(Vigil reading from the RCL: Exodus, Baruch, Ezekiel “dry bones”; Romans, Luke’s “empty tomb”)
What has the last word in your life? When all is said and done, what is the one truth that matters most deeply? What is the one reality after which nothing more need be said?
Not long ago I sat with a group of clergy as they heard with shock that, according to studies, people aged 18-35 in this country get most of their news from The Daily Show and The Colbert Report. You see, news in our culture used to be handled with solemnity. The dulcet tones of Walter Cronkite would end each evening broadcast with “And that’s the way it is”, and we believed it. The idea that a comedy show would be the way people get their news seemed deeply wrong to that gathering. And yet, I get it. Why not have some laughs, when the news seems to be a parade of the same old misery? Wars continue, words continue, homelessness and joblessness continue, partisan bickering while people go without health care or education, abuse scandals in churches—I wonder if old Walter ever cringed inside when he said “and that’s the way it is.” Is changeless bad news the last word? Is the same old mess the most basic truth of our world?
Or does something else have the last word? Tonight there is a different Las Word. Tonight we proclaim a message that is outrageous, that turns all those expectations upside-down.
So what is the basic truth of each of our lives? What really powers our lives? Is it fear? Is it frustration and anger? Is it hopelessness? Is it resignation and grim endurance? Is it grief and loss?
Our stories are our stories, and no one has the right to tell us to simply put aside our pain. But into our stories come this story, the great Story that in its telling transforms all our stories with light and fire and life!
That’s why we lit a fire this evening, and for a moment bathed in its light. It is a shadow of the Everlasting Fire that was lit on this night. The Everlasting Fire is not just a long-ago tale, but is Now, always Now. Do we even wish to imagine a world in which the Resurrection-light had not been lit?
That is why we told the story of the Hebrew children, the slaves who dared to believe that God heard their cries and saw their tears and went to war with a mighty empire for their sakes. “Be still!” said Moses. Not with weapons and budgets was this struggle fought, but with the passionate love of God. And so it was the Hebrew women sang, the women who had their newborn babies threatened by the great king of Egypt. They sang and danced as the cruel chariots and the brutal soldiers were thrown into the sea, and a Pharaoh saw that there was a power greater than his power and his throne.
That is why we told the story of the divine Wisdom, who speaks in a feminine voice, the neglected transforming life-giving voice and breath and spirit whom we can put aside or ignore, but who waits for us to seek her again so that we may find life.
That is why we told the story of those dry old bones baking in the sun. There is nothing so still as death. But in the hopeless stillness of death in the valley, there came by God’s Spirit new life, stirring the bones, making what was dead to live again.
And all these tales of new life and liberation and life-giving Wisdom take flesh in the cry, “Christ is risen!” The cruelty of an empire, the fear of those in power, the neglect of gentle Wisdom, the stillness of death—all come to focus in this terrible, wondrous story of the betrayal, death, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus. The powers of the world have done their worst. Threatened religious authority, brutal state power, betrayal by friends, pain and abandonment, death itself has done its worst. And from the stillness of death, from what should have been the end of the story of just another Messiah, has come this explosion of new life and new vision and new hope. Over 2000 Easters have come and gone, and we have not begun to tell the glory of it. “Christ is risen” may be proclaimed to the end of human time, and we will not reach the end of the wonder of it.
So what is the basic truth of your life? What truth penetrates every fibre of your being?
Once two Russian monks were walking together in the forest. Monks get discouraged, and these two were speaking quietly to each other about their troubles and their sorrows. Suddenly around the corner came a fellow-monk named Sergius. Sergius was walking two feet above the ground. “Don’t be discouraged, brothers!” called out Sergius. “Christ has risen from the dead, trampling down death by death, giving life to those in the tomb!”
How shall your own story be transformed by this, this outrageous Easter story?
A contemporary theologian, Richard Rohr, said, “The Gospel is an eternal promise from God that tomorrow will be different than today.”
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