“Control, Alt, Delete!”
God's command to start fresh
Sermon Preached by
The Rev. Dr. Andrew Stirling
Sunday, April 11, 2004
Text: Psalm 40:1-13; Matthew 28:1-10
It was my first year back in Canada after having lived in South Africa. I was in my study preparing for the first set of Holy Week sermons that I had ever preached, in a rural pastoral charge in Nova Scotia. As I was sitting there going over what I was going to say, the telephone rang. It was the local post office: “Mr. Stirling,” they said. “We have a letter for you here. In fact, we think it might be a card. We can't deliver it because it has insufficient postage, so you'll have to come pick it up.”
Immediately, I thought it must be a letter from one of my Scottish relatives! (Just joking! They're listening on the Web again this morning, I had to say it.) I eagerly went down to the post office. They handed me the envelope and I opened it with great excitement, after having paid the postage, and lo and behold! it was not what I expected. I expected lilies and bunnies and Happy Easter, but the card said, “Happy New Year!” It had been lost in transit for three months. Inside it were the words of Frances Ridley Havergal:
Another year is dawning,
Dear Father, let it be
In working or in waiting,
Another year with Thee.
Another year of progress,
Another year of praise,
Another year of proving
Thy presence all the days.
A.B. Simpson once said that Easter is the New Year's Day of the soul. When I pondered that card, I thought that nothing could be more fitting than for it to arrive the week before Holy Week. What could inspire me more than the thought of new beginnings, a new year, a new day and of the promise of God's presence, as God had been with me before?
Indeed, my friends, this very day is the celebration of a happy new year. But more than just a happy new year, a happy new life, a happy new world, a happy new joy. For when those women, Mary of Magdalene and Mary, the wife of Cleopas, the mother of James who was called “the Less” went to the tomb, they found something new, on a new day. We're told in Matthew that it was a new day, the beginning of a new week. For they went to prepare the body with spices. It would have been prohibited on the last day of the week - on the Sabbath - for they were not allowed, as Jews, to be in the presence of death. But on the first day of the week, they could go to the tomb to meet their crucified Lord and to embalm His body and give Him the blessings of the fragrances.
During Lent, our Bible study series was called, “The Women of the Lord.” It was amazing to have it opened up before us that women have been there during the central moments of God's activity in the world with God's people, especially when the Bible has the reputation in our popular culture as being a book about men. So, it is no surprise and no source of wonder that it was women who, on the first day of the week, found this new beginning, this empty tomb. They had gone expecting to find something old. They had gone expecting to find a body and to their great surprise and shock the tomb was empty. A new day had begun.
What they witnessed and eventually came back and related to the apostles, in astonishment, fear, trembling and joy, was something that had happened not only in their experience, not only just to them and them alone, but to humanity - for humanity. You see, the message of Easter and of the empty tomb is not just about what they witnessed, it's about what we believe. It's not just a matter of Christ being raised from the dead. His resurrection ushers in a new era, a new hope, a new life for all those who believe in Him and cleave to Him. A new beginning, a new day, a new year for the world.
When I first got a computer in my last church, I was assigned a tutor to help me learn to use this intimidating machine. Like many of you when you first started, I was even frightened to turn it on, lest it explode before my eyes or something. As he took me through all the different programs and explained to me all the different bits and bytes of this intimidating machinery, my tutor said, “I want to introduce you, Dr. Stirling, to three keys that will be your salvation. They are: Control, Alt, Delete.” (Some of you have had the same experience, haven't you?) These are your salvation. When you think you have lost something: Control, Alt, Delete. When a program freezes: Control, Alt, Delete. When you have suddenly sent a virus all over the world: Control, Alt, Delete. Control, Alt, Delete are the three keys you press (for those of you who don't know the computer) to wipe the slate clean and begin again.
When those women went to the tomb that day, they experienced God's, Control, Alt, Delete. The old is gone, behold! the new has come. He is not in the tomb. He is risen. Death is not the final conqueror, life is. Sin does not have its final hold, forgiveness does. Death is not the end, Christ is the new beginning. Control, Alt, Delete, begin again.
To look at this a little more clearly this morning I want to draw on this morning's passage from the Book of Psalms, written hundreds of years before the resurrection of Jesus but nevertheless words that I believe anticipated, looked forward to, hoped and prayed for this very new beginning. And in this psalm there are words of inspiration and hope for every single one of us. What it talks about is the merciful rescue of God. Listen to what the psalmist said: “I waited patiently for the Lord. He turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the slimy pit.”
You see, the psalmist anticipated, hoped and believed that God would bring a new day, that God would hear the cries of his people. Now, it is fair to say that throughout the ages there have been those who have endeavoured to deal with the cry of humanity. Socrates, for example, taught us the art of dying, what is known as the ars moriendi. Philosophers throughout the ages, from Aristotle to Plato, yes, even to Dr. Phil, have tried to teach us how to live, how to get along, how to structure our society. But, it is the wind of the resurrection, it is the gift of God, not in our hands but in God's hands, that brings the power of new life and shows us the ultimate things that matter - the ultimate victory of God. It teaches us how to die. It teaches us and inspires us how to live. It gives us the hope that we live under the shadow and in the wind of the new life that is to come.
