Only Child

As you probably know by now, I am an only child.  You may have heard me mention that Ginger says this explains everything.  Among the things she would say is explained is my difficulty in sharing.  It’s not that I’m opposed to sharing in theory.  It seems like a good idea to me.  It is simply that, at least growing up, the need never arose to practice much.  It never occurred to me to have an argument over the last dinner roll or to share a room.  There was no negotiation to be done about what to watch on TV or whose turn it was to ride in the front seat or where the dividing line was in the back.  I never competed for my parents’ attention, or for that matter, my grandparents’.  There’s a lot to be said for being an only child.  Learning to share is perhaps not one of them. 

Two of the disciples were on their way from Jerusalem to Emmaus in the afternoon of the first Easter Sunday.  Jesus joined them along the way, although the disciples were not aware who he was even though they discussed the Scriptures all along the way.  It was only when Jesus sat at table with them at the end of the day, took the bread, and broke it that they realized that this stranger from the road was the risen Jesus.  Breaking the bread is the first act of sharing it.  It is in sharing that the risen Jesus is most clearly revealed, more clearly even than all of the biblical elucidation in the world. 

Now Luke tells quite a different story in the Book of Acts (2:14a, 36-41).  There Peter preached with many arguments and 3,000 were baptized into the community of believers.  Peter was obviously eloquent and persuasive.  It is a dramatic story.  It also seems so much less costly than the one about Emmaus.  For one thing, there is no dusty road involved.  There are no miles to be walked over a couple of hours.  No huffing and puffing.  And no sharing.

It is also much more efficient.  We don’t know how long it took, but probably less time than it took to walk to Emmaus.  And there were 3,000 believers to show for it.  There is a great deal more effort put into the walk to Emmaus, and so little to show for it.  The latter involved just two people, and they were already disciples anyway.

Somehow, though, I can’t help but think the inherent self-sacrifice that comes in sharing of one’s daily bread leads to something much deeper than all the eloquent words in the world.  Maybe not.  Peter, after all, seems to have made a pretty big impression. Still, the act of sharing reveals more to me about Jesus.  But maybe it’s because I’m an only child.

Peace,

Doing Something about Easter

Perhaps some of you have gone to Jerusalem.  If so, you have probably visited the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.  Without turning this into a Discovery Channel special on “Secrets of the Bible,” the Church of the Holy Sepulchre has a very solid claim to contain within its walls the site of the crucifixion and the tomb where Christ was buried and rose from the dead. 

So the Church of the Holy Sepulchre is generally understood to be the holiest spot in the world for Christians.  It is possible to go into the tomb through a small doorway and pray in in the very place in which it is likely that the body of Christ lay from Good Friday until Easter.  

Here is what is curious to me.  This is the holiest site in the Christian world, the place where the most important event in all of human history actually took place.  It has been revered by millions upon millions.  And yet, it is the one place in the world, the only one, in which Christians proclaim that God is not present.  The proclamation of the angel is emphatic and clear:  “He is not here.”  The faithful wait long lines to see the inside of the tomb, but the announcement of the Gospel is:  “He is not here.” 

Even the angel invited the women who came to the tomb that first Easter morning to come in—“Come, see the place where he lay.”  It was not to worship, though, or even to pray.  It was to prove a point.  “He is not here.” 

And the angel no sooner proves his point than he has instructions—“Go quickly and tell his disciples, ‘He has been raised form the dead, and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him.’”  In fact, it is not just a matter of go and tell the disciples. The disciples themselves are to go, too.  They are to go to Galilee.   And, if you think about it, once they get to Galilee, they get a further instruction to go.  “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations.”  Go baptize and teach.  Go. 

We all know that the cross is not the end of the story.  We know that the resurrection comes after it.  But I think we do our faith a great disservice if we take Easter as the end of the story either.  Easter is no more the end of the story of Jesus than was Good Friday.  There is yet more to come.  There is still going to be done.  The angel tells the women to go tell the disciples.  The women tell the disciples to go to Galilee.  Jesus tells the disciples in Galilee to go baptize and teach.  In other words, it’s all about doing something about Easter.  Unless we do something about it, I’m not sure Easter matters very much at all. 

Easter is not the end of the story for us because it was not the end of the story for Jesus.  Easter is the beginning of something.  It is not the end of something.  Easter is an initiation.  It is not a completion.  Easter is a promise to be realized.  It is not an accomplishment to be admired.    Easter is an offer to us.  The part of the story yet to be written is whether we accept the offer or not.  And we can only accept the offer of Easter by choosing to do something about it.

