Stewart Weaver

I was recently told that Abraham Lincoln used to spend 2/3 of his address preparation time thinking about the topics or subjects that the audience wanted to hear.  He would then spend 1/3 of his time thinking about that which he was going to say.

What do people want to hear on Easter Sunday?
What is it that could bring to people the joyous celebration of Easter or perhaps the sense of wonder that something mysterious and ineffable happened on this day many centuries ago?

Many, I think, would like to get that sense of inspiration and joy that perhaps marked Easter Sundays when we were young.  That sense of celebration with bright colours, Easter bonnets, packed churches singing robustly wonderful Easter hymns such as ‘Jesus Christ is risen today’ or ‘Thine be the glory’.

Many, I think, would want to walk out of church inspired, uplifted and buoyed up by the sense that they, in their faith, have partaken of something beyond human reckoning that points us beyond the often encircling and perhaps claustrophobic horizon.  That the barrier of death is not final and absolute and thus there is space for endless hope.

On Easter morning we had a 7am service on the beach.  Two of the youth group lads, who had been up all night as part of the vigil, wandered out to the beach in flip-flops and swimming shorts and towels and sunglasses.  They waded into the water and then dove in.  One of them floated effortlessly on his back.  And that water was COLD!

I can only imagine the sense of refreshment, of invigoration, of renewal that they must have felt.  I can only imagine the tingling that must have crept upon them as they warmed up/dried off.

That’s what people are probably looking for….not a dip in the cold Firth of Forth but a physical tingling in celebration that God has and will intervene decisively in our world.  And thus boundless hope and optimism.

In light of this supposition, a thought.

The resurrection according to Mark doesn’t really allow this sense of re-invigoration.  Most scholars assume that the original gospel ended with 16.8 and that the other verses were added as early followers tried to make sense of the open-endedness of the story.  A story with an empty tomb, a divine messenger and frightened women fleeing away.

It is an unfinished story and we are to finish it.

And we are pointed to Galilee, to the home of Christ, by this messenger.  Interestingly, there are only two other points in the gospel when there is this outside voice that tells us what is going on.  Early in Mark the voice of God affirms that Jesus is his son: the voice from heaven at Jesus’ baptism.  Much the same holds true at the transfiguration: the voice of God telling them, telling us, who this is.

Three times a voice from outside reminding us of who Jesus is.

This is an important point for the disciples as portrayed by Mark are a pretty thick lot.  They simply don’t seem to see or understand what is going on.  They need, it seems, this extra, outside voice to remind them of the import.

And so do we.

At St. Philip’s we are thinking a great deal about, and focussing on, the parables.  As I thought about Mark’s story I thought of the parable of the Good Samaritan.  How often my faith feels like the Good Samaritan on the side of the road.  Battered, bruised and left for dead.  In a world and environment that continually criticises, ignores or belittles faith, in a world where belief is so often ridiculed, it can be so difficult.  The slings and arrows so often do strike home and they hurt.  Add to this the endless tasks of those who believe, who are often the ones in a community to whom much responsibility falls, and it’s enough to want to sit on the side of the road and bleed.

Then the Samaritan comes along, cares for us, dresses our wounds, oil and wine for us, and pays for our healing.  The outsider to renew us.

Easter is that outsider’s voice calling us back to a life of everlasting love and grace.  It is God bashing down our human preconceptions and reminding us that there is so much more, so much that is beyond us and is mysterious and therefore absolutely wonderful and sacred.

Because of this curious, unbelievable miracle we can rest assured that the love of Christ continues.

And so I end with a story told by Cecelia Clegg at one of the St. P’s Lent Lectures (see elsewhere on the website).  She ends her lecture with a story of South Africa.

‘A white Afrikaner young man was imprisoned for killing the son of a black South African man.  After 15 years the old man decided to visit his on’s killer who had been asking forgiveness and asking to see him for some years.  They talked.  When the old man came out of the meeting he was very moved and distressed.  He said that he had discovered that the family of the prisoner had disowned him when he was convicted and had never come to see him.  He said that he was going to visit him and added ‘because he is now my son’.

Easter is real.  Easter is relevant.

Amen.