Easter

Remembrance of Me

Abbie Smith — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 07:15:42 -0700

If Easter really happened, I may rest, allowed to loose my hands from the outcomes of this day, flying freely from an identity beyond my own. Hope of Glory now resides within, the wings of Christ, from which I can do nothing without.

If Easter really happened,
the Sacrifice is finished, my penalties paid in full.
Pain no longer goes without Counsel, nor suffering empathy’s Perfection.
Union no longer without Communion, nor the body apart from the soul.

If Easter really happened, the Savior says, Be still, my beloved, and cast your cares upon me.
My blood is your cleansing—my crucified body the Way to resurrected living.
Where you are weak, tired, inadequate and insecure, I seek you.
Where you are ashamed, unlovable, disappointed and lonely, I love you.
Where you are addicted, adulterous, guilty and greedy, I call you My own.
Where you are, I invite you, Into me, your Hope of Glory.
Where you are, beloved, forever there with you, I will be.

It is my utmost loss to live as if Easter didn’t happen,
For if Easter really happened
I am forgiven.
From all.
Forevermore.
With but a task of returning Home to such Love
as often as Grace should help me remember.

Christ's Love and the Blessing of Holy Saturday

Holly Ordway — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 21:06:35 -0700

Saturday in Holy Week – in between Good Friday and Easter Sunday, it seems like just a placeholder. Why then does the Church call it Holy?

On the Friday we call Good, our Lord laid down his life for us; went to the Cross in love, and there took on all the weight of the world’s sin, and death too, all for us. He died. His heart was pierced by the centurion’s spear, and blood and water poured out. His lifeless body was taken down, covered in blood and sweat, cradled in his mother’s arms, and then, hastily, wrapped up and placed in the tomb.

And there in the tomb he lay.

Jesus had done his work on the Cross – redeeming the world that God had made and called good, but that we had broken; calling all humanity to him, his arms outstretched on the Cross to draw all to himself. In six days, God made all of creation; on the seventh day He rested. And the Son, having done his work on the Cross, rested too.

Jesus came to fulfill the law in his own person, and so he did; to the last. In the tomb, on Holy Saturday, he rested – kept the perfect Sabbath rest, kept the Sabbath as no one ever did or ever could except the Son of God himself. For the Son kept the Sabbath in the perfect rest of death; utter passivity, complete helplessness, resting with absolute and complete trust in his Father who would raise him on the third day.

And so our Lord is with us to the very end of all things.

A couple of years ago, my priest gave me a book of meditations on the theme of prayer and pain. One of the passages that moved me deeply asked the question: do you see yourself as a feather floating in the air, or a stone at the bottom of a pool? My immediate connection was to the stone – a pebble, lying at the bottom of the well. And as I meditated on that image, I realized that I did not have to stay there; that Christ could, and did, reach down into that pool and draw me out, into the light. It was a good image, a helpful one, a reminder that there is no place so dark that my Savior cannot find me.

And yet it was only this Lent that I realized that my understanding of Christ’s love was far short of the reality. For if I imagine myself as that stone in the pool, and Christ reaching in for me, he is still “out there” apart from me, a great distance between us.

This Holy Week, I have been reading Malcolm Guite’s Sonnets on the Stations of the Cross, and quite unexpectedly there I found the image that brought home far more vividly the reality of Christ’s love for me.

In Sonnet IX, meditating on Jesus’ third fall as he carries the cross, Guite writes of the darkest and deepest fall of all, the fall into depression, where “there seems no rising and no will / To rise, or breathe or bear your own heart beat.” In that dark place, where there is no strength to hope – where there is not even strength enough to desire strength to carry on – despair is right there, deadly and desirable at the same time: “And you could almost wish for that defeat”...

Almost.

For it turns out that Jesus is not reaching down to help us from a place outside of our pain. He is here beside us. Beside me.

He knows what it is to be helpless, for he lay helpless in the tomb, that Holy Saturday. He knows what it is to trust entirely and absolutely to another, for so he trusted himself to the Father. He has been there; he knows the way.

