Alleluia! He is RISEN‼️🎉🙏🎶💥🎶🎉

Some thoughts and a short Easter sermon here.

On Not Seeing Yet Believing: today’s By the Way column in the Medicine Hat News

Bright Week is what the Orthodox Church calls the week after Easter. This week is Bright Week for us. What a lovely name! Last weekend the Risen Jesus beamed himself through a locked door to stand among his fearful disciples, showed them his wounds and they “rejoiced” (John 20.19-20). No kidding! Can you imagine? Talk about supernatural and radical rearrangement of paradigms! But Thomas missed it. When the other disciples told him about Jesus’ visit, he didn’t believe them and said he wouldn’t believe unless he got to see Jesus himself and touch his wounds (John 20.24-25). 

A week later Jesus beamed his Risen self through a locked door again so Thomas could see him and touch his wounds. Thomas then made one of the most important defining statements in the Bible about who Jesus really is when he said, “My Lord and my God! (John 20.28). Seeing must be believing. 

You might think that story and that statement by one who is probably the most famous doubter in history would have settled everything. Everyone would have been convinced and believed from then on. Highways, byways, cities, towns and villages would all empty into the Churches at least every Sunday morning to celebrate and to bear witness to God’s defining, eternal life giving and loving act: the Resurrection from the dead of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. 

But that’s not the way things turned out. During the original Bright Week not only was there astonishment, rejoicing, great joy, burning hearts, minds opened to the Scriptures, heart-felt worship and the receiving of the Holy Spirit, but there was also bribery, doubt, fear, disbelief, weeping, and people weren’t able to recognize Jesus (Mt 28, Mk 16, Lk 24, Jn 20-21). All of which continues to this day.

“Have you believed because you have seen me?” Jesus asked Thomas. “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe (John 20.29). That’s most of us who have come to believe today; people who have not seen like Thomas did and yet who have struggled to faith through adversities, temptations and the sin that clings so closely. After all, “Those who believe they believe in God,” wrote Spanish Basque author and philosopher Miguel de Unamuno, “but without passion in the heart, without anguish of mind, without uncertainly, without doubt, and even at times without despair, believe only in the idea of God, and not in God himself.” 

Coming to believe in all the fullness and resurrection glory of God in Jesus Christ is worth the effort. May your blessings be bright, indeed!

Gene+

Easter Empties: Thoughts and a Link Including a Short Easter Homily with Reference to John 20

Empty became an Easter theme for me over the last few years. Empty cross, empty tomb, often running on empty, myself, by Easter Sunday morning because of all the Holy Week activities, the intensified emotional and spiritual disturbances  that always seemed to brew up (the period leading up to Christmas was the same), and the, for me, often draining push to make the Easter celebrations as rich and full as possible. It was wonderful and fraught, exhausting and exhilarating all at the same time—rather like the lead up to opening night for a stage show. 

I can certainly relate to the following liturgical fragment some wag conceived on the subject: 

Amen. 

And today I also discovered another riff on the empty theme from Matt Marino's most excellent THE GOSPEL SIDE blog on Easter's Empty Promises—empty cross, tomb and burial clothes. Read it all here. 

Yesterday, presiding again at StB on Easter morning, I got to continue on the theme as follows: 

Jesus wasn’t in the tomb when Mary Magdalene went there early on that first day of the week while it was still dark. She thought someone had taken his body. She ran to tell Simon Peter and the other disciple. It must have been very disturbing, especially after what they’d all just been through in the previous week from hell. The tomb was empty.

In 2006, the Archbishop Of Uganda, the Most Rev. Henry Luke Orombi began his Easter Message like this (I’ve shared this before, but I love it, so I’m going to share it again):

When we are told the water tank for the Archbishop’s Palace is empty (which it often is!), we say, “That is not good.” When my wife, Mama Phoebe, discovers that the food store is empty, we say, “That is not good.” When my driver tells me that the fuel tank in my vehicle is empty, I say, “That is not good.” 

If you are like me, most of our associations with the word ‘empty’ are negative. We think, “empty is bad, and full is good.” 

Yet, Easter challenges that assumption, because it is an empty cross and an empty tomb that are central to our faith. The resurrection from the dead of Jesus Christ sets him apart from all other human beings throughout history and especially all other religious teachers. Buddha is dead. Confucius is dead. Mohammed is dead. Jesus and Jesus alone has returned from the grave, never to die again. Jesus is alive today! Empty is good!

Empty didn’t appear to be good to Mary in our Resurrection Gospel reading this morning. Mary Magdalene must have felt as if she was “running on empty” in a bad way as she ran to tell Simon Peter and the other disciple that Jesus was gone and the tomb is empty. Jesus wasn’t there (except he was, but they couldn’t see him yet). But Jesus is here for us now (except we can’t see him either). And then when Mary did see him, she didn’t recognize him (John 20.14). Amazing. She must have known him so well—every line on his face, every mannerism. He even spoke to her to ask her why she was crying and who she was looking for (John 20.15)—as if he didn’t know. She thought he was the gardener. She still didn’t recognize him. Until he said her name.

And suddenly, empty was good. Wonder of wonders, because the tomb was empty Jesus could fill the dark, empty void in Mary’s grieving heart with the goodness of his presence and she knew the empty tomb was a good thing; a very good thing, indeed.

“I have seen the Lord!” was the next thing she said to the disciples. Her heart was full. Empty, she had discovered, was good.