My friends, if you are like me, you are saddened this Easter Sunday by the injustice and violence that exists in the world. When we see the number of people who are dying in Iraq and Afghanistan, when we see the dark side of humanity raise its head, the injustices that underlie our society, it seems to me that the message of the crucifixion and the resurrection of Jesus Christ speaks to a world and says, “It is life, it is love, it is justice that ultimately is victorious. Power is not in a gun, it is in love. Power is not in dissension and division, it is in grace. Real power is in forgiveness. It is in an empty tomb. It is in God's Control, Alt, Delete. ”
Every Easter, the world needs to put behind its old self, needs to put it away and remind ourselves what, ultimately, is truth.
There is also something marvellous in this. In this passage we find the multiple resources of God. Look how the psalmist speaks: “He has set my feet on a rock and given me a firm place to stand.” Easter is that rock. It is the assurance of that foundation on which we build our lives and on which everything rests: The eternal power of God in heaven and on earth.
One of my favourite singers currently is Josh Groban. He sings a song that I have always loved. It goes:
You raise me up so I can stand on mountains.
You raise me up to walk on stormy seas.
I am strong when I am on your shoulders.
You raise me up to more than I can be.
The power of the risen Christ is to lift us up and to let us stand on solid ground and not be seduced by the sinfulness of the world or by those things that cause death, but rather to stand on the foundation of life.
But, to do that we have to let go. A friend of mine once told me that he was going on a camping trip. I thought about him in my prayers, because I knew he wasn't a very hardy soul and I could just picture him in a tent, cooking over an open fire, with wind and rain and bug spray, carrying his back pack with bleeding hands and feet with boots that didn't fit properly. After two weeks, he returned. He looked relaxed, he had put on a bit of weight, he seemed very happy, he hardly had a suntan. I said, “My goodness, how were you able to do this?”
He said, “It's amazing, these camper vans are fantastic! I had a microwave. I had air conditioning. I had a stove and I had satellite T.V. to watch the Master's on!”
I said, “Well, what kind of camping is that? I mean, you have just gone out into the world and taken your home with you. What's new about that? What's exciting about that? Nothing has changed!”
Well, our lives, my friends, are often like that. We have a camper van mentality. We need to take the old things and put them away, bury them, leave them behind in order to embrace what those women embraced when they saw the empty tomb - the victory of God, the power of love, the risen Christ, the wonderful resources of God on which we stand.
There is one last and most beautiful thing about the Resurrection, and that is that we have a motivational response. Listen to what the psalmist goes on to say: “God has put a new song in my mouth. A hymn of praise to our God. Many will see and fear and will put their trust in the Lord.” The psalmist is looking ahead to a day when God's victory would put a new song on his lips. If we have a new song on our lips it is not just enough to make it a verbal expression of praise. It must be a new way of living, a new way of loving and expressing God's grace to the world around us and in our everyday relationships. It's no good just to sing praises today if our lives aren't changed in the way in which we relate to one another in the world, if we do not stand for the things of God: life and peace and justice.
I heard a story about a man who was driving his car and came to some traffic lights turning from amber to red. He didn't know whether to put his foot down on the gas or on the brakes, so he decided to do the latter. But behind him was a woman who blared her horn, made all kinds of rude gestures and screamed all manner of obscenities at him, wanting him to go through the amber light. Suddenly a police officer came up and tapped her window. He said, “Excuse me, ma'am. You must come with me.” He arrested her on the spot, put her in handcuffs, took her back to the police station, fingerprinted her and put her in a cell. After a couple of hours the police officer came back and released her from the cell.
She said, “What on earth did you do that for?”
He said, “Well, ma'am, I saw your vehicle and on it there was a bumper sticker that said, 'What would Jesus do?' And another one that said, 'Follow me now to Sunday School' and on the licence plate surround it said, 'Jesus is Lord,' and the sign of the fish. When I heard your horrible language and saw your rude gestures, I assumed the vehicle must have been stolen!”
It's no good just to say, “He is risen, He is Lord” if our lives do not conform to it. My friends, I make an appeal this Easter Sunday to our gathered community here and to those listening to us wherever they may be, in the world beyond: Jesus Christ really does want us to follow Him, follow Him with our hearts and lives. The very same forgiveness and love and compassion that he had for others is what is ultimately victorious. The life eternal is the life that must break into the here and now. It is not just in heaven but here on earth that God's reign must be manifested. We need to open our hearts to it.
But lastly, we also need to praise God and of all the days, this is the one on which to do it.
One of the greatest instructors of preachers was an English minister named W.E. Sangster. His books have informed my scholarship for many years. In the 1950s he was diagnosed with a terrible illness. He woke up one day and was hardly able to move his right leg, his voice started to shut down and he could hardly speak and was in constant pain. He was diagnosed with atrophy of the muscles throughout the whole of his body. It was incurable. When he found out he had this disease and was unable to speak he wrote books for students like myself, to follow. He wrote inspirational books on prayer. He went around the breadth and length of the United Kingdom expressing his love and writing for people in small prayer groups. Even though he was in terrible pain and people would ask him about it he said, “I am only in the kindergarten of my suffering. Don't worry about me.”
On his last Easter he wrote a letter to his daughter. It would be his final letter. At the end were these closing words: “It is terrible to wake up on Easter morning and have no voice to shout, 'He is risen!' But it would still be more terrible to have a voice and not want to shout.”
My friends, we have our voices, we must shout God's praises. As those women found, He is not here, He is risen. God has given us a chance to begin again: Control, Alt, Delete. Let's sing God's praises. Let's live in God's way. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.
This is a verbatim transcription of the original sermon.