In that place of loneliness, I find that I am not alone; there is no need to wait for him to reach out, for he is already here with me. I may have no strength to reach up, no will to cry out, but I do not need to, for

...in the cold hell where you freeze

You find your God beside you on his knees.

-----

Read the whole sonnet sequence on Malcolm Guite’s blog. And you can listen to his reading of Sonnet IX here.

What is truth?

Matt Chapin — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 08:31:17 -0700

What is truth? This question the Roman Governor Pilate asked Jesus is just as relevant today as it was two thousand years ago. Pilate may have been replying in a sarcastic manor when Jesus stood before him claiming himself to be the truth, but it is a reality each of one of us must answer. What is the truth about Christ? As this is the week of Passover, Good Friday, and Easter, I want to help answer this question of who Jesus is by examining the last part of Olivet discourse found in Matthew 25:31-46.

Matthew 25:31-46 is a very popular passage these days. It is often used by social justice minded people calling attention to make provision for the “least of these” in society. Although this is a noble and important aspect of understanding this passage, it would be better to make this a secondary point of application. The primary point of this passage is to ask what are the requirements for entrance into God’s kingdom?

The reason this is the primary question the passage raises is because of its conclusion. By the end of the story, Christ, has divided and separated the sheep and goats based on their treatment of him. The goats “will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life” (Matthew 25:46).

Prior to this passage, Christ illustrates his authority as the one who administers justice in four parables. They are the parable of the faithful houseowner, the wise servant, the ten virgins, and the talents. (see Matthew 24:42-25:31) These parables develop a three-fold theme of an authority figure, who then judges the attitude of his subjects, and issues the consequences of his judgment.

In these parables Christ plays the role of the judge, or person having authority, and his judging is based on what the attitudes of the people were to his message. Was the message received and taken seriously or was it ignored and treated indifferently? The consequence and point of division is how the individual treated the message. If received there was blessing, if it was not they were without hope.

Jesus teaching on the sheep and the goats carries the same three-fold theme found in the previously mentioned parables. This is a great parallel to what God had prophesied through his prophet Ezekiel nearly six hundred years before Christ was born. Here God gives to Ezekiel the mark of what the true shepherd would do. “I will search for the lost and bring back the strays. I will bind up the injured and strengthen the weak, but the sleek and the strong I will destroy. I will shepherd the flock with justice” (Ezekiel 34:16). Also, “I will judge between one sheep and another, and between rams and goats” (Ezekiel 34:17).

Jesus not only confirms himself as the true shepherd at the conclusion of this discourse, but he also calls himself King and the Son of Man. Jesus is the King as Matthew’s genealogy establishes in the opening chapter of his book, and he’s the Son of Man as one who identifies with us and reveals his incarnation.

When I was a teenager there was a popular song by the Indigo Girls called “Closer to Fine”. Their lyrics reflect the heart of our relativistic age when they sing, “there’s more than one answer to these questions pointing me in a crooked line…..And the less I seek my source from some definitive the closer I am to fine.” I have to admit I use to like the song because it was so catchy and innocent sounding, but the philosophy could not be more wrong.

Jesus Christ is the most true reality there is, who does not point anyone in a crooked line. He makes the crooked path straight, and is the truth, and the life. “For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him” (John 3:17). This Easter hopefully you are encouraged by the reality of who Christ is because you believe, and if you are not encouraged I hope this gets you to think more about Christ’s claims and what they mean for you. Truth can be known, because it has been revealed.

Shadow and Light: Thoughts on Route to Easter

Holly Ordway — Mon, 18 Apr 2011 18:49:31 -0700

Five long weeks of Lent, and yet one more, as we move through Holy Week toward the events of Easter. Why observe Lent? And why so long, when it seems so very long, these five weeks and more of a bare, unadorned church, of the disciplines of self-denial and self-examination?

