, are you surprised | 7:28 | |
| that lots of us just loved it in slavery? | 7:31 | |
| Oh, the work was hard, | 7:35 | |
| but at least we got three square meals a day | 7:36 | |
| and we knew where we stood with the powers that be. | 7:39 | |
| Pharaoh's slavery is not so bad once you learn to adjust. | 7:43 | |
| The bit back grows calloused | 7:48 | |
| to the sting of the master's whip. | 7:51 | |
| Adapt, adjust, we can send a therapist out to the ghetto | 7:54 | |
| to help you accept your lot in life. | 7:59 | |
| But God | 8:04 | |
| refused to adapt. | 8:06 | |
| God came back. | 8:09 | |
| To Moses, minding his own business, | 8:12 | |
| keeping his father-in-law's flocks in Midian. | 8:14 | |
| A bush burst into flame and there was a voice. | 8:17 | |
| "I've heard the cry of my people | 8:22 | |
| "and I have come down to deliver them. | 8:25 | |
| "And guess who's going to help me, Moses." | 8:28 | |
| Moses stammered. | 8:33 | |
| He said he wasn't good speaking in public. | 8:34 | |
| But | 8:38 | |
| God came back | 8:40 | |
| and led them with unmoistened foot | 8:43 | |
| through the Red Sea waters. | 8:45 | |
| The story continues. | 8:50 | |
| Israel, once free, wasn't free for long. | 8:51 | |
| From the North there came chariots, | 8:54 | |
| men with iron swords, the Assyrians. | 8:57 | |
| Cities burned and pillaged, | 9:00 | |
| whole Hebrew tribes led off into Assyrian exile, | 9:02 | |
| the first of many pogroms and deportations | 9:07 | |
| for God's chosen people. | 9:09 | |
| Death, | 9:12 | |
| deportation, | 9:13 | |
| defeat. | 9:15 | |
| You've heard the story in Serbia, | 9:17 | |
| Bosnia-Herzegovina, Assyria, Israel. | 9:19 | |
| But | 9:25 | |
| God came back. | 9:27 | |
| There was a sharp-tongued prophet, Jeremiah, | 9:29 | |
| who promised the return for beleaguered Assyrian exiles. | 9:34 | |
| In a great speech of consolation, | 9:39 | |
| the one you heard read for the first lesson today, | 9:41 | |
| Jeremiah points the way towards a great homecoming party, | 9:45 | |
| a great party with tambourines and drums | 9:50 | |
| and the dance of merry-makers, | 9:53 | |
| bigger than anything you've ever seen on West Campus, | 9:55 | |
| 'cause tyrants, be they Assyrians or any other, | 9:58 | |
| they always get edgy, they get nervous, | 10:03 | |
| they call out the National Guard | 10:06 | |
| whenever people on the bottom, | 10:08 | |
| people down in the ghetto get uppity, | 10:09 | |
| begin to make music, pull out the tambourines, | 10:14 | |
| the drums, begin to dance. | 10:17 | |
| And would these Jews ever have had the guts to dance | 10:21 | |
| had not they known that this God comes back? | 10:26 | |
| A little backwater town in Judea, first century. | 10:33 | |
| Roman soldiers on every street corner | 10:35 | |
| registering these Jews, | 10:38 | |
| registering them so as better to oppress them. | 10:40 | |
| The greatest, most powerful army, | 10:45 | |
| in service to the most ruthless dictator Augustus. | 10:47 | |
| What can anybody do? | 10:51 | |
| One year it's Assyrians, the next year it's Romans. | 10:52 | |
| It's all the same. | 10:55 | |
| Adjust, keep your head down, obey the rules, | 10:56 | |
| say your prayers, but | 11:00 | |
| down in the ghetto, in a stable out back, | 11:04 | |
| behind the motel a young woman is heard to sing. | 11:10 | |
| "My soul magnifies the Lord. | 11:15 | |
| "My spirit rejoices in God my savior. | 11:17 | |
| "For He has scattered the proud, | 11:20 | |
| "He has put down the mighty from their thrones, | 11:22 | |
| "He has lifted up those of low degree." | 11:24 | |
| Now, Mary, what have you to sing about? | 11:28 | |
| Mary replies, | 11:32 | |
| "I'm going to have a baby." | 11:36 | |
| God came back. | 11:38 | |
| Now, last Friday should not have taken anyone by surprise. | 11:44 | |
| No, if you've had a course in freshman Western Civ, | 11:48 | |
| you should know about Friday. | 11:53 | |
| That's the facts of death. | 11:54 | |
| You know the way the religio-politico-economic | 11:57 | |
| powers that be work. | 12:00 | |
| Then you musta known from the very first | 12:04 | |
| He was doomed. | 12:08 | |
| The way He disregarded social convention. | 12:11 | |
| The way He | 12:15 | |
| ate with sinners and tax collectors, whores. | 12:17 | |
| The way He reached out to the wretched of the Earth, | 12:22 | |
| the names He called the clergy. | 12:25 | |
| You knew Friday was coming. | 12:29 | |
| You could smell Friday's bloody business | 12:32 | |
| at the place of the skull from the beginning of the story. | 12:35 | |
| You can't fight city hall. | 12:41 | |
| Caesar's got the guns. | 12:44 | |
| The fickle crowd turned against us. | 12:47 | |
| The one who came promising us life | 12:50 | |