The tomb was empty because Jesus had conquered sin and death. The empty tomb means the world is full of the resurrection power of God Almighty. The tomb was EMPTY. Jesus is FULLY and wonderfully raised from the dead.

Jesus is here now. The tomb is still empty, so this church isn’t. No Christian church is. This church is full. Jesus fills it by his Holy Spirit. He just does, because he is God which means he is omnipresent, that is, he is everywhere at the same time. Not only that, he is omniscient, in other words, he knows everything—past, present and future. Jesus is also omnipotent, or all powerful. Those three attributes mean that Jesus can be fully present to everyone, everywhere, all the time, but especially in his church.

He is here. Like Mary, I might not recognize him. He might look like a gardener, or one of you, or like bread and wine, or like a church full of flawed people like you and me. “Now you are the body of Christ” wrote Paul to the Christians in Corinth, “and individually members of it.” (1 Corinthians 12:27 ESV) So are you. You and I are all the body of Christ, the Church, in the world and individually members of it. This is the best place in the world to look for Jesus and to listen for when he might say your name as he did for Mary. This is the best place in the world to bring our empty bits for him to fill with his Holy Spirit—this is the place to bring any of our empty, grieving hearts, like Mary’s, to be filled with the goodness of his presence in the worship and in the bread and the wine. If this is where Jesus is, this is the best place in the world to be as often as possible.

Alleluia! The tomb was empty. Empty is good. In Jesus, God the Father has made empty good enough to run on. Running on empty is good because of Jesus.

Eastertide: Running on Empty and Monotheistic Monotony

Another Easter come and gone. I always felt like it was a long run and  an uphill climb for a parish priest through Lent to Easter. There was some Easter running for Mary Magdalene, Simon Peter and John, too—read some more thoughts on the subject here.  

Then comes the joy and release of the lovely Eastertide easy peddling downhill run to Pentecost and summer. Downhill was good because, once Easter was done, I was often spent and would be running on empty for a few days. Running on empty isn't necessarily a bad thing, as it turns out. Christians have been running on the reality of that empty tomb for over two thousand years—more thoughts on that here. 

Monotheistic Monotony

I read somewhere that monotony could be a problem in clergy life. The same seasons, stories and readings year after year could wear a cleric down. Apart from the occasional worry about coming up with something new and original to say each time the cycle repeated itself, the repetition didn't bother me. When I first came out of seminary I was a little afraid I would have preached all I had to say in about six weeks. Once I realized just how endlessly rich and diverting the Scriptures are, I relaxed and enjoyed the mixture of reprises and new insights whenever they came.  

I came across some wisdom from GK Chesterton on the subject in a piece on the joys of knitting over at Her-meneutics recently: 

Children have abounding vitality… they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, “Do it again”; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. 

But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun; and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon.

It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we.

Lovely. Read the whole article here. 

On Being April Fools in Holy Week

April Fool’s Day falls in Holy Week this year. Next Wednesday. The day before the great Triduum of the church year—The Three Days—which begin with the evening Foot Washing and Eucharist on Maundy Thursday, through Good Friday, Holy Saturday and to Evening Prayer on Easter Sunday. It’s the pinnacle of the church year when Advent’s hope and expectation, Christmas’ wonders, Epiphany’s lights, Lenten and Holy Week sombreness finally deliver us, amazed, relieved and joyful, to the Resurrected Jesus Christ.

That April Fool’s Day is the day before is fitting because the word of the cross can, indeed, seem to be folly in so many ways, foolish and something to stumble over (1 Corinthians 1.18-25). Rotten, tragic, undeserved things continue to happen to people. God can seem so silent. Many of my prayers don’t seem to be answered in any way I can perceive.

And yet. Easter comes.

April Fool’s Day fell on Good Friday in 1988. A week before that my mother was healed of arthritis. It happened when I, a relatively new Christian and Anglican at the time, wrote a letter to my father, a Presbyterian, suggesting that he have the Anglican Vicar in the town in which Mum’s hospital was, go and pray for her. Not long afterwards I received a letter from my mother:

…the Vicar of Rotorua came the Friday before Good Friday about tea time on what had been one of my worst days. That morning I hadn’t been able to move without assistance—something I had feared so I was at an absolute low. He came and wheeled me down to our quiet room here at Queen Elizabeth and there in that lovely peaceful place he anointed me and after having had a short and moving little service with me reading the responses. I can’t describe the wonderful feeling of certainty and peace and knowing God’s presence. That feeling stayed with me for days—I slept that night as I hadn’t done for ages and the next morning I woke feeling so much better and since then I have had a steady improvement—so much so that I go home this Friday. I still have difficulty walking and will need a wheel chair for a while but I do better every day—and “I FEEL GOOD”—praise God. The aches and pains are under control—I’m so happy.

My mother was not an Anglican. The “little service” would have been strange to her. She was not healed completely, some pain and mobility issues continued, but she was healed enough so that she was soon playing the organ again at church and was able to dance at my brother’s wedding in 1989. It’s easy to think it foolish to expect such a healing at all, let alone when strangers are involved across denominations and so many miles. We all shared her happiness. We were amazed, relieved and joyful. It also happened to be the year my family and I went off to seminary.

And yet. Easter comes.

Collared: the Full Easter

My Easter and Christmas rig. Jude chose the shirt at The Vill-a-a-age, took the collar off and made provision for the collar studs (thank you, my dear). Bit over the top for normal wear for me. But then being raised from the dead is pretty well over the top, too. Worthy of a shirt with a little extra pizzazz. 