Lent is indeed too long – too long for me to go on my own strength and resources. It is long enough for me to feel the initial enthusiasm of self-discipline, and past it, the weakness of failure. Lent is long enough for me to see my own weakness. Long enough to say, What’s the point? Why keep struggling on?

Lent cuts through our too-quick assurances of peace and joy; forces us to recognize that the pain of the world, and our own pain, cannot be salved by a cheery Bible verse or a hearty exhortation to rejoice. The brokenness of our world and the needs of the human heart run deeper than that.

When the shadow is upon me, promises of blessing and joy seem unreal, as if seen through a haze or muted by distance. When the future is unknown and uncertain, words of hopeful encouragement seem nothing but trashy trinkets; in the shadow, diamonds’ luster is dulled, and seems rather the cheap glitter of rhinestones. I cannot do, or be, all that I feel called to; I am incomplete, broken. What then?

Lent is long enough to remember Our Lord falling as he carried the Cross, and getting up again, and continuing on his way. Yes, on the way toward the Resurrection, but first, on his way to Golgotha, and a terrible death on the Cross.

Lent points toward Easter, but it takes us on a journey first. We begin with Ash Wednesday, and then journey through the wilderness, day after day, just as our Lord spent those forty days in the desert being tempted of Satan. And Lent brings us to the doorstep of Easter – Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, all steps leading up to Sunday.

First, Maundy Thursday; “Maundy” from the Latin “Mandatum,” meaning “command”- a reference to Jesus’ words at the institution of the Eucharist: “Do this in remembrance of me.” The entrance to Easter, Maundy Thursday reminds us that we are called to obedience. And called to obedience first – before we have the reminder of joy, on the day before Good Friday, a reminder that the way of Christ is the way of the Cross.

What does our Lord command us to do? He tells us, makes it simple for us: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and mind and strength, and your neighbor as yourself.” Our Lord calls us to love others as he loves us: desiring the good of the other above our own good.

Lent is long enough to try to love others as Christ loves us. Long enough for me to convince myself for a little while that yes I can do it, that indeed I do love others with that unconditional and self-sacrificing love. To convince myself that indeed I am putting all my hopes into God’s hands with simple trust, and that I love Him and have confidence that He will provide for me.

Lent is long enough to break that too. I find that what I thought was self-sacrificing love still has its jealousies, its envies, its fears, so that even that which is good and true is wrapped round with the disreputable tatters of self-will. Even when I think I have put all in God’s hands, I find that I am clinging still. Lent is, in short, long enough for me to fail, and to recognize my failure; to be emptied out.

I do not like being emptied out.

It is, nonetheless, necessary.

Mary tells us, in that great song of praise called the Magnificat, that God has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent empty away.

To be filled, we must first be made empty, empty of all the things that we try to substitute for God’s grace.

Easter promises that we will be filled with that grace.

God’s grace; the renewal of our hopes by participation in the one, eternal sacrifice on the Cross, and the renewal of our life by participation in the eternal risen life of our Lord.

Without God’s grace, interrupting our world with the shock of the Incarnation and the scandal of the Cross, there would be no end to Lenten sorrow.

Without the glory of the Son’s self-offering on the Cross, his offering to the Father that is definitively accepted in the Resurrection, and without the gift of being drawn up, through the Son’s humanity, into that perfect sacrifice, there would be nothing but the ashes with which we began Lent: from dust we came, and to dust we shall return.

Lent is like a cleansing rain that, though it brings with it dark clouds and a chill downpour, refreshes the dry and cracked earth, making it ready for the new life and new growth of Easter. And this is the gift of Lent: we know it is but a season. Even as I reflect on the darkness of the season, the recollection of the Cross cuts through the shadow, and, dimly, a gleam of that uncreated light shines through.

Do You Believe in Miracles?

Stan Jantz — Mon, 18 Apr 2011 00:44:07 -0700

Miracles in the Bible—especially the miracle of the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead—are a problem for many people. To those who operate within a worldview of naturalism , a miracle is a violation of natural law (naturalism by definition excludes the supernatural). They don’t believe in miracles of any kind, most of all the resurrection.

