Sermons from
First Congregational Church
of Southington
An Idle Tale
Luke 24.1-12
Easter Day
March 27, 2016
The Rev. Dr. Ronald B. Brown
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Luke 24.1-12
But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they came to the tomb, taking the spices
that they had prepared. 2They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, 3but when they went
in, they did not find the body. 4While they were perplexed about this, suddenly two men in
dazzling clothes stood beside them. 5The women were terrified and bowed their faces to the
ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not
here, but has risen.6Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, 7that the Son of
Man must be handed over to sinners, and be crucified, and on the third day rise again.” 8Then
they remembered his words, 9and returning from the tomb, they told all this to the eleven and
to all the rest. 10Now it was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other
women with them who told this to the apostles. 11But these words seemed to them an idle tale,
and they did not believe them. 12But Peter got up and ran to the tomb; stooping and looking in,
he saw the linen cloths by themselves; then he went home, amazed at what had happened.
†††††††
I.
One of the beloved Easter traditions of First Congregational Church is the annual sunrise service
at Camp Sloper held jointly with the Plantsville Congregational Church. It is always an “event.” We have
celebrated the resurrection at these services with flash mobs and daffodils and Ken Sullivan rowing a
canoe across Sloper Pond (standing up!) to get to the place where Jesus was frying fish on the shore.
Like I said, it’s always an event.
Two years ago we had a wonderful plan in place. The planning team includes both clergy and
lay members of our 2 congregations—lots of creative energy there. The plan that emerged two years
ago was dramatic. We arranged to borrow a casket from DellaVecchia Funeral Home. We would hold
the beginning of a funeral service, a funeral service for Jesus, in the pavilion and then have a funeral
procession down to the pond for a burial. Unbeknownst to those who had gotten up early on this Easter
morning we had put helium-filled balloons in the casket and we opened it on the lake shore the balloons
would rise out of the casket carrying with them a banner that said, “Christ is Risen!”
Sounds great, huh?
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Year C: Easter
“An Idle Tale”
March 27, 2016 Sermon
The Rev. Dr. Ronald B. Brown
Page 2 of 5
And it was great, in the end, but this resurrection didn’t happen just as we expected.
The funeral home had agreed to deliver the casket on the Saturday morning before Easter.
What none of us realized was that Saturday was the annual fishing derby and Sloper and there were
about a million kids there with their fishing poles. So when Shane, one of the Sloper staff, found a
casket in the pavilion, let’s just say he was surprised. No one had told him to expect it. He called the
police. When I got there all was calm, but he had put the casket in the office and promised to meet me
on Easter morning to get it out for us.
So at 5:30 on Easter morning I was there with several others on the planning team. Instead of
Shane, John Myers, the executive director of the YMCA was there to retrieve the casket for us. The
problem was he couldn’t find it. It wasn’t in the office where I thought Shane put it. John looked
everywhere; he couldn’t find it.
My daughter, Hawley, was with me. She loves that service and it’s pretty remarkable for a
teenager to get up that early. She sensed the chaos and asked me what was going on so I told her, and
she updated her Facebook page with the news:
“The tomb is empty, and now the casket is missing.”
Finally, the casket was found, the balloons and banner placed inside, and all went well until we
opened the casket to release the balloons. You see we had tested the balloons on the afternoon before,
and seven helium-filled lifted the banner nicely on the sunny, 50-degree afternoon. But on Easter
morning it was only about 35 degrees down at the shore of Sloper Pond and the balloons rose in the
cool air more slowly carrying the banner, and then began to sink back into the casket. Christ is risen, but
maybe not. Paul Goodman, the pastor at Plantsville, and I helped a bit and people saw the message,
and felt it too.
Though the casket has been found, the tomb is still empty. Christ is risen!
I know it’s hard to believe, it may even sound like an idle tale, but I swear it happened just that
way.
II.
This story that we tell on Easter, well, it’s pretty dramatic—I’m guessing that’s at least part of
why you’re here this morning. It is compelling this story of the empty tomb, but a little hard for us
modern, 21st century Christians to take.
An early dawn pilgrimage to the graveyard.
The stone rolled away from the tomb.
Jesus missing.
Men in dazzling clothes speaking to terrified women.
But this story isn’t just difficult for us. When the terrified women run to report what had
happened, according to the Gospel of Luke, even the disciples thought it was an idle tale.
