Sermon for Easter 3
1 Peter 2:11-20 + John 16:16-23
When you read a story for the first time, not knowing what happens next, you probably won’t catch the author’s full meaning as you’re going along. He’s likely dropping hints and clues, leaving open several possible outcomes, and including all sorts of details that you can only appreciate later on, after events unfold. Early on in the story, you don’t know the purpose of many of the setbacks and hardships that the main characters suffer, or where they’ll end up. Only later does it begin to make sense, when the author shows you where he was going all along. The early part of the story is usually characterized by question marks and confusion, on the reader’s part, and on the part of the characters themselves.
The same thing is true of the Christian life, where God is the Author, and we don’t know what, exactly, comes next. And if we don’t know what comes next, if we still have confusion and question marks, just try to imagine what it was like for Jesus’ disciples in the upper room on Maundy Thursday, just hours before Jesus would be betrayed, listening to Him—the Author—describe the future to them. We’re two thousand pages farther along in the story than they were. We have two thousand years of seeing how things played out, including on Good Friday, and, even more importantly, Easter Sunday. If we still have questions, you can understand why they were still so confused.
But even without knowing the details ahead of time, there is something you can know ahead of time, and that’s the point that Jesus is making with His disciples in today’s Gospel from Maundy Thursday. Life will be hard for a time. But in just a little while, things will get better.
“A little while, and you will not see me. And again, a little while, and you will see me, because I am going to the Father.” They didn’t understand what He was talking about. They had questions, and they were afraid to ask, so He goes on to explain, although still somewhat mysteriously. Jesus said to them, “You are asking one another about what I said, ‘A little while, and you will not see me. And again, a little while, and you will see me.’ Truly, truly, I tell you, you will weep and mourn, but the world will rejoice. You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will be turned into joy.
There is a fulfillment of these words in Jesus’ suffering and resurrection. In a little while, within a few hours, Jesus would be taken away from them, arrested, tried, tortured, convicted, crucified, and buried. During that time, Jesus’ disciples would be sorrowful, while the unbelieving Jews and Gentiles would rejoice. The disciples would be sad, but then things would get better, when Jesus appeared to them again, in that same upper room, on Easter Sunday evening. And then they would rejoice, just as Jesus promised.
But on that evening, when Jesus talked about going away, He wasn’t only talking about going away to death and the grave. He was also talking about going away to His Father in heaven, visibly leaving this world behind until He returns at the end of the age. In a little while, that is, in 43 short days, they wouldn’t see Him anymore during their earthly lifetimes. And during that time, for the rest of their earthly lives, they would know many times of sorrow, as they and their fellow Christians faced hatred, persecution, and death. During that time, the world would rejoice, because the world would think it had gotten rid of Jesus for good, and so they could do as they pleased with Jesus’ followers, too.
And yet, Jesus says that, in a little while, His disciples would see Him, and their sorrow would be turned into joy. Things would get better! When they closed their eyes in the sleep of Christian death, if even that death were a violent one, at the hands of wicked men, their souls would be taken to Paradise, where they would see Jesus again after the sorrow of this life was done. And things will get even better, when Jesus returns at the end of the age, when all things reach their goal, and evil is destroyed, and death is swallowed up forever, when God will put an end to all sorrow and wipe away every tear from every believer’s eyes.
So there are three fulfillments of Jesus’ saying: at the time of Easter Sunday (for the original disciples), at the time of their earthly death, and at the end of the age which is still to come. But there is yet a fourth fulfillment of Jesus’ mysterious statement.
The life of every Christian is dotted with little whiles of sorrow, when, for His own reasons, God allows His children to experience sadness and sorrow and even near-despair—not the same for everyone, and that alone may cause sorrow for some! “If I’m sorrowful, what about those people?” But even those little whiles will eventually be replaced with something better. After we struggle through those difficult times, after we’re driven back to Scripture, and prayer, and humility, and meditation on God’s faithfulness, the Lord Jesus sends His Spirit again to bring comfort and joy. Here’s how Paul describes it in Romans 5: Having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance; and perseverance, character; and character, hope. Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
Do you see what this means? As we make our way through the story of this life, not knowing exactly how things turn out, we’ve been given some vital information along the way, and promises from God to accompany that information. You may be confused about the future. You may have plenty of questions. But what do we know? We know that God gave His Son into death for our sins, and that our Savior was raised back to life, and that He now lives to reign on our behalf and to justify and sanctify believers. If you believe that, then you already know that things got better for us when Jesus rose from the dead, and better still when He grafted you into Himself through Holy Baptism, forgiving you your sins and granting you eternal life.
What else do we know? We know that, no matter what sorrows we may experience in this life, things will get, not worse, but better when we fall asleep in the sleep of Christian death. And we know things will get better still on the Last Day, when Jesus raises all the dead and brings us into the home of heavenly righteousness.
What else do we know about this story? We know that, in the midst of our sorrows here, God intersperses moments of healing and comfort and joy, when the Holy Spirit allows us to experience again the joy of His salvation, to see that God truly is working all things together for good to those who love Him.
In a little while, things will get better. And not just a little better! As Jesus says, A woman has sorrow when she is giving birth, because her hour has come. But as soon as she gives birth to the child, she no longer remembers the anguish because of her joy that a human being has been born into the world. So it is that you also have sorrow now. But I will see you again, and your heart will rejoice, and no one will take your joy away from you. When a woman gives birth to a healthy child, things don’t just get a little better. The life that results from the labor of childbirth is immeasurably better than that brief time of painful labor, and more than worth it, as every mother knows. So, too, the sorrows we face in the story along the way will not be worth comparing with the glory to be revealed in us, as St. Paul writes to the Romans. Things will get immeasurably better when this story reaches its end, and the story of the new heavens and the new earth finally begins.
For now, knowing all that, God says, Be still. Be still, and know that I am God. In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength. May the Holy Spirit carry these words deep into your heart today, so that you know for certain that what Jesus says is true. Things will get better. In just a little while. Amen.
