Readings Matthew 27:45-54
 
Today we have another reading which stresses the strangeness and expansiveness of the Easter message. On a previous Sunday we had Jesus descending unto the depths of the earth proclaiming good news to those in their graves… well, now we have this:
 
Jesus cried again with a loud voice and breathed his last. At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. The earth shook, and the rocks were split. The tombs also were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised. After Jesus’ resurrection they came out of the tombs and entered the holy city and appeared to many.
 
What do we make of this scene – the supernatural tearing of the Temple’s curtain, the shaking of the very earth, and the awakening and resurrection of many saints? To get to that question, I think it might be helpful to contrast this feast of divine activity and miracles with what has preceded it in the scene of Jesus’ crucifixion.
 
Those who passed by derided Jesus, shaking their heads and saying, ‘You who would destroy the temple and build it in three days, save yourself! If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross.’ In the same way the chief priests also, along with the scribes and elders, were mocking him, saying, ‘He saved others; he cannot save himself. He is the King of Israel; let him come down from the cross now, and we will believe in him. He trusts in God; let God deliver him now, if he wants to; for he said, “I am God’s Son.” The bandits who were crucified with him also taunted him in the same way.
 
Jesus’ utter powerlessness on the cross is mocked and flaunted by those who have seemingly won the day. Those who in this moment must feel a vindication of their religious authority or imperial might. After all this rapscallion from backwater Galilee has gone around saying, see him here exposed: a fraud, a fake, a huckster powerless to save himself, unable to carry out any of his promises, futile and failing, severed from the very God he claimed to be one with. Truly, this man was no son of God.
 
And then, amplifying the dramatic tension and seemingly offering greater validity to the position of his opponents, Jesus cries aloud “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Ding, ding, ding, we a have a confession! This man is no Messiah, no beloved son, no herald of God’s kingdom, no saviour of the people… the very God he said sent him is alien to him, the blasphemer has been forsaken, and now dies alone and exposed!
 
The scene is set for the most satisfying of dramatic reversals… and just so no one misses it, the reversal must be Dramatic with a capital D.
 
It begins with a loud voice (not unlike the voice that sounds over the primordial nothingness at the beginning of time). Christ “cried again with a loud voice” – which, when we pause to think, is a remarkable and miraculous event in its own right. Where could a man about to die from asphyxiation find the strength and breath to cry with a loud voice? This cry itself is the decisive turn of the crucifixion scene, Jesus calls into action all that follows with a voice of one who has the resurrection and the life within his grasp.
 
Following this miraculous cry, God acts. The One presumed absent, the One presumed satisfied with the execution of this heretic, the One presumably turning their back on this forsaken and marginal Jew, acts! God tears the Temple curtain, God shakes the foundations of the earth, God breaks apart the rocks, and God fills the dead with life. God responds to the death of Jesus with a tremendous display of power. In this response the truth is proclaimed, God was and is with this man Jesus, sent by God to save the world. God has not forsaken Jesus, but is vindicating all he said and did, and God will raise this man Jesus on the third day. And then, not to be missed, the mighty display of God’s power and presence is capped with an ironic twist: in a flip of the derision displayed by Jesus’ own people, a flip of the dismayed desertion of Jesus’ own followers… a lone centurion stands and beholds all that is happening and proclaims: Truly this man was God’s Son!
 
At Golgotha, Jesus mocked and misunderstood, suffers the indignity of imperial violence and the scorn of religious fear. Yet he withholds his power, commending his Spirit to God and a greater, more cosmic reversal to come. A reversal Jesus ushers onto stage with his last breath. And while we see the immediate impacts of this reversal in the moment of Christ’s death, this great reversal (in a kind of divine surplus) continues and continues. The reversal continues three days later in the resurrection (for where there was death, now there is life), in the ascension (where the one who wore a crown of thorns is now given all authority over heaven and earth), at Pentecost (where Christ’s body once pinned to the cross, now extends and expands across the earth and across the centuries) and will continue until that great and glorious day when Christ comes again (when the man of sorrows wipes every tear from our eyes).
 
The specific metaphorical or theological meanings of the particulars of this demonstration of God’s power and presence (the curtain, the earth, those in their tombs) while not being unimportant are not necessarily the point – yes they have something to say about the power of Christ’s atonement, the labour pains of the new creation, and the promise of the resurrection, but it is this display of tremendous and surprising divine power in its totality and dramatic surprise that teaches us the lesson today: Despite all worldly appearances, Jesus was not forsaken, his ministry was not a folly, his death was not the end. God fills the moment where God seems most absent with the reminder that at any moment all things can be upturned. God fills the moment of dereliction with majestic presence. And God fills Christ’s cry with the proclamation of good news which fills us all with hope: Christ was the Messiah, and through him redemption and reconciliation is achieved for the whole of creation, and in him is the resurrection and the life in which we all shall share. 
 
