They
have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid
him.
Mary Magdalene, first report from the empty
tomb [John 20:2]
She
turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was
Jesus…supposing him to be the gardener…
Mary, weeping outside the tomb [John
20:14-15]
Jesus
himself came near and went with them, but their eyes were kept from recognizing
him.
On the road to Emmaus, the first Easter
evening [Luke 24:16]
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| Icon by Vladimir Tamari |
New life rises from a stone-closed tomb
and it goes unnoticed, unrecognized, unappreciated. The first visitors to the
empty tomb assume that the body has been moved or stolen. One of them thinks
the just-risen Jesus is the gardener. Others ask the traveling companion who
comes up alongside them if he’s the only one who doesn’t know what awful things
happened to Jesus in Jerusalem…and it turns out the companion is, in fact,
Jesus.
This life is so new, so fresh, so
unexpected that no one sees it for what it is: world changing, life
transforming resurrection. People just like you and me squint at the new life
through old lenses, lenses clouded by long-held assumptions and colored by
fear, yet rendered obsolete the moment Jesus shed the shroud and left the tomb.
We are Easter people. We live on the
far side of the resurrection of Christ. We proclaim for seven weeks: Christ is
risen! Christ is risen indeed! Yet we so often walk through our days as if
Jesus were still lingering in the tomb. Resurrection life is afoot in the world
and, squinting through old lenses, we so often miss it.
Thankfully, this Risen One is
persistent. He keeps coming up alongside us to give us new lenses to see the
new life he offers. A sip of wine and a bit of bread…water and Word washing
over us…forgiveness offered or received…a friend living in recovery day by day…a
simple sunrise or the complexity of a relationship restored…these and so much
more are signs of resurrection and new life afoot in the world, so easy to
overlook or mistake for something else. In, with, and under the mundane matters
of our drudging days the Risen One comes near again and again to speak our
name, open our eyes, stir our hearts, take our hands, and lead us out of dark
tombs into resurrection light.
This Eastertide, may God’s Spirit open
our eyes wide with wonder to see new life coming near, open our hearts to
receive it with hope and joy, and open our hands to share it with all we meet
along the way.
Christ,
our companion, hope for the journey,
Bread
of compassion, open our eyes.
Grant
us your vision, set all hearts burning
That
all creation with you may arise.
[Susan Palo Cherwien, “Day of Arising,”
ELW 374]
Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed!
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