THE JOURNEY OF TRANSFORMATION:  FROM DEATH TO LIFE

Easter Sunday, March 23,2008

            The Alleluias of Palm Sunday became “crucify him” on Friday and then a long silence…Until, on the third day, the news that everything had changed.  That is the testimony of all four of the Gospel writers.  It is the central affirmation of Paul, whose writings are the earliest, and closest in time to the ministry of the historical Jesus.  It is the reason why we are sitting here today and it is the reason why, despite all that is broken and bleeding and oppressive in our world, there is still a reason for great hope.

            Over the past six weeks we have been on a journey of sorts.  Using the images of the World Peace Prayer which we have sung every Sunday, we have reflected on  the central themes of the Gospel which is transformation.  Transformation of you and me into more complete and compassionate and generous people…transformation of our communities into places of justice and forgiveness and inclusion…transformation of the world into a place of peace, reflecting the deepest and holiest of hopes that have been embedded in the human heart.  We learned that the life of discipleship involves the discipline, the faith, the courage, the imagination, and the perseverance to take the risky steps that move us from status quo to a future that is new.  As Christians we affirm that in the  life of Jesus of Nazareth, we see the contours…the shape… of what such a life looks like.

            But then they crucified Jesus.  They being all the established powers of our world, political, religious, economic, social…all the powers that benefit from keeping things just as they are….they conspired to put Jesus’ way out of business.  As much as the world longs for change it will always resist it.  And nothing can stop something cold in its tracks and forever quite like death.  Death is final. 

            And then, on the first day of the week…,the new day when, in the language of the beautiful creation poem of Genesis when God’s spirit begins creating, on the first day of the week,  something new.  The consistent witness of the Gospels and the testimony of the church then to now is that death will no longer have the final word.  For all the things the church has gotten wrong through the years, it is right on this central affirmation.  And that changes everything. 

            John stretches the limits of what language can do in proclaiming this newness.  In a story that seems simple on the surface but is brimming over with images and symbols and allusions that go all the way back to the mythological Garden of Eden, John struggles to proclaim that a new creation has begun and we are invited to be part of it.  The Easter Gospel is not primarily the assurance of what happens beyond our physical deaths, although it doesn’t discount that. But by trying to reduce this Gospel to the realm of personal piety is one attempt among many to tame it.  For it is about an utterly new reality beginning to bubble up out of the dry and barren landscape of the old.

            If the Gospels struggle with the limitations of words, they each, in their own way, insist that this newness was not simply a happy ending to an otherwise tragic story of a man, Jesus and his message.  Rather, the Gospel is insistent that within the boundaries of our space/time matrix, something new is happening.  What they want us to know is that  the boundaries of what we once believed was possible have been penetrated by God’s newness so that a new kind of life can begin to take shape. The new life that Jesus preached and lived will not be stopped in its tracks forever because the  power at work in his life and ours is greater than the powers of death. 

            This is a BIG truth, not easy to wrap our minds around.  But we do the Gospel a grave injustice if we stake its truth on a literal interpretation because language is based on experience and therefore it simply cannot contain this newness.  It is an equally grave injustice when we dismiss it because it doesn’t fit neatly into our post-enlightenment framework.  There continues to be a great mystery at the heart of the Easter proclamation that will forever resist our attempts to wrestle it into conformity with our limited understanding whether in the first or the twenty-first century.

            So the question becomes, how do we know it is true?  There is only one way…and it is a hard way, and what we’ve been talking about these last six weeks.  The only way we can know it is true is the same way the earliest Christians knew it and that is by stepping into its waters and living it.  And those who live it, as Jesus himself lived it, provide the compelling witness to the world  that it is true.

Down through history there have been those who have lived it, taking seriously the call to costly discipleship and taking even more seriously God’s resurrection promises. They live… they shape their lives… around those promises. 

They have been the ones who after crouching in the shadows on Friday became an unstoppable force on Sunday.   They have been the ones throughout history who speak prophetic truths in faithfulness to God’s vision…truths that no one else wants to hear because they are hard truths and engaging them seriously will change things. They put themselves on the line for justice when their friends and neighbors tell them it is a lost cause.  They dare to unmask the idolatries of the culture of wealth and greed.  They create communities based on inclusion recognizing that true wholeness is built from diversity, not sameness.  They practice the discipline of forgiveness even when they don’t feel forgiving, they love their enemies, they counter evil with goodness.  They step into troubled waters willingly and eagerly because they trust that the creativity and love that is God is creating something new and nothing will stop them because in the living of this way they have discovered its truth, they have discovered its hope, and they have experienced new life that is promised.

Such witnesses to resurrection often get a reputation for being eccentric and out of step.  Sometimes they become so threatening that the powers will attempt to silence them.  But such threats do not stop them. They stand confidently, even in the face of death because they know that even death has no ultimate power over the life that is promised to the world through the living of Jesus’ way.

            The witness of all those who have lived the truth of  resurrection is that ultimately it is this way that will prevail because it is from God.  When we face all those powers that seem so invincible  this promise may feel as small and insignificant as a ripple along the rocks but it was something as small as that that with time and persistence carved out the Grand Canyon. 

The Gospel of Easter is a truth that will not be stopped.  Words alone cannot capture its full meaning and the scope of its hope so the only way to know it is true is to live it…one day at a time…one moment at a time  and watch how human life begins to be reshaped.  As significant as the spark of creativity that ignited the big bang, eons ago…something new is happening and it too is from God and that changes everything.  A new creation is being born.  And we’re invited to be part of it.

            The Lord is Risen.  The Lord is Risen Indeed.  Alleluia. And thanks be to God.