Wow! What a weekend! Sleepovers, food, Easter egg hunts, food, sunrise service, food, worship service and more food – do you see a pattern? It has been a wonderful, filling weekend of rest, reflection and retreat. I can think of no better time to pause from work and the day to day busyness than to celebrate the death, burial and resurrection of Christ. There is indeed something within that most divine work of redemption that begs us to give pause in our lives.
But today is Monday. Some of you have an additional day off from work which if your company is “p.c.” they are now calling a “spring” holiday. Others are headed back to the daily grind and it is just another week that we hope goes by quickly so that we can welcome our weekend as soon as possible.
We will hurriedly turn our attention from the empty tomb to the empty pocket book, the empty fridge, the empty house, the empty marriage, the empty self, forgetting all that has taken place over the weekend. We will forget the grief of Calvary and the celebration of a stone rolled away. Soon enough the high of the worship will fade and the cares of life will snatch away our Easter joy. How fickle we are; fickle and forgetful.
The nation of Israel was successful in proving this long before there ever was an Easter. God knew that they would soon forget all that He had done for them so He constantly admonished them to “Remember, remember and do not forget.” But even this would not be enough so God in His gracious love provided ceremonies and rituals that would serve as reminders to His people of what He had done for them. Not only that, but He foretold a beautiful story through each event of what He would do for them through their Messiah who was to come.
They were to be perpetual reminders. We can see numerous examples in scripture from the memorial altars to the feasts and the temple sacrifices. All these serve as a clarion call to remember the “Lord your God” consistently throughout the year. They were also to be generational reminders. The Lord instructed them to tell their children so that the greatness of God toward His people would never be forgotten. They were to be attesting reminders. In the fourth chapter of Joshua, after Israel crossed the Jordan on dry ground, God instructed them to set up stones as a reminder of the miracle He had performed there so “that all of the peoples of the earth may know that the hand of the Lord is mighty, so that you may fear the Lord your God forever.” These observances also served as a witness to pagan nations about the One True God.
The most important of all feasts was the feast of Passover. God instituted this feast upon the return of Israel from their exile in Egypt. God says in Exodus 12: 42: “It is a night to be observed for the Lord for having brought them out from the land of Egypt: this night is for the Lord, to be observed by all the sons of Israel throughout their generations.” Every year the entire nation was to cease from everyday tasks and travel to Jerusalem to celebrate Passover. Keep in mind this is long before the days of Delta and Greyhound. This was in the days of Israeli Foot-lines and Donkey Saddle-ways. You didn’t hop on your donkey on Friday, spend a long weekend in Jerusalem and head back home on Monday. The journey, depending on where you lived, could take days. It took time and preparation and EFFORT to celebrate Passover.
Then, depending on your time to get home, you had opportunity to meditate on what had occurred.
Jesus celebrated Passover with His disciples the night before His crucifixion. At that time He established a new ordinance; the Lord’s Supper. Jesus was putting an end to the old covenant that had been established by the law. But, by His death, He would institute a new covenant with His blood. Likewise, He left us a reminder of His new covenant in The Lord’s Supper. He told His disciples, “This do in REMEMBRANCE of Me.” Jesus was creating a new ceremony that serves as a perpetual reminder to us of His work on the cross. However, He doesn’t stop there. In His time with the disciples that evening He encourages them by telling them that He will not “drink of this of the fruit of the vine from now on until the kingdom of God comes” (Luke 22: 18). Jesus is letting them know that He is coming again.
You see, the disciples had heard all that Jesus had to say about His death but they didn’t fully believe it. Many of them didn’t even believe that He had risen from the dead until they saw His resurrected body. But He continued to promise them that He would come again for them. Eventually they believed and the evidence was visible. It says in the last verse of Luke that they “were continually in the temple praising God.” The resurrection had changed their lives! It wouldn’t take long after Pentecost to see how deeply the resurrection had impacted them. Each of them boldly proclaimed the truth of what they had seen. Each of them endured continual persecution and all but one died martyrs deaths.
Do you think when the first Easter rolled around on their calendar that they celebrated for the weekend and then picked up on Monday where they had left off on Thursday? Do you think that they celebrated the Lord’s Supper, sang a few hymns, made their token visit to the temple and then got on with life? No! These men lived every day after the resurrection for the gospel, in remembrance of Christ. Their lives were offerings and sweet smelling sacrifices to God for His final and complete work on the cross. Mostly, they lived with the end in mind. They lived with a sense of urgency and kingdom perspective knowing that Jesus was coming again. Do you?
So today is Monday and unless God deems otherwise we are still here and the Master’s coming is not yet at hand. How will you live today in light of the imminent return of Christ? The tomb is empty. He is risen and oh yes, He is coming again. Will you live with the same sense of urgency, the same gospel centrality, the same kingdom mindset or will you be as the servant, who when His Master returned He found him eating and drinking, distracted by the cares of his heart? To which the Jesus states, “and that slave who knew his master’s will and did not get ready or act in accord with his will, will receive many lashes. From everyone who has been given much, much will be required” (Luke 12:47;48b)
In ancient cultures slaves would set the table for each meal much like we would today. After bringing plates and goblets they would finish the place setting with a cloth to be used to wipe one’s face, hands and beard. If the master at anytime got up during the meal the servant could determine based on the cloth whether or not the master was finished. If the cloth was waded up and tossed to the side then this indicated that the master was done. If the cloth was folded and laid aside this indicated he was coming back.
In the recount of the resurrection John 20:6-7 reads “And so Simon Peter also came, following him and entered the tomb; and he saw the linen wrappings lying there and the face-cloth which had been on His head, not lying with the linen wrappings but folded up in a place by itself.” Our Master is coming back. The grave said so, the Word says so and Jesus Himself said so. What will be your post-resurrection etiquette? Will you heed the reminder or will you foolishly assume that the Master is busy with other things? “Therefore, be on the alert, for you do not know which day your Lord is coming” (Matthew 24:42).
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