Steve's Letter: You Only Get One Shot, Don't Screw It Up!

I may have told you about the worship leader who overslept and failed to show for the Easter sunrise service at his church. The next year, the pastor called him Easter morning at 4 a.m. and said...

"Jesus is Risen! You had better too!"

I remember the first Easter Sunday I realized that Jesus was alive. It wasn't as powerful as the disciples' realization but, for a peon like me, it was close.

I was a young pastor in theological graduate school at Boston University and served a small church on Cape Cod to pay the bills. All winter, in that little church, we had struggled to get by. Cape Cod winters can be brutal and the people of New England are not known for putting church attendance at the top of their list of important things to do.

Someone said her church was so small that "when the pastor says 'beloved,' I blush." That small church on Cape Cod was like that. All winter we had worked to get people to church with very little success. That had a negative impact on our paying the bills and on me. I began to think that God had not called me to this. I had made a lot more money doing a morning radio show in Boston and, while I was willing to work for less, it began to look like the church wouldn't even be able to pay me.

Then Easter!

I was in my little study (so small that if I sneezed, I caught my own cold) and heard some noise outside the door. I opened it and to my astonishment, the ushers were moving chairs from the church parlor and the Sunday school rooms into the sanctuary. "What are you doing?" I asked. They explained that it was Easter and Easter meant big crowds.

Now that really ticked me off! I decided to change my sermon to one on hell with the addendum of "that's where you're going and I'm glad." (Not really. In those days, I didn't believe in much of anything and certainly not that people were lost for all of eternity.)

That was when the church janitor (Ralph Richardson, who died a couple of years ago and adds a big attraction to heaven) came into my study without knocking, picked up on how angry I was, and said, "Pastor, you only get one shot at these people, so don't screw it up." Then he left, softly closing the door behind him.

I didn't.

But I would have if Jesus had not shown. Ralph was a good and wise man, but his words weren't enough. After he left, I started thinking about Easter and about a dead man getting out of a grave. Maybe for the first time in my life, it hit me that Jesus was alive. And not only was he alive, he was right there in that little study and would be there in the service when I preached to the cretins who only came to church once a year.

That changed everything.

Still does.

There's something about Easter that makes a bad day good, a cynic wish for something better, and the sinful hopeful. Paul put it this way in 1 Corinthians 15, "And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain....and you are still in your sins....If in this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied."

That's why I like Easter. It's that time of year when I turn from religious nonsense, clich‚s and pretense. (If you're a "religious professional," there is a lot of that sort of thing. I need the job.) It's the time when I sit back, light my pipe, and review the basics...well...uh...the basic. A cold, dead corpse got out of a grave and said I could too.

If Jesus is a dead leader to be honored each year on the anniversary of his birth or death, leave me out. There are a lot of graves around filled with very important people and I don't need another one. Paul said that if Jesus was still in the grave, we were to be pitied. Why is that? Because it would mean that there was nothing and "men must work and women must weep, and the sooner it's over, the sooner to sleep."

Did you hear about the man who threatened to jump off the 20-story building? He wouldn't talk to anyone but his pastor. The pastor was called and crawled out on the ledge with the man. They started talking. After about an hour and half of this, they joined hands...

...and both jumped.

Sorry. But frankly, if Jesus is dead, there really isn't any meaning to this whole thing. Do the best you can-or not-and then you die.

Paul also said that if Jesus was a "remembered statesman and teacher" instead of a risen Messiah, we were still in our sins. That may not seem like a big deal, but it's key to everything else. God is holy and as the Christian song says, "everything is holy now." That's fine except when you come to the realization that you are not holy...not even close. Where do you go with that?

Jesus said to the prostitute in Luke 7 that her sins were forgiven. He says that to us too. If we're forgiven, we're free. If we're free, we're his, and that changes everything. I don't have to be driven by guilt and shame. I was driven before, but now I'm drawn...drawn to Jesus who says, "I don't care where you've been or what you're doing, come to me. Your sins are forgiven." Good Friday, if Jesus was God, always leads to Easter Sunday for him...

...and for you and me.

And then Paul references the fact of our death in 1 Corinthians 15:20, "But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep."

D. L. Moody once said that the time would come when people would read in the papers that old D. L. was dead. "Don't you believe it," he said. "It's a lie. When you read that, I'll be more alive than I have ever been in this life." He's right because Jesus promised and when Jesus got out of his grave, everything he promised became as real as if it had already happened.

And of course, the risen Christ isn't bound by time and space. As I write this to you and as you read it, he is here. I just stopped and told him about what I just wrote to you. I asked him to make it real and right for you. Jesus will do that because he likes both of us.

He is Risen!

He is Risen Indeed!

I don't know about you, but that's enough to keep me at this until the faith becomes sight and the sun-and Son-shine forever.

"Jesus is Risen and you had better too!"

Better: "Jesus is Risen and you will too...now."

He asked me to remind you!