Saturday in the Octave of Easter, April 26, 2025
(click here to listen to or read today’s scriptures)
Easter vigil revisited
Observing the boldness of Peter and John, they recognized them as the companions of Jesus. Seeing the lame man who had been cured standing there with them, they could say nothing in reply.
Winn Collier, author of Eugene Peterson’s biography, posted the following thoughts last week on the day of Easter vigil …
Today, something strange is happening.
Yesterday, we placed Jesus’ lifeless corpse into the dank tomb, all our hopes arriving at the absolute end of the line. The story ended with dead criminals and busted bones, vinegar and tears. The final act held us under a dark sky, among decay and rot, where dreams wither and futures gasp after final breaths. We buried the World’s Light, extinguished like a snuffer over a candle. And we walked away, in despair and silence. What else could we do?
But something strange is happening.
Deep beneath the still and barren earth, a flame we cannot see — a fire we can perhaps no longer even imagine — kindles, gathering strength. Overwhelmed by so much suffering — all our sorrows and deaths and all the world’s twisting pain — we feel none of the gathering warmth. But strange, strange things are stirring.
As the Creed confesses, Jesus has descended into the place of the dead. His entire life, Jesus has always moved toward the dying, toward the ruin, toward the stories we’re sure are finished. On this day, then, where else would Jesus go?
Ancient iconography shows Jesus, deep in the bowels of Hades, lifting Adam and Eve (and all humanity) from our graves, from the very places where the story’s supposedly over. Whenever we’ve sunk to our final, cataclysmic end — here, exactly here, is where God’s impossible story commences. It’s tempting to believe death wins. Current conditions suggest that injustice, greed, catastrophe, and sickness have all the power. But none of that holds if Resurrection is where we’re headed.
We’re more than poor schmucks pitifully clinging to fairy tales. It’s true: we too are corpses buried in the forgotten country. But exactly here, on this strange day, evil and sorrow strain to hold their grip. There’s a rumbling. Death — that ol’ snaggletooth enemy — feels uneasy, getting spooked. As St. Epiphanius said, “God has died in the flesh and Hades trembles with fear.”
We’re living in a strange, strange day. Hold on. – Winn Collier
Something strange is happening: There is a great silence on earth today, a great silence and stillness. The whole earth keeps silence because the King is asleep. The earth trembled and is still because God has fallen asleep in the flesh and he has raised up all who have slept ever since the world began. God has died in the flesh and Hades trembles with fear. – St. Epiphanius of Cyprus
(posted at www.davesandel.net)
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