Luke 24:1-12 "Why Should We Trust The Resurrection?"

I didn’t grow up in the church. So, Christmas was all about Santa and Easter was all about the bunny. My mom went to a lot of trouble to make sure I believed in them.

We’re going to have an Easter Egg hunt in a little while where the kids will fill up each other’s bags and baskets with plastic eggs filled with all kinds of good things—chocolate, candy, prizes. 

When I was a kid, do you know what was in the eggs my mom hid in my backyard? Egg. They were just hard boiled eggs that she had dipped in pastel food coloring. My brothers and I would get all excited and search the yard filling up our basket—then I’d sit in the middle of the living room peeling and eating boiled eggs. Oh, we’d also get a chocolate bunny—but it would be one of those hollow ones with yellow eyes made out of candy so hard it would break your teeth. I’d always eat the ears first, that way he couldn’t hear how disappointed I was when I bit into his hollow body that shattered into pieces.

Every year I see Christians on social media struggle with the ideas of Easter and Bunnies and eggs. “What do they have to do with the resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ?” 

And I get it. Some of those things probably have pagan origins and we might wonder if Christians should mess around with them. 

I heard about a church that’s going to Jesus Juke their Easter Egg hunt by having a bunch of special empty eggs—symbolizing the empty tomb! Teach those kids the real meaning of Easter! 

So, let’s see if I understand: I’m a little kid, it’s Easter, my mom and dad take me to church—they got me all excited about an Easter Egg hunt! I’m imagining all the Reeses peanut butter eggs, and Skittles, and Sour Patch whatevers. I line up, wait until they say to go—and I fill up my basket with a pile of empty plastic egg shells.

See? That’s like Jesus! Get it, kids? A bunch of nothing! Full of promise and hope but when you crack it open—all the disappointment you can eat. Is that really the lesson we want to teach?.

Oh yeah, I had forgotten that God commanded us to be a bunch of heartless, miserable, killjoys that steal candy from children and replace fun with the theological complexities of sucking all the wonder from their tiny souls.

Well, bunnies and eggs and chocolate might not have anything to do with the resurrection but there’s nothing wrong with them either. So, I have good news for all the pagans and their holidays—Jesus redeems pagans like me and our harmless childhood traditions.

I say, “Taste and see that the Lord is Good!” Give them enough sugar so they don’t sleep for a week—so much candy they’ll need to get their A1C tested. 

We’re all about keeping some playful fun in our Easter celebrations at the Hart house. We always get the kids Easter Baskets, even now when my teenagers are in their twenties. Kim also likes to hide plastic eggs filled with money all over the house then have the kids run around trying to find them all. Problem is, she forgets where she hides them. Of course, that just makes the game last all year!

The first Easter took place during Passover—the reason Easter falls on different dates each year is because it’s still linked to the calculations for when Passover happens. 

There’s a tradition in the Jewish Passover celebration that’s kind of like an Easter egg hunt. During the Passover meal, a piece of bread is broken in half and the larger piece—called the Afikoman—is hidden somewhere in the house and the little kids go looking for it. Whoever finds it gets a prize and that piece of bread is the last thing eaten in the Seder meal. The Afikoman represents the hope for redemption and the coming of the Messiah. 

Isn’t that kind of amazing? They’re still looking for the Messiah—but how interesting that he is represented by bread, in the meal where Jesus instituted Holy Communion saying “this bread is my body given for you.”

Anyway. Easter, Passover, and children searching for treats. Pretty cool.

We’ve been going through the Gospel of Luke line by line and today we come to the final chapter. Everything has pointed to this moment. Everything Jesus said, everything He did—this is the reason He was born in that manger in Bethlehem. It all comes down to this.

On Good Friday we left the story at the end of chapter 23. Some of the female disciples of Jesus who had been with Him from the beginning of His ministry followed Joseph of Arimathea, a man who had been a secret follower of Jesus until the crucifixion. Joseph was a member of the High Council, the Sanhedrin, he was there when they condemned Jesus to go before Pilate. We’re told he didn’t go along with the plan to kill Jesus. We don’t know how hard he fought it but now, after Jesus is dead, he’s very bold. He asks Pilate for Jesus’ body, then goes himself to take it off the cross and carry it to his personal family tomb—probably with the help of some other people who had not agreed with the verdict to execute Jesus. 

The women followed them to see where this unused tomb was located, they watched the men wrap Jesus in strips of linen, then went inside and saw how they placed His body. After this, they hurried home to prepare the spices and ointments for a proper burial. The next day was not only the Sabbath, it was also the Passover—they were not allowed to do any work from sundown Friday until first light on Sunday. It was going to be a long, sad, confusing holiday.

