Why are you crying?

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Why Are You Crying?

John 20:11-18

Sam Wells

St. ^rtin-in-the-Fields, London, United Kingdom

1 wonder if you’ve ever looked into a deep, dark cave. It’s cold, it’s mysterious, it’s maybe a little damp, and there’s this little voice in your head that’s saying to you, “If I go down too far into it either there’ll· be something scary and angry down there that’ll get me, or maybe worse, there’ll be some kind of rock that will roll across the face of the cave and shut me in – and no one will hear my cries.” Mary Magdalene was looking into a cave like that on the first Easter morning. And it turned out there wem indeed some creatures in the dark cave. Two angels. So not your average tomb, then. The angels are pretty observant, mind you. They can see the state Mary’s in. They say to her, “Why are you crying?” You can toll these angels have never done a course in pastoral care and counselling because the first thing you learn in pastoral care and counselling is, “Never ask, ‘Why?’” “Why?” is a useless question. It’s threatening, unsupportive, paralyzing, and conversation-stopping. It’s the sort of thing a husband says. It’s almost certain to make the person cry all the more because if they could give a satisfactory answer, they probably wouldn’t be crying, Stupid. Mary, to her credit, doesn’t say, “That’s not a very helpful question. What kind of an angel are you?” She says,“They’ve taken away my Lord, and I don’t know where they’ve laid him.” Let’s put ourselves in Mary’s shoes for a moment and allow ourselves to be asked that question. “Why are you crying?” Why is Mary crying? Let’s hear her answer . “I’m crying because I’m experiencing horrifying loss, aching grief, and a huge hole where the love and hope and trust and joy of my life used to be. This man, this m ore-th-just-a-m an who was supposed to be laid in this tomb, turned my life from monochrome to technicolor, from a lonely violin to a crescendoing orchestra, from a limp and falling feather to a soaring eagle’s wing. I’mcrying because I’m staring into the horror of death, and death right now seems to be obliterating everything I want, everything I need, everything I know. I toel so powerless, so fragile, so alone.” But perhaps if we asked a more thoughtful question, we’d get an even bigger answer. “What’s going through your mind, Mary?” Then she might say, “I keep thinking of toe way they killed him. The nails, toe blood, toe jeering laughter, the noise, toe sneering, toe baying for blood, toe throwing of dice, toe cheering, toe way toe disciples all ran away, toe way ?ilate washed his hands, toe finger-pointing, toe lashing , toe spear piercing his side. Human beings can be so cruel, so mean, so violent, so stupid, so weak, so selfish, so treacherous. It’s not just toe death that makes me cry; it’s the sin.” And then maybe if we’d ask a deeper question, we’d get a bigger answer still. “Mary, what d’you think God makes of your tears?” I wonder if she’d say, “I think God’s crying too. That’s what makes my tears frei right. I frei I’m weeping with God’s tears. Who can bear to see God’s tears? I frei by letting myself cry I’m sharing in God’s tears, mingling my tears with the tears of the Father who’s grieving toe death of Jesus and mortified by toe depth of our sin. Somehow in these tears I feel

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Fm alone with the aloneness 0 ؛God.” Here’s Mary, staring into the unknown, weeping. And she’s asked the question “Why are you erying?” And her answer is, beeause of death, beeause of sin, beeause God’s erying too. And that leads me to ask the same question of you on Easter morning as you look into the unknown. “Why are you erying?” Of eourse we’ve all got resistances to answering the question. We’ve erected a wall of privaey around us, we’ve draw ncurtain ofself-suffieiency, we’ve established ق demeanor of emotional steadiness. “I’m not crying,” we say. “I’m not the crying type.” But then we look at Mary as she has the courage to stare into the nothingness of the tomb, and we begin to touch the territory of those trembling tears. I’mcryingbecauselrealizemy life is an orchestrated denial of death,and someday I’m going to have to face the truth of my mortality. I’m crying because like Mary I’ve lost people who put the color in my rainbow and wind beneath my wings. I’m crying because I’ve been hurt and disappointed and betrayed, and I’m bleeding with pain about these things. But I’m also crying because I’ve been no angel myself, and I’ve done some things I can’t undo, and I’m part of some habits and systems and addictions I can’t extricate myself from, and I can’t bear to see the pain I’ve caused others. Fm crying because I want to have a faith that takes the grief away, but somehow I seem to find that being with God makes me cry more, not less. I’m crying because I’mjust overwhelmed.” Is that why you’re crying? Fet me tell you about one night when I was crying. It was Christmas Eve around 15 years ago. I was a young pastor. A few months earlier I’d been appointed to a church on the edge of town whose Sunday morning congregation was about 15. We started making plans for Christmas. We made a leaflet with a wise and witty Christmas message and a list of all the Christmas worship services on it. I insisted there should be a Midnight Communion. That was always the highlight of my Christmas growing up. No one in the congregation remembered ever going to church at midnight, but I still thought it was a great idea. I set the time for 11:30 p.m., December 24. We organized. We leafleted the whole neighborhood-more than 3,000 houses. 11 p.m. Christmas Eve came. No one there. 11:15… still no one there. 11:25… still just me, the bread, and the wine. 11:30… I tried so hard, so hard, to stop a tear beginning to roll down my eyelashes. Why was I crying? Because I’d tried so hard. Because for a moment I’d dared to hope. Because I felt I’d failed. Because I wondered if the church was dying. Because I felt humiliated. I heard a rustling noise. I looked at my watch. It was 11:32. The door opened. Into the church walked a man and a woman, maybe late forties. I’d never seen them before. “Is it just us?” they asked. “Fm afraid it is,” I replied, wondering if they were going to laugh at me. “Oh good,” foe woman said. “We waited outside in foe garden to see if anyone else would come, and when we thought we’d be the only ones, we walked in.” “How d’you mean?” I asked, gesturing for them to sit down. After all, who wants to be alone at midnight on Christmas Eve with a hopelessly underachieving pastor? “Well,” she said, “I guess you should know that Dave and I used to be married to other people until recently. There’s a lot of folk unhappy about us being together. We moved out here because we didn’t foel we could go to any of the downtown churehes. In fact we haven’t been to church at all for over a year. We were frightened to come tonight, but when we saw we’d be the only ones, we got foe courage to walk through foe door. Our lives are a mixture of love and shame. We want to begin again.”