And as those who share in the resurrection and the life, we are also called to participate in this great reversal. Called to not accept the appearances of a world where violence and fear have presumably won the day, not to accept that those condemned by religious and political power are thereby the god-forsaken. We are called to hold out hope that with God everything can be upturned, hold out hope that the kingdom where last are first and poor are blessed and the mighty are cast from their thrones can rise up within us and break into our world at any moment.

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Image, "cracked rock" ID 2825090 - accessed here

Readings Romans 6:5-11 and Matthew 22:23-33
 
Anyone who has played a hand in raising children knows that a lot of time is spent teaching the importance of sharing. And part of learning about sharing is learning how to respond/treat the thing that has been shared. It is not ok, for instance, to take a favourite toy and then break it, it is not appropriate, for example, to demand someone share a chocolate with you for upwards of 15 minutes only to take one lick and then toss it away. Learning the importance of sharing includes learning how to respond to being shared with.
 
Over the last few weeks, we’ve seen how the Easter season is the sharing season… where what’s Christ’s becomes our own. Christ shares with the disciples his breath and Spirit so that we might share in his mission (for as the Father sent the Son, so the Son sends us). Last week we explored how Jesus descends unto the dead, so that all humanity might ascend with him – Jesus shares his victory over death so that none should be lost. And now today, Paul reminds us that we who share in Christ’s death will surely share in his resurrection, indeed we share in Christ’s own life. Christ thus shares with us his victory over sin, so that we would be freed to be alive to God in Christ.
 
What does it mean for us to live as beneficiaries of all this that Christ has shared? As those whose lives are a result of Christ sharing his breath, spirit, mission, life, and resurrection? How does this shape our life together? This is the ongoing question of the disciple: having recognised that we have been set free, having been plucked from death into life, what does it look like to be dead to sin and alive to God in Christ?
 
At one level we could try to respond to such a question by turning to the lives of the saints, diving into the biography of those held in the memory of the church for the ways their life reflected their devotion to God and neighbour, the hardships they endured, the trials they faced, the witness they maintained, and the many lives that were impacted because of their great faithfulness, their love of justice, their heart for the needy. I wonder who comes to mind for you, as such an example of being alive to God in Christ?
 
On another level, we might consider those faithful saints who are not preserved in stain glass or written about in books. Those faithful Christians we have been lucky enough to know, who served their community and church with great love and devotion, who fought quiet battles for others, who sought to treat others always with love, dignity and grace. Those who we can warmly recall, whose names are known only to a few, but whose impact on their community was a holy and significant thing. I wonder who comes to mind for you, as such an example of being alive to God in Christ?
 
I think both of these are valid approaches, as what it looks like to be dead to sin and alive in God, is something better lived than described. It looks different in different times and places. A life lived for Christ looks differently in each person as their gifts, passions, community, and contexts shape who they are and the relationships they form. Reflecting on the saints (both famous and non) also reminds us that to live for Christ is something that can be remarkable and majestic, but also mundane and everyday… it is not preserved for the elite, but the goal of all who have died and been raised with Christ.
 
Ultimately, the question, “what does it look like to be dead to sin and alive to God in Christ?” is one we consider together as a community. We all have a stake in this question, and we need one another to help us answer it in our own life. It is thus of no surprise then, that the season of Easter reaches its crescendo with Pentecost! Pentecost – the sending of the Holy Spirit and the birth of the church.
 
The bookending of this season by Easter Sunday and Pentecost, teaches us two things: First (and as initiation) Christ is the agent of our liberation, it is he who breaks the bonds of death and shares with us his resurrection and life, and then the Church is the site where we respond to gift. The church is the people we are given in the power of the Holy Spirit and the name of Jesus in order that we might learn and live out our freedom and commission as disciples.
 
This is why it is helpful that Easter is both a Day and a Season. In a day Christ claimed victory over sin and death, rose from the grave, and made us his own, sharing with humanity all that is his. And then, starting from that day, is the season (which stretches from that day until the last day – the times between Christ’s resurrection and return) where we seek together what it means for us to live as one who is dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus, to live as one who has been set free, to live as one who – daily – dies and rises with Christ.
 
We might consider, for an analogy, a family (perhaps a somewhat idealised version of a family, but nevertheless one which might help). Our birth is the easter moment, the moment we receive life. We did nothing to be born, nor anything to be born into this particular family, we are simply welcomed into a new family because life was shared with us (as was a name, a home, care, and nourishment) – by this we a brought to life, and – importantly brought to life within a community (a family). It is within this family that we are then taught how to live (how to speak, yes, walk and eat, yes, but also, more deeply, it is here we observe how to love, how to respond when someone has a need, how to work together. It is here we learn values, priorities, it is here we are granted the freedom to make mistakes knowing we won’t be abandoned (because it wasn’t our good behaviour that earnt us our birth). It is here that we have an environment to experience joy and sorrow, to grow and to change, to prepare to meet the world. Christ is the one who gives us our life, it is through the Spirit that we are born (again), into the church, this family, where we grow up together, learning from one another and those who came before and after, who we were born to be, what it looks like to be part of this family.
 