The cross was a gift from The Reverend John Falea of the Solomon Islands. We were class mates at seminary. Those are real dolphin teeth, the "beads" are shell money, the cross is turtle shell with mother of pearl inlay. John's father made it. Thoroughly appropriate for a gospel with sharp teeth that is an absolute treasure. Resurrection and Incarnation worthy wear, indeed. 

I have at least one dear Anglican priest friend whose "inner Pharisee" might stir at the sight of such clerical irregularity. But, since He really is Risen Indeed and a whole world of natural and rational rules and laws were broken in the rising, a little celebratory sartorial boundary pushing can't hurt. Besides, what can they do? Fire me?

One of these days I hope to write some more in my "Retirement and Things I Would, or Would Not, Do Differently" series about wearing clerical collars or not, among other things. I think I'll call it Collared: Confessions of an Introverted? Ordinary? Anglican Clergyman—or something like that. 

Jesus, Two Marys and All Us "Other Fellers": a short homily for Easter Sunday with reference to Matthew 28.1-10

Jesus is, as always, the main character in our worship and our Scripture readings; especially in this morning’s Resurrection gospel, along with two Marys. His is the story that defines us and it’s full of dramatic action. Suddenly a great earthquake (Mt 28.2), although with none of the destruction and loss of life that happens when we hear about earthquakes on the news these days—quite the opposite, in fact!—an angel of The LORD who looks like lightning comes down (Mt 28.2-3). Guards shake and become corpse-like (Mt 28.4). The two Marys, senses reeling, are told to go quickly and tell the disciples what the angel said: Jesus is raised from the dead (Mt 28.7) and has gone on ahead! They obey and go quickly, terrified and joyful, all at once. They run (Mt 28.8). Jesus meets them suddenly. “Greetings!” he says. “Don’t be afraid. Keep going and tell,” he says. And the Marys set off again.

What’s in it for people like you and me? Apart from delivery from sin and death and the promise of abundant and eternal life and everlasting felicity, I mean? Four things:

First, look at verse 7, Jesus IS raised from the dead. Fact. There is too much evidence to doubt that. Most of the disciples died violent, nasty deaths because they believed it. And I’ll remind you of erstwhile Baptist, now Roman Catholic, Professor of Philosophy, Peter Kreeft, who wrote: Christianity is the only major religion that requires belief in miracles. That Jesus supernaturally and miraculously rose from the dead is the main one.

Second, also in verse seven, Jesus went on ahead of the disciples. Jesus is always ahead of us, too. It’s like Jesus is the fastest checkers player in the world, someone said, it’s always our move. The smartest man that ever lived, wrote Dallas Willard. There were two thousand people at the field house on Good Friday and one hundred thousand for mass in St Peter's square today because of him. All we can ever do is follow someone like him in awe, adoration and obedience—hence our mission statement: to follow and enjoy Jesus Christ in worship and service so that everyone will come to know him.

Third, although dramatic earth-shaking encounters with angels who look like lightning are rare these days, I think Easter reminds us that they can and do happen. Look at verse nine. “Suddenly Jesus met them and said, ‘Greeting!’” (Mt 28.9) Jesus can still show up suddenly to say, “Hi!” in a healing or a word of prophecy. The two Marys show us how to behave when that happens. They go to him, approach him, get as close as they can to him, take hold of his feet and worship him. Then they go and tell everybody that he is alive.

Fourth, I like that there is the “other Mary” (Mt 28.1) in the story. It makes me feel as if I could be an “other” guy in the story, too. I could be an “other” Gene. It gives me a place in the story and its telling. You could be the “other” N and N and N and…in it, too. The story isn’t over. “Go and tell,” the angel of The LORD and Jesus said. The “other Mary” did. I suspect all us others are called to, too. Chosen as witnesses. It reminds me of Buddy Wasisname and the Other Fellers. We’re the other fellers—only we know who Buddy really is. You and I are here this morning because a whole host of “other fellers” were obedient to the call to go and tell, too.

Here’s another thing I like about this gospel reading this morning. It’s the beginning of the chapter which ends with the Great Commission. After Mary Magdalene and the other Mary did what they were told and told the disciples ‘…the eleven disciples also did what they were told and went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. 17 When they saw him, they worshiped him just like the two Marys; but some doubted. 18 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 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, 20 and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”’ (Mt 28:16–20)

You and I are called to be goers and tellers along with all the other fellers.

On Doing Holy Week Anglicanly: More on Retirement and Things I Would or Would Not Do Differently

The best Easters I’ve experienced have always followed a fully observed Holy Week. Palm Sunday, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday in Holy Week, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and The Great Vigil of Easter on Holy Saturday. I’m usually thoroughly weary by Easter Sunday morning, but does it ever light up. Taking the time to follow Jesus on his journey through that last week makes it real and rich. We don’t even do anything particularly creative. Just the liturgies as they appear in The Book of Alternative Services straight up and unadorned. It just works.

Lately, we’ve not observed the Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays. When we did—and they helped deliver the best Easters—we would do an early morning Eucharist on Monday with Evening Prayer and even Compline some years, followed by Morning Prayer on Tuesday morning, a Eucharist at noon and Evening Prayer, and then Morning Prayer and a Eucharist around supper time on Wednesday. We did it that way so as many people as possible could experience as many liturgies as possible. It was rich.