Luke 24:1–12 

But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they went to the tomb, taking the spices they had prepared. And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. Luke 24:1-3

From darkness to light. The first day of the week—which up to this point was not a special day. It was just the 1st day after Sabbath. Back to work day. So, here they are, rolling up their sleeves, ready to do the very somber work of preparing the corpse of Jesus for the long decay.

But the body was missing. This would not have made them happy. They would have thought the worst. Grave robbers! Foul play! Who did this?

The giant circular stone that had been rolled in front of the entrance, and sealed by Roman guards, was not only open, it was blown off the track. This was done with force! It would be like coming home, not only to find your front door open but it’s laying in the yard. It would have been frightening and disturbing.

Thankfully, God sent someone to tell them what was going on. Two messengers.

While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel. And as they were frightened and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to them, “Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen. Luke 24:4-5

We know from other accounts these men were actually angels. They are shining like Jesus in the Transfiguration. At first, this didn’t make the women feel any more at ease. The morning had started off as one of the saddest days of their lives, then they show up and the tomb is blown open with the body missing—that was bad enough—now it’s a supernatural encounter with glowing angels. They were too bright to look at them directly, the women had to lower their faces to the ground.

And then they delivered the most amazing message, “Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen.”

They were in a cemetery. A place for dead people. They were looking for Jesus, their friend they had watched die. They saw His lifeless body taken down from the cross, He hadn’t left their sight, they followed all the way to this tomb, saw Him wrapped up like a mummy and laid on a stone slab. They expected to find Him just as they had left Him.

Why do you seek the living among the dead?

It sounds harsh but it’s not a rebuke. It’s a great line. Joyful. It’s a clever way to tell these very depressed ladies that their day is about to get a lot brighter. The resurrection of Jesus is about to completely change their perspective forever. 

This is the Gospel for those who don’t yet believe. Jesus died but He lives again!

He is not here, but has risen. Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, that the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified and on the third day rise.” Luke 24:6-7

For three years they had followed Jesus, listening to Him talk about these things—but they didn’t get it. It always sounded wrong. These women are the first disciples to get it. All the words of Jesus come flooding back as they stare at the place where His body should have been. 

This had been God’s plan all along. “Must” be delivered into the hands of sinful men. It had to happen. This is what Jesus’ ministry was always leading up to. He knew this was going to happen. 

The angels tell them to remember—remember how He called Himself the Son of Man? Remember how He kept saying He would be delivered into the hands of sinful men, how they would kill Him—but on the third day He would rise? Remember? The angels are calling them to faith.

And they remembered his words, and returning from the tomb they told all these things to the eleven and to all the rest. Now it was Mary Magdalene and Joanna and Mary the mother of James and the other women with them who told these things to the apostles, but these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them. Luke 24:8-11

Luke tells us who some of the women are—Mary Magdalene, who may have had a pretty sketchy past but that was all behind her now, she was the leader of the women like Peter was the leader of the men. Mary the mother of James the lesser, one of the Twelve, and Joanna, a woman who was healed by Jesus and had been traveling with Him ever since—she was a woman of wealth who helped support the ministry financially. There were other women who had been with Jesus in His travels who were there on that first Easter morning, too—Salome and Jesus’ mother were in this group.

At this point, in the history of the world, these women are the only ones who know. The most important information since the dawn of time—something the fate of mankind rests on—they are the only ones who know. Luke includes their names, he’s like, “Ask them if you don’t believe me.”

So, they returned to the others with the incredible news. Jesus is alive again! They hadn’t seen Him yet but they believed it. They saw the empty tomb. They saw the angels. They were very excited.

You ever try to listen to someone tell a story when they’re a little too excited? They can hardly breathe, they’re talking too fast, skipping over details—they kind of come off like a crazy person?

The women go back to wherever the men are staying and try to tell them the good news. It says they kept on telling them all the things they had seen and heard—just kept telling them over and over. They wouldn’t have called an assembly, the guys are spread all over the place—the women have to go looking for them. They’d tell one group over here and another group over there. “Come on guys! Listen! We went to the tomb and it was empty, there were angels, they were glowing, they told us Jesus is alive! Our friend is alive! Why are you looking at us like that?”