The historical records of people seeing Jesus after the resurrection are meaningless to naturalists, because the events happened so long ago during a time when people were more prone to believe myths and fables. Of course, naturalists don’t have a problem believing in the existence of Julius Caesar, probably because he never performed any miracles.

Deists don’t go much for miracles either. Thomas Jefferson famously removed all the miracles from the New Testament and published what is known as The Jefferson Bible, or The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth. His goal was to present Jesus as a great moral teacher, without the miracles or the resurrection.

But as C.S. Lewis points out, Jesus doesn’t leave us the option of considering him a “great moral teacher” and then leaving it at that, precisely because His claims regarding his deity were so extravagant. Lewis writes, “He would either be a lunatic—on the level of the man who says he is a poached egg—or else he would be the Devil of Hell. Either this was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse.” 1

Even some theists would rather not bother with any “proofs” for miracles because they don’t consider them convincing. They would rather accept the miracles and the resurrection of Jesus by faith without any corroborating evidence.

So what do we do with the miracles in the Bible, particularly the miracles Jesus did? Can you prove they really happened? And can we appeal to miracles to argue for the existence of God and Jesus? We can, but we have to be smart about doing it. According to the philosopher Doug Geivett, when offering a defense for miracles and the life of Christ, it’s not a good idea to put a lot of weight on just one kind of evidence (in this case, miracles) for the simple reason that it’s hard to overcome “worldview commitments” people have that exclude supernaturalism.

That’s why Geivett offers an approach that may stimulate your own thoughts about miracles and the supernatural. Start with the probability that God (who is supernatural) exists, and then look for anomalies (another word for miracles) that cannot be explained naturalistically (such as the resurrection of Christ). If you start with the premise that God exists, you can then proceed to the idea that miracles are not only possible, but exactly what you would expect from a supernatural being.

And think about this question: If a supernatural being wanted to reveal Himself to His created beings, would He not do so in the form of miracles, which are by definition supernatural events? When you look at miracles in this way, Geivett writes, they act like a kind of “divine signature, confirming God’s actual sponsorship of a particular revelation claim.” 2

Does this mean we should expect miracles in our own lives? Lewis doesn’t think so. In his book, Miracles, Lewis writes, “God does not shake miracles into Nature at random as if from a pepper-caster. They come on great occasions: they are found in the great ganglions of history—not of political or social history, but of that spiritual history which cannot be fully known by men. If your life does not happen to be near one of those great ganglions, how should you expect to see one?” 3

Lewis has a point. Certainly I’ve seen things that can’t be explained naturalistically—the healing of a friend from cancer, the timing of an event that could never have been manipulated—but are these really miracles, or are they simply demonstrations of God working through natural means to accomplish His purposes?

Perhaps we are too quick to call something a “miracle” when it is in fact a normal outpouring of God’s sovereign work in the world. On the other hand, I’ve heard eyewitness accounts of miracles more on the order of what happened in the Bible. In fact, these are consistent with what Lewis says about miracles being found around “heroic missionaries, apostles, or martyrs.” If we were any of those, writes Lewis, “it would be a different matter.”

I suppose it would be exciting to witness a miracle of biblical proportions, but I’m okay if I never do, for two reasons. The first reason is that the most significant miracle in history—the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead—is as real as to me as anything I could see with my own eyes because both the external evidence and my internal experience are real.

The second reason I’m okay if I never witness an actual miracle is because, as Lewis points out, martyrdoms tend to follow miracles. Maybe that’s why God is pretty selective when it comes to miracles. He knows only a few people can handle them. I for one don't know if I could.

1 C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996), 56.

2 R. Douglas Geivett, “The Evidential Value of Miracles,” in In Defense of Miracles, ed. By R. Douglas Geivett and Gary Habermas (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1997), 179.

