Text: Luke 24:1-12, John 20:1, Matthew 28:1-2, Mark 16:1-2

Speaker: Joel Miller

When I say Christ is Risen, you say Christ is Risen Indeed.

Christ is Risen….Christ is Risen.

How many people does it take to witness resurrection?

How many people does it take to witness resurrection?

It sounds like the set up line of a bad joke.

Like, How many Mennonites does it take to change a light bulb?

We probably shouldn’t go there.  Change can be a sensitive topic.

Back to the first question, which is not a joke.  How many people does it take to witness resurrection?

Our Bibles contain four gospels, and thus four accounts of those first witnesses of resurrection, at the empty tomb, that first Easter morning.  You’d think of all the stories to get the particulars just right, this would be it.  The continuation of the Jesus story hinges on this – that the crucifixion is not the end of the line.  That Jesus most certainly died, and that this same Jesus, in some wonderful and glorious way, has been raised up, and is very much alive in this world.

And it all starts early on that first day of the week, after the Sabbath, when the women go to visit the tomb.  To properly anoint the body.  To honor the life.  To grieve the one they loved who had loved them so dearly.

You’d think a single story of what went down that morning would emerge.  Each gospel writer carefully adhering to those details.

Remarkably, each gospel has a different way of answering that question: How many does it take to witness resurrection?

This is Year C in the lectionary, the year of Luke’s gospel.  So we’ve heard that reading.  Of all the accounts, Luke’s scene at the empty tomb is the most…crowded, shall we say.  He names some of the women who were there, and leaves others unnamed.  They all return together to tell 11 of the male disciples what they had seen and heard.

We’ll get back to Luke’s account.  But let’s step back a bit and work our way there, because each of the gospel writers have their own way of telling this story.

Starting with John.

Voice 1 (standing up, speaking into mic): “John chapter 20, verse 1: Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the tomb.”

In John, Mary Magdalene travels to the tomb alone.

Katie comes up to color.

It’s still dark, not exactly the safest time of day for a woman to be traveling alone, especially among the tombs.  But there’s enough light for her to see that the stone had been removed from Jesus’ tomb.  She runs and tells Simon Peter and another disciple, who run together to see for themselves.  They go into the tomb, take a look around.  They return home.

And it’s Mary, again by herself, weeping outside the tomb.  Alone.  The body is gone.  For Mary, this is a profound absence.  In her grief, she turns and sees someone standing by her.  She thinks it’s the gardener.  The one who tends the life of this place where she is.  She was kind of right.  She asks the gardener about the body.  He says “Mary.”  The gardener speaks her name.  The gardener is Jesus.  And Mary suddenly sees this.  A profound absence is replaced with a profound presence, and she holds on to him, and he tells her to go and tell the others.

For John, resurrection is first experienced by Mary Magdalene alone.  How many people does it take to witness resurrection?  One.  Resurrection is so deeply personal, that it must be one.  So personal, that the Christ addresses you, speaks your name, that word that follows you your whole life and contains the whole of who you are – your innocence, you failings, your doubts, your hopes and deepest longing, your story – your name, your humanity.  Like the Creator speaking the world into being.  Let there be light.  And there was light.  “Mary.”  And there was Mary, recreated through the resurrected Christ whose love abides as a profound presence experienced in one’s inescapable solitude.  In her inescapable solitude, Mary meets Jesus.  Mary: One witness of resurrection.

Voice 1, singing:

This is the sound of one voice One spirit, one voice The sound of one who makes a choice This is the sound of one voice This is the sound of one voice

Now for Matthew:

Voice 2 (standing up, speaking into mic): “Matthew chapter 28, verses 1 and 2: After the Sabbath, as the first day of the week was dawning, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb.  And suddenly there was a great earthquake; for an angle of the Lord, descending from heaven, came and rolled back the stone and sat on it.”

Along with Mary Magdalene, Matthew mentions “the other Mary.”

Shakita comes up to color.