Maundy Thursday has always included foot washing exactly as laid out in the book. I’ve never organized anyone to come to have their feet washed before hand. Some always come. We’ve also provided a couple of stations for people to wash one another’s feet. It is so moving to see grandchildren washing their grandmother’s feet and vice versa—wives and husbands, friends. We acknowledge this day is so named because of Jesus’ new commandment (latin: maundate) to love one another. We give thanks for the institution of the Eucharist. Afterwards, the altar is stripped and all the decorations and colour are removed as the lights are extinguished. We depart in silence. It never fails to move me.

Medicine Hat Good Friday’s have always begun for me with the Evangelical Association service in the morning—an extroverted, high energy affair with close to two thousand souls present every year. To miss that out of Anglican liturgical sensitivity would be wrong, especially when I know I can also indulge my Anglican quietism in an hour of silent meditation on The Stations of the Cross in the church in the afternoon before The Celebration of the Lord’s Passion—again, straight out of the book. It’s quiet, holy and lovely.

And then The Great Vigil of Easter on Saturday. We do it at sundown. This year that means 822pm. We light the new fire, process into the darkened church behind the Pascal Candle. Candles are lit and the Exultet is sung as the church is redecorated with hangings and Easter lilies. We listen to lots of Scripture (thirteen readings!) telling the story of our Salvation, we baptize people or re-affirm our baptismal vows and we celebrate the Eucharist. Sometimes we roast marshmallows over a re-kindled new fire out behind the hall afterwards. It’s wonderful.

Finally, it’s Easter morning. Jesus Christ is risen today! Lively. Joyful. All the more luminous because of the quiet, darker days before.

I’m a soon to be retired Anglican priest and I’m okay.

From Behind Locked Doors: an Homily with Reference to John 20:19-31 for the Second Sunday in Easter, Year C

Didn’t they know it was Easter? Lenten fasting over. O joy, O joy! Not really. The week had been brutal. Jesus dead. Were they next? Would the ones that got Jesus come after them?

Then there was Mary with her “I have seen the LORD.” But she was so besotted with Jesus and so “emotional”! Not only that, Peter and John were behaving strangely. Just stories. People get stressed and they start imagining things.

No wonder the doors were closed and locked for fear.

Jesus got to them anyway.

19 “Peace be with you.” he said. 20 When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord.

Welcome to Eastertide—fifty days from the great Easter Resurrection Celebration to the Day of Pentecost on May 19th. Mystagogia is the word the ancient church used to describe what the period is for. A time to go deeper into the mysteries of what really happened and what God really did through Jesus, the Cross and the Resurrection.

Jesus started it when he beamed through the locked doors, gave them his peace, showed them his hands and his side.

It’s time to go deeper, Jesus was saying. Again, 21 “Peace be with you.”. And then, go. I am sending you. And he breathed on them and said, 22 “Receive the Holy Spirit. You are to be agents of my forgiveness in the world.

Thomas missed it. When the other disciples told him they had seen The Lord, Thomas said, “Right! Show me.” Eight days later, doors securely locked, Jesus beamed himself in again, wished them peace, and invited Thomas to check him out: touch me, look! Believe! 28 Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!” 29 Jesus said to him, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”

Which brings me to us. Like Thomas, we weren’t there either. We didn’t experience the events ourselves—we’re at the other end of history. Many of our doors are closed, if not locked—for fear, fear of what others may think of us if we get into all this too much, or fear that God might really call us to do something we don’t want to do. Fear is a factor for most of us in some way or another—our doors are locked by comfort, routine, not having experienced many, or any, of the supernatural signs we read about; we don’t expect Jesus to beam himself through our doors at church, at home, or any where else any more.

Well, Jesus is here, folks. He’s certainly been beaming through my doors and I’ve been trying to believe and obey, and trying to encourage you to do the same as I’ve prayed for revival and spoken to you about the Holy Spirit Jesus breathed on his disciples. I’ve tried to put more energy into the people Jesus is sending you and me to serve as agents of his forgiveness than into ourselves and our comfortable set up here. I want be a Go-er, not a hider-behind-locked-doors.

The breath of Jesus released the Holy Spirit in those disciples and transformed them. His breath is doing the same for us. This Eastertide we have an opportunity to go deeper, to enter into the Mystagogia, to continue to the process Jesus started behind those locked doors. It starts on Thursday night at 7 in the hall. Ed and Carmen Codding are leading a 5 week, Eastertide, course called “Hearing God’s Voice.” In the Parish Life, “a practical course for..

In their bio, Carmen and Ed describe themselves as just a couple of ordinary people whose lives were changed by an encounter with Jesus in 1991.  Then they discovered that God communicates personally though Scripture which altered their lives again.  As the years went on they realized that God was speaking to them through others, circumstances, dreams and "coincidences", but did not know how to separate ordinary experiences from God experiences.  In 1998 their questions were answered through a series of teachings about "Hearing the Voice of The Lord" by Godspeak International.  Some changes in their lives as He spoke to them were opening their heart and home to the needy, a much earlier retirement than planned and four years on the mission field of Malaysia.  One of their greatest joys is facilitating others to recognize His voice and seeing their joy and surprise as He speaks to them.

The first session is called, ARE YOU QUALIFIED FOR MINISTRY? The answer, of course, is no. None of us are, but think about this: the people Jesus chose to send as his agents and ambassadors, were lacking in faith and weak in prayer, they lacked understanding of some of the basic teachings of Jesus, were stingy, judgmental and mean-spirited, selfishly ambitious and vengeful. They argued, plotted and schemed, doubted, were disloyal and unfaithful. Just like us.

