(John 20:1-18)

There is tendency in some theological writing to reduce the story of the crucifixion to ‘Jesus died to forgive my sins.’ This statement can, inadvertently, take the emphasis away from what Jesus did and put it on what happened to me. The telling of this Resurrection story throws all the emphasis on what happened rather than on what people felt about what happened. One of the first people to see that Jesus had risen was unnamed and the other was a woman. In Jewish custom, two men were needed as witnesses for something to be accepted by law. John is so convinced of the truth of what happened that he does feel the need to script in two of the disciples as being the first people to see Jesus, in order to act as a proof to what might have then become a wondering and questioning early church. So all defining is Jesus’ resurrection that even here, after he has risen from the dead, he does not wait with Mary to stop and explain – “Don’t linger”, he says “but go and tell the disciples, because I am not yet ascended to the father”.

I have two illustrations that give a glimpse of what the world looks like from a “Jesus is alive” perspective. The first illustration comes from my running. I am an epileptic. I was out for a run, last Saturday, and I was heading for home – well known route and familiar territory. As I was running, I clicked into a ‘petit-mal’ epileptic absence. A ‘petit-mal’ is a momentary absence. I retain a full sense of images and motor-skills bit I don't know who anyone is or where I am. I was conscious of running. I was conscious of people and shapes. I was aware that I was on a pavement and so I knew that I was safe but I had no knowledge of where I was, where I had come from and where I was going. I then ran even faster, maybe because my adrenalin was pumping. Then as quickly and as suddenly as I had gone into an absence, my senses were switched back on and everything returned to me – everything was utterly different but completely the same. The world was re-placed, re-stored and re-framed in my mind.

The second example is an adaptation of an illustration given by G. K. Chesterton – imagine that you are going on holiday and need to take a long haul flight. The plane flies into the night and you sleep. As you are sleeping the pilot realises that the plane needs to return home. The plane banks round and turns for home. This all happens unbeknown to you because you are asleep. When you wake up you have the excitement of landing somewhere knew but then also the reassurance of returning somewhere familiar. Things are completely the same yet completely different