Did you hear that?
www.fccsouthington.org
“An Idle Tale”
March 27, 2016 Sermon
The Rev. Dr. Ronald B. Brown
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“Now it was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other women with
them who told this to the apostles. But these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not
believe them.”
They thought it was an idle tale.
“Idle tale” is actually a pretty sanitized translation of the Greek word, λήρσς (lā'-ros), which is
used only in this verse in whole New Testament. λήρσς would be more accurately translated “garbage,”
or perhaps with an even more crass word that I won’t utter from here, but has the same abbreviation as
“Bible study.”
The apostles, the ones who were with Jesus all this time, who witnessed the miracles and heard
the stories—who were right there with him the whole time, “these words seemed to them λήρσς, and
they did not believe them.”
The women got it—they didn’t necessarily understand it, but they got it. They got that they
couldn’t find the living among the dead; the disciples did not.
But Peter, the one who claimed that he would never deny Jesus, that he would die with him
first, then claimed not to know Jesus when the fire was hot, who ran and hid when faced with reality. It
is Peter who finally figures it out in Luke’s story of the resurrection.
When Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other women report to him
what happened in the graveyard, he gets up, runs to the tomb, looks in, and is amazed at what
happened.
I think that is all that God asks of us, that we be amazed at what happened this morning.
The women are the first to tell the story, and then Peter gets the truth of Easter right when he
gets up and runs to the tomb; stooping and looking in, he sees the linen cloths by themselves; then he
goes home, amazed at what had happened.
If you go home from church this morning amazed at what God has done if the world through
Easter, through resurrection, well then, I think God will be pleased. Because while no one witnessed
exactly what happened in that tomb before Mary Magdalene and the other women arrived, here is the
amazing thing: death lost its power.
III.
In his Holy Sonnets, the English poet, John Donne says it eloquently:
Death be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so . . .
Why swell’st thou then?
One short sleep past, we wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die.
That’s what the women who went to the tomb that first East morning saw; that’s what the
others thought was λήρσς: death is dead, and we go away amazed.
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“An Idle Tale”
March 27, 2016 Sermon
The Rev. Dr. Ronald B. Brown
Page 4 of 5
William Sloane Coffin said it this way, “Easter has less to do with one person’s escape from the
grave than with the victory of seemingly powerless love over loveless power.”
And that is really the amazing part. That there is nothing, nothing in the world that is more
powerful than love. I can’t say that I understand it, but I believe it with all my heart. It is a love that all
the λήρσς in the world cannot overcome.
Terrorist attacks in Brussels and Nigeria can’t defeat this seemingly powerless love.
Flyers with messages of hate or fights at high schools can’t defeat this seemingly powerless love.
Not even presidential campaigns that seem more concerned with insults and innuendo than
with the serious issues facing our country can defeat his seemingly powerless love.
“Easter has less to do with one person’s escape from the grave than with the victory of
seemingly powerless love over loveless power.”
IV.
I’ve even seen that powerful powerless love at work.
I remember a day long ago when that same witty teenager who posted on Facebook that “the
tomb is empty…and now the casket is missing,” was just three. She was angry at her father. I don’t
remember what grievous deed I had committed against her, but she was mad; the thing she wanted I
would not grant and she was sent to her room.
After she settled down, her mother went in to check on her. My heart was pretty torn up over
the thing too so I stood out of sight in the hallway to see how she was. Jane sat in the rocking chair, and
Hawley, pouting, crawled into her lap and handed her a favorite book, The Runaway Bunny, and Jane
began to read:
Once there was a little bunny, who wanted to run away.
So he said to his mother, “I am running away.”
“If you run away,” said his mother, “I will run after you, for you are my little bunny.”
“If you run after me,” said the little bunny, “I will become a fish in a trout stream and I will swim
away from you.”
“If you become a fish in a trout stream,” said his mother, “I will become a fisherman and I will
fish for you.”
“I will become a rock,”
“and I will become a mountain climber and I will climb to where you are.”
“I will become a bird and fly away from you.”
“If you become a bird and fly away from me,” said his mother, “I will be a tree that you come
home to.”
Powerless love overcoming loveless power—always a tree to come home to.
www.fccsouthington.org
“An Idle Tale”
March 27, 2016 Sermon
The Rev. Dr. Ronald B. Brown
It is an amazing new world you and I live in now.
Death no longer rules.
Jesus Christ is risen today.
Alleluia! Amen!
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