"That's All Folks"

Pastor Nagle
03/27/2005

“That’s All Folks” John 20:8-9 The Festival of the Resurrection March 27, 2005
In the old days, before there was television, there were movies. And people would go to the movies on a very regular basis—sometimes to see the movie itself, but almost as often to see the latest cartoon. Cartoons which, more often than not, ended with the words scrolled across the screen, “That’s all folks.” Which at that particular moment was true, but which didn’t bother anyone, because there was always something ahead. Surely the main feature, maybe another cartoon, always another week.
Some of you, fully aware that this is my last Sunday as a pastor of our congregation, have come to worship this morning with a sense of sadness, with a sense of finality, with a sense that the sermon title is true: That’s All Folks. If that attitude is true for you, then you’re in good company, for that’s precisely the same attitude which was held by Peter and John, early in the morning of that first Easter. You know the story. Even know the whole story in the several different ways it’s told in the four gospels. But that kind of knowledge gives us an advantage the first disciples didn’t have. For Peter and John were in some ways like a little child seeing the fading scene at the end of a cartoon—asking, is that really all there is? Listen again to this one partial sentence lifted from this morning’s gospel story: “for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead.” And then the disciples returned to their homes.
These days, it seems an almost impossible reaction—that the disciples went to the tomb, the empty tomb, and didn’t think more about it, didn’t do more about it. But you can understand why. On Friday afternoon, fewer than 40 hours earlier, the disciples had been witness to Jesus’ death on the cross. And it was a real death too. Not play-acting. Not mass hypnosis. Not a literary device. Scripture is quite clear that the government carried out the sentence reserved for trouble-makers. Jesus was executed. Dead. And then buried. And everyone there knew, “That’s all folks.” That’s what they thought then. But we know better now, don’t we?
I’d like to think so, but there are days when I’m not very certain. Not very certain that you and I know more or believe more. True, I did take out of context the line that said the disciples didn’t understand. And it’s true that they went back to their homes. But the story went on, of course. That little by little, the disciples remembered the prediction and the promise, and came to accept what could not reasonably be understood. That this Jesus who was more than Jesus, was able to do what only God could do—defeat the power even of death, and live on. So that, all of a sudden, the meaning of “that’s all folks” was changed. Because, all of a sudden, there was more than there had been. And the certainty of more yet to come. Do you know what that could mean? Could mean for you and me?
It means that the endings we have come to dread are not endings at all, but pauses along a much longer path. When there is physical death, when Johnny and Susie break up, when the job disappears and when Pastor Nagle retires, it would be easy to fall apart and assume that life as we know it will never be again. Haven’t you attended funerals like that, where the mourners grieve greatly, as they are encouraged to do by the preacher and the neighbors? Not that there is anything wrong with tears. I’ll bet we don’t get through all of today without some. But those tears had better be temporary because the theology that lies behind the cartoon words says that they must be temporary. For a moment, that’s all folks. For eternity, well, the word infinity comes to mind. And I can’t explain that one either. But that’s the promise we’re given. That life goes on and on.
Though it’s true that, for some people, infinity, eternity, seems awfully long. When death came at the end of sickness, it was a friend. No one wanted poor health to go on forever. And when Johnny and Susie broke up, or when the company decided you must leave, that was all right too. And my retirement. Some things aren’t meant forever. Some things are supposed to end, or else, how can what comes next ever come to be? And someone says, “You’re sadder than that, aren’t you? Are you really so callous that, after 36 years, you’re just going to turn your back and go away?” Turn my back, yes. But not go away. Go on, in a path toward something new, for us all. So that if you see my back, you can follow my back, and keep on with me and what I have always proclaimed, so that you’ll come to see what Peter and John saw too. That there is so much ahead. And it’s called Easter, the Festival of the Resurrection. That’s what it’s all about. You just have to look at the gospels and count the pages to know that that’s what it’s all about.
So, though Jesus lived among us for 30-something years, it’s only the last relatively little while that matters enough to be included in scripture. And of the time spent in all his travels, all his teaching, all his healings, the gospels give the greater space to the last week of his life. And the first day of new life most of all. Over my years here, I taught many things in sermons and classes. Sometimes I reminded you of the need for obedience. Surely the Ten Commandments is in scripture. Sometimes I reminded you of the need for social action. Surely the Old Testament prophets are in scripture. Sometimes I reminded you of the need for knowledge and prayer and spirituality. And it’s all there too. But our world misses the point entirely if it concentrates on any or all of those, at the expense of these words—that the Lord is risen. He is risen indeed. Nothing else in scripture has much meaning, except in the light of those words. Nothing else in life has much meaning, except in the light of those words. And anyone who says that the end is near or that the end is here, anyone who lives with sadness and dread, anyone who insists that passages are blocked and the way is not clear, has failed to understand just as much as Peter and John—people who were witness to everything important, and then just went home. It happened for them, but simply must not happen for us.
Then what shall we say about “That’s all folks?” Deny that it has meaning? No, but push it off, way further off, than we could have supposed. To see that the new life given to us is so full of glory and grandeur and joy and peace that nothing else matters. But that the glory and grandeur and joy and peace with Christ is the “all” to which we refer. And as children of God, which of us would want it any other way. To know, for sure, that Easter truly is the “all” that is. For (and here is what it’s all about) the Lord is risen. He is risen indeed.