We all have things we hope for… things we expect in life… we all have expectations for how our relationships should be, how our careers should go
When Jesus was born, the people were living under very threatening, arbitrary, and even violent authorities….
So when people heard that the Messiah had been born, they expected him to grow up and overthrow the current authorities. They expected that he would become their earthly King and restore peace to the land.
As Jesus grew up and began to minister, he was so much more than they ever expected… The fervor of excitement over Jesus had grown so strong that when Jesus entered Jerusalem… People shouted for joy… took off their coats… pulled branches of palms down and laid them on the ground… They literally rolled out the red carpet for him in full view of the current authorities….. Shouting… “Here comes the man who is going to take over and save us from you, horrible leaders!”
The support was so strong, so visible, and so loud that the local authorities devised a plan to get rid of Jesus. They quickly arrested him and then killed him on the cross.
Where was the fancy golden crown?… where was his palace?… How is he supposed to be our King when he is dying on the cross?…. How could this happen?
For his disciples and all his followers… this was devastating… their expectations were completely torn apart…
All that they had hoped for was lost…. They had put their trust in something that just didn’t seem to pan out the way they thought it would….
And so many of us have been there at one point or another…. We have expected our lives and relationships and careers to turn out in a certain way and it’s just not working out the way you thought it would… and for some of you the loss of this expectation has nearly torn you apart…
------- long pause
Mary Magdalene was among the few who stayed with Jesus as he spoke his last words and took his last breath…
She was so torn apart over the loss of Jesus.. our scripture tells us that she woke up in the dark hours of the morning and went to Jesus’ grave to pay her respects....
But when she arrived she found that the stone had been rolled away and Jesus was not in the tomb…
This was not what Mary expected…This was not what anyone expected.
So Mary assumed the worst. “They killed Jesus ….. the only logical explanation for his missing body is that someone must have stolen his body…”
Sometimes our first reaction is to assume the worst…
Mary runs off to tell Peter and another disciple that someone has taken Jesus’ body and they immediately get up and run back to the tomb to see for themselves…
After they walk through the empty tomb, the text simply tells us that they believed, but did not understand what had happened and then they leave… I get the sense that they just needed to walk away from it.. it was too intense… too unexpected… They saw the empty tomb and so much of it did not make sense… they just needed space to process it all…
When things don’t work out as planned… sometimes we need withdraw..
This is not working out … I need space…. I need to get away from it all..
So the disciples step out of the empty tomb… they walk away… they need space and as Mary watches them leave, suddenly grief washes over her. This is the first time we hear in the text that she weeps… for everything that had been lost… Jesus was my friend… my leader… my mentor… our new king…. And they killed him… and now they have stolen his body…. Everything I expected is now lost…
Some of you might need to figure out what expectations you have been carrying around that are just not working out… name those expectations and grieve them like Mary did as she stood before the empty tomb…
After standing in front of the tomb, weeping… Mary turns around…
Turning away from our lost expectation can sometimes be the hardest part… As we turn away from it… a whole host of other emotions can set in….
We might try to explain it away… That’s okay… I didn’t really expect that it would actually work out.…
We might get angry or resentful… I’m the only one who ever….
We might compare… Well… they may have what I wanted… but I hear that the rest of their lives are in shambles…
We might blame others… Those people are all crooks anyway…
We might to try to problem solve… I know this didn’t work out the way we expected… but let me try to fix it…
All of these reactions are attempts to ease the pain of lost expectations.. these are all attempts at making our grief a little less….
Mary turns around from the tomb, she sees a man nearby and she starts problem solving….… she asks the man if he knows where they took Jesus’ body so she can recover it..
Mary was so overcome.. that she did not see that the man standing in front of her was not any man … The man standing in front of her was.. in fact.. Jesus…
Sometimes we are so stuck in our own expectations of how things should be … we literally do not see that Jesus has a far better solution standing right in front of us.
I heard one preacher say… “Maybe God didn’t answer your prayer… your hope… because your expectation was too small…Maybe God has something greater in store for you.”
Mary was searching for Jesus in all the wrong places… all the places she expected him to be…… But Jesus wasn’t on the thrown… he wasn’t in the tomb… He had done something beyond what she ever could have expected or imagined… He had risen from the dead…
So when she see him … she doesn’t even recognize him … she doesn’t see the miracle standing right in front of her.
Are you searching in all the wrong places… are you stuck in your expectations so much so that you cannot see the miracle right in front of you…
You might think Jesus would be a little annoyed with Mary here… After all I’ve done for you don’t even recognize me? He could have walked away from her in disgust… but instead Jesus in his great compassion calls her by name…
and the text tells us she turns again… I get the sense here that Mary looks up at this point for the first time…. and this time she actually sees Jesus… She sees the miracle of resurrection standing right in front of her…
You may have had an expectation that you lost… You may be searching for it in all the wrong places…… you may be resentful, angry.. comparing…. blaming… you may be trying to explain it away or fix it…. And all of those attempts are just coming up empty….
But remember… Jesus knows your name and he is calling you to something that you never could have imagined.…
This Easter morning, Jesus is saying to you… I know you lost something… I know none of this is what you expected….. I see you. I know your name. I know your frustration, your hurt, your confusion, you need for space… Look up at me and I will give you new life. Look up at me I will give you a new a solution, a new way of seeing things… a new kind of healing…a new kind of hope.
So… in our everyday lives… what does this look like… because none of us are standing at a literal tomb with Jesus right behind us…
So what does it look like to “look up” at Jesus when hope is lost…
It can simply mean pausing for one moment… and asking God… Can you help me?
Notice when all your attempts to feel better are just falling short… When you feel like you are trying so hard, but you are coming up empty…
When you feel like nothing is working…. stop and Ask God for help ….
When you take a moment to slow down, and sit in silence even if it is just for a moment….. when you ask God for help… you will be surprised how often a new idea comes to mind… Jesus was ready to give you a new way of thinking about something… Jesus was ready to give you hope again… he was just waiting for you to look up…
Easter morning Jesus broke open the grave to give us new life…… to break open our expectations… to call us by name and dislodge us from being stuck and searching in all the wrong places… to give us hope when hope seems lost…
So, what are you expecting?
Is anything just not going the way you expected it to go?
Are your reactions to that loss working out for you?
In the week or month ahead try looking up… maybe for the first time… or maybe more often than you ever have before… Look up.
Jesus is calling you by name. He is right in front of you… and he will offer you a new solution.. new life… new hope.