And them, rather than feeling condemned and disqualified they asked Jesus to increase their faith and teach them to pray, they drew near to Him, seeking, questioning, receiving and learning of Him. They decided to enter into the Mystagogia, the deeper things of Jesus and their faith him.

We can do the same, starting this Thursday. Hearing God’s Voice is for everyone: newbies and oldies who need refreshing. Jude and I will be there. There are sign-up sheets up and down the hall.

Running on Empty—Part the Second: a Short Homily for Easter Day

This uses the same opening and closing as last night's homily for the Vigil (here), but with thoughts on John's account of the Resurrection instead of Luke's. Soon you will also be able to hear it here. 

In 2006, the Archbishop Of Uganda, the Most Rev. Henry Luke Orombi began his Easter Message like this:

When we are told the water tank for the Archbishop’s Palace is empty (which it often is!), we say, “That is not good.” When my wife, Mama Phoebe, discovers that the food store is empty, we say, “That is not good.” When my driver tells me that the fuel tank in my vehicle is empty, I say, “That is not good.” 

If you are like me, most of our associations with the word ‘empty’ are negative. We think, “empty is bad, and full is good." 

Yet, Easter challenges that assumption, because it is an empty cross and an empty tomb that are central to our faith. The resurrection from the dead of Jesus Christ sets him apart from all other human beings throughout history and especially all other religious teachers. Buddha is dead. Confucius is dead. Mohammed is dead. Jesus and Jesus alone has returned from the grave, never to die again. Jesus is alive today! Empty is good!

Empty has been good right from the beginning. In the very first verse of the Bible we read, “the earth was a formless void and darkness covered” (Gen 1:1) it. In other words, the earth was empty and dark. Then God started filling it. God spoke until everything was made “and, indeed, it was all very good.” (Gen 1:31) God filled the emptiness with goodness. The filling was good. Empty became good. It’s been the same ever since.

God makes empty good enough to run on. Running on empty takes on a whole new meaning when you believe in Jesus.

Mind you, empty didn’t appear to be good to Mary in our Resurrection Gospel reading this morning. Mary Magdalene must have felt as if she was “running on empty” in a bad way as she ran to tell Simon Peter and the other disciple that Jesus was gone and the tomb is empty. Then Peter and the other disciple ran back together and they, too, found the tomb empty except for the cloth and wrappings which had been around Jesus. But, empty, as they were soon to discover, was good.

First, John tells us the other disciple “saw and believed.” Empty must have been good for him.

And then Mary was weeping outside the empty tomb in which she had expected to find the body of her beloved Jesus. For her, empty was not good. And then she turned to see Jesus standing there with her (v14), but didn’t recognized him until he spoke her name. And then, wonder of wonders, just as the word of God filled the empty void with the goodness of creation at the beginning, the words of Jesus filled the dark, empty void in Mary’s grieving heart with the goodness of his presence and she knew the empty tomb was a good thing; a very good thing, indeed.

“I have seen the Lord!” was the next thing she said to the disciples. Her heart was full. Empty, she discovered, was good.

The tomb was empty because Jesus had conquered sin and death. The empty tomb means the world is full of the resurrection power of God Almighty.

Empty is good because with God empty never stays that way, in Jesus he always fills it. With Jesus there are no half-empty glasses or lives and there are no half-full ones either. The tomb was EMPTY. He is FULLY and wonderfully raised from the dead. There was no half-dead with Jesus. There is no half-raised. There is no half-saved, no half-eternal life. The tomb was EMPTY. Empty is good! Confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead and you will run on empty full-on for ever. Empty is good.

Running On Empty: a Short Homily for the Easter Vigil

In 2006, the Archbishop Of Uganda, the Most Rev. Henry Luke Orombi began his Easter Message like this:

When we are told the water tank for the Archbishop’s Palace is empty (which it often is!), we say, “That is not good.” When my wife, Mama Phoebe, discovers that the food store is empty, we say, “That is not good.” When my driver tells me that the fuel tank in my vehicle is empty, I say, “That is not good.”

If you are like me, most of our associations with the word ‘empty’ are negative. We think, “empty is bad, and full is good.”

Yet, Easter challenges that assumption, because it is an empty cross and an empty tomb that are central to our faith. The resurrection from the dead of Jesus Christ sets him apart from all other human beings throughout history and especially all other religious teachers. Buddha is dead. Confucius is dead. Mohammed is dead. Jesus and Jesus alone has returned from the grave, never to die again. Jesus is alive today! Empty is good!

Empty has been good right from the beginning. In the very first reading this evening, from the very first verse of the Bible we heard, “the earth was a formless void and darkness covered” (Gen 1:1) it. In other words, the earth was empty and dark. Then God started filling it. God spoke until everything was made “and, indeed, it was all very good.” (Gen 1:31) God filled the emptiness with goodness. The filling was good. Empty became good. It’s been the same ever since.

In reading number six from Isa 55:1 “Ho!” God said, “come!” My word “shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and succeed in the thing for which I sent it.” (v11) God speaks and his words fill emptiness with fruitfulness, accomplishment, success and life: full-on and forever.

God makes empty good enough to run on. Running in empty takes on a whole new meaning.

Mind you, at first, empty didn’t appear to be good to the women in our Resurrection Gospel from Luke when they arrived at the tomb and “did not find the body of the Lord Jesust” there (Luke 24:3) They were perplexed (v4), and terrified (v5) because of its emptiness, and because of the “two men in dazzling clothes” (v4), and when the women told the apostles about it, the apostles thought it was nothing but “an idle tale” (v11), that their words were empty; but, empty, as they were soon to discover, was good.