Easter is a sharing season – we have been given so much, so much that everything needs to be reconsidered and reconceived (death is not the ultimate power over life, sin does not hold us in captivity, we are sent to do even greater works than Christ, and we share in the very divine life in which all things find their end and perfection). How do we live after this? What does life look like because of this? In many ways being an environment where we can consider and respond to these questions is the purpose of the church. The church is the site (the people) where we work this out together, encouraging, supporting, and journeying with one another on this path, each and every day.
 
Let us then take up the charge once more, to use what we have received to help each other consider ourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.

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Image: Church Interior, Grace Cossington Smith (1941-42)

 Readings 1 Peter 3:15b-22 and John 5: 25-29
 
In the Apostles’ Creed, Christians proclaim: “[Jesus] descended into hell: on the third day he rose again from the dead”
 
There are several passages in the New Testament, which describe Jesus’ descent into the realm of the dead. We heard one in the gospel of John today, where those “in their graves will hear Jesus’ voice.” In Ephesians Jesus is said to have made captivity a captive, after he “descended into the lower parts of the earth.” In Philemon, Paul notes that Christ’s name is confessed “under the earth” among the dead, and then in 1 Peter 3, “[Jesus] went and made a proclamation to the spirits in prison.”
 
What do we learn, what does it mean to us, to proclaim such a thing in this season of Easter?
 
I was thinking about three recent works of art that take place (in part) in the realm of the dead. Hadestown, is a modern, musical retelling of the Orpheus and Eurydice myth. The Morning Star, is a novel by the Norwegian writer, Karl Ove Knausgaard (which some might remember from this week’s e-news!). And Coco is a Pixar film, set in Mexico and the on the Day of the Dead. Their respective realms of the dead are marked by increasing confusion and descent into non-being.
 
In Coco, a young boy, accidentally cursed, must journey to find a way out of the land of the dead, in doing so he strikes a deal with a skeleton named Hector, who will help the boy escape should he restore a photo of Hector to his family’s home. The great threat that looms over the land of the dead, is to be forgotten in the land of the living, should no one alive remember you, you fade from the land of the dead, fade from being, and become one of the forgotten.  
 
In Hadestown, Eurydice discovers that those who spend too long in the underworld, can no longer hear, or raise their heads to see another person standing before them, they cease to be able to recall their own name, or the details of their lives. Forgotten in the world above and in their minds below, they become indistinct cogs in the unceasing industry of the realm of the dead. This same slippage into non-being, into the haze of the forgotten begins to take hold of Eurydice too, that is until Orpheus arrives to claim her and lead her out to life (let’s just, for the moment, ignore how that actually ends).
 
The Morning Star’s land of the dead also abounds the loss of memory and self amidst the haze of timelessness and purposelessness. Through this section of the narrative we follow one man, desperately trying to cling to an identity and calling, even as he forgets his name and all details of his life, for he knows one thing: his son is somewhere in this realm of the dead, and could he only find him, he might be able to draw him out… of course, as just another mortal, he cannot pierce the fog of non-being, nor pluck life from death.
 
These three mythic and artistic realms of the dead, share much with the varying views of the land of the dead in the ancient world. The loss of self, the impossibility of return, the deterioration and eventual dissolution of the self into nothingness. It is a realm marked less by torment, and more by forgetfulness, lethargy, and hopelessness. It is a place of no individuality or change, just the slow fade from being to non-being, something to nothingness, as one is forgotten, erased, and unmoored.
 
And yet, “[Jesus] descended into hell: on the third day he rose again from the dead.” Jesus descended into the lower parts of the world and made a proclamation to the spirits imprisoned, so that those in their graves would hear his voice. The descent of Christ is an assault on the seemingly unescapable realm of the dead, a claiming of those held there since even the days of Noah. Christ descends so that humanity might ascend with him – the resurrection of Christ is not Christ’s alone, it belongs to all of humanity even those long asleep. 
 
This descent of Christ breaks apart the suffocating cling of death! It loosens chains, breaks doors, and reveals that despite all appearances: we are – in death - still known and named, still loved and claimed. Christ proves that no one has been forgotten, no one has been lost, no one has dissolved into non-being. As the psalmist says, If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there. Christ knows the names of those death claimed sovereignty over and proclaims that they belong to him. He breaks death’s grip and pulls humanity up by the roots, because there is no place in which he does not hold authority, no place in which darkness overcomes the light of the world, no place in which humanity can be severed from the love of God.
 
There’s a profound practice in Eastern Orthodox iconography of the resurrection. Christ appears, bursting from the tomb, standing over the broken doors of hell leading Adam and Eve from their graves. In his descent, Christ goes right back to the beginning of death, to the first sin, to the cataclysmic beginnings of humanity’s loss and longing, and he takes these figures by the hands and with all mercy and power, draws all the dead into life. Christ shares with all the dead the power of his resurrection. His death and descent hold the promise that we are not destined to the shadows and confusion of the underworld, we are not destined to be forgotten, we are destined to be his! Humanity is not created to be uncreated by decay and dissolution, we have been created to be restored and glorified, to be swept up in Christ’s own resurrection, so that we might share in his very life.
 