3 C. S. Lewis, Miracles (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1969), 174.

President Obama on Easter and his "Risen Savior"

Christian Buckley — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 19:39:32 -0700

One of the things I HATE...YES HATE...is when we think we know something that we really have no idea about.

I HATE that conservatives love to HATE Obama and consider him the end of America.

I HATE that liberals HATED Bush and considered him the end of America.

On those notes, a friend of a friend attended President Obama's Easter Prayer Breakfast on April 6th and sent his speach along for me (and others) to read. You can read it if you want at the White House Press Page, but I thought I would post some very interesting chunks.

I don't know that I like Obama and I don't know that I don't. But I do know that much of what he said is down right true and frankly not even being said (let alone) preached by many of the people who should know better...

...today, I’m particularly blessed to welcome you, my brothers and sisters in Christ, for this Easter breakfast.
...I wanted to join you for a brief moment today to continue the Easter celebration of our risen Savior, and to reflect on the work to which His promise calls all of us.
...For even after the passage of 2,000 years, we can still picture the moment in our mind’s eye. The young man from Nazareth marched through Jerusalem; object of scorn and derision and abuse and torture by an empire. The agony of crucifixion amid the cries of thieves. The discovery, just three days later, that would forever alter our world -- that the Son of Man was not to be found in His tomb and that Jesus Christ had risen.

We are awed by the grace He showed even to those who would have killed Him. We are thankful for the sacrifice He gave for the sins of humanity. And we glory in the promise of redemption in the resurrection. And such a promise is one of life’s great blessings, because, as I am continually learning, we are, each of us, imperfect. Each of us errs -- by accident or by design. Each of us falls short of how we ought to live. And selfishness and pride are vices that afflict us all. It’s not easy to purge these afflictions, to achieve redemption. But as Christians, we believe that redemption can be delivered -- by faith in Jesus Christ. And the possibility of redemption can make straight the crookedness of a character; make whole the incompleteness of a soul. Redemption makes life, however fleeting here on Earth, resound with eternal hope.

Of all the stories passed down through the gospels, this one in particular speaks to me during this season. And I think of hanging -- watching Christ hang from the cross, enduring the final seconds of His passion. He summoned what remained of His strength to utter a few last words before He breathed His last breath. “Father,” He said, “into your hands I commit my spirit.” Father, into your hands I commit my spirit. These words were spoken by our Lord and Savior, but they can just as truly be spoken by every one of us here today. Their meaning can just as truly be lived out by all of God’s children.

So, on this day, let us commit our spirit to the pursuit of a life that is true, to act justly and to love mercy and walk humbly with the Lord. And when we falter, as we will, let redemption -- through commitment and through perseverance and through faith -- be our abiding hope and fervent prayer.

Now What?

Chris Tomlinson — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 09:34:30 -0700

Good Friday and Easter combine to create an emotional roller coaster of faith packed into a single weekend. Reflection upon Good Friday can bring darkness, conviction, grief, introspection, gratitude, and worship. And reflection upon Easter can bring wonder, fear, faith, hope, exhilaration, trembling, and deep joy. These days are two sides of a single coin of faith, one rooted in belief in a God who holds power over sin and death, for our sake and His glory.

But the depths and heights of these emotions cannot be sustained over life’s journey; there are plains among the valleys and peaks. This is why we remember these things regularly in communion, preaching, and days of remembrance. So we may find ourselves wondering how we should continue in Christian living following a weekend of such magnitude.

But we don’t need to wonder for long when we have God’s word to guide us. As disciples of Jesus today, we can always look back to His first disciples as examples of what to do, and what not to do, in the weeks following Holy Week. Although we have the benefit of hindsight to know how the story ends, we can still find ourselves in their sandals in many ways. As we consider their example, we may find ourselves:

1. Worshipping Jesus. “And behold, Jesus met them and said, ‘Greetings!’ And they came up and took hold of his feet and worshipped him” (Matthew 28:9).

Truly understanding and believing that Jesus rose from dead will lead to worship, for there is no one in heaven or on earth like Him.