In Luke’s gospel, Peter must have felt as if he was “running on empty” in a bad way when (Luke 24.12) “he got up and ran to the tomb” and “saw the linen cloths by themselves.” But then empty must have changed because “he went home, amazed at what had happened.” His heart was full. Empty, he discovered, was good.

The tomb was empty because Jesus had conquered sin and death. The empty tomb means the world is full of the resurrection power of God Almighty.

Empty is good because with God empty never stays that way, in Jesus he always fills it. With Jesus there are no half-empty glasses or lives and there are no half-full ones either. The tomb was EMPTY. He is FULLY and wonderfully raised from the dead. There was no half-dead with Jesus. There is no half-raised. There is no half-saved, no half-eternal life. The tomb was EMPTY. Empty is good! Confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead and you will run on empty full-on for ever. Empty is good.

 

Posted with Blogsy

Notes for an Homily on the Occasion of the Third Sunday of Easter

I find it helpful to see all the readings at once so I can see themes and colour code them (this thanks to Logos Bible Software and, for the printed screen, Skitch). The two themes were:

1. Jesus Himself (yellow highlighting)
2. Repentence (blue highlighting)

In addition, this morning I also referred to the following quotes:

... a congregation of souls, men and women who find themselves called upon to repent and believe, obey and love, pray and forgive in the sin-tangled disorder of family and culture, world and work. (Marva Dawn & Eugene Peterson, The Unnecessary Pastor, Eerdman's, 2000, p61)

And from the also most excellent Timothy Keller, The Reason for God (Penguin, 2008): 

If Jesus is not a lunatic, then our only alternative is to accept his claims and centre our entire lives around him. The only thing we have no right to do is to respond to him mildly. p230

Repentance, then, is confessing the things besides God himself that you have been relying on for your hope, significance, and security. That means we should repent not only for things we have done wrong (like cheating or lying), but also for the motivations beneath our good works. p233

The second thing you have to do is believe in Christ. Belief in Christ has a definite content to it. We must believe he was who he said he was, that we require salvation, that on the Cross he secured that salvation, that he rose from the dead. However, while life changing Christian faith is not less than believing these things with your intellect, it is much more. p233-234

You don’t have to wait for all doubts and fears to go away to take hold of Christ. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that you have to banish all misgivings in order to meet God. That would turn your faith into one more way to be your own Saviour. Working on the quality and purity of your commitment would become a way to merit salvation and put God in your debt. It is not the depth and purity of your heart but the work of Jesus Christ on our behalf that saves us. p234

Easter, Miracles and the Separation of Church and State

For there is something within the universe that is alive, that keeps reviving, that is unkillable. That can be silenced, yet will speak out of order; that can be crucified, and will come back to life; that can be buried, and will rise. And in moments of stillness, within our own souls, we perceive that immortal force, as Love, both immanent and transcendent.

His name is Jesus. David Warren, Sunday Spectator for The Ottawa Citizen. All here.

Rolling Stones: a Short Sermon on Easter Morning with reference to Mark 16:4 and Tyson Stabler's Baptism

Mark 16:4 (NIV84) But when they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had been rolled away.

Resurrection morning. The day that everything changed. The day that turned the bleakness of defeat and despair into victory and hope. And it all centred on that empty cave; cold and dark, a borrowed tomb (Joseph of Arimithea had had it made for himself),  carved out of rock.

Sometime between when Joseph rolled the stone against the door of that tomb and when the Marys arrived to find it rolled away; probably during the night immediately before the women arrived with their spices because if the stone had been rolled away earlier someone would have noticed, Almighty God focussed a beam of divine life-restoring energy into that dark space and performed the defining miracle of our faith. It happened unseen, without human help, in the Father’s sovereign timing and will. And here we all are two thousand years later. Here you are. Good on you for making the effort to come here this morning to recognize and celebrate what Jesus did for us—to acknowledge our salvation and that we will share his resurrection.

Mark 16:4 (NIV84) But when they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had been rolled away.

The stone was large. Too large for the women to move, they thought. They were worried about who would remove it for them. They wanted to get in to where they thought Jesus was to serve him even in his death.

There are such stones in our lives. They also need to be rolled away so we come out from the darkness of sin and death into the light of the Risen Christ. Like the women, we need help with that. The stones are heavy. There is work involved.

Here are some stone rollers:

• Liturgy, literally, the work of the people. Worship; repetitive, faithful, worship is a powerful stone roller. It brings us of our sin-tombs into the light. 
• Devotional Bible reading and study, not so much for what you can get out of it, but for what it can get into you. God’s word written rolls stones. 
• Daily prayer. I want to remind you of rich treasure we Anglicans have in our prayer books for that. Morning, evening, mid-day and night, family prayer is all in there. Great stone rollers. 
• Serving others in Jesus’ name. Helping others to get out from behind the stones which entomb them in loneliness, sickness, poverty and distress is another effective stone roller. 
• Baptism. By bringing Tyson to be baptized, Colin and Donna Lee are rolling the stone back from the tomb that would otherwise imprison him forever if it were not for Jesus, his Resurrection and his church. To keep that stone rolled away, this Easter morning, Donna-Lee and Colin will commit themselves to showing Tyson how to look for Jesus of Nazareth and where to find him (Mk 16:6)—here in his church. They’re promising to do the work of bringing him to church and nurturing Tyson here in the presence of the Risen Lord Jesus, to pray and witness—set an example—so Tyson (and Rylan, baptized ? Years ago) will grow to be like Jesus. They will renounce the devil and everything opposed to Jesus, turn to him, accept him as Lord and Saviour, put their whole trust in his grace and love and promise to obey him as Lord. 