So we return to our opening question, what does it mean to proclaim Jesus’ descent into hell, into the land of the dead, in this Easter season?
 
Well, for starters it is a great reminder that the gospel message is bigger, stranger, more mysterious, expansive, and cosmic that we are often want to present it. The story of Easter is not just for you and me, but all of humanity, all of creation, it is an event proclaimed and felt in every possible realm, on every possible side of life and death. In the resurrection a seismic shift is revealed… death, forever appearing the strongest power over all, the ultimate and unreversible destination of all, has been triumphed over – Jesus made captivity a captive!
 
Such a victory and transformation doesn’t preclude the reality of grief, of the injustice of death come to soon, of the longing for more life. And yet, Christ’s death, descent, and resurrection nonetheless transforms death. Death becomes yet another place where Christ reigns, yet another place where deliverance is proclaimed. It is for this reason that Paul proclaims that death has lost its sting! Death is no longer a land of no return, of slow demise, of the forgotten and forsaken. It is from the peaceful rest of death (robbed of its horror and confusion) that we are found by Christ, and shall one day be restored and raised with him!
 
This is good news for us, for we shall all die. It is consoling news in the wake of the death of those we love and lose. And yet, this good news also shapes our discipleship, shapes how we live today, in the realm of the living… for the traits that marked the realm of the dead – the confusion, the chains, the dissolution into non-being, being forgotten and unmoored – all these fates can befall the living. Such a living death can befall the one who lives isolated and alone, no longer visited or received. It can befall the one excluded from society because of mental illness, poverty, or unemployment. It can befall the one cut off from family, friends, and purpose by an abusive partner. It can befall the child forced to live in lies so as to live in their family home. It can befall whole communities weighed down by generations of injustice and indignity. It can befall the one whose very mind has become a haze of confusion and forgetfulness. And yet, we confess that Jesus descends into all these places. Jesus is found in these homes, communities, and hearts proclaiming deliverance and salvation. Jesus descends even to these living graves and takes people by the hand to lead them into life. It is even in these places of living death, marked by hopelessness and regularly consigned to baskets marked “too hard”, that Jesus breaks chains, opens doors, and transforms them into gardens of new life.
 
And so let we who grieve take heart, we who feel trapped by the circumstances of a broken world be comforted, and we who confess to follow Christ, follow him in all these descents. Let us be found among those living in the realms of the dead, let us fight the forces of death with the way of love and life, proclaiming that in Christ’s descent we shall all ascend.

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​Image: Gustave Dore, The Burial of Jesus (1844)

Readings 1 John 5:1-6 and John 20:19-31
 
Of the death of Jesus, Mark writes, Then Jesus gave a loud cry and breathed his last.
Matthew writes, Then Jesus cried again with a loud voice and breathed his last.
Luke writes, Then Jesus, crying with a loud voice, said, ‘Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.’ Having said this, he breathed his last.
John writes, Jesus said, ‘It is finished.’ Then he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.
 
And now, here in the locked room with his fearful disciples, Jesus stands among them and breathes again, giving them the Spirit. That which was given up, lost, and commended is once again Jesus’ to give. Jesus lives and breathes: the breath of resurrection, the breath of victory, the breath of salvation is breathed upon his disciples. Jesus stands amongst his disciples and gives to them the Spirit that was upon him in his ministry. The very things that crucifixion seemed to snuff out (his breath and Spirit) are here revealed as vibrant, present, and ready to be bestowed. The cross was not the end, death did not win the day, the tomb could not hold him – hell has been harrowed, death robbed of its sting, and here (as testament to that victory) Jesus demonstrates that he is the one who can lay down his life and take it up again, breath his last and then breath again, give up his Spirit and then give it again.
 
And in this power, in this breath and Spirit, the Christian is created.
As the Father has sent me, so I send you.
The Christian is one who has received the Spirit of Christ to follow in the way of Christ. The one who has received the breath of new life in order to live the life of Christ. The one who has been forgiven in order to take up the ministry of forgiveness. The one who has received the peace of Christ in order to proclaim peace on earth. The Christian is the one who is sent by Jesus in the same way Jesus himself was sent. The Christian is one who has received the breath and the Spirit and thus can live according to these words of Christ:
Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father.
 
The Christian (and thus the church) is created in the breath of resurrection and the giving of Holy Spirit in order to do the works that Christ himself has done. The Spirit makes it possible for the Christian to live in the way Christ lived, minister in the way Christ ministered, to be (as the church) the very body of Christ in the world today. As Christ himself kept no power, blessing, or gift to himself (even his breath and Spirit is proved to be not his own but ours) so we keep no power, blessing, or gift to ourselves. All we have received from Christ is ours to serve and bless others. All we have gained from Christ’s perfect righteousness is gained so we may become the righteousness of God for the world. Having been reconciled to God in Christ, Christ has made us ambassadors of reconciliation.
 
