“Our great hope!”
The Battle of Waterloo was one of the most significant wars in history. It was fought on 18 June 1815 between Napoleon’s French Army, and an English-European coalition led by the Duke of Wellington and Prussian Field Marshal Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher. The battle concluded a war that had raged for 23 years, ending French attempts to dominate Europe, and destroyed Napoleon’s imperial power forever.
Major Henry Percy, the Duke of Wellington’s assistant, had witnessed Napoleon’s final defeat at Waterloo and was tasked with carrying the official dispatch announcing the victory to London. At home, all in England were holding their breath waiting for news of the outcome. But Major Percy was significantly delayed in departing from Brussels, with travel along the route to the coast tediously slow due to regular interruptions. Having taken nearly 24 hours to reach Ostend, the ship he departed on was not aided by any wind and the voyage was painstakingly slow, one which was quicker to complete by rowboat in the final stages. It was three days later, three days after the battle ended, that the message came across the channel. The words “Wellington defeated” were spelled out when a sudden blanket of fog obscured the signals. “Wellington defeated” was the message that quickly started to spread through the homeland and the deepest gloom settled on the English. Then, when the fog lifted, the message was completed: “Wellington defeated the enemy!” Sorrow and disappointment suddenly turned into great relief and rejoicing! What had looked like defeat was really victory![1]
On Good Friday we heard from Matthew in chapter 27. We heard how the disciples had great
disappointment when news of Jesus’ death spread throughout the land. It was a day of great despair as the people imagined living under oppression forever. In the gloom of Good Friday the people could only read “Jesus defeated!”
But three days later, news spread throughout the city of the true situation: “Jesus defeated the enemy!” He has risen! Despair has turned into hope because death has turned into life. Their Lord and friend is back, and nothing can keep them from him!
Having journeyed through Holy Week with Matthew we now arrive at chapter 28, where Matthew relays a message of great hope for us in times of gloom and despair. We hear that, after the Sabbath, at dawn on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary (the mother of James and Joseph) went to look at the tomb. They expected the body of Jesus to be there and there was nothing to suggest it wouldn’t be.
As they arrive there was a violent earthquake, for an angel of the Lord came down from heaven. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothes were white as snow. The guards were so terrified that they shook and became like dead men themselves, frozen with fright. Going to the tomb, the angel rolled back the stone and sat on it. Why had the angel done this? Because the women had both witnessed Jesus die on the Cross, back in Matthew 27:55. The angel wanted the women to see that the tomb was empty, because Jesus had already risen.
The angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified. He is not here; he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay.” The angel from heaven reveals the truth of what has happened. Jesus’ body was there, but now it is not! It is almost a picture of a bed, not a tomb: this is where he lay, now he has got up! These first eyewitnesses need revelation from above to clear away the possibility of any misunderstanding or
misinterpretation. The angel must come and show them, and reveal the good news to them.
The women are charged to go quickly with the news to Jesus’ disciples: ‘He has risen from the dead and is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him.’ So the women hurry off, afraid yet filled with joy, and ran to tell his disciples.
Suddenly Jesus meets them. “Greetings,” he said. They came to him, clasped his feet and worshiped him. The clasping of Jesus’ feet is an act of humble worship as they fall down before him in amazement and wonder, placing themselves at the lowest level on the ground before their Lord. They can’t bow lower than feet-level, and they grab hold of his feet in amazement and joy. He is not a ghost, or a vision or delusion. They clasp the feet that were nailed to the cross. Jesus has risen as a whole person; a whole being, in body and spirit. Every single DNA molecule, every strand of hair, every skin cell has been resurrected! Resurrection was already happening, already taking place even when we don’t see it, don’t expect it, or don’t think it can.
Then the risen Christ said to them, “Do not be afraid. Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me.” Jesus’ disciples would see him for themselves. There they would see him again, in the place where he had done so much of his ministry. Nothing is impossible for Jesus, nothing can stop him, now not even death itself can keep Jesus away from his people. Three days earlier there was gloom, despair and a sense of defeat. Now there is hope—great hope.
This great hope was so important for those early disciples. The church was never at a more vulnerable state than it was on the morning of the resurrection. They had witnessed their Lord and friend be executed in the most barbaric way possible, and the threat of the same punishment hung over them like a shadow, for anyone who confessed Jesus would be put out of the synagogue, and therefore at the mercy of the Roman Empire. They were frightened, confused and a small, weak band.