This is really important work. Don’t lose focus. Don't allow yourselves be distracted by other things because if you do, not only are your children more likely to lose theirs, but the stone will almost certainly roll back. Don’t let that happen! Jesus is risen from the dead! He is alive! Making sure that we, and our children if we have them, share in his resurrection is the most important thing in the world!

Trembling, Bewildered and Afraid: a Short Sermon with Reference to Romans 6 and Mark 16—on the Occasion of Katherine and Claire Randle's Baptisms at the Easter Vigil

Mark 16:8 (NIV84) Trembling and bewildered, the women went out and fled from the tomb. 

They said nothing to anyone, because they were afraid. The tomb was empty and they didn’t know what to do about it. Their world had just been turned upside down—for the better they would soon find out—but right then? Trembling and bewildered. Fear. So much so that they ran.

I’m afraid that two thousand years of church has buried any trembling and astonishment, any fear, we might feel in what we celebrate tonight. O the Resurrection is amazing and joyful, but even that becomes routine if we’re not careful.

If we drill down into it, though, there’s really jeopardy, danger and death. Cruel slavery in Egypt. Misery. Passing throught the sea with a wall of water each side. Terror at having to leave home and go who-knows-where? Death and burial. Crucifixion. Sin, and not just matters of discourtesy and hurt feelings, but violent, bloody, torture, injustice and death on a grand scale.

And then, wonder of wonders, there’s also miraculous deliverance, a promised land and a resurrection on an even grander scale. Christ is Risen!! Alleluia!

So here we are to help Jesse and Janine bring Katherine and Claire from slavery to sin and death, out of “dead IN sin” into “dead TO sin”(Ro 6:11) and alive! “Living a new life! (Ro 6:4) United with Jesus in his resurrection (Ro 6:5). “Alive to God in Christ Jesus” (Ro 6:11).

What’s alive to God in Christ Jesus like? Jesus himself prayed, “Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.” (John 17:24 NIV84) Alive to God in Jesus means being where he is, seeing his glory. That’s what he wants for us.

The transaction that will soon take place in this holy sacrament should cause a little trembling and astonishment. As Katherine and Claire's dad Jesse said about what we're doing tonight, "To be a part of something bigger and stronger than yourself." No kidding! We’re rolling the stones back from tombs that would otherwise imprison Katherine and Claire forever—all of us, in fact—if it were not for Jesus and his church. The Risen, loving, King Jesus provides The Way.

As the young man told the Mary’s at the tomb:

Mark 16:6 (NIV84) “You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. He has risen! He is not here.”

Tonight Janine and Jesse will commit themselves to showing Katherine and Claire how to look for Jesus of Nazareth and where to find him (Mk 16:6)—here in his church. They’re promising to nurture Katherine and Claire here, to pray and witness—set an example—so they will grow to be like Jesus. They will renounce everything opposed to Jesus, turn to him, accept him as Lord and Saviour, put their whole trust in his grace and love, promise to obey him as Lord. All so Katherine and Claire can get out of this alive.

EASTER: a Poem by Emily Jane Alexandra Berringer

Easter means candy, chocolate and cake,

But it can mean much, much more,

It can mean he has risen!

It can also mean CANDY GOLORE!


It can mean more candy more, more, more!

It can mean on the third day he rose again,

Also it can mean a big chocolate hen!

Easter can mean lots of different things,


Easter can mean chocolate and cake

But it also means Jesus and the cross for heavens sake!

(Emily is my granddaughter who will be ten years old just after Easter)

Run: A Sermon for Easter Sunday with reference to John 20

(John 20:1) It was early. Still dark. A woman, Mary Magdalene, was the first to the tomb. The stone that had blocked the entrance had been moved aside. The tomb was open. She thought someone had taken the LORD's body out of the tomb and didn't know where he was. It must have been pretty close to the last straw for her. The week had been hell. The arrest, the mockery of a trial, watching Him die. Now this. A lesser woman might have collapsed in anguish; paralyzed by grief, stress and fatigue. Not Mary Magdalene, she realized she needed help so she took off (John 20:2) and came running to Simon Peter and John. She didn't freeze, she didn't walk, she ran.

There are times when we have to run for help. To stay in a situation and just wring our hands does us no good. We've got to go for help. We've got to move. Anyone run to church this morning? When you think about it, our need for the help the LORD provides is at least as urgent as Mary's need for help. Without the benefits Jesus provided this weekend—Cross and Resurrection—we're in serious trouble. We'd better run. It's that important and without Jesus our situation is that desperate. Really.

I don't know how desperate Mary felt. In any case, she ran. When she got there (John 20:2)  she told Simon Peter and John what she had seen. They listened and (John 20:3) they ran back to the tomb.

What does it take to make you run? Some people run just for the sake of it. For the exercise. You might run to escape danger. You might run to rescue someone else who is in danger. You might run to catch someone. You might run just because you really need to know what the situation is with someone or something you really care about. Simon Peter and John ran because they loved Jesus and they wanted to find out what had happened to him.

