Easter Sunday

Easter Sunday John 20:1-18

This day we call Easter, is a great occasion arriving only once each year. It is the apex of all Christian celebrations. We have so much to feel good and joyful about as we celebrate Easter Sunday. Our manifested itself almost 2020 years ago. Jesus walked the earth, taught many, performed miracles, was crucified. Died, was buried and on the third day (Easter) he rose from the dead that Christians can enjoy eternal life. We can finally proclaim, “Alleluia, Christ is risen. The Lord is risen indeed, Alleluia!” In the light of this proclamation, I bid to all of you, praise continually.

I recently considered what words would bring our Lord the most Honor and Glory on the day of his second birth., “Perhaps just telling the story is enough.” I thought, all the while thinking to myself, “but just telling the story isn’t enough.”

But this day, no matter how challenging it may be to say something about, calls for some reflection.

Part of a prayer of old reads: “….let the whole world see and know that things which were cast down are being raised up, and things which had grown old are being made new, and that all things are being brought to their perfection by him through whom all things were made, your Son Jesus Christ our Lord.” This prayer, in so many ways, captures the heart and spirit of Easter. Old things are dying and being transformed into new things. Things that are being cast down, are being resurrected or raised up. Change is in the air when God is involved. Old gives way to new. Death gives way to life. Without death, no life. The prophets wrote “there is a time be born and a time to die.” Easter is about the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, and about the triumph of eternal life over death. This is why this day and all that it represents is so important. With the resurrection comes new hope and unlimited possibilities.

We live in the time John wrote about concerning the end times. Just as the Lord spoke it John wrote it. High tech, fast paced, vast accumulated knowledge and world centered application is the rule of the day. We live in a world where religious institutions – the mainline churches – are numerically in decline. Growing churches, in many cases, are growing into a condition of apostate. As Americans, we are increasingly facing the realization that in a matter of a few decades we will probably no longer be the sole super power in the world – that there are other nations in the world that will pass us by economically, and drop off their chosen religion as they pass. The changes brought about by globalization, technology and the internet, are an accepted part of our cultural landscape. Our cue given in God’’s word is to watch for changes in technology, commerce, education, religion and education. These changes will move us closer to a one world people and the end as we know it. Christ came, died and raised up from the dead so that we could avoid the harrows of these days to come. We see people from all over the world increasingly rubbing elbows and living side by side. The grade schools have a huge enrollment in the ESL classes –in our local schools the debate over the inclusion of Islam as a religion to be considered in underway. Integration with foreign students is prolific. Cultural exchanges prepare for a ‘ONE” system. I doubt that people fifty years ago would have been able to see these changes coming. I suspect that we could add to this list as evidence that the world we live in is changing dramatically and quickly as we move toward the “end times.” Institutions that we took for granted at one time are being cast down and others are rising in their place. Every where we turn, it seems that change is in the air.

But change is not simply relegated to the structures and institutions of our common life. We can see it in our attitudes, our expectations, and our assumptions, our plans and hopes. When we consider our gospel record of the life and death of Jesus, we can safely assume that the disciples and the women who followed Jesus were devastated by Jesus’ crucifixion. The loss of a friend and master, the hopes they had placed in him that he was the long awaited Messiah seemingly were crushed. But the discovery of an empty tomb that first Easter Sunday morning took them by surprise. Confusion was the order of the day. Mary Magdalene assumed somebody had removed the body. Peter entered the tomb first followed by the beloved disciple. We are told that the beloved disciple believed but neither he nor Peter understood what had taken place. Mary lingered at the tomb and in the midst of her tears as she peered into the tomb, she was startled to find two strangers sitting where the body of Jesus had been laid. But when she turned around, she was confronted by a third stranger she believed to be the gardener. We, however, know that this person washer son Jesus, and Mary realized it too when he called her by name. And after telling her to pass on the message, to his disciples, of his coming to them in Jerusalem after His ascension to the father, Mary hurried off to declare to them, “I have seen the Lord.” Mary delivered the first message ever preached. What was cast down that first Easter morning was the devastation of presumed loss of a friend and Lord, and the conventional wisdom that dead was dead, and what was raised up was a shocking realization that God had acted and that Jesus lived on. For Mary and the disciples, life would never again be the same. Everything was turned upside down. Isaiah wrote: “Behold, I am doing a new thing, Even now it is springing to light. Do you not perceive it?” The resurrection of Jesus will forever be a reminder to us that God is in the midst of all change bringing about the new. Old forms, old ideas, old ways of doing things will die and pass away, but God will always be there raising new things up in their place because He never changes.. It means that you and I can face the future with boldness and courage knowing that whatever happens, God is there. God is doing a new thing in the world around us. He is doing a new thing in our communities. He is doing a new thing in us. And as we live in to the change that is all around us, the newness that surrounds us, we too, like Mary Magdalene, can say to the world around us, “I have seen the Lord.” Know God, know peace. Amen 04-21-2019 BLL