Caitlin Trussell with Augustana Lutheran Church on April 5, 2026

[sermon begins after Bible reading]

Matthew 28:1-10 After the Sabbath, as the first day of the week was dawning, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. ² And suddenly there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord, descending from heaven, came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. ³ His appearance was like lightning and his clothing white as snow. ⁴ For fear of him the guards shook and became like dead men. ⁵ But the angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified. ⁶ He is not here, for he has been raised, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. ⁷ Then go quickly and tell his disciples, ‘He has been raised from the dead, and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him.’ This is my message for you.” ⁸ So they left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy and ran to tell his disciples. ⁹ Suddenly Jesus met them and said, “Greetings!” And they came to him, took hold of his feet, and worshiped him. ¹⁰ Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers and sisters to go to Galilee; there they will see me.”

[sermon begins]

I grew up in earthquake country. We’d guess the seismic strength of the current quake with each other–a 3.0 on the Richter Scale could be felt a little, a 4.5 would get your attention, and a 6.0 could knock down walls. I remember the first big quake in my teens. I was home alone, on the second floor of our house. It was loud, like a freight train barreling by within feet of the house. It was long, the shaking lasted almost 30 seconds. And it was scary—5.9 scary, the epicenter of the Whittier Narrows quake wasn’t far from Altadena.[1] The house stood through it, but I shook for a while. A few minutes after the quake, my stepbrother Bill strolled nonchalantly into the house and asked me if we had any bar soap. He’d been on his way to get bar soap when the quake hit but the grocery store was a mess. I’d never been so happy to see him! Quakes happen on their own time. They surprise and disrupt what you thought would happen next. And they connect us differently to each other.

This Easter morning, our Bible story begins with an earthquake. But it isn’t the first one felt by Mary Magdalene and the other Mary. Their world had been metaphorically and literally rocked by the events of the past few days. Judas had betrayed Jesus to the ones who arrested him.[2] Peter had denied knowing Jesus to servants and bystanders at his trial.[3] The women looked on from a distance as Jesus cried out on the cross and breathed his last while the EARTH QUAKED THEN, too.[4] Mary Magdelene and the other Mary watched Joseph of Arimathea wrap Jesus’ body in a linen cloth, lay him in the tomb, roll a great stone to cover the door, and walk away.[5] The women’s constant presence was unwavering as their world was rocked by the execution of their teacher and friend at the hands of the powers that be. Some of us know that feeling of not being able to look away when our foundations tremble through a seismic shift.

We’re told that Mary Magdalene and the other Mary return to see the tomb. Their longing to reconnect could have stirred their natural instinct to visit after Jesus’ burial. Their world was immediately shaken by another earthquake, an aftershock of the one at the cross. Perhaps the angel gained leverage from the quake to roll back the two-ton stone before using it as a chair. Afraid of the angel’s power, the guards quaked and fell over as if dead. Just like that [snap fingers], the ones in power were laid flat by their own fear while the Marys’ fear and joy launched them from the tomb to go tell the other disciples, “He has been raised from the dead.”

Reverberating with the good news from the angel, the women met Jesus on their way. They ran to him, knelt and touched his feet. Like the angel, Jesus sends them to tell the good news to his disciples. In this telling of the story, we don’t know how surprised the other disciples were to hear their news. But we do know that the women’s story led to action, because a few verses later the disciples actually do meet Jesus in Galilee.

Regardless, the fear and joy of the women are part of this seismic story. Many of us are shaken to the foundation by things that happen to us and by things happening around us. And many of us experience a God who brings life out of death. Maybe not as dramatically as Jesus resurrecting out of tomb. But individual experiences that, like Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, can mingle our emotions of joy and fear. God begets us through cross and tomb into new life because we are children of God, broken and beloved, resurrected into the body of Christ that we call the church. The church that is resurrected through Jesus’ death and new life.

Part of the good news that we get to share as the church is that there is enough for everybody—enough resources, enough love, enough life—as we extend Christ’s arms of love and grace, so that Jesus’ joyous welcome through us nourishes a disrupted world with community and belonging, nourishes us with hope and new life. Jesus calls us to be the love that we receive however imperfectly we get that done. We share joy with our new neighbors who are new homeowners just down the hill in Augustana Homes. We welcome the stranger with our Refugee Support Teams. We pray for our public leaders while holding them accountable for the dignity of each person made in God’s image. And we love our neighbors as ourselves by accompanying them in advocacy and amplifying their voices with our own.

New life literally abounds as Easter and Spring happen simultaneously this year. Tree roots are soaking up the latest snow even as they clamor for more. Birds fly back to our latitude for nesting and nectar. Perhaps your suffering, confusion, and grief make it difficult to see life at all, to feel any joy alongside your fear. Real life doesn’t conveniently align with the season of the earth or the season of the church. Fear is a reasonable reaction to the unpredictable nature of life on this planet. One gift of the body of Christ is that the prayers, practices, and people of the church’s resurrection faith surround us while we grieve or heal, holding space for joy until we can feel it once more. When we’re too broken to pray, our church community prays for us as the risen body of Christ for each other and for the world. Individually, we are not designed to hold all the things, everywhere, all at once, but the church IS intended to hold the surprises, disruptions, fear, and joy, as a people who look to the future with hope. As a people formed and sustained by the life and love of Jesus.

The good news of Easter surprises us with God’s love for the world, reminding us that we belong to God through the life-death-life of Jesus. The seismic shift of Easter surprises us with the reclining angel on the tomb’s stone who announced to Mary Magdalene and the other Mary that Jesus had been raised as he said; and today, Easter Sunday, and for the next 50 days of the Easter season, we remind each other that there is good news of defiant joy alongside our fear.

God brings us through cross and tomb into the joy of new life because God is love.[6] Made in the image of God, each one of us is beautiful and unconditionally beloved—there is nothing we can do or not do to make God love us any more or any less. YOU are beautiful and unconditionally beloved by God. Such is the radical, excessive, audacious love of God. The love of God is a seismic shift that surprises and disrupts with the power to change the world that God so loves. Jesus first revealed God’s love in his life and ministry on earth including taking our violence into himself on the cross and transforming death into life through the self-sacrifice of love. Through that very love of Jesus, the body of Christ gets to be the love we receive for the sake of the world. Thanks be to God and Happy Easter!

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[1] M 5.9 – The 1987 Whittier Narrows, California Earthquake

[2] Matthew 26:47-50

[3] Matthew 26:69-75

[4] Matthew 27:45-56

[5] Matthew 27:57-61

[6] 1 John 4:16a