The peace Christ offers, the hope Christ brings, the affirmation of his presence and power to the disciples is not solely an act of consolation (though it is that) it is an act of commissioning. Following their scattering at the threat of the cross, Jesus spends the days and weeks following his resurrection gathering up those who were lost. In his tender mercy he restores them as his friends and disciples. Having been restored, they are then sent as he himself was sent - to do greater works than these. Sent as he himself was sent – with the power and peace of the Spirit. Sent as he himself was sent – to make disciples. Sent as he himself was sent – to proclaim good news and the deliverance of the captives. Sent as he himself was sent – to forgive sins and make a new family. Sent as he himself was sent – that we might have life and have it in abundance!
 
In the season of Easter we celebrate: Christ is risen. The cross could not claim his last breath, death could not claim his Spirit, and the tomb could not claim his body – these were his to lay down and his to take up again. And having taken them up he gives them generously to those who follow after him, so that we might live as he lives for the world he loves!

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Image: Nalini Jayasuriya (Sri Lankan, 1927–2014), The Great Commission, 2002. Mixed media on canvas, 28 × 53 in.

Readings: Jeremiah 31: 1-5 and John 20:1-18
 
Here in this garden Mary experiences a sublime moment of clarity. She pokes her head into the empty tomb and encounters two angels (though we can’t tell if she realises what they are), she spins around to see a gardener (though that is not who he is). Both ask her why she is weeping, to both she asks after her Lord… everything to this point is a cascading experience of confusion and distress – where is the body, where is her Lord, who are these people standing in and around his tomb so early on a Sabbath morning?
 
And then a singular voice cuts through the chaos, cuts through the noise and distraction, the loss and desperation. A singular voice – which has no likeness in this age or the next – dispels all fear and falsehood with a word: “Mary.” In this moment truth radiates, beauty shines, and redemption blossoms. It is a restorative word of recognition, her teacher, her shepherd, her saviour calls her by name. In the moment he recognises her (Mary) she recognises him (Rabbouni) – his naming of her makes possible her naming of him. Having been seen, we are able to see. Jesus’ voice dissolves all confusion and grief, and Mary knows – with perfect clarity – who she is, and before whom she stands: she is a disciple of the Living Lord.
 
Jesus’ naming and claiming of Mary, fulfils that which he promised earlier in the gospel:
I won’t leave you orphaned; I’m coming to you. A little longer, and the world won’t see me anymore, but you’ll see me, because I live, and you will live.
 
Her encounter with Jesus, the sound of her name on his lips, his resurrected body before her, vindicates all he had said and done. It vindicates the million little reasons he had given her to believe, to hope, to follow. He is indeed the good shepherd who will call the sheep by name, he is indeed the Son of the Most High able to lead us into life, he is indeed the light and life of the world, he is indeed the one who came that we might have life in abundance. Here, in this moment of recognition, Jesus’ words are vindicated: because I live, you will live.
 
Mary finds herself in the presence of the Living Lord, and in joy and relief embraces her friend, her hope, her Rabbouni. And yet, that is not who she has been named to be, that is not why she has had this encounter with the resurrection and the life. It is not so that she might build him a tent on earth, nor ascend with him to the heavens. No, in being named she is claimed – in being claimed she is commissioned: she is a disciple of the Living Lord. Mary is named so that she might proclaim the resurrection. She is named a herald of good news. Mary is named and claimed as one set apart to proclaim the spirit of adoption we receive through the resurrection and ascension of Jesus (for he goes not only to his God but our God, not only his Father, but our Father).
 
In speaking her name, Jesus signals to Mary that he lives, and that she will also live. She is called into life – a life of faith and witness, a life of a disciple in service to the world, a life glorifying God in the manner of Jesus’ own life. This is why she is asked not to cling; not because Jesus wants to create any distance between her and him (for in the ascension there can no longer be any distance between Christ and creation – for Jesus is with us always to the ends of the earth and the end of the age). She is asked to go so that she might teach others that because he lives, we will live!
 
On Easter Sunday, we take our place in the line that reaches back some two-thousand years to Mary – the first of the witnesses, the first herald of the resurrection. On Easter we remember that Jesus has also called us by name. That Jesus triumphed over sin and death for us as well. That Jesus promised us that because he lives, we will live. And that we will not live just any kind of life, but a life of love, a life of hope, a life of joy, a life of service. We are called (raised!) into a life grounded on the great proclamation: The one the world thought dead has ascended to his God and our God, to his Father and our Father. The one Rome tried to kill, did not leave us orphaned. Weep not! Hear your name in his promise: because he lives, we will live. Jesus is with us always, to the end of the age.

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Image: Graham Sutherland, Noli me tangere, 1961.

Readings: Exodus 12:1-14 and John 13:1-17, 31-35
 
Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.
 
