Hope Here and Now

Tonight is about storytelling. We begin before anything exists, when God brings the universe into being. Then we move through the whole of the Old Testament before arriving at Jesus’ ministry, his death, and resurrection. The reason we are taken on this journey is because Easter is not a random miracle dropped into the middle of an unrelated world. Instead it is the moment when everything God has been doing for millenia comes rushing into focus. The resurrection of Jesus is the turning point of the great narrative of salvation, the place where all God’s ancient purposes are gathered up and clarified in startling newness.

From the beginning, the story has been about God with us, God for us, God refusing to abandon what God has made. Over and over again, the Bible tells this same truth in different ways: when the world is trapped, when people are lost, when the future looks closed, God acts. God comes near. God makes a way. The Easter story is of God continuing, persistently and lovingly, to bring life where death seems to have settled in for good. But this story is ultimately about what is greater than death. Throughout the Bible we find hints and foreshadowings of what God will do through Jesus. There is the widow’s son raised by Elijah. Jairus’ daughter lifted from her bed. Lazarus stumbling out of the tomb. These are flashes in the darkness, hints that death may not be as secure as it seems. But they aren’t yet the full story. These individuals who experience resurrection before Jesus are only preparing us, because they all remain mortal and will go on to die again. But when we get to Easter, Jesus’ resurrection is the game changer. This is where hope comes into full bloom.

I think for many people, faith is an insurance against the ‘perhaps’ or ‘what if’ of death. If there is an afterlife, if God is real, then faith will make sure that after this life, the next one is good. We can also focus too much on heaven as the end goal, losing sight of the importance of faithful living in this one.

I’ve started listening to a Christian radio station in the car, partly because worship songs are surprisingly effective at getting a toddler to sleep. One song kept coming on, called Homesick for Heaven. The lyrics were exactly what you’d expect - about how the author wanted to be finished with the difficulties of this life and to instead be enjoying the wonders of heaven. In and of itself, there’s nothing wrong with that. But it is also only one part of the story. It’s only one aspect of what it is to be Christians.

Jesus’ resurrection does give us the hope for being united with God after death. It shows that death is not the end, and that God’s love and power will ultimately have the final word. But the Easter story is also more daring than that. In the raising of Jesus, God launches the new creation into the middle of the old one. It is the new reality breaking into the here and now. Easter hope is that the kingdom of God has already burst into the present. Our life with God isn’t something we are perpetually waiting for, that we have to get to heaven in order to begin, but it’s already happening right now!

This is what Paul is talking about in our reading from Romans. When we pass through the waters of baptism, we are enfolded into this story of resurrection life. When we embark on the Christian journey, we are participating in the kingdom of God. We are able to choose to live by faith, to commit ourselves to following Jesus, and by doing so we live into the joy of Easter in a present and tangible way.

Our gospel reading presses this home in such a beautifully relatable way. When the angel tells the two Marys that Jesus has risen, that isn’t the end of the message, but the angel also tells them that Jesus is going ahead of them to Galilee. Jesus’ resurrection isn’t allowed to be an abstract idea, instead he meets his disciples in the town where they live and work, the ordinary town where these ordinary people became his followers. This is because God-with-us is not a truth that stays at the tomb, or is only manifested in heaven, but it is also a truth which we discover around us in our ordinary lives as we experience them day by day.

So our Easter joy is that the grand narrative of God’s story is still unfolding through each of our lives. The hope we rejoice in is not only comfort for when we face death, but it is a reminder that we live into resurrection here and now. And because of that, we know that the work of feeding, welcoming, healing, mercy, and prayer matters now. It matters now because Jesus is alive now, and his presence is always with us.

So we worship in joy. We tell again the grand narrative of salvation, noting that this is where it arrives: in God redeeming the world through the risen life of Jesus, bringing the future into the present. The Easter resurrection is no passive story to watch as it passes by. This story dwells within us. This is the story we are part of, continuing it in our own flesh and blood. We are the stewards and enliveners of God’s ongoing interaction with the world, and it is our hearts and minds and voices which spread the good news to others. The good news that hope is here. That joy is active among us. That salvation has begun its new creation in the present through each of us.

So let the church be glad tonight! Let our joy be proclaimed. Let hope rise like incense. Christ is risen, and God is with us here and now. Love has won, Christ is risen, Alleluia!

Romans 6:3-11; Psalm 114; Matthew 28:1-10