Good Friday: Who Are You Buried With?

Friday, April 14, 2006

Pastor Meyer's Sermon

Who are you buried with? The old Alfred Hitchcock Presents TV show had a woman who was in prison, and this woman became friends with the prison caretaker. Now the prison caretaker's job was that, if a prisoner were to die, he would ring a bell. And then he would go and retrieve the body, put the body into a casket, nail the casket closed, put the casket onto a wagon, take the wagon outside of the prison gates to the cemetery, and bury it. Well, the woman knew this and she devised an escape plan and she shared it with the caretaker. She told him, “The next time I hear the bell ring, I'll leave my cell and I'll find where the casket is, the one with the dead body in it. I'll get into the casket. You can go ahead and nail the lid shut, take the casket with me in it and put it onto a wagon, and go to the cemetery and bury the casket. You don't have to worry about me because I should have enough air in the casket so you can come back later in the evening, dig the casket back up and release me.”

Well, the caretaker agreed to the plan. One day, the woman heard the bell ring and so she left her cell. And she went and she found the casket with the dead body in it. She got into the casket and she waited. A little bit later, she heard the sound of hammer and nail as the lid was nailed shut and she felt herself being lifted up and put onto the wagon. And she felt the wagon go outside of the prison gates to the cemetery. And then she felt herself being lowered into the hole. And, as she was hearing the dirt being poured onto the casket, she giggled and she laughed and she cried out, “I'm free! I'm free!”

But curiosity got the best of her. Who was she lying next to? Which prisoner had died? And so she took a match and she lit it and, in the glimmer of the light, she could see that it was the caretaker. And, in classic Alfred Hitchcock style, in the final scene, we hear the woman screaming, screaming, screaming until there was silence.

Have you ever been buried like that before? Sure you have and so have I. We've been buried and questioned, “If God is so good, then why do I hurt so badly? If Jesus is the light, then why am I in the dark?” We've been buried in disappointments. “You're not like your older brother.” “The boss that came before you was a little better.” We've been buried in responsibilities. “Here's a 30-page case study. Be ready to discuss it tomorrow.” “Honey, the kids have a softball and a baseball game tomorrow.” We've been buried in the past. The minute we lost our temper, the hour we lost our purity, the day we lost control, and the years we lost our priorities. And, on top of it all, literally, we buried ourselves in our daily self-assertion, our self-righteousness, our self-satisfaction, our self-sufficiency, and our self-will. Buried, boxed in, and six feet under, right here, just now, it's dark, it's tight, it's claustrophobic, and it seems the lid has been nailed shut. And if there isn't screaming, my friends, then there are heavy sighs and lifeless looks and empty hearts. And if we had a match and we lit it, we might see ourselves as alone, distressed, our life ebbing away.

However, in our lives, no matter how buried we may seem to be, no matter how dire the circumstances, we still have a flicker of hope. In the words of Jonah, “When my life was ebbing away, I remembered you, O Lord, and my prayer rose to you.” When we feel buried, boxed in, and six feet under, from the depths of our grave, we can call out to the Lord. Why? Because the scriptures tell us, salvation comes from the Lord. And in the words of Matthew 12:41, “There is now one greater than Jonah here in our midst.” And, because we are buried, boxed in, and six feet under, He is our man. It was high noon at the OK Corral, and our man, our Christ put down His gun, and He said, “Go ahead, Satan, give it your best shot.” And Satan marshaled every weapon of mass destruction. Judas, Herod, Pilot, thorn, nails, spear, darkness, sweat, and screaming, screaming, and screaming until there was total silence. And it all ended, crucified, dead, and buried. And nothing is as bottomless as a pit, as lifeless as a grave, as hopeless as the tomb. Can you smell the mildew? Can you smell the blood, the stench of death? Do you see the confines, the darkness, the sealed stone? Jesus Himself buried, boxed in, and six feet under.

And we, in our lives, cramped by the chaos of our lives, suffocating in the stillness, thinking we are alone, trapped in transgressions and sins, screaming in the silence, we light a match and we see who we are buried with. Romans 6, “We were, therefore, buried with Him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life again.” Colossians 2:12, “Having been buried with Him in baptism and raised with Him through your faith in the power of God who raised Him from the dead.” Through water and the word, you and I are buried, buried with Jesus, our Christ. But our buried and boxed-in screams are more like words like “baptized” and “blood bought” and “forgiven.” Through the words of the apostle Paul, “He died for us so that, whether we live or die, we may live together with Him.”

And so we remember, on that first Good Friday, 2,000 years ago, Jesus' heart stopped for us. Amen.