| now nailed to the cross in death, | 12:53 | |
| death's latest spoils in battle. | 12:56 | |
| And we disciples, we said, "Well, | 13:01 | |
| "it was a good campaign while it lasted, | 13:06 | |
| "but we didn't get him elected Messiah and | 13:10 | |
| "I guess it's over. | 13:14 | |
| "You women take these flowers on out to the cemetery | 13:16 | |
| "to show our respects for dear Jesus, | 13:20 | |
| "and we'll come on out after the soldiers are gone | 13:22 | |
| "and after it's light. | 13:25 | |
| "You women go on out there and let us know how things are | 13:26 | |
| "out at the city of the dead." | 13:29 | |
| And the women went out to the cemetery | 13:34 | |
| and they peered into that dark tomb. | 13:36 | |
| Surprise. | 13:40 | |
| God | 13:43 | |
| came back. | 13:45 | |
| And on the way back from the cemetery, | 13:48 | |
| I love this, | 13:51 | |
| there is one who says, "Greetings." | 13:52 | |
| And these graveyard flowers just look silly in their hands. | 13:58 | |
| And we fall down and worship because God came back. | 14:02 | |
| I'm telling you, you've heard the shout of the women before. | 14:07 | |
| That day as pharaoh's chariots foundered | 14:11 | |
| and the sea surged back, | 14:14 | |
| women grabbed a tambourine and began to dance. | 14:15 | |
| Or that great homecoming party for exiles | 14:19 | |
| promised by prophet Jeremiah, | 14:21 | |
| in Mary's war chant lullabye, | 14:24 | |
| you've heard it before. | 14:26 | |
| Greetings. God came back. | 14:27 | |
| When will we ever become accustomed to death's defeat | 14:33 | |
| and to these incursions of the living God? | 14:37 | |
| When will we get it through our little brains | 14:40 | |
| that the whole history of God's intrusions among us | 14:43 | |
| are the tale of the defeat of death's dominion? | 14:47 | |
| Easter is ubiquitous. | 14:51 | |
| God came back. | 14:56 | |
| That's Easter. | 14:59 | |
| And I'm saying it's a story begun long before Easter, | 15:00 | |
| a narrative not yet even done with us. | 15:05 | |
| God came back. | 15:10 | |
| I was in East Germany. | 15:13 | |
| I was visiting some informed people, | 15:16 | |
| professors who know a lot. | 15:20 | |
| And these professors told me, | 15:23 | |
| "The wall, it will never come down, not in our lifetime. | 15:25 | |
| "No, we've got to adjust to the wall. | 15:29 | |
| "The role of intellectuals is to help East Germans adapt | 15:32 | |
| "and adjust to the situation. | 15:36 | |
| "That's a fact, finished." | 15:38 | |
| I swear to you, two weeks later that wall came down. | 15:42 | |
| 'Cause God, after we had finished with our facts, came back. | 15:48 | |
| They told him, | 15:57 | |
| "Once a drunk, always a drunk. | 16:00 | |
| "It's like a disease, it's genetic, | 16:03 | |
| "it's something in the blood, something in your family, | 16:05 | |
| "something you're born with, a fact, fixed." | 16:08 | |
| But there was this woman with whom he worked. | 16:14 | |
| One day she dropped a note on his desk | 16:17 | |
| and the note said I know what you're going through | 16:19 | |
| because I've been through it before. | 16:23 | |
| I know a way out | 16:27 | |
| if you're ready to break free. | 16:29 | |
| Now, I called it his AA group. | 16:34 | |
| He attributed it | 16:37 | |
| to the fact that | 16:40 | |
| - | God came back. | 16:42 |
| - | God came back. | |
| Cancer. | 16:45 | |
| Terminal. | 16:46 | |
| All the physicians said, "Sorry, it's over. | 16:49 | |
| "You're at death's doorstep, this is it." | 16:51 | |
| And I was there when she clenched her fist, | 16:55 | |
| even in her pain, and she said, "I'll tell you what. | 16:57 | |
| "I may have to live with this, | 17:01 | |
| "but I'll be darned if I'm going to die of it." | 17:02 | |
| Now, I called it grit. | 17:06 | |
| North Carolina childhood. | 17:08 | |
| But she said it was because even in her illness, | 17:13 | |
| God came back. | 17:17 | |
| And who you gonna believe? | 17:19 | |
| The world tells you, "Adjust, adapt, | 17:22 | |
| "grow up, become an adult. | 17:24 | |
| "This kinda stuff happens." | 17:27 | |
| A Duke student is crushed by a bus. | 17:30 | |
| Go ahead, adapt to reality. | 17:34 | |
| This is the way the world works. | 17:35 | |
| 'Cause in this world, | 17:38 | |
| death always wants to have the last word. | 17:39 | |
| Death's always standing over you, | 17:44 | |
| waiting to sing into your ear, "Save the last dance for me." | 17:46 | |
| But I tell you what, I was here | 17:53 | |
| when the university gathered | 17:57 | |
| and the choir stood and sang, | 18:00 | |
| through their tears, | 18:04 | |
| hallelujah. | 18:07 | |
| Because | 18:10 | |
| God came back. | 18:12 | |
| - | God came back. | |
| (rumbling percussion) | 18:21 | |
| (jubilant horns) | 18:23 |
