Happy Easter everyone :)
Every year every festival has a new meaning for me. It is just as well really, otherwise the sermons would get a bit repetitive...
I've been reflecting a bit about what Lent and Easter mean to me this year. It occurs to me that the disciples who met Jesus risen from the dead would have an attitude of 'anything's possible' for the rest of their lives. Perhaps that is what it means to be Easter people...
And yet when Jesus appeared he was still wounded. The resurrection does not take away the harsh realities of life, but it gives us hope that they can be transformed.
I once knew someone who suffered from a dreadful fatal illness. She was young, with young children and she refused to believe that she was going to die. She prayed and had absolute faith that God was going to heal her. She never let anyone breathe the possibility that it might not work out that way. In the end she died... I think everyone else had accepted the inevitability of this.
How do we respond to this as Easter people? For some it is the promise of life after death, but I am far more interested in life before death. How can the painful things be transformed? How can the brokenness in our lives and in our church be transformed? How can our world be transformed? Anything is possible.
As resurrection people, we remember once again that wonderful quote from Desmond Tutu:
Good is stronger than evil;
love is stronger than hate;
light is stronger than darkness;
life is stronger than death.
Victory is ours, through him who loves us