Reflection for Easter Sunday

Easter means many things to us as Christians. It is too big a miracle to mean just one thing. Easter clearly means that Christ is risen. It means that Jesus has defeated death. Easter means that eternal life is real, that death does not end our life with God. That all who live and believe will never die.

But that stone being rolled away from the tomb – a detail recorded in all four gospels – tells us something else about Easter that I think is quite significant. The stone being rolled away tells us that Easter is also about the ways in which God removes obstacles in our life, those obstacles that try to keep us from God, and try to stop us from living the life that God has called us to live.

The joy we feel at Easter is not a passing joy, but rather a deep and radiant joy which comes from the Lord’s victory over sin and death, and we share in this joy through the very gift of baptism which is at the heart of our Easter liturgies. We believe that the Lord is risen and so the entrance antiphon to our Easter day Service proclaims the faith of the Church on this day; ‘I have risen, and I am with you.’ (Psalm 138). So, Easter is the time when we really learn to trust in the Risen Lord who accompanies us on the journey of life, just as he did with the disciples on the road to Emmaus when he helped the disciples to see how he is with them every step of the way.

The disciples on the road to Emmaus didn’t recognise the Lord immediately, something prevented them from seeing who it was they were speaking with, it was only at the moment of the Breaking of the Bread that they realised it was the Lord and they knew that what they felt when their hearts burned within them was the Lord’s presence. They gain the courage and the peace to be true disciples of the Lord and witnesses to His Resurrection.

When we gather at church on Easter day, it is a moment for us to appreciate all the Lord has done for us as we listen to the Scriptures and when we receive Him in the Eucharist. Like the first disciples on the way to Emmaus our hearts burn with love for what we have received when we truly know that the Lord is with us and like them, we are compelled to announce to others the joy of the Lord which is planted deep in our hearts.

Or to see it another way we are like the women who go early in the morning to the tomb and encounter the Risen Lord and go back to the disciples to tell them what has happened. Celebrating the Lord’s resurrection gives us confidence to proclaim to others, including those who sit with us in Church, what the Lord has done for us. Easter improves our capacity to trust in what the Lord is doing for us and compels us to be missionary disciples, men and women who share with others what we ourselves have received.

I love mornings. I will happily wake up with my alarm and bounce straight out of bed and thinking through the day ahead. Mistakes have not yet been made, ideas have yet to be tested, and nobody quite knows exactly how the day will pan out. It’s exciting, if we allow it to be.

The Bible is full of references to the morning, using this tangible, everyday occurrence to illustrate the refreshment and renewal that Christians believe is on offer through the presence of God. The book of Lamentations reminds readers that, “The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning”. Psalm 30 gives the encouragement that “Weeping may last for the night, but joy comes with the morning”.

Mornings, especially early ones, buzz with potential. Perhaps this is why Jesus embraced them, too. Luke’s gospel tells us that Jesus would preach in the temple “early in the morning”. Mark’s gospel similarly reports that Jesus would get up “very early in the morning, while it was still dark”, in order to pray. And, perhaps most significant of all, the resurrection of Jesus was discovered “at dawn on the first day of the week” (Matthew 28:1).

Easter Sunday is a time when Christians remember that the extraordinary, history–shaping resurrection of Jesus means a fresh start. A new day, filled with space for forgiveness, celebration and hope. The resurrection is the sign to all who wish to see it that death – in all its thievery and pain – is not the end, and that another reality is possible. As is often the case in life, this idea is perfectly summed up by the inimitable Nina Simone: “It’s a new dawn, it’s a new day, it’s a new life for me; and I’m feeling good”.

We humans have the tendency to grip happiness and positivity the moment it peeps out of the ground.  For good reason; we all want to look forward to something.  An NHS Manager described the desperation to put the bad past behind us as “banking something before it has ended” and that really, that is not the right thing to do.  I love BBC1’s ‘The Repair Shop’ but humans are not fixable as easily as a musical box or leather bag.  Our permanent state is fragile with the capacity to be broken.  Pain and exhaustion cannot be ticked off like another task on the ‘to do’ list.  Adopt Leonard Cohen’s thought – we’re all full of cracks, that’s how the light gets in.

C. S. Lewis writes in The Four Loves: “Man approaches God most nearly when he is in one sense least like God.”  The embodiment of that couldn’t be much more evident than in the nailing of a human to a make–shift wooden cross at Golgotha – meaning ‘skull’.  Some years I’ve sensed the sigh of relief amongst some Christians on Easter Sunday when Resurrection is celebrated and the weight of torture is behind, almost to the point of “let’s forget all that nasty stuff”.  A bit like our attitude to the pandemic at times.  But that’s not reality and nor is it particularly helpful for those still on crosses. 

R.S. Thomas reminds us –

When we are weak, we are

strong. When our eyes close

on the world, then somewhere

within us the bush

burns. When we are poor

and aware of the inadequacy

of our table, it is to that

uninvited the guest comes.

Easter is a short period of time when all of life’s long spectrum of experience is encapsulated – the darkest and most painful of experiences take place and can remain with us, while simultaneously hope and light filter through.  A theme expressed so beautifully by Annie Dillard, alluding to that dark Golgotha as being also home to hope, in Pilgrim At Tinker Creek: “Cruelty is a mystery…But if we describe a world to compass these things…then we bump against another mystery: the inrush of power and light, the canary that sings on the skull.”

Easter for me has always been a special time, in fact, it is my favourite time of the year. The days are getting longer, brighter, and hopefully a little warmer as we see the signs of new life around us. The promise of this new life echoes the glory of the resurrection which once again we celebrate with great joy. So, this truly is the day, which was made by the Lord, we rejoice and are glad!

May our celebration of Easter this year bring us the deep joy of knowing that through our baptism we are renewed in the love of Christ who suffered, died, and rose from the dead so that we may have life, life in abundance.