Sunday, April 20, 2025
Easter Across the Christian Earth
(click here to listen to or read today’s scriptures)
Upon Christ, throw all away
On the first day of the week,
Mary of Magdala came to the tomb early in the morning,
while it was still dark,
and saw the stone removed from the tomb.
One day, and then another. In our privileged position, watching from what might seem a safe distance, we listen to the outrage and fear of Jesus’ followers and then wonder at the silence of Jesus – followed first by just the few sentences he spoke in the Garden of Gethsemane, then his words in the presence of rulers and authorities, the powers of this dark world, and at last to his criminal companions on the three crosses of Golgotha, to John, to all of us, and His words finally to his Father.
IT IS FINISHED!
We consider our own words as we navigate the various Easter cultures of our time, our place and personal point of view. We have not needed, this past Passion Week, to rush to resurrection. In fact, holding life and death in tension is exactly what we’ve done instead, learning how to live like that all the other days of our lives. There has been darkness. And now today there is light.
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, and darkness covered the abyss. A mighty wind swept over the waters. God spoke.
“Let there be light.”
And there was light.
And God saw how good the light was.
Jesus asked his disciples, “Can you drink the cup that I will drink?” How can we if we aren’t emptied as Jesus was? Henri Nouwen, who worked hard to make his most profound thoughts accessible by finding words all of us can understand, simply said, “We must empty the cups of our lives completely to be able to receive the fullness of life from God. Jesus lived this on the cross. The moment of complete emptiness and complete fullness became the same.”
Now today as midnight gives way to sunrise, I am happy. The joy of Jesus’ resurrection comes upon me. HE IS NOT HERE, HE IS RISEN! Margaret and I will not forget Marc’s 5-year-old race from Sunday School toward us in Waynesville, wearing a “Jesus is alive!” crown, shouting out, “He is risen!” And I look now, decades later, for poems that renew those memories, verses like this from Gerard Manley Hopkins:
Break the box and shed the nard;
Stop not now to count the cost;
Hither bring pearl, opal, sard;
Reck not what the poor have lost;
Upon Christ throw all away:
Know ye, this is Easter Day.
What would we do without Marc’s abandon and Mary’s perfume, the whole bottle poured with no restraint, all of it over the feet of Jesus? Careful now! Would we be too protective of what we think belongs to us? Know the value only of what we ourselves have made, or bought, and always kept for a rainy day? We do that enough already, suddenly now – stop it!
Hopkins says more about this. “Ye have kept your choicest wine – let it flow for heavenly mirth! Gather gladness from the skies. Mingle praises, prayer and song …”
It’s been Friday for awhile, and now Sunday’s here. In the midst of his prolonged depression Hopkins’ powerful reachings-up toward heaven climax at Easter. Leave off with the ashes, kick off black blouse and sash, let us come and celebrate with all our might.
Beauty now for ashes wear,
Perfumes for the garb of woe,
Chaplets for dishevelled hair,
Dances for sad footsteps slow;
Open wide your hearts that they
As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame …
(Acts 10, Psalm 118, Colossians 3, 1 Corinthians 5, John 20)
(posted at www.davesandel.net)
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