We don’t know much about this other Mary.  Earlier she is named as Mary, the mother of James and Joseph.  It’s probably not Mary the mother Jesus.  So many Marys.  Here she’s not named in reference to her motherhood or her sons.  She’s her own person.  We don’t know much about her, but what’s important now is that she is a second witness to resurrection.

Because of course there must be two.  Multiple times the Torah states that testimony can only be established on the basis of two or three witnesses.  “A single witness shall not suffice,” says Deuteronomy 19:15.

If a tree falls in the forest and there’s only one person to hear it, does it make a sound?  Can we trust such a singular experience?  And so there must be two.

If Jesus rises up from the grave, does it make a sound?  How many people does it take to witness resurrection?  Matthew says two.

And besides these women weren’t going to the grave to witness resurrection.  They were going to grieve.  They were going to anoint the body, as was their custom.  To care for the dead, to honor their friend.  There are times in our grief when we need someone to accompany us.  We cannot walk the road alone.  We need a partner.  We need another Mary.  Someone who shows up, and stays at our side.

It is perhaps no coincidence that the first ones to walk into their grief together are the first to experience resurrection.

Voices 1 and 2, singing:

This is the sound of voices two The sound of me singing with you Helping each other to make it through This is the sound of voices two This is the sound of voices two

And Mark’s gospel:

Voice 3 (standing up, speaking into mic): “Mark chapter 16, verses 1 and 2: When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint Jesus.  And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb.”

Mary + Mary + Salome makes three.

Elisa comes up to color.

If you’re thinking at this point that maybe each new writer inserted one more witness to give the story more credibility over time, you can go ahead and drop that theory.  Scholars have reached about as much of a consensus as scholars do that Mark’s gospel was the first of the four to be written.  John’s was last – Matthew somewhere in between.  That means the number of witnesses is actually counting backwards from early to later accounts.  Mark – 3.  Matthew – 2.  John – 1.  Luke is written somewhere in the middle, like Matthew, so it’s not exactly a clean 3-2-1 line, but it’s not 1-2-3.

Mark’s is the oldest gospel account in our Bible, and we’re looking at three witnesses to resurrection.  The Torah does say two or three witnesses, so why not hit the high end?  Three is a good Christian number.  The Trinity, the basis of being and creation and love itself.  Three in One.  The men had their Peter, James, and John, and now we meet Mary, Mary, and Salome, apostles of the new humanity.

Three is sturdy.  Like the legs of a stool.  Put your full weight on it, and it will hold you strong.

Three witnesses to resurrection.  Do you see what I see?  Yes and Yes.

Except that women didn’t count.  Their testimony was considered unreliable in a court of law.

In order to believe in resurrection, we’ll have to start believing the stories of those who haven’t been believed.  The brown, the black, the queer, the women.  The black queer woman.  An intersectional Three in one, blessed trinity, each part a witness.

Voices 1,2, and 3 singing:

This is the sound of voices three Singing together in harmony Surrendering to the mystery This is the sound of voices three This is the sound of voices three

And then, there’s Luke:

Voices 1,2, and 3 (standing up, speaking into mic): “Luke chapter 24, verses 1 and 10: But on the first day of the week, at the early dawn, they came to the tomb, taking the spices that they had prepared…Now it was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other women with them.”

Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other women with them?  How many is the other women?

Adam and Bill come up to color

I guess we’ll let a couple guys come up too.  And we only had five sketchers, but how many witnesses to resurrection is Luke asking us to imagine?

It’s open ended.  It’s a group.  Perhaps a large group.  All gathering around the empty tomb.  All wondering and terrified and electrified and remembering that this is what had been said all along.  That death would not hold the Christ.

Remembering and conversing and congregating and declaring this to be true.  Witnessing to what they knew to be true.  Celebrating as only groups of people can celebrate.  As a collective.  As a body, made of many parts, together forming something entirely new.

How many people does it take to witness resurrection?

How many?

Voices 1,2, and 3 and choir standing in place and singing:

This is the sound of all of us Singing with love and the will to trust Leave the rest behind it will turn to dust This is the sound of all of us This is the sound of all of us

This is the sound of one voice One people, one voice A song for every one of us This is the sound of one voice This is the sound of one voice