My Easter Sunday sermon is one that I both look forward to writing with great anticipation and that I dread as well. I look forward to writing and preaching it because Easter is the most important day of the year for Christians. It is the day on which we celebrate that event that is the very foundation of our identity; the day on which Jesus was resurrected from the dead; the day when God triumphed over death; the day on which life and love had the final word, not death.
Beginning in January with Epiphany we have been focusing on the light of Christ. During Epiphany we watched as the light of Christ grew as we followed the stories of Jesus’ birth and his life when he walked on this earth. Then during Lent we watched as the light of Christ was slowly diminished, was slowly put out until with the death of Christ the light was put out completely. For this is what the world tries to do. The world tries to put out that light of Christ the light of God. That is why Jesus was put to death on a cross.
The world crucified Jesus because his preaching, his teaching, his actions, every aspect of his life challenged the death-giving values of this world. The world said that the key to security and happiness is money, power over others, and possessions. But Jesus demonstrated to all who met him that the key to security and happiness is a relationship with God—the key to security and happiness is to love your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength and to love your neighbor as yourself. For this, the world killed him. For this, the world snuffed out the light that was Christ.
But, as Christians, we know that ultimately the world does not have the power to put out the light of Christ. The world cannot do away with God’s love. We can try, because God has given us free will, which means that we can choose to turn away from God. We can try as hard as we can to find security and happiness in money, possessions and power, but ultimately, in the end, God will prevail, the light can never put out. This is the foundation that our faith as Christians rests upon. This is the very source of our identity. This is what we are here today to celebrate this Easter morning. The light was not put out! The darkness did not prevail! Death has not had the final word! Life has triumphed! God’s love is more powerful than any worldly power! Alleluia, Christ is risen! The Lord is risen indeed, Alleluia! This is what Easter is all about and this is what I love to preach about.
And, this is also one of the most difficult Sundays of the year on which to preach, because resurrection is a hard concept for us to get our minds around. For us when someone we love dies, they are dead. We don’t see them again. They don’t come back to visit us as Jesus did with his followers. They are simply gone. If their bodies were buried, we could go and dig up their graves and find their bones even decades after they had gone from us. So, how do we get our minds around resurrection? We start to ask ourselves, could this amazing thing really have happened? I’ve never witnessed a miracle like this, so maybe those followers of Jesus so many years ago made the whole thing up. How are we to understand an event that is really beyond our very basic human understanding, an event that is outside of our human an experience, an event that is ultimately a mystery?
I’ll tell you what helps me to understand Jesus’ resurrection. Gardening. I love to get my hands in the dirt. I love to see things I’ve tended grow. I love to look at beautiful flowers and plants. And I am very glad that Easter falls in the spring in our part of the world. I am very glad that I live in a place that has four seasons. For it is the four seasons that help me gain some understanding of resurrection. I love raking leaves from a flower bed in the spring and discovering little green shoots and leaves pushing their way up through the soil. Plants that were dead and gone are back. As the sun shifts in the sky, and the days get longer and the soil begins to get warmer, these little plants begin to return to life. That which was dead begins to live again. For me, I feel as though I am witnessing the miraculous. You would think seeing this happen again and again, year after year, that this spring growth would lose its wonder for me, but you know what—it never does. Every year as I see the new life emerging, I understand again that life does triumph over death, death is not the final word, God’s love does prevail. Alleluia!
But, maybe you are not a gardener, so maybe this new life isn’t miraculous to you. So here is another amazing incidence from nature that might help you as you grapple with the idea of resurrection. I learned about this from a book called The Big Thirst by Charles Fishman. Did you know that the water coming out of the tap in your kitchen is over four billion years old and could well have been sipped by a Tyrannosaurus rex? All the water on Earth was delivered here when the Earth was formed, or shortly thereafter. The water around us is original equipment—it was included with the planet itself, in the first 100 million years or so. There is, in fact, no mechanism on Earth for creating or destroying large quantities of water. What we’ve got is what’s been here, literally, forever. That saliva in your mouth—four billion years old. That water in your water bottle—four billion years old. It was all created in another part of our solar system and arrived here in vapor form. And water is still being created in the part of our solar system that we call Orion’s belt.
There is a water factory there that is making the equivalent of all the water on Earth, sixty times a day. All the water on Earth, sixty times a day? Just think about that—all the oceans, all the seas, all the lakes, all the rivers, all the ponds—sixty times a day. That is water to infinity and beyond! That is where our water came from four billion years ago. That is where the water on your tongue started. There is no one on this planet that can create water and we can’t destroy it. It is for me truly miraculous and mind-blowing. It is an analogy for me of the death and resurrection of Jesus. It is for me another way of getting my mind around the love of God. Just as we can’t destroy our water, no matter how hard we try by dumping garbage and chemicals into it or by wasting it each and every day, the water cannot be destroyed. What has always existed always will exist.
This is exactly the same as God’s love, God’s light. We often seem to be trying our hardest to put out God’s light to prove that God’s love is limited and finite, but in the end no matter what we do and how hard we try God’s love continues to be infinite and we cannot put out God’s light. Those who killed the prophets in Israel couldn’t put out God’s light, those who killed Jesus couldn’t put out God’s light, and we, living in 2023 can’t put out God’s light. The light of Christ burns bright in spite of us all. This is what the resurrection of Jesus was all about. This is the foundation of our faith. This is why we are here this morning. This is why we celebrate Easter.
Alleluia, Christ is risen!
The Lord is risen indeed, Alleluia!