The fact that all four Gospels say it was women who told the men about the empty tomb and Jesus coming back from the dead is a powerful argument for the validity of the Biblical accounts. Those were different times. Women were not considered legal witnesses. They couldn’t testify in court. N.T. Wright, in his book on the Resurrection, says one of the strongest arguments for it actually happening is that women are the first witnesses. The writers of the New Testament must have been tempted to remove that embarrassing fact—if they wanted anyone to believe them. That they just wrote down the story the way it happened is a powerful testimony to the reliability of the Gospel accounts.

Also, it laid the groundwork for change. In Christ there is no male or female. We are one body. Brothers and sisters. It was going to take a while for the Gospel to change the way cultures look at this but make no mistake—it’s the Gospel of Jesus Christ that has created a world where, in places that the Gospel has taken root, the possibility for equality can even exist. The Gospel of Luke is particularly empowering to women.

But on that first Easter, the guys thought their female friends were nuts. Thought the story sounded like nonsense. An idle tale. Sounds made up. I’m sure they were trying to mansplain the way things really are, “Ladies. Ladies. Calm down. Stop talking crazy. We all watched Jesus die and dead people don’t come back to life.” 

Lazarus was there—”dead people don’t what?”—that didn’t sound quite right to him. He probably made eye contact with Peter—who took off sprinting for the cemetery

But Peter rose and ran to the tomb; stooping and looking in, he saw the linen cloths by themselves; and he went home marveling at what had happened. Luke 24:12

The Gospel of John tells us that “the other disciple” outran Peter and got there first. Luke says when Peter finally arrives—huffing and puffing—he looks inside and sees the linen cloth laying in one piece on the stone slab. He enters the tomb and notices the face covering was folded neatly, like Jesus woke up and carefully set it beside Him. He had been wrapped like a mummy but apparently His glorified resurrected body just passed through the grave clothes—leaving them laying there intact. 

Peter walked home, it says he was marveling at what he just saw. He didn’t know what to think. What does this all mean? He didn’t see the angels. He didn’t see the resurrected Jesus—not yet.

At this point, Peter doesn’t have much more to go on than we do. Someone told him that Jesus came back from the dead. An empty tomb isn’t exactly proof of the resurrection—it sounded a little too good to be true. But maybe! Maybe Jesus is alive. 

And maybe that's the way it’s supposed to be. Jesus said, “Blessed are those who believe without seeing.” At this point in the story, that’s what Peter is marveling about—could it really be true? 

Why do you seek the living among the dead?

All over the world, people got up and did something they don’t usually do on Sunday morning—maybe once a year. They went to church. It’s Easter, that’s what you do, you go to church. Right? 

Why do you seek the living among the dead?

A lot of those people are skeptical of everything Easter stands for. A God-Man? His death saved the world? He came back from the dead? Really? Come on.

Why do you seek the living among the dead?

This is what Christians believe—we believe if Jesus didn’t rise from the dead then we should all just go home. If the resurrection isn’t true, then none of it is true, and we are all still dead in our sin. If he isn’t raised then we won’t be either. 

If Jesus wasn’t raised, then there’s no life here. So, why would you seek the living among the dead? Why would you look for anything here?

But Christ is raised. We can thank the women who followed Joseph to the tomb for telling us about it. Real women. Historically verifiable people. Jesus really lived and really died. He’s the most historically validated person who ever lived in the ancient world. He’s not only mentioned in the Gospel accounts and the other documents written by eyewitnesses, He’s also mentioned by Roman historians (like Tacitus and Suetonius)—that He was executed in public, and that His followers said He came back from the dead. The Jewish historian Josephus said the same thing—and marveled at how Jesus’ disciples persisted in their belief no matter what it cost them.

Why would they do that? Why would they risk their lives telling people that Jesus died, was buried, and on the third day He rose from the grave? They didn’t gain anything from it—not in this world! They didn’t get riches, or power. Thousands of people continued to spread the news that Jesus was alive—and the only earthly thing they got out of it was being hunted down like dogs and martyred for their faith. There’s only one plausible explanation for why they would do such a thing: they believed it was true. 

The resurrection of Jesus isn't just a story we tell once a year—like Santa and the Easter Bunny; it's a reality that changes everything. It turns our disappointments into hope, our doubts into faith, our fears into courage, and our darkness into light. It reminds us that no matter how empty or broken we may feel, no matter how scary dying might seem, Jesus is alive, and He promises that if we believe in Him, then death won’t be the end for us either. Because He lives, you will also live, even if you die. 

This isn’t the end of Luke’s Easter story—this isn’t the end of Easter, either. You’ll have to come back next week to actually hear about what happens when they all meet the risen Savior face to face. Oh man!

Happy Easter, everyone! He is risen —-- He is risen indeed!