By Archbishop Linda Nicholls
One evening while I was a teacher at a school in the Indian Himalayas, I was at Bible study with about ten other teachers. We were seated in a living room on chairs, benches and couches. In the middle of the study I wondered why someone down the bench from me was shaking it so much. I looked up and discovered that everyone else was looking up in consternation – and in a second, I realized that what was happening was not someone shaking the bench – but the entire house was shaking from the tremors of an earthquake.
In that moment my mind raced frantically wondering where would be a safe place to go. The door frame? Run outdoors? And even as I considered possibilities I knew that there was no where that would be safe on a mountain hillside. The very ground that I had always trusted to be firm, secure and unchangeable – had become insecure and unsafe. Then – as quickly as it had started – it stopped. But I have never forgotten that moment when the world I knew as secure and predictable had for a few moments become unpredictable!
I often think of that night when I imagine Easter morning and the complete upheaval of all that was expected and secure. Matthew tries to capture the radical nature of the events in his description – that almost feels too dramatic! The two Mary’s arrive at the tomb. Matthew does not say why they went though, like us, they may have simply known that desire to be near the body of a loved one who has died – to visit the site of the grave – to weep and to mourn there. Suddenly there is an earthquake – shaking the ground – as an angel descends and rolls back the stone from the tomb. Having seen a garden tomb in Jerusalem I know that these are very large, very heavy stones not easily rolled or moved. No wonder the ground shook! The guards, placed there by Pilate to prevent anyone stealing the body to artificially claim Jesus lives, become ‘like dead men’! The tomb, so carefully guarded, is no match for the power of God.
The women hear the message – see the empty tomb – and run to tell the others – with fear and joy. Their fear is understandable! Death carries a certainty with it – As Anna Carter Florence, a preaching professor, wrote – ‘If the dead don’t stay dead, what can you count on?’ And being confronted with an earthquake and an angel – are not everyday occurrences. Fear is completely understandable.
They did already know about Lazarus being given life again – though he would die sometime in the future. So maybe that gave them permission to believe the angel – and know that death can be defeated! Just maybe Jesus lives!!
Even as they run to tell others they are met by the risen Jesus who calms their fear – and invites them to call the disciples to Galilee where he will meet them.
Dramatic and powerful, these moments of encounter upend all their expectations – If the dead don’t stay dead then what else is possible? Over the next 40 days their encounters with the risen Christ affirm their joy and confirm that something utterly new has happened – and they will be the evangelists of this certainty. Some will take longer to fully embrace this new reality – Thomas will need more convincing than Peter. But they will move into a new relationship with their world and with God. It is as if they have passed through an invisible veil into a world that looks identical yet they know that in this world nothing is more powerful than God – not even the ultimate tool of tyrants and oppressors – the fear and reality of death. If death is conquered –as St. Paul has said, ‘whether I live or whether I die I belong to the Lord’ – then it is possible to live life from a well of deep joy for nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus. It is possible to find new life in, through and beyond the deepest suffering. It is possible to hope always.
One of the joys of being in ministry for a long time is acquitting a very large file of sermons! While preparing this homily I re-read older ones I have given and found a story that I had forgotten. It is a real story – and told with the permission of the parishioner involved. Her name was Jayne – and she had a blood cancer diagnosed some eight months previously. She had faced intensive chemotherapy with courage and the final stages of treatment approached. The reality of death loomed and fear had become her greatest enemy sapping her sense of humour and her joy. We spoke about her journey and that the only way to reclaim life is to stare death in the face and deny its power because NOTHING can separate us from the love of God. In the days after we spoke Jayne had intense chemo and radiation and a bone marrow transplant. Her future was still not certain but hopeful. On Good Friday that year I sat with her in the hospital after the services and was overwhelmed by her joy. God was with her. Her sense of humour had returned and she kibbitzed with the staff. Jayne had faced the fear of death and discovered anew God’s power to bring life. I asked if I might share her story and her face lit up with surprise. “Why would anyone want to hear it?” she said. I replied. “Because it is all about EASTER!” We live differently when we live in the light of the resurrection.
We need to hear the stories of the witnesses to God’s love and power from new witnesses in every generation. If the disciples were the only ones to have met the Risen Christ faith would soon have dissipated after their deaths. It is the very fact that we keep on encountering the risen Christ and the power of the resurrection generation after generation that ensures this is the power of God at work now.
It is the words and actions of Christians continuing to live and act out of love even in the face of death – that tell us Christ lives!
The Al Alhi Arab hospital in Gaza is run by the Anglican Diocese of Jerusalem. It was bombed on several occasions during the Israeli devastation of Gaza but kept operating throughout the war. The lovely St. Peter chapel had at times been converted into a triage and treatment area as parts of the hospital were unusable. This past week a group of Christian staff went back into the chapel to clean it up and return it to its primary use as a place of worship and prayer. The same staff who have endured untold moments of fear and disaster over the past three years, faced being bombed, watched colleagues and patients killed and those seeking shelter in their courtyard attacked – they are rebuilding and proclaiming their hope.
Nothing had prepared the women at the tomb or any of the disciples for the radical disorientation their lives would face when they were confronted with the resurrection. They could only believe it – and then live it – showing the world what it means to love one another and telling their stories of the risen Christ.
If the dead don’t stay dead what can you count on?
God – God alone.
ALLELUIA, Christ is Risen! The Lord is risen indeed Alleluia!!
