Sorrow only lasts from Friday to Sunday

Sermon for Jubilate – Easter 3

1 Peter 2:11-20  +  John 16:16-23

We’ve been celebrating Easter now for several weeks. But as you know, the Church has actually been celebrating Easter every Sunday for nearly 2,000 years. We’ve never known a world without Easter. We’ve never lived in a time when Jesus, the Son of God, was dead. So it’s hard for us to imagine the depth of sorrow, of grief, of despair that Jesus’ disciples must have experienced between Good Friday and Jesus’ first appearance to them on Easter Sunday evening, hard to imagine a world in which God Himself was dead, even if it was only for two days.

What’s not hard to imagine is a world in which we can’t see Jesus, a world in which sorrow and grief abound, a world in which the world rejoices to see wickedness prosper and the Word of Christ silenced and Christians dragged back into the filth of sin and self-centeredness and unrighteousness and false belief. That’s the world we live in, the only world we know.

But Jesus taught His disciples one final lesson on the night before He died to prepare them for what was to come, a lesson that helps us, too, a timely lesson about sorrow and joy—that sorrow and grief will certainly come upon those who love Jesus in this world, because He won’t always be visible to us in this world. But that sorrow and grief last only a little while and will be followed by joy that lasts forever when we see Christ again. The sorrow only lasts from Friday to Sunday.

A little while, and you will not see Me; and again a little while, and you will see Me, because I go to the Father.

Of course, Jesus was talking, first, about the little while before His death—less than a day—and the little while until His resurrection appearance to His disciples two days later. “I go to the Father” is a reference to His ascension forty days after that. The events of the coming days were set in stone. They would happen, just as Jesus said they would.

The disciples were still confused on Thursday. They wanted to ask Jesus what He meant, but they were like students in a classroom who don’t understand the teacher’s words, and yet don’t want to look foolish by asking a question to which they should really already know the answer.

Jesus doesn’t give them the answer now. The events of that night and the next day had to play themselves out, and He couldn’t be too specific with them. What He could do was to teach them how to handle things from Friday to Sunday.

I say to you that you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice; and you will be sorrowful. But your sorrow will be turned into joy. He says that their sorrow would be like that of a woman in childbirth—real, painful, seemingly unbearable. That’s what it will be like from Friday to Sunday, when Jesus is dead, buried, and out of sight. And yet, like a woman who finally gives birth to the child, there would be an end to the sorrow and a joy so great and so enduring that the sorrow is all but forgotten in the end. That would be the joy of Easter, the joy of knowing that Jesus paid for sin and conquered death and now lives and reigns forever and ever.

The apostles didn’t learn the lesson that night, but what they eventually learned from Friday to Sunday stayed with them forever. They would always remember that grief and sorrow when Jesus was crucified, dead and buried, and how the world rejoiced with spite and hatred while they grieved and lamented. They would remember how they felt on Saturday, like all hope was gone. But they would also always remember that their grief lasted only a little while, from Friday to Sunday. And then they knew joy again—a joy that would sustain them for the rest of their lives, a joy that would follow them when they were later whipped and beaten, persecuted and imprisoned, a joy that would follow them even to their martyr’s death. Jesus was only dead for two days, from Friday to Sunday, and now He is alive again.

That pattern of a little while of sorrow followed by endless joy isn’t restricted to Good Friday to Easter Sunday. That Friday to Sunday grief really symbolizes the Christian’s whole life on this earth, because now, for a “little while,” we don’t see Jesus.

And because we don’t see Jesus, we suffer all kinds of sorrow and grief. Imagine, if Jesus were standing here next to you, risen from the dead, and you could see Him, would it bother you that there are so (relatively) few people gathered here this morning? If Jesus were standing here next to you and you could see Him, would you still be worried about tomorrow, still grieve over any earthly hardship, still be bothered by how much the world hates Christianity, or how much the false prophets lie in Jesus’ name? Of course not! Seeing Him here beside you would reassure you that He’s real, that He’s in control, that everything will be all right. But from Friday to Sunday, for this little while before He comes back from the Father, He remains unseen.

And He remains unseen, because this is the age of the Holy Spirit. This is the time when He must build His Church, not with His hands, but with His Word, even as He’s doing right now, in Word and Sacrament. He’s been building His Church invisibly for nearly 2,000 years, which seems like a very long time to us, but it’s a drop in the bucket compared to eternity. Peter says that, with the Lord, a day is like a thousand years and a thousand years are like a day. So, in the Lord’s reckoning, although nearly two thousand years have passed, it’s like nearly two days. From Friday to Sunday! Hmm. It looks like we’re nearly there!

Then Christ will come. Then comes the resurrection. Then we will see Him as He is. And then will come a joy that we only know now by faith and in hope, the joy of every hardship overcome, every temptation defeated, every weakness made strong, every wrong made right. The truth will prosper. Justice and righteousness will prevail. And life will no longer be interrupted by death.

For now, we do well to pay attention to St. Peter’s words in 1 Peter chapter 1: Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith for salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials, that the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ, whom having not seen you love. Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, receiving the end of your faith—the salvation of your souls.

Let this joy inexpressible fill your hearts today. Christ has died. Christ is risen. Christ will come again. Friday and Saturday are passed. Sunday morning has already dawned. In a little while you will see Him. It’s just a matter of time! Amen.