2. Dealing with slander. “[The elders] said, ‘Tell people, ‘His disciples came by night and stole him away while we were asleep’’” (Matthew 28:13).

Easter may arouse worship among followers of Jesus, but it may also arouse ridicule from scoffers and skeptics. We are a strange people, orienting ourselves around a God-man who is said to have risen from the dead, and the folly of the cross creates disbelief in the power of the resurrection. Sometimes, even those closest to us may grieve our hearts as they mock the roots and object of our faith.

3. Doubting. “So the other disciples told [Thomas], ‘We have seen the Lord.’ But he said to them, ‘Unless I see in his hands the mark of the nails…and place my hand into his side, I will never believe” (John 20:25).

Faith doesn’t erase all doubts; it erases our penalty for sin. We are not a perfect people when we first believe, and God will grow us into Christ-likeness in a thousand different ways. Those among us who are skeptics at heart may find ourselves reflecting on Holy Week and asking ourselves, “Do I really, actually, truly believe this story?” When we encounter these kinds of questions, it’s good to ask Jesus to meet us in our moments of doubt. After all, He did not scold Thomas; he came wounded, inviting him to believe.

4. Finding wonder in the word. “They said to each other, ‘Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the Scriptures?’” (Luke 24:32).

The Scriptures are a limitless mine for amazement at the majesty of God in weaving a narrative across geography, people, time, and genre into a tapestry that reveals a detailed portrait of Jesus. Studying this word, meditating on it, memorizing it, hiding it in our hearts are gateways to wonder.

5. Receiving a commission from Jesus. “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you” (Matthew 28:19-20).

“[Jesus] said to [Peter], “Feed my lambs…tend my sheep…feed my sheep…follow me” (John 21:15-17, 19).

The Great Commission is for the Church, and as members of that Church, it is for us. But we’re also part of one body, and each of us has a specific role to play, so our means for fulfilling the Great Commission may look different from one another. Being close to Jesus will bring us our own small commissions to do this or that and follow Him.

6. Going back to work. “Simon Peter said to them, ‘I am going fishing…’ When Simon Peter heard it was the Lord…he threw himself into the sea [and swam to shore]” (John 21:3, 7).

There’s a kind of joy that comes from the brokenness of Good Friday and a kind of joy that comes from the hope-filled wonder of Easter. But then there is Monday, and Tuesday, and Wednesday, and the next week, and the week after that. The routine of life soon reemerges to confront our time of reflection. But Jesus will show up in the midst of our daily routines, and we do well to throw ourselves into His presence as He reveals Himself to us.

So what do we do after Holy Week? We continue our mission of being and making disciples of Jesus, living in community with one another, confronting our fears and doubts with the power of the word, being firmly rooted in faith that is made possible by God’s work on the cross, in hope made possible by God’s work in the tomb, and in love that is expressed by daily obedience to the word of Christ. We honor the glory of Christ in celebrating His death on Friday and His resurrection on Sunday, but we also honor Him in our daily steps of obedience on Monday.

Resurrected Jesus, Resurrected Us (5 Days in 4 Gospels: Bonus Easter Post)

John Barry — Sun, 04 Apr 2010 06:00:00 -0700

When Jesus is resurrected, we are resurrected. He overcame death, so that we may do the same. He died so that we may live sinless lives, not go on sinning. With Jesus, we can be restored to right relationship with God. We can be new creations.

Here’s the back story: Resurrected Servant Prophesied.

“Yet Yahweh was pleased to crush [the servant]; he afflicted [him] (with sickness). If [Zion or Jerusalem] places his life a guilt offering. He will see offspring, he will prolong days and the will of Yahweh in his hand will succeed. From the trouble of his life he will see light. He will be satisfied” (Isaiah 53:10–11, my translation).

Here’s the front story: Resurrected Jesus.