This small flourish of narration – easily overlooked – is the beauty of Christ and his way; the hope and promise of Easter. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. Jesus, the anointed one of God, is the one they called a friend of sinners. A friend to the downcast and the lost, the lonely and despised, a friend to those who have more than a few regrets. Jesus loves people – we should not lose the power of this statement just because we could imagine seeing it on a t-shirt. Jesus loved humanity (sure!), loved all creation (yes! enough to reconcile it all to God) – these are true statements about the redemptive mission of Christ… but Jesus also loved (loves) people, specific people, as a friend would. Many of the times Jesus becomes acutely emotional in the gospels is when he is confronted by specific suffering. When he weeps over his friend Lazarus, when he considers those suffering Jerusalem, when he sees the fear in his followers, the needs of a hungry crowd. For Jesus loved his own in the world and loved them to the end… To the end. This phrase is not supposition – it has been tested. Between this claim and the end, Jesus will be betrayed, denied, deserted. He will be tortured, abused, crucified. He will experience desolation, abandonment, and mockery. And yet, upon the cross he will look down on his mother and ensure she is taken into a friend’s home, he will look down on those killing him and ask for their forgiveness, he will look at a man dying next to him and promise him paradise. In three days, he will find those disciples who fled and offer his wounds as a testament to his presence, and breakfast as a promise of his forgiveness. To the end, to the bitter and triumphal end, Jesus loved his own.
 
This love did not require their unwavering courage in the face of violence, did not require them to understand all that was happening (and happening in realms unseen). He, who was a friend of sinners, knew the love sinners had to offer was fragile. He loves his own to the end, despite knowing how awkwardly and unsatisfactorily he would be loved at the end. Jesus loves his own to the end because such a love will be found nowhere else. It is with no expectation of perfection, or a demand to be shown our worth, that Jesus asks his disciples: love one another. This is his “new commandment”, the last commandment. One might presume, that facing the precipice of death, alone with his closest followers, a religious leader might offer some final esoteric knowledge or secret doctrine. But Jesus, friend of sinners, asks them to simply love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.
 
We gather tonight, on the eve of Calvary, readying ourselves to attend to the cross of Christ. This mysterious, tremendous, salvific event. There has been plenty of ink, and more than a little blood shed over the details of how exactly life comes through death, how exactly the execution of Christ constitutes something “good.” And while the pursuit of answers to these questions are not to be scoffed or shelved, we are here reminded that they are surrounded by these two little verses in John.
 
Easter orbits the love Jesus had for his own, and the love Jesus asked his own to show. We stand amidst and as testament to this love. For we too are Jesus’ friends, we too have been loved to the end, and we too are asked to love one another as he loved us. Easter is, at its core, simply another time to grow in this love (to know ourselves more and more as those who are loved, and called love one another in kind). That’s it really: Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. May we do the same. Amen.

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Image: Maundy Thursday Foot-Washing by Cara B. Hochhalter, 2019 (Vanderbilt Divinity Library)

Readings Romans 16:1-16 and Matthew 26:6-13
 
Easter approaches… the cross and the tomb loom on the near horizon, the clash between the Jesus movement and Imperial Rome intensifies, the cosmic battle between Christ and Death sweeps into view, The Light of the World’s descent into Hades and harrowing of hell shall be attended… and yet, here we are, one week before Palm Sunday, listening to Paul give the biblical equivalent of an Oscars speech - listing name upon name with gratitude and greeting.
 
Why this pause, why all these names on the eve of the most dramatic narrative events of our liturgical calendar? Well, before we answer that, let us consider the gospel reading.
 
Jesus, reclining at table, is anointed with a costly perfume, an act which raises anger in his disciples, yet he rightly interprets as preparing him for his death. This woman demonstrates, in her lavish act of respect, that she has grasped what so few have yet grasp: When Jesus has been predicting his betrayal and death, he has meant it. She has grasped the words that begun this Lenten season: Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. Her beautiful act is an act of preparation, one which signals she has realised the path of the Lord, which will take him to Calvary.
 
Like John at the Jordan, this woman exemplifies the calling of the disciple – to bear witness, to point to Jesus, to (in action and devotion) direct the gaze of the world to him and his work. It is because she has grasped the significance of Christ and his death, that Christ offers the highest praise: Truly I tell you, wherever this good news is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in remembrance of her.
 
Wherever the gospel is proclaimed what she has done will be remembered. The role of Christian witness can never be severed from the good news, which, as a matter of pure coincidence, leads us back to our opening question about why we are pausing to spend time with Paul’s greetings and gratitude before the good news of Easter.
 
In this reading we are introduced to a range of Christian witnesses, and the importance of their work in the life of the church. And like the gospel reading, one thing that is noticeable is the vital and robust role of women in the church.
 
Phoebe, a deacon in the church, is the one entrusted with Paul’s letter. But her role does not end at delivery. She would have read it, but reading also involves interpretation, requires her to answer questions of clarification and application. Her responsibility is thus to teach the church. Prisca and Aquilla run a church together in their home and risked their necks for Paul in the past. There is no sense that one is above the other, and so we have on display female church leadership and church planting. And then there’s Junia, a woman, an apostle. And not only an apostle, for Paul says she is prominent and eminent among the apostles. Evidently, for some Christians the idea of a woman apostle was so confronting that some translations added an s to the end of her name so it appears masculine. But despite such linguistic gymnastics, indeed despite the many ways that the church succumbed (and succumbs still) to patriarchy and gender inequality, Paul’s letter to the Romans preserves for us the history of women leading the early church in a range of offices, ministries, and roles.
 
