St Mary's

EASTER DAY Talk

20th April 2025 - Acts 10:34-43 & John 20:1-18

I hope everyone is having a fabulous time taking part in Easter celebrations today!

I love Easter eggs, not just because of the chocolate, but because they’re an easily recognisable symbol of new life - which is very fitting for Easter Day.

I do think Easter eggs have a downside though! They’re usually empty aren’t they? I think there’s something quite disappointing about a hollow chocolate egg!

Surely the egg on the screen is better? Full of biscuits and sprinkles! An empty egg is a bit of a let-down isn’t it?!

But EMPTINESS is an important part of the Easter story, so perhaps my feeling of disappointment is OK?

We often find EMPTINESS a bit disconcerting don’t we?

I went to university in Norfolk, and one summer, my friends and I visited the ecumenical shrine in Walsingham. They’ve got a display there that looks like a copy of Jesus’ EMPTY tomb. You can stand in the tiny room that seems as if it has been carved out of stone and look at an EMPTY bench.

I still remember my friend David, cramming into this little space, bent over slightly, so he didn’t hit his head on the ceiling. He spent about two minutes dutifully staring at…nothing…before finally nudging me and saying ‘do you know what we’re supposed to be looking at?’

An empty tomb, like an empty Easter egg does seem a bit odd doesn’t it? I think my friend found the whole thing very amusing and bizarre. He felt it was a bit like watching crowds of people gather around in the Louvre the see the Mona Lisa, but with only the frame hanging on the wall.

Strange. Awkward. Unsettling. Disappointing. Maybe?

Our Gospel reading starts with EMPTINESS. Surprisingly, there is nothing to see! The big event, God’s miraculous act, the saving of the world, seems to have taken place overnight - in the dark, in the quiet. As far as we’re aware, nobody is around to see the moment that Jesus is resurrected and walks out of His grave.

Instead, all that’s left is an EMPTY tomb, waiting to be discovered. Strange. Awkward. Unsettling. Disappointing. Maybe?

When Jesus’ followers find the EMPTY tomb, they feel all these things and more.

The EMPTINESS isn’t just confusing, it appears to be a very cruel twist in already tragic tale!

Mary and the others are already suffering as a result of what they have seen, They’ve witnessed Jesus’ torture and terrible death on the cross. They’re exhausted, emotionally frayed and swamped by grief. Now, as they look around the tomb, they’re further dismayed by what they cannot see – the body is missing, it must have been moved or stolen? What a harrowing thought?

So, the resurrection is first experienced as a terrible EMPTINESS. Mary and the rest of Jesus’ followers hoped to properly prepare Him for burial, to hold onto his body a little longer and now, even that, has been taken away from them.

The tomb is EMPTY. All is lost. Those who had travelled this far with Jesus are left with nothing to cling to.

Like my friend David, we can find it very hard to sit with EMPTINESS but we’re all invited to do so this morning.

The other disciples are overcome and go home but we can stay with Mary, stepping back into the EMPTINESS, waiting in the space.

The resurrection could have taken place in broad daylight with fanfare and trumpets but then I think we would have missed our chance to notice this EMPTINESS.

This EMPTY space is where FAITH begins. It’s where we acknowledge our failure to comprehend, our bewilderment, our fear. It’s where we face the truth, that our powers of human reasoning are limited and can’t produce an answer, an explanation. It’s where we finally accept that we are helpless. It’s where we reach the end of ourselves.

It’s important that we don’t rush to fill the space or look away from the EMPTY tomb, so that, with Mary, we can start to recognise that that there is an ABSENCE at the very center of the Christian faith.

This absence is so incomprehensible, so unimaginable, so mind-blowing that, like Mary and my friend David, we can struggle to understand what it means at first glance.

The unoccupied, EMPTY place that is forever at the heart of the Christian faith, remains vacant and bare, because Jesus’ actions have changed creation - they have removed something.

The tomb is EMPTY because death is not present anymore.

Death is no more. It cannot take root, cannot fill our nightmares, cannot make us afraid. Death can no-longer take up space!

This EMPTINESS might be strange, awkward and unsettling – it might feel almost impossible to accept - to believe - but it is the truth that the Christian faith asks us to acknowledge.

Jesus IS alive! He is Risen! Alleluia!

The first part of our Gospel reveals that death has been emptied away but the second half is all about filling up!

If creation has changed, then it’s time for Mary to leave the tomb behind and step out into this brave, new world.

God invites us all to do this! To leave the tomb, the grave, the things of death and darkness behind and step into the new life Jesus has prepared for us.

If you’re thinking about taking that step today, I want to encourage you! Jesus is already waiting for you in the garden, just like He was waiting for Mary.

You don’t have to do anything fancy, you don’t need any special knowledge or skills, you just have to turn towards Jesus. Mary knew Jesus well, but she still struggled to recognise Him – it didn’t matter! Jesus was there anyway, ready and waiting to reveal Himself to her – to fill the space, to give her the free gift of new life.

At first, Mary thinks Jesus is the gardener. She’s not entirely wrong.

John tells us:

They are standing in a garden. It is the morning of the first day. Jesus is the new Adam. This is the beginning of a new creation. He begins, as the first Adam did, by naming His creation - Mary.

Jesus is the re-creator. He fills everything up and transforms it!

Finally, Mary recognises her friend, her Lord, her God and is astonished by the implications. The world has changed, Mary has changed. Everything has been emptied of death and filled with new life. Now is not a time for weeping – it is a time for joy.

Our final picture is of a broken, empty egg but I hope that when we look at it now, we don’t see something boring and disappointing but a reminder of something wonderful, miraculous and outrageously joy-filled!

We must look at the empty tomb but we are also called to move on from there. The footprints remind us that the egg is empty because new life has up and left and started living! It cannot be held back!

On the first Easter morning, God’s new creation was waiting be discovered by the disciples. We have that same opportunity all around us, every day! Jesus invites us to walk in the garden of His new creation with Him, to have His presence fill our lives, so that we can enjoy His love. We’re invited to join in with the gardening, wherever we see justice, mercy and peace starting to flourish! We are to go out, free from fear and filled with hope and witness to what God has done – to the Good News of Easter Day!

Sometimes, our world can feel as stale and cold as the stone tomb, but the place where Jesus’ body should have been found is still EMPTY. Death is no more. The disciples remembered the EMPTY tomb when they first started to tell others about what had happened. They remembered it when they organised the early church and acted as witnesses to what God had done. They remembered it when they faced failures and set-backs and suffering. Today, we remember. There is a new creation being built right now and it is bursting with life and love. And it will stand forever and ever because Christ is Risen! He is risen indeed!

Alleluia!