“But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they went to the tomb, taking the spices they had prepared. And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel. And as they were frightened and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to them, ‘Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen. Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, that the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified and on the third day rise.’ And they remembered his words, and returning from the tomb they told all these things to the eleven and to all the rest. Now it was Mary Magdalene and Joanna and Mary the mother of James and the other women with them who told these things to the apostles, but these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them. But Peter rose and ran to the tomb; stooping and looking in, he saw the linen cloths by themselves; and he went home marveling at what had happened” (Luke 24:1-12, ESV).

Here’s the now story: Resurrected Us

“Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father [so that] we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his” (Romans 6:4–5, ESV).“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ [they are a] new creation. The old has passed away, behold the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself” (2 Corinthians 5:17–18, ESV, adapted).

May Jesus resurrect our lives. May our suffering servant make us new creations.

The Cross and the Tomb: Easter

Holly Ordway — Sun, 04 Apr 2010 00:00:00 -0700

“Now, if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him” (Rom 6:8). We have died with Christ; we have suffered the agony of our sin that He carried for us on the cross; we have failed Him, fled from Him, come back in shame and sorrow to kneel beside His tomb.

And then – into the darkness of Holy Saturday shines the light of Easter. An empty tomb. Shock, fear, awe, joy. “He is not here, for he has risen” (Mt 28:6).

Now, only now, can we raise our voices in praise with Paul: “We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him” (Rom 6:9). Christ is risen – not a legend, not a hope, not a spirit, but the Son of God in new, strangely transformed life, the firstfruit of the new creation.

Christ is risen! And that changes – everything. “For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus” (Rom. 6:10-11).

Christ is risen! How can we sing out loudly enough to convey the joy, the utter and earth-shaking joy of those words? It is the pivot-point of history. It is the sure foundation for everything in our life and work and worship. It means that Jesus is the world’s true Lord – that Jesus, and not Caesar, is God. Christ is risen! How can we find language to carry that meaning?

One poet, Gerard Manley Hopkins, comes closer than any other in capturing the mingled awe and joy of the Resurrection – perhaps because Hopkins was, like the Lord he served so faithfully, a man well acquainted with grief and troubles. Hopkins writes:

…the Resurrection,

A heart’s clarion! Away grief’s gasping, joyless days, dejection.

Across my foundering deck shone

A beacon, an eternal beam. Flesh fade and mortal trash

Fall to the residuary worm; world’s wildfire, leave but ash:

In a flash, at a trumpet crash,

I am all at once what Christ is, since he was what I am, and

This Jack, joke, poor potsherd, patch, matchwood, immortal diamond,

Is immortal diamond.

Christ is risen! The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

The Cross and the Tomb: Holy Saturday

Holly Ordway — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Jesus is dead. Say it again: Our Lord is a lifeless body, wept over by a few women, his friends having scattered. Darkness lies over the land. We can imagine the disciples, on that terrible Saturday, puzzling over what seemed to be shattered hopes. “We had hoped,” Cleopas would say a day later on the road to Emmaus, “that he was the one to redeem Israel” (Lk 24:21). Is this what the vindication of Israel looks like? Is this what the Kingdom of God looks like? Or is it what it seems to be – shame, death, defeat?

What is there to do? Perhaps only to give up. Yet not everyone had abandoned Him. In the waning hours of Friday, a few stayed faithful, even if it was a faith without hope. Joseph of Arimathea, a man “looking for the kingdom of God,” did what he could, even if it was pathetically little. “This man went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. Then he took it down and wrapped it in a linen shroud and laid him in a tomb cut in stone, where no one had ever yet been laid… The women who had come with him from Galilee followed and saw the tomb and how his body was laid. Then they returned and prepared spices and ointments.” (Lk 23:51-56).

A bitter, sorrowful obedience. Not a joyful anticipation of the Resurrection, for we know that they did not understand. The world shook at the moment of the Lord’s death, but then it seemed to go on just as always. Shouldn’t the world have paused, with the Son of God lying dead in the tomb?

We have to go through Good Friday to get to Easter. But we also have to go through Holy Saturday. The time of waiting: time to let the significance of His atoning death seep in; to face the sins that sent Him to the cross.