Simon Peter and John weren’t racing each other but (John 20:4) John outran Simon Peter and reached the tomb first. Then (John 20:6) Simon Peter was first into the tomb. Finally, (John 20:8) John went in, saw and believed.

Here we all are. None of us ran to get here, but those of you who bought kids with you this morning may feel as if you have. What did you come to see? Are you seeing, or hearing, or sensing anything which makes you believe that the tomb to which they ran was empty? I’m not asking you whether you understand what, or how, it happened. (John 20:9) Simon Peter and John didn’t. But they believed.

Mary didn’t understand either. (John 20:11) She was outside the tomb crying. When Jesus arrived (John 20:14), at first she didn’t recognize him.

Think about that. It wasn’t that Jesus was absent; he was there, it was just that she didn’t recognize him. I wonder how many times that’s happened to you and me. We’ve been somewhere—perhaps even a church service—and we’ve thought, “Can’t see Jesus here,” when the problem is with our poor earth-bound, through-a-glass-darkly eyes and we just don’t recognize him.

v15 “Woman,” he said, “why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?” 

Who are you looking for this morning? The Risen Jesus? Or, something or someone else? Are you here to make yourself feel better? To please your mother? To solve your problems?

v16 Jesus said to her, “Mary.” 

Listen for Jesus. Jesus knows who you are. Jesus knows your name. Is He calling your name today. Look for Jesus. Run to Jesus. He is alive. He is Risen from the dead. Jesus is here in his word written, in the bread and the wine, in his followers. Run in your hearts! Run in your minds! Run away from anything that keeps you away from him. Don’t worry about anybody outrunning you. Just run. Come to the table. Receive his body and blood. Believe and he will give you eternal life. Run.

A Short Easter Resurrection Sermon with Baptismal Overtones

Jesus, our Lord and Saviour, crucified and risen from the dead, is the reason I stand before you this Easter and every Sunday.

“Alleluia! Christ is risen,” I said at the beginning of this service. And you replied, “The Lord is risen, indeed. Alleluia!”

And there you have the central, key, pivotal, most important— how ever you want to put it—doctrine of the Christian faith; the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ from the dead.

St Luke writes it in our first reading from Acts:

God raised him (Jesus) on the third day and made him to appear, not to all the people but to us who had been chosen by God as witnesses, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. (Acts 10.40-41, ESV)

And then we heard from St Paul as he writes to the Corinthians:

He (Jesus) was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, …he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me. (1 Cor 15.4-8)

Consider the details: eating and drinking, names and numbers of real people. John records a breakfast on the beach of fish roasted over an open fire. It doesn’t sound like a myth.  And those were written while most of the people about which Luke and Paul were writing were still alive and could easily have refuted the story. But there is no evidence of anyone doing so. We’re not here celebrating a myth this morning. The historical and scholarly evidence for the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead is compelling.

Bishop of Durham and respected New Testament scholar Tom Wright puts it this way:

Jesus of Nazareth was certainly dead by the Friday evening; Roman soldiers were professional killers and wouldn't have allowed a not-quite-dead rebel leader to stay that way for long. When the first Christians told the story of what happened next, they were not saying: "I think he's still with us in a spiritual sense" or "I think he's gone to heaven". All these have been suggested by people who have lost their historical and theological nerve. (See the rest here.)

How’s your historical and theological nerve this morning? How’s your “faith nerve”? Jesus Christ is risen from the dead. Literally. Actually. Unmistakeably. That fact defined and generated the church and has been its message when it has been faithful and true. It must also define us and it must be our message.

Tomorrow, the 13th of April, it will be ten years since Jude and I began our ministry, in His name, among you at St Barnabas.

This is and has been my heart’s desire for these past ten years:

• For those of you who already have a saving faith in the literally risen Jesus Christ; that your faith be increased and strengthened.
• For that those of you who have not yet come to such a personal, saving resurrection faith, that you will do so.
• That you all become convincing and fruitful witnesses of the Resurrection of Jesus.

You see, “grace flows like a mighty river,” Robin Mark sings in one of his songs. That grace is flowing all around and through us this Easter morning. Robin draws a lovely lyrical image as he goes on to sing, “and one day I just dipped my finger in, and a love caught and dragged me to a deeper place, I laughing and flailing some some water babe when grace flowed like a mighty river.” (Central Station, East of the River)

Colin Stabler and Donna-Lee Sheardown have decided to dip their finger in that mighty river today on behalf of their little son, Rylan. 11 year old Christopher Sheardown has decided to dip his finger in on his own. Will you join them? As they make their Baptismal covenant, and we renew ours, will you assure your salvation by making that an Easter “yes” to Jesus. Will you allow the love of God, uniquely and wonderfully expressed in the person and the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ, to catch you this morning and sweep you into that  deeper place where life is richer, where chains fall off and where amazing grace abounds?

If so, make your renewal of your baptismal vows today be a new personal “Yes” to belief in the risen Jesus. Make the Eucharistic prayer a new personal thanksgiving for all he has done and a new offering of yourself for his service.

The Easter Timer is Running

Professor John Stackhouse on The Subversiveness of Easter. I love the way he describes the present Good Friday/Holy Saturday situation.

Then he is buried. Gone. Out of sight, out of mind.

Like a ticking bomb.

Heh, heh.

All here. 

Run, Run! David Warren's Easter bit.

Do you know how beautiful it is to run? You old, you lame, you fools, run! And tell it to the ends of the earth: He is risen!

He is risen, indeed, David. A very good bit, here.