By The Rev. Deacon Christine McCloudCome Holy Spirit: Touch our minds and think with them, touch our lips and speak with them and touch our hearts and set them on fire with love for you. In the name of the risen Christ who brings us life from the tomb. Amen.
"Why do you look for the living among the dead?" When the women left for the tomb on that first Easter Sunday morning they knew exactly what to expect -- or at least they thought they knew what to expect when they arrived at the tomb. Luke tells us in the Gospel that they carried spices with them that they had prepared. As was their custom, they were coming to carry out the task of anointing Jesus' body for final burial. At the end of their journey to the tomb, they fully expected to find the dead body of Jesus. We know of course what they will find -- but in their minds, they were going to the place of the dead. They were going to view Jesus in his death and not to rejoice in the glory of his Resurrection.
Sometimes, we gloss over details of the Resurrection story because we've already heard the story so many times. Let's be honest with one another, why waste time on the old news -- the unimportant details. Tom reminded us in his Good Friday sermon that there is a danger in skipping over the suffering of Jesus of the past three days and wanting to move right into the salvation part of the story. Oh, we're clear about Jesus' suffering, but we need to remember that those closest to him suffered too. Not the physically cruel suffering that Christ endured for our sakes, but nonetheless, a deep emotional suffering brought on by witnessing the crucifixion of the one that they loved deeply. But the Apostles and the women missed some important details that Jesus shared with them before he died. They were so busy living the life of salvation that Jesus offered them that they forgot that his suffering and death was going to be a BIG part of Jesus' message. They simply did not want to hear this part of the story -- these were the details they wanted to overlook and avoid.
"Why do you look for the living among the dead?" In our own ways, we too, look for the living among the dead. We don't look to the new life that is offered to us, but instead, we often look first to what is totally contrary to what God wants and wills for us. We know the story so well that we often miss the transformative power of the Resurrection that is ours to live into fully. I know, all too well for myself, how easy it can be to miss the message, to forget the essence of what the Resurrection can really mean for me on a deeply personal level. Why? Because I've heard the story; I know the ending and forget that I make a choice -- whether consciously or unconsciously -- to live into my fears, my anger, my own created sense of hopelessness instead of looking to the obvious -- the Risen Christ who is available to me, and you, every hour of everyday and not just during the Easter season.
When things go awry for us, most us run into our own tombs of fear, distrust and aloneness. Somehow, it feels safer to live into the darkness of our lives instead of living into the light of our lives. Again, I know all too well about personal tombs because I've been to my own personal tomb far too many times not to admit it. All of our tombs are built rather securely on the foundations of our fears and inadequacies, and it engulfs us and gives us a false sense of safety and a peculiar sense of comfort. But what do we really find in our tombs: utter emptiness. We spend endless hours and days looking for the living -- that would be US -- amid the emptiness and deadness of our lives.
Setting aside our reserved Episcopal nature for a moment, let's wrap our thoughts around this -- Jesus, my friends, LIVES! Now, I want you to say this with me, LOUDLY and with ASSURANCE. We seem to have such difficulty saying Jesus' name unless it's in the context of the liturgy. I want you to feel JESUS right now. JESUS LIVES! That's right. Jesus is alive, he is well and he is with us and he loves each and every one of us. He is here, right now at this moment in time, in this place, and at every other moment we invite him to be with us. Jesus comes to give us a new life, to pull us out of our personal tombs so that we can carry His light of life into the world. He calls us to be His Light in the world; to be the living among those who are the walking dead.
Our Risen Christ comes to take the deadness of our lives and transform them into new lives. It doesn't matter how bad or how good we think our lives are right now, Jesus is ready and willing to take our lives, resurrect them, and make them whole in the spirit of His love for us. St. Paul reminds us that we are invited to put our old self to death, the self that is enslaved by our fears, so that we might be raised with Christ into the fullness of God's eternal life. And our baptisms and the renewal of our baptismal covenant give us the opportunity to drown the oldness of our lives so that a newness of life can emerge in us.
And so, on this is the night we gathered in our collective darkness and waited for the light to emerge for us and in us. This is the night where we gathered with water to welcome Elissa, our newest member of the faith and to reclaim for ourselves our own baptismal covenant faith. This is the night of our own resurrections. We no longer need to fear our personal darkness or the darkness of the world. It is the night where all things are made new and where we are reminded that death did not have the final say after all.
As we leave this place tonight, let us remember that Easter is not just a single celebration or a season of 50 days. It is the starting point for us to always keep close in our hearts and minds that our God is the source of all life and liberation. That He is the one who leads us out of the land of darkness and chaos into a place of inner freedom and peace. That our God, who gives to us His son, Jesus Christ who redeems us through his glorious resurrection and makes us all new by giving us transformative life outside of our tombs.
Alleluia. Christ is risen. The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!
© 2007 The Rev. Deacon Christine McCloud
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