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I stared at them in siienee for a long time. It was a man and a woman in a garden. It was a story of death and fear and sin and shame and tears; and beginning and life and trust and change and love. It was midnight on Christmas Eve. But, through my tears, I was staring at the dawn of Easter Day. By the end of that night, I was still crying. But I was crying a different kind of tears. I was crying Easter tears. When Mary turns away from the tomb, having not got much out of the angels, she begins another eonversation, this time with a man she takes to be the gardener, but we realize that he is someone else. Jesus asks Mary the same gestion the angels just asked her. “Why are you crying?” He clearly hasn’t done the pastoral care and eounselling course either. And unless he hadn’t been paying attention, he must have heard the answer she gave to the angels. But Jesus adds a seeond question. “Whom are you looking for?” “Whom are you looking for?” Now that is a good question. That’s a good question to ask anyone, and it’s an especially good question to ask Mary right this minute. Because Mary’s obviously looking for Jesus. But who is Jesus? Well here’s the erueial point. The story has shown us who Jesus is. Remember why Mary was crying? Mary was erying beeause she was faeing her sense of loss in the faee of death, her sense of fra^lity and weakness and loneliness and poweriessness. This is who Jesus is. He’s the one who overcomes death and transforms the fraile, the weak, the lonely, and the powerless. Staring into the tomb, she began to realize whom she was looking for. But there’s more. Who is Jesus? Mary was crying because she’d seen how ghastly humankind can be; she’d witnessed brutality and horror and duplicity and killing and betrayal. This is who Jesus is. He’s toe one who dismantles sin, deflates enmity, heals cruelty, absorbs malice, forgives treachery. Staring into the tomb Mary begins to realize whom she is looking for. There’s still more. Who is Jesus? Mary was crying because she was shedding God’s tears, tears of sadness for God’s separation from us, from toe rebellious ereation . This is who Jesus is. He’s the one who reunites us with God. He’s toe one who blends our tears with God’s tears, he’s toe good shepherd who knows each one of us by name and gathers us into toe Eather’s sheepfold, he’s the true vine who grafts each one of us on as his branches. Staring into the tomb Mary begins to realize whom she is looking for. Then Jesus says one word. “Mary.” When you’ve been crying, what’s toe most helpful thing anyone can do? They can be silent with you, in wordless presence, to affirm toe value of your sorrow and toe truth of your tears. They can touch you, gently, respectfully, lovingly, to share your humanity and show you you’re not alone. And they can speak tenderly, just a word or two that makes you feel accompanied, received, understood. “Mary.” She’s crying, but she feels the sense of a companion with whom she will never again be alone, she senses toe touch of toe one who will never let her go, she hears her name like never before. “Mary.” Her eyes are opened. She’s looking into the face of the resurrected -lesus. And now, surely, she discovers a different kind of tears. She’s known what it means to be overwhelmed by loss, by sin,by toe absence of God. But now she’s crying more than ever, yet in a new way. She’s crying because, if Jesus has emerged from the tomb, that means he’s not been destroyed by toe grave, and she’s blinded by toe wonder of imagining what it’s like to live beyond death, to enjoy life forever, to put

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aside fear and loss and grief and sorrow; and the tears are caseading down her cheeks and falling to the ground in fountains of joy. She’s crying hecause ىJesus is alive, that means he’s dismantled sin, and she’s swathed in a shower of tears in dreaming ofa world where enmity’s healed,hatred is transformed, cruelty’s turned to kindness, and anger’s displaced by mercy. She’s crying because if Jesus isﺎﻬﻬﻄﻨﻟآ §at her, that means he’s reunited us with God, and her disbelief is being washed away by a tidal wave of grace, and she’s in an ocean of glory with angels and archangels and saints and eherubim and all the company of heaven. These tears don’t seek the comfort of one person to share, to receive, to cherish, and to understand. These tears are infectious – they need to be taken to the whole world. These are the tears of baptism that are sent to refresh everyone; this is an overwhelming that’s destined to flood the whole creation with joy. Mary’s asking the whoic creation, “Why aren’t you crying?” Here are a man and a woman in a garden, the very picture that started the whole Bible, the very place where everything went wrong. And here again is this man and this woman at the very place where everything is put right again, but way beyond the imagination ofthat first man and woman, because here is not just the setting-right of human relations with one another, but here is the reunion between humanity, creation, and God. If that doesn’t make you cry with tears of joy, nothing ever will. $0 here’s my ؟uestion for you on Baster morning. Why are you crying? Are you looking into the tomb, overwhelmed by grief, by sin, by utter loneliness? Or are you looking into toe face of the risen Lord, overwhelmed by glory, by wonder, by joy? Whom are you looking for? The one who overcomes death, dismantles sin, and reunites you with God? Well, here’s toe good news of Easter. He’s looking at you, kid. Easter’s drenched in tears. But they’re tears of joy.