If we do, we will go in the same way that Christ was known to go—to proclaim good news to the poor, release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind, liberation to the oppressed, and the acceptable year of the Lord.  If we do not, well, we might as well be waiting in a long line for the chance to see the one place on earth where God is not present.  God is found by going, going out among the people Christ has given us to love and the creation Christ has given us to care for.   We are going to have to go if we are going to get to the resurrection.  We are going to have to go do something about Easter.

Peace,

Easter of 1971

My family lived in the suburbs of New York for a few years when I was growing up.  Among my memories of those years was Easter of 1971.  It snowed that year on Easter, which made Easter rather difficult to imagine.  I remember my dad driving to church that morning creeping along to avoid an accident in the slippery conditions.  Had Easter been any earlier than it was this year, it could well have been our experience in New York this year. 

As it turns out, though, this Easter is going to be nothing like the Easter of 1971. Spring has arrived.  We are surrounded by new life.  The weather this last weekend was particularly glorious.  It just feels the way I think Easter ought to feel.  It makes it rather easier to anticipate the coming celebration of the resurrection.

Of course, Easter is never more needed than when it is difficult to anticipate and impossible to imagine.  In truth, though, resurrection is difficult to imagine at any time.  Resurrection is always difficult to anticipate. 

In some parts of the world, Easter comes, not in the spring, but in the midst of shortening days and increasingly colder weather, not as flowers are blooming and trees are budding, but as the landscape turns brown and the leaves wither and fall, not as abundance and color return but as barrenness and dark approach.  Easter must be difficult to imagine.  It is never more needed.

I had time a few weeks ago with my oldest friend and his family.  I was glad to see his daughter, who had recently returned from a tour of duty in Afghanistan.  I had been praying for her.  She returned safely, but not unaffected.  I think Easter may have become more difficult for her to imagine.  It has never been more needed.

Within the past year I have had parts in services on the death of a young single mother taken by Leukemia, of a young woman struggling with her identity as a transgendered person, and of a young Native American deacon whose ministry as a reconciler had placed him at the center of a church fight of international proportions.  It makes Easter difficult to imagine.  It has never been more needed. 

A senseless loss of life in Kansas, apparently motivated by hate, makes Easter difficult for us to imagine.  A mother’s loss of both her son and her father at the hands of a man described as a “raging anti-Semite” makes Easter difficult for us to imagine.  It has never been more needed. 

And Easter, I am sure, has never been more difficult to imagine than it was on the first one.  In the midst of hatred, loss, and broken dreams, resurrection catches us, as it did the first disciples, off guard, unprepared, and by surprise.  Still, Easter comes.  It came on the third day following Good Friday.  It came in 1971.  And it will come in 2014, just a few days from now. 

I’m pretty sure it is always equally needed. 

May this Easter come to you, whether it is difficult for you to imagine or not.  May light triumph over darkness even if the days grow shorter where you are.  May life overcome death even when death surrounds.  May love triumph over hate even when hate seems to have the upper hand.  Easter comes.  Easter comes especially when it is most needed. 

Happy Easter.

Peace,

Two Views of Salvation

The liturgy for this Sunday strikes two quite different themes related to salvation. 

The day begins with the story of the triumphal entry into Jerusalem:

A very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road, and others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road.  The crowds that went ahead of him and that followed were shouting, Hosanna to the Son of David!  Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!  Hosanna in the highest heaven!”  (Mt. 21:8-9)

That’s one way of looking at salvation.

There’s another way, the way of the cross.  We hear about it this Sunday, too. 

And when they came to a place called Golgotha (which means Place of a Skull), they offered him wine to drink, mixed with gall; but when he tasted it, he would not drink it.  And when they had crucified him, they divided his clothes among themselves by casting lots; then they sat down there and kept watch over him.  Over his head they put the charge against him, which read, “This is Jesus, the King of the Jews.”  (Mt. 27:33-37)

One way to look at salvation is salvation is something like rescue, like the cavalry (or the king) showing up to save us from danger.  That’s the triumphal entry point of view.  It is salvation from.  We like that a lot, and we greet it with palm fronds and hosannas. 

The other way is less to our liking.  In it, the cavalry doesn’t swoop in and rescue us from anything.  Instead, the cavalry, or God in this case, does something quite unexpected, not saving us but standing with us.  God chooses not to rescue us from our situation but to redeem it by taking it on Godself.  It is more a redemption sense of salvation, salvation in rather than from.  As the Passion narrative reminds us, we respond rather less favorably to this approach.

I think we wish for rescue and instead are offered redemption.  God does not save us from but saves us in.  To be more specific, God does not save us from our mortality, but in our mortality. God does not save us from our humanity, but in our humanity.  God does not rescue.  God redeems.  We choose the triumphal entry.  God chooses the Passion.

Peace,