Christ the King-Epiphany Church, Wilbraham

The Rev. Martha S. Sipe

April 20, 2025 / The Resurrection of Our Lord

Luke 24:1-12

On Thursday evening, we had the joy of welcoming four young children to the Lord’s table for the first time.  Last weekend, during our final communion preparation class, I told the kids the story of Easter.  I told the story in my own words, and because we hear the Easter story from St. Luke’s gospel this year, I intentionally stuck to the details of Luke’s version of Easter morning.  So I told them about the women coming to the tomb.  And I told them about the angels that met them there.  And I told them that the women ran back to tell the others what had happened.  And I told them that no one believed them.  The youngest child immediately asked why?  Why didn’t they believe the women?  And before I could formulate an elementary school appropriate response to that excellent question, one of the slightly older girls piped up:  “That’s how it was in the old days.  People didn’t think women counted.”  Indeed.  Out of the mouths of babes!

I confess I always do an inward smirk when I read that line:  that in the apostles’ ears – all masculine ears, of course – “these words seemed to them an idle tale.”   A foolish yarn.  Utter nonsense.  But in case this implicit sexism isn’t bad enough, the depiction of the disciples gets even worse when we dig deeper.  According to Columbia Seminary preaching professor Anna Carter Florence, “idle tale” is a PG version that translators have chosen to render a much more colorful word in Greek – the word leiros.  Leiros, says Florence, means “trash,” “garbage,” . . . or worse.  She writes, “For one wildly out-of-character moment, they forget their disciple manners and resort to the subtle cadences of a high-school locker room. . . . A more faithful translation would probably be, ‘These things seemed to them like . . . a lot of bull.”[1]  Bet you didn’t expect to hear the pastor say that on Easter morning.

Truth be told, though, to many people the Easter story does seem like a lot of bull.  And as a story, it is pretty unbelievable.  Some people are skeptical about Easter because, well honestly, we’re skeptical about everything these days, aren’t we?  There are certainly plenty of “idle tales” circulating on cable and social media, and frankly, we’re at a point where it’s really hard to know what to believe.  But other people wonder if the Easter story isn’t a load of leiros because they’re in pain.  When we face turmoil and trouble of an imminent nature, the promise that everything will be okay some day can leave us impatient for help now.  When we’re dealing with a serious diagnosis, and wondering how much longer we have in this life, it’s probably hard to get excited about eternal life.  When we’re standing at the grave of a loved one and would give anything for just one more conversation with them, one more chance to hold them and tell them we love them, it can be difficult to sustain the hope of heaven.  I can’t completely fault the disciples for calling the announcement of resurrection an idle tale because we’ve all been there – shell shocked by the trauma of life and unable to believe seemingly impossible good news.  And so, the disciples, uninspired by the “idle tale,” stayed idle, stayed there paralyzed by grief and fear.

But not Peter.  Peter is the hero here.  Yes, Peter:  the same Peter who had, just three days before, messed up so badly by denying even knowing Jesus; Peter, who had a habit of putting his foot in his mouth; the same Peter who was reckless and impulsive and so very human.  But Peter, on hearing the women’s idle tale did not stay idle.  Though he was clearly skeptical, nevertheless he got up and ran to the tomb to see for himself.  He held onto hope, trusting that the one who had revealed himself to be Messiah and Lord could do anything – even bring life out of death.

And so must we:  hold onto hope.  Because this story is about so much more than the promise of eternal life.  It is also about resurrection and newness now in every part of our life that feels dusty and dead.  It’s about forgiveness and second chances.  About a path forward where it seemed there was none, and about God, who loves us so much that the Spirit will help and guide us along the way.  Easter means that hope is alive, hope is sustaining us, hope is flourishing like the bulbs emerging from the cold earth of winter.

Friends, let this not be an idle tale.  May you not receive this good news of Jesus’ resurrection and remain idle, like a car at a red light, waiting for the light to change.  Easter is a green light.  Easter means it’s time to take your foot off the brake and press on the accelerator, and move forward.  Easter is forgiveness, just waiting to be offered so that broken relationships can be made whole.  Easter is help from above, given to us in such abundance and with such freedom that we can, in turn, freely and generously help one another.  Easter is the love of God which nothing can contain – not a stone tomb, not current events which divide us, not prejudice nor fear – Easter is compassion, mercy, and love bursting forth for all of God’s children.  And of course, Easter is also the promise of everlasting life, so that we can live each day confidently trusting that this life, as wonderful as it is, is not all that there is.  Jesus’ love knows no bounds.

If Easter seems an idle tale to you, listen again:  Christ is risen.  He is risen indeed.  Alleluia!

[1] Small, Lindsey,  chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://covchurch.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/4.2012.All-Glory-Laud-and-Leiros.pdf