That eclipse of the sun, causing darkness to fall over the land, was certainly fitting, in response to the mourning and sorrow experienced by Jesus’ disciples, especially his Mother, who stood at the foot of the cross. The eclipse was also a fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies, such as Amos 8:9, which speaks of the sun going down at noon and the earth being darkened on a clear day. It appeared, for a moment that darkness had triumphed—that the violence of man overcame the goodness of God. The extent to which man would go to secure his power, his comfort, his ego. He would lie, conspire, manipulate. He would torture and slaughter the innocent lamb of God.
Yes, there for a time, it appeared that Good Friday was a victory, not for God, but for evil. It appeared that the eclipse that began with original sin in the Garden of Eden would last forever.
But, the eclipse has ended. The stone rolled in front of the tomb, has been rolled back to reveal that the tomb is empty. And easter celebrates a morning when light was so bright it blinded roman soldiers and burnt an image into a burial cloth—a morning when life triumphed over death, where truth trumped falsehood, when hope was victorious over despair, when faith championed doubt, when God put Satan in his place. Jesus Christ is risen today!
And the Easter proclamation is not a mere historical recollection but a living reality that continues to reverberate through the centuries. The resurrection of Christ offers new life, transformation, renewal, conversion, spiritual resurrection, to all who profess Him.
Old ways, which we have sought to cast aside during the season of Lent, make way for new beginnings. Easter means, “I will not let selfishness keep me from the generosity God wants from me. I will not let fear keep me from the courage God wants from me. I will not laziness keep me from the life giving endeavors God wants for me.” Pride and Envy, Lust and Sloth no more. It is time to live for purity, generosity, goodness, and peace.
For, the extraordinary news of Easter morning is that not only did Jesus Christ conquer death for himself. The good news is that he shares that victory over death and sin and despair and darkness and sin and evil with us. His victory is ours. He invites us to share in his triumph. If that is not extraordinarily Good News, I don’t know what is.
Now, I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty sure everybody in this Church could raise their hands in agreement, that there are periods in life that seem more like Good Friday than Easter Sunday. Periods of life filled with death and darkness. Periods of life when we wonder about life’s meaning, when we struggle with sickness or the death of someone near to us, periods of life when we seem stuck on a cross, or overwhelmed, like life has buried us in a tomb, when we struggle to find God amidst all the chaos and violence and evil in the world.
But, the message of Easter is that Good Friday does not get the last word. Easter Sunday does. Our faith in Jesus Christ allows us to be confident that evil and death do not get the last word, that there is truly nothing that can keep us from the love and life God wants for us. That his mercy endures forever and that God will always have the last word over Satan. So, if there is a part of your life, that still seems to be stuck in Good Friday, I invite you to ask Jesus very sincerely today, to enter that part of your life, to transform it. Ask him to come into that Good Friday broken relationship, that Good Friday doubt or confusion, that Good Friday sense of defeat. And to allow him to bring Easter Victory to your Good Friday sufferings.
The Easter Gospel also speaks to our experience of obstacles. In John’s Gospel this morning we hear how Mary of Magdala had come to the tomb early in the morning, while it was still dark, and saw the stone removed from the tomb. Mark’s Gospel includes the detail that as she and the other women made her way to the tomb to anoint the body of Jesus, she wondered “Who will roll back the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?” After all, the stone was heavy. It was large. It was truly a foreboding obstacle. It took several people to roll it into place.
What beautiful fervor, that Mary and the holy women, despite the obstacle, go to fulfill the duty of charity anyway. They could have stayed home. They could have dwelt on the enormity of this obstacle and stayed home. But they go anyway.
And they find the stone already moved, the obstacle has already been removed by God. The power of the resurrection was already at work.
And then, Mary ran. Mary ran and went to Simon Peter and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and told them of the empty tomb. Talk about overcoming obstacles in order to do the work of God! In first-century Jewish society, women were often marginalized and their testimony was considered less reliable than that of men. In many cases, their testimony was considered inadmissible. And yet she goes, and testifies. The power of the resurrection already animating her mind and heart and will.
The power of Christ’s resurrection is unleashed when we refuse to allow fear to keep us from doing God’s will.
Good Friday was not an obstacle for God’s will to be done, nor was the stone of the garden tomb. Nor were the social and cultural norms of his day.
Now there are certainly some social and cultural norms in our own day which want to keep the Church from spreading and continuing the saving mission of Christ.
Emphasis on personal autonomy over the sanctity of life, romantic permissiveness and the normalizing of perversion, relativism and moral subjectivism which denies the existence of truth—moral, philosophical, or theological.
And like Mary of Magdala, we cannot allow these dark forces to keep us from spreading the saving Gospel of Christ. God desires our freedom from spiritual, intellectual, and emotional bondage.
The fact that you are here today is a sign that God wants you to respond to an invitation to believe, and like Mary of Magdala, to become instruments of the Gospel. Unlike so many these days, you are here, which means God has already begun to move away some stones in your lives. The eclipse has already begun to wane.
So continue to allow the power of Christ’s resurrection to animate your lives every day. Don’t go back into the tomb and roll the stone in front of the light of God. Say yes to God every day. And every week.
The Early Christians celebrated every Sunday as a “little Easter”. They knew that without this little Easter every week, they’d be allowing those forces which conspired against Christ on Good Friday to have power over them; they were allowing excuses and fears to keep them from serving the Lord. So every Sunday for them was an opportunity open their lives to the Easter victory of Christ, to all Easter to resonate in their lives. And it is meant to be for us as well.
In just a few moments, we will renew our baptismal promises: our resolve to not be mastered by sin, by those immovable rocks, but that through the faith of the Church, we will seek Him who longs to be found, over and over in our lives. For He is Risen. Death couldn’t hold him. Unbelief and human cruelty couldn’t vanquish him. Politics can’t replace Him. Science can’t explain him away. The noise of the world cannot silence him. Perversion, selfishness, human weakness cannot keep him from being longed for.
For He was bound and now brings power. He was bruised and now brings healing, He was pierced and now eases pain, He was persecuted and now brings freedom, He was killed and now brings life. For he is Risen. Indeed, he is Risen. Alleluia. Alleluia. For the glory of God and salvation of souls.
No comments:
Post a Comment