Easter Protest Hymns--April 30, 2019
"When [the temple police] had brought [Peter and the other apostles], they had them stand before the council. The high priest questioned them, saying, 'We gave you strict orders not to teach in this name, yet here you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching and you are determined to bring this man's blood on us.' But Peter and the apostles answered, 'We must obey God rather than any human authority. The God of our ancestors raised up Jesus, whom you had killed by hanging him on a tree. God exalted him at his right hand as Leader and Savior that he might give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins. And we are witnesses of these things, and so is the Holy Spirit whom God has given to those who obey him'. When they heard these things, they were enraged and wanted to kill them." [Acts 5:27-33]
The emperor never likes to be told that he's naked, and the loud, powerful voices never liked to be exposed as just empty suits.
But these things need to be said and done--and in fact, to hear the apostle Peter tell it, this is exactly what the resurrection of Jesus means. Easter is about civil disobedience.
Seriously. If you don't believe me, go read the words of Peter again. He makes a direct connection to his refusal to do what the authorities have told him to do, and the resurrection of Jesus.
Why? How do those dots connect? Like this: it is the reality of the resurrection that assures Peter that he must resist the directions of the police, the governing council, and the decrees of the Respectable Religious Crowd. The fact that God raised Jesus from the dead is what reveals God to be the one with real power, while the bullying of the authorities is revealed to be hollow. So if (or rather, when) Peter has to choose between obeying the local rulers and obeying his commission from Jesus to speak and act as his witnesses, Peter knows whom he will choose to obey, and whom he will choose to disobey. The fact that Jesus is risen from the dead confirms that he is the one to listen to... even when that runs counter to the edicts, decrees, and bans of the powers of the day.
The resurrection is what tells Peter to obey the directions of his crucified rabbi--Jesus didn't stay dead! He must really be who he says he is, and this Jesus must really have the power that the authorities could only wish they had. And even though it sure looks like these authorities have all the force and leverage, Peter is convinced that standing with Jesus will turn out to be the right side of history. It is the right side of history, because it is where Jesus stands, after all.
We don't often sing about this dimension to Easter, do we? We don't hear many hymns that make the connection Peter does. I've yet to hear a verse that goes something like:
"Jesus Christ is risen today (Ah-ah-ah-ah-ah-le-lu-ia.) Tell the king we won't obey (Ah-ah-ah-ah-ah-le-lu-ia.)"
"Thine is the glory, risen conquering Son. We will not comply when Caesar says what must be done."
The reason I think we do not sing Easter protest hymns like that is that we are afraid. We are afraid of making the connection that Peter so clearly made, so early on in the life of the Christian church. Peter knew that there would be times when the decrees of the state were incompatible with the mandate of the risen Christ. For Peter (the Simon Peter, apostle whose confession became the rock on which the church was to be built), the resurrection of Jesus makes it clear that sometimes being a good Christian means being a bad citizen of the Empire, because only one should get your allegiance. And the empty tomb tells us where to put our chips.
And I'm not sure we are willing to take that leap, honestly. It is easier to believe that we can always keep a foot in both camps, and that following Jesus will always align with supporting Caesar. But that's a hollow lie--and to be honest, for a lot of the time we really know that already. Caesars and Respectable Religious Leaders alike, no matter how much they may try to cover themselves in the trappings of piety, have a way of revealing rather blatantly that they think they themselves, and they alone, should get our allegiance and loyalty, and they do not like the possibility that purposes of the living God just might run counter to their agendas.
Voices like Simon Peter's here, followed by a long line of witnesses like the martyrs of the early church, Martin Luther exiled and excommunicated for his stance of faith, Anabaptists burned at the stake for their convictions, Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglass for resisting our nation's laws regarding slavery, the ten Booms, the White Rose resistance, and the Dietrich Bonhoeffers during the Nazi reign in Europe, Dorothy Day and Martin Luther King, Jr., who both lived their faith in jail cells from time to time, and saints among us today who say "No" to the powers of the day, this whole chorus of faithful voices sings out to us the hymn we are too nervous to sing on Easter Sunday--that the resurrection means Jesus is Lord, and Caesar is not. They teach us that if Christ is our "Leader and Savior," then even if the Respectable Religious Crowd of the day scowls at us for going where Jesus leads us to go, we should be prepared to disobey those middle managers to go where Jesus himself compels us to go, walking in his footsteps since Jesus never sends us somewhere he isn't willing to go first.
The thing we are going to have to let simmer in our heads and hearts for today is this: even though much of American church life has declawed the Easter message to be a warm fuzzy feeling, made it a time to break out the trumpet lilies and pull out all the extra stops on the organ, or reduced the impact of Easter to be only about the afterlife, for the first followers of Jesus, it was the resurrection itself that pushed the early church to know when to say "No," to the powers of the day, and to be willing to suffer for it when they did.
Today, being Easter people might mean that we should be prepared to be unpopular, or to act against the decrees of Caesar, or be seen as unpatriotic. That's ok. It might just actually be a sign that the God in whom you put your faith is the real deal. In fact, that's how it's been since the beginning.
And if someone thinks that your dedication to following the way of Jesus looks subversive, maybe that just puts you in the company of Simon Peter and all the rest of those holy troublemakers following the crucified and risen Jesus.
Lord Jesus, guide us to follow after your nail-marked-but-risen footsteps, even when that means running against the grain of the powers of the day.
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