Easter 5 Resurrection---Now Everybody is a Somebody

[HKHaugan]

Easter 5 Resurrection and Identity

If someone asked you, “Who are you?,” what would you answer?

I remember when I was in New York City at Spring Break my second year of seminary I happened to take a shortcut through a narrow passageway by a Broadway theater where a small crowd was standing. They seemed to be anticipating the arrival of some star. As I walked by what happened to be a stage door the crowd all looked at me expectantly until someone blurted, “Oh, he’s nobody!” and the crowd shifted its gaze back to the door. At that moment my identity was “Nobody.” I didn’t think about it at the time but it left an impression that later would give me pause to think about who I really was, what had really taken place and what I felt at that moment of being identified as “Nobody.”

We live in a world where the standards of identity are set by image, wealth, achievement, success, recognition and marketability. In the eyes of the world we are judged by horizontal external appearance and symbols.

Now shift back to where a ‘nobody’ named Mary Magdalene and two other ‘nobodies’ from a ‘nowhere people’ in a ‘nowhere’ country arrived to find that the tomb of a ‘nobody’ named Jesus was empty. He had been executed by the military of the mighty Roman Empire on a cross of wood designed to show that non-Romans were ‘nobodies.’ That dynamic is alive and well in every collected group where individual identity is a matter of belonging, recognition and acceptance. No one wants to be ‘nobody.’

When Glen Campbell sang his hit “Rhinestone Cowboy” it spoke to the need for an identity in the world. It depicted the ‘nobody’ who wanted to be “Like a Rhinestone Cowboy, getting cards and letters from people I don’t even know.” Another song screams “I wanna be a somebody.”

When Jesus died as a ‘nobody’ He rose as a ‘Somebody.’ Because He rose from the dead He turned the tables on every world definition outside of God. He overturned death, anonymity, nobody, insignificance, the devil and his tools he uses to tempt vulnerable ‘nobodies’ to be his idea of somebody.

The glory of the Resurrection is that the most famous nobody in history has become the greatest ‘Somebody’ of all time. A single non-descript young man from an obscure ethnic group in a little known province is revealed as Son of God and the Savior of the world.

But not only that He promises something else. “If I be lifted up I will draw all men unto me.” His Resurrection did three very basic things for every ‘nobody’ who was ever born.
First, He lifted up all human beings and gave them an identity, images of God, that is above any the world has to offer.
Second, He gave them a relationship with His Father through Him as younger brothers and sisters.
Third, He gave them the Spirit of God to secure that relationship eternally.

When Jesus was raised truth was raised with Him. There are seven basic truths raised by His Resurrection.

First, He raised up the truth that One spiritual God is the source of everything.
Second, He raised up the truth that He made, knows, cares about and loves every single human being.
Third, He raised up the truth that we are spiritual beings made in His image and likeness to be like Him, significant, with meaning and purpose for eternity.
Fourth, He raised up the truth that He is a personal Father to everyone and therefore the God of the universe gives us His identity, which is above all worldly identities.
Fifth, He raised up the truth that we ultimately answer to Him. He is our final personal authority.
Sixth, He raised up the truth that the Scripture given by Him is our written authority defining who He is, what we are and our lifestyle as His children.
Seventh, He raised up the truth that we are part of a larger spiritual family called the Body of Christ whose mission and purpose is to share Jesus so that every nobody becomes somebody. A nobody can be rich and famous or simply an anonymous drifter. All are loved by God.
More on the Resurrection. Stay tuned.