Great Easter Vigil - April 4, 2026 - Matthew 28:1-10 - The Rev. Colette Hammesfahr
April 4, 2026 – Matthew
28:1-10 -Easter Vigil
If
you’ve had children or grandchildren, or maybe you’ve had a niece or nephew
stay overnight, this scene may sound familiar to you. You’re sound asleep in
your bed. Down the hall, in another room, a young child wakes up in the middle
of the night. He’s disoriented. It’s so dark that he doesn’t even recognize his
own room. From his room he calls out to you. You wake up from your sleep. From
your room down the hall, you answer, “I’m here.” Nothing in the room changed.
The room didn’t get any brighter. The child lays back down and goes to sleep.
He didn’t go to sleep because the darkness was gone. He went back to sleep
because a voice with authority had spoken. He knew that voice. He trusted that
voice. Somehow, that was enough for him, even though the darkness was still
there.
Tonight
Mary and Mary Magdalene have gone to visit the tomb of their beloved Jesus. And
when they get there, something happens. There is a great earthquake, an angel
appears, the stone is rolled away, the guards watching the tomb stand in fear,
and the angel says, “Do not be afraid.” Moments later they meet Jesus, who has
just risen from the dead and he says to them, “Do not be afraid.”
“Do
not be afraid” are the same words the angel said to Mary and Joseph when it was
announced that Mary would bear a son. When the birth of Jesus was announced to
the shepherds an angel said to them, “Do not be afraid.” When Jesus was walking
on water and the disciples thought they were seeing a ghost, Jesus said, “Do
not be afraid.” In Revelation John hears a voice and a man puts his right hand
on him and says, “Do not be afraid.”
We
say these words all the time. Friends or family come to us with a problem, an
illness, and our response is a form of “Do not be afraid.” “It’s going to be
okay.” “Don’t get all worked up over it.” “Everything is going to work out.” We
say these words to offer encouragement and to lessen anxiety.
When
we say, “Do not be afraid,” we are hoping things will turn out okay. When a
voice speaks to a child in the dark or when Jesus speaks to his followers, they
are not hoping. They know. The difference is authority. When we speak to others,
we are consoling. When we speak to that young child in the other room, absolutely,
positively, without a doubt know that there is nothing that is going to happen
to that young child lying in the dark bedroom. When Jesus says, “Do not be afraid,” he’s not hoping. He knows.
He has already been through the worst fear we could possibly have, he’s died,
been to the grave, and he’s come back.
Tonight
we sit in the dark. We light a single flame. We listen to stories of things
that have gone wrong. Many of us walked in here tonight carrying fear. Real
fear, not imaginary things. We carry fear about our health or of someone we
love. We carry fear about what our future will look like and fear about things
we have no control over. Some of carry grief that is heavy and never gets lite.
Some of us are simply tired of holding it all together. Easter doesn’t pretend
that those things aren’t there, because they are. Easter simply says, “You are
not alone in the dark anymore. Do not be afraid.”
Theologian
Frederick Buechner once said, “The worst isn’t the last thing about the world.
It’s the next to the last thing. The last thing is the best.”[1] He’s not saying that
things aren’t bad or that suffering isn’t real. The worst is very real. Good
Friday is real. The cross is real. The tomb is real. It’s not meant to say,
“Look on the bright side.” He’s saying that the worst thing you can imagine is
not the final thing.
When
Jesus says, “Do not be afraid,” he’s not saying that nothing bad will happen –
we know they do. He’s saying even if the worst happens, it’s not the end of
your story. And so tonight, a voice speaks to us, in whatever darkness we are
carrying, and says, “Do not be afraid.” Not because the darkness is gone but
because the one speaking to us is the one who has authority over darkness. And
that is enough. Amen.
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