But three days later comes a message of victory. What seemed like death and defeat is triumph.
Jesus has risen! They have hope—great hope. Not just a vague, general kind of wish, but assuredness, certainty. This small band of frightened, vulnerable followers don’t have much. In their own strength and resources, they have very little in the face of fear and evil. But they have a risen Lord, a Saviour who has destroyed death, and in Galilee they would see him again.
Some 2,000 years on, we also need a message of hope. We cannot see for ourselves the empty tomb. We do not see Jesus in Glenelg like the disciples saw him in Galilee. What we do see is sin and evil all around. We do not live under the oppression of the Roman Empire, but throughout the world the empire of man heartlessly rules with greed and exploitation, violence and terror. We live in a creation which is in bondage to decay and dying, and are ourselves are trapped in bodies of death. The troubles of life come to us each day. It is easy to see sorrow and brokenness, experience pain and suffering, and know fear and failure. Like the English waiting at home to hear the outcome of the Battle of Waterloo, and saw news of defeat when in fact there was victory, it often seems like we live in defeat and failure, under the gloom of evil and death.
But we have hope. Not a vague wish, or even dreaming of possibilities of better outcomes. Christian hope is expectation because we have certainty and assuredness that what we hope in and what we hope for has already happened. All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Jesus. There is nothing in all creation that can limit him or stop him—not even time and space, or a stone tomb, or death itself. Jesus has risen, and so death is the final enemy to be destroyed. The writer to the Hebrews said: “But faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see” (Hebrews 11:1).
Our certainty and confidence comes not from what we see, but from what we hear. Like the disciples on the morning of the resurrection, we too have heard the message of Good News, that though Jesus died, three days later he is risen.
On the morning of the resurrection the women and the disciples saw the risen Christ. We can’t see him today, but when we listen to him, we can be sure he is here with us, for us. For the last words of Matthew’s Gospel are Jesus’ own words. That’s fitting, because in death and life, Jesus will have the last word. He says: “I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
The resurrection of Jesus is not just a past event in history. Nor is it a hope for our future. The resurrection of Jesus is also for the purpose of bringing blessing now. “I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
On Friday there was great disappointment for the disciples, as Jesus groaned words from the Cross before he gave up his spirit: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” He was forsaken so that we would not be forsaken. We are not alone. On Sunday the risen Christ says: “Surely I am with you to the very end of the age.”
On the morning of the resurrection the women went to the tomb expecting the body of Jesus to be there. But he had already risen. New life takes place even when we don’t see it, or don’t expect it, or don’t think it can happen. It’s why Paul could say “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” Galatians 2:20 NIV
Jesus is with you in all things. He lives with you, and has made his home in you, to bring his abundant life and resurrection power to work in our bodies of death. And so he is with you in your joys and sorrows. He is with you in your achievements and your failures. He is with you in good health and in your pain and sufferings. He is with you in times of peace and times of fear. He is with you in life and in death. And he is with his faithful people even beyond death. He is not only with you until the end of your life, but with you until the very end of the age, that time when he will come again to judge the living and the dead. On that day we will finally see that which we cannot now see, but only hear with our ears and believe.
On that day your tomb will be opened and left empty, as Jesus raises his holy people from death, even as he himself was—every molecule, every hair follicle, every cell of your body—nothing will be lost but only made new as we will all be changed in the twinkling of an eye.
Until that day, he is with you. He is here for you, the unseen bishop and overseer of your souls, continuing his ministry for you. He is here for you in water and word, bread and wine, giving you his holy body and precious blood poured out from the Cross, that his resurrection power may also go to work in you, and strengthen you in body and soul to life everlasting. Every time you come to his table and eat and drink, you also witness of his resurrection to others. For every time you come to his table to eat his holy body and drink his holy blook, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes. Amen.
Pastor Tim Ebbs
St Paul’s Lutheran Church Glenelg
Easter Sunday, 2026
[1]Cathcart, Brian ‘Why news of victory at Waterloo took three days to travel 250 miles to London’ https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/why-news-of-victory-at-waterloo-took-three-days-to-travel-250-miles-to-london-1.2195595 last accessed 4/4/26 9:50pm