Paul’s letter to the Romans is often treated as this systematic, theological treatise – which, compared to Paul’s more incidental letters, lays out his fuller, mature thought, more applicable to the church universal than concerned with local issues. And yet, here we are reminded, that Paul, as always, has many particular people, churches, and households in mind. We are reminded too, that the growth and shaping of Christianity is not a one-man-show. Paul’s teaching, learning, and witness emerge from within a community. It evolves out of relationships, it is learnt from others, it reflects more than him. The church’s proclamation, worship, and witness, does not happen in a vacuum. It is the work of a people infused with the Holy Spirit and committed to the way of Christ. The gospel is something witnessed to, and so it is not unnatural to pause at this moment of the church’s year and remind ourselves that the reason we celebrate the big story of Easter is because it has been witnessed to us by others (family, churches, friends). We celebrate Easter today, because of disciples like those Paul names, because of women like the one Jesus commended, who recognised him and responded with lavish and abundant devotion.
 
I want to end with a small point of irony… Jesus says of the woman who anointed him, Truly I tell you, wherever this good news is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in remembrance of her. What’s her name? This woman? Interestingly, despite Jesus’ recognition and commendation, Matthew didn’t think to record it. We know Jesus was in the home of Simon, we know the names of the twelve male disciples who grumbled… but we do not know her name (at least not from this gospel). At one level, such an omission reflects the aforementioned patriarchal background and attitudes that permeate Scripture and shaped the church. And yet, despite (and without erasing) that, there is a way that her namelessness points to a deep truth. Her anonymity allows her a symbolic role – she is who we are all called to be… she is a picture of a disciple, an exemplary witness to Christ, she is Christian… In her very anonymity she reminds us that we are also called to be one whose actions and devotion point to Christ, whose work and witness is performed in such a way that (as John the Baptist captured) Christ must increase while we decrease. We are called to prepare the way of the Lord, point to Christ and the freedom he brings, and to do all this with no intention of seeing our names preserved in the history books, with no intention of being named among the notable (should it be that we are remembered among the witnesses this is a grace and a gift, but never a goal). We do this out of sheer love and devotion for who Christ is and what Christ has done, so others might know the story. Our goal (if it may be characterised as such) is simply to join the great cloud of witnesses that have gone before and surround us still, who found their life in the name of Christ. 

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Image: Pieter Bruegel the Elder, The Road to Calvary, 1564

Readings Numbers 5:5-10, Matthew 5:21-26
 
There’s a certain archetype in action films and westerns, that of the haunted hero. When we meet this character, we are struck by their devotion to pursuing justice, or risking their life protecting the vulnerable. And yet, over time, and often during some camp fire confession, it is revealed that their motivation for pursuing the good, is not altogether altruistic. It is revealed that in their past they committed some awful act that led to unspeakable and irreparable harm, which they have now devoted their life to rectify. Of course, what makes the haunted hero, well haunted, is that they can no longer directly fix the situation they caused. Thus, as the next best thing, they are devoted to helping anyone they can in an attempt to do no further harm, in an attempt to clear the ledger, in an attempt to ensure what happened once will happen no more…
 
To what may we compare the haunted hero? While Christians are not called to be haunted by the failings in our past, (after all Happy are those whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered), Christians are nonetheless charged to take seriously any harm we have caused, any charge of wrongdoing or mistreatment that someone holds against us, to take seriously unreconciled relationships and potential enmity within the community. And so, without valorising hauntedness, Christians can nonetheless recognise in the vocation of such a haunted hero, our own calling as disciples. For, as our two readings demonstrated, we should be unsettled by the notion of having done wrong, and comprehend the task of needing to rectify, repair, and restore any we have hurt.
 
The readings from Numbers emphasises the need to deliver reparations (full restitution plus one fifth) to the wronged party. And if that wronged party is deceased, the restitution must be made to their kin, and if no kin can be found, then it goes to the community. The requirement to make right does not dissipate just because the parties directly and immediately involved are no longer present. The gospel reading also emphasises the onus of reconciliation and repair is placed upon we who have done wrong. If you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift before the altar and go, first be reconciled to your brother or sister. Do not wait and appeal to the law of the land, make right swiftly.
 
Both readings make it clear, repentance is displayed in repair and restitution. As the people of God we live under this commandment.
 
For the religious life is a communal life, and so the life of the community (its health, honesty, and hospitality) matters a great deal. Interpersonal conflict, community brokenness, harsh words and mistreatment, wrongdoing and exploitation – these things cannot be side-lined or postponed while we attend to our worship and spiritual growth. They are not secondary, not fringe, not optional. Worship is not a discreet category able to be cordoned off from our life together. We do not get to neglect relations with people in order to pursue our relationship with God; after all whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love. The altar cannot be approached before reconciliation is sought, we do not take communion until we have passed the peace, what good are platitudes, the apostle James reminds his community, without attention to material need, for just as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is also dead.
 
