Pastor Mark A. Loest
Immanuel Ev. Lutheran Church of Frankentrost
Saginaw, Michigan
Easter Sunday, March 23, 2008
Job 19:23-27

03-23-08 audio

Alleluia! Christ is Risen! He is risen in deed! Alleluia!
For I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another. Job 19:23-27 (ESV)

A most blessed Easter to you! On this day when we celebrate one of the earliest Easters possible. Two thoughts come to my mind at this early morning hour when it is so cold out.

First, Easter should be early, because God does not abandon His holy ones to the grave. Jesus did not remain in the grave after three days—and we also, will have our three days, first of suffering and the cross in this life, and then our grave will receive us, and afterwards the Judgment Day when we will come forth from our graves. As the Psalmist says, “And that right early!”

Second, Easter is the spring of our souls, with its end of the winter of sin, the grave and the devil’s power over us. Death is swallowed up in victory!

We sing in one of our Easter hymns:

This the spring of souls today: Christ has burst his prison
And from three days’ sleep in death As a sun has risen;
All the winter of our sins, Long and dark, is flying
From his light, to whom is given Laud and praise undying.

And this, which we just sung

All the fair beauty of earth From the death of winter arising!
Every good gift of the year Now with its master returns:

Yet the frost of sin remains a part of our lives. After our Good Friday Tenebrae service I went to Cederberg Funeral Home in Frankenmuth. There I paid my respects and offered comfort to the family of Daniel Long and his daughter Emily. Daniel and Emily were the stepfather and half-sister of Beth Beelman, a member here at Frankentrost.

No doubt you heard or read about their deaths. They died Monday in a terrible accident when the van they were in was hit by another van just south of Frankenmuth on Dehmel Road. Daniel was driving his daughter Emily to school. He was 43 years old. She was 5.

You would expect that it would be easy for pastors to deal with this sort of thing. But it’s a shock—even for us. I have buried still-born children—you don’t see in the coffin. I have buried an 18 year old. But I have not buried a five year old child like Emily.

I’ve buried young parents in their thirties and forties. Their funerals are hard. The surviving spouse and children are so sad to look at.

I’ve come to the conclusion that if you want people to cry at your funeral: die young. If, however if you want them to say it was a blessing, or that they’ll never live that long and therefore resent your age—then die really old. There’s truth to the saying, the old: they have to die; the young: they can die at any time.

It is very hard to look into the coffin of a five year old. It is also very hard to see the caskets of a father and daughter side by side. I suppose that each of us here today come with our own experiences of sudden sadness with death.

No doubt you’ve buried a loved one. Parents, perhaps your spouse, maybe a child—or a grandchild.

I think of my own mother who died on Easter Sunday 17 years ago. I was with her and had read the Easter story to her. Then she died. We had the front of the church full of Easter lilies for her funeral. We sang,

I know that my Redeemer lives! What comfort this sweet sentence gives!
He lives, he lives, who once was dead; He lives, my ever living head!

What joy it was to be in the Lord’s House the same day she died and hear the Words of the angel that Jesus rose from the dead.

We forget that not far from this place—maybe 150 feet east of here, where the founder’s memorial and bell hangs—are the graves of small children from this congregation from long ago. The inscription there reads, “many children still lie buried here.”

When those children died they were grieved. They were committed to Gottesacker just as we commit our loved ones, to rest until the day of the resurrection of all flesh.

Job buried sons and daughters. He also was buried. Deaths sting has been felt by God’s people since Adam and Eve buried Abel. Jacob buried his Rachel. The children of Israel carried Joseph’s body into the promised land to be buried there. God buried Moses. Ruth buried her husband. David buried Absalom.

And on Good Friday we heard how our Lord Jesus Christ was buried, too. In a grave. His burial was more hurried than most funerals seem, because it was the Sabbath and the Passover. Little preparation could be made for proper burial the same day, so the bereaved family and friends—mostly women—intended to complete the burial the day following the Sabbath. They were grief stricken and disillusioned. And they were afraid for their own lives.

The difference between the burial of Jesus and our funerals is that they did not immediately have the words of the angel who preached to them that Jesus was alive! “Why seek the living among the dead?” ‘He has risen; He is not here.”

How much easier is a Christian funeral because of the word which says Christ is risen. How much easier it is for us to face our declining strength and years believing with Job, that,

I know my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another.

This is not the Easter of bunnies and eggs. Of jelly beans and orchids. Of spring break and new clothes. This is Christian hope and confidence.

It extends over time and gives us the same assurance that just as those who came before us and are now long gone died believing they would someday live again, we too believe we will join them on the last day with al who have died in Christ.

We confess in the words of the Second Article of the Creed. “Even as he is risen from the dead, lives and reigns to all eternity: this is most certainly true!” –

May God comfort each of us with the knowledge that Jesus has overcome the sin, death and the grave for us. And that in so doing, we need not fear our last hour, but look forward to the day when it will be also said of our graves. He /she is not here. Why seek the living among the dead? He /she is risen.

Alleluia! Christ is Risen! He is risen in deed! Alleluia!