The haunted hero’s journey tends to resolve when they let go of the guilt they have been carrying all these years. They must forgive themselves of the wrong they committed, move forward into healing, and open themselves to love once more. Importantly however, such an act doesn’t mean they give up their vocation to be a hero. They don’t stop helping others, protecting the vulnerable, or seeking justice. They keep doing that, just, less haunted. In this way again, the (now-not-so-haunted) hero and the Christian are similar. For we too are called to seek forgiveness as those already forgiven, to seek reconciliation as those already reconciled, to seek restoration as those already restored, to pay restitution as those whose debts are erased. The spiritual and the material, our worship and our community cannot be severed, because our life together is made possible by God’s life with us, as the scripture says: Beloved, since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another…. if we love one another, God lives in us, and God’s love is perfected in us.
 
As children of God, Christ in his perfect righteousness has shared with us the spirit of adoption. Jesus has shared with us a portion of the divine life, and so we are not asked to be haunted heroes: we do not right wrongs to work off a debt that cannot be satisfied. Instead, we are invited into a family, and asked to take seriously its life and health. Such an invitation (to abide with others in the love of God), asks us to prioritise repentance, restitution, and reconciliation, for it is by this that we become a people of freedom, joy, and peace. By leaving our gift at the altar and hurrying off to the brother or sister we have wronged, we overcome any split between worship and community, and embody fully our calling to be a people who love one another as Christ has loved us.  

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​Image, Reconciliation, Sculpture by Josefina de Vasconcellos 

Readings Genesis 18:1-8, 1 Kings 17:8-16, Matthew 14:13-21, Luke 24:13-16, 28-31 

We have heard four scenes in which food is served to strangers.
 
Scene 1. Abraham serves the travelling strangers (who turn out to be God and angels).
In the context in which all these stories are composed, hospitality is regularly a life-or-death matter. If you (and your party) are travelling, if you are in one of the many in-between places between departure and destination, your life depends on the kindness of strangers to show you hospitality, to offer water and food, to offer shelter and protection. It is not simply politeness, it is the offering of life. Abraham sees three travellers approaching and goes to meet them, insisting they stay – through this he serves God and angels.
 
Scene 2. The widow from Zarephath serves Elijah (who turns out to be a prophet of God). Amidst a prolonged drought, God sends Elijah out of the lands of Israel. Upon arriving at Zarephath he asks for some water, which the woman is ready enough to provide, but then he asks too for some bread. The woman now faces the conundrum – to offer bread to a stranger is to offer life, and yet, she has no life to offer… indeed, as she says, what she has left will be her and her son’s last meal. Death hovers over her house, what hospitality could she offer. Elijah, a stranger, says to her, from that last morsel, God will make enough food to outlast this drought. Elijah prophesies: if you offer life to the stranger at your gate, it will bring life to your home. Hospitality will keep death at bay, if she is willing to trust that this stranger at her door is indeed an emissary of a foreign God.
 
Scene 3. Jesus serves the hungry crowds (who turn out to be us whenever we take communion). Jesus has withdrawn to a deserted place in grief. The death of John the Baptist casts a shadow over the scene. And yet, the crowds follow Jesus, drawing near to the light and life of the world. In doing so they become a people in need of hospitality. The disciples are right, there is nothing for them to eat in this in-between place. They must be sent away in order to procure what they need to live. And yet, Jesus reminds them, we do not live on bread alone, what is needed to live is there amongst them. Jesus asks the disciples to share what they have. The disciples have to trust, that by handing over what little they have to Jesus, they will not become empty, that by sharing what little they have, this hospitality will bring life. And so they do, and it does. Some 10,000 people, maybe more, are fed.
 
Scene 4. The men walking to Emmaus serve a stranger travelling with them (who turns out to be Jesus). The scene is cast in the shadow of Christ’s own death. The men, in fear and grief, are withdrawing from Jerusalem. Along the way they meet a stranger, with whom they share their loss and discuss the scriptures. As they arrive at their home, they – without prompt – offer the traveller hospitality, inviting him into their homes for a meal and shelter for the evening. At their table, the stranger breaks the bread and blesses it – and in that moment they realise they have invited Jesus into their home. In offering life to a travelling stranger they encounter Christ alive and present with them. Their hospitality leads them out from under the shadow of his death and back into the life of the people of God.
 
I wonder if you are captivated or struck by any of these particular scenes?
Or notice strange connections, parallels and paradoxes running between them?
Do any of these scenes remind you of a time you received or offered hospitality? A time when you felt nourished and sustained by Christ, or found yourself being led into life through the offering of hospitality to another?
 
For as these stories teach us, we are both the ones who are served by God (in word and worship, in scripture and sacrament, in daily bread and kingdom banquets), and we are the ones who serve God (for as you did to the least of these you did unto Christ, or as the writer of Hebrews reminds the congregation: Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it).
 
Last week we entered Lent with an invitation drawn from Revelation:
The Spirit and the bride say, ‘Come.’
And let everyone who hears say, ‘Come.’
And let everyone who is thirsty come.
Let anyone who wishes take the water of life as a gift.
 
Today we see that this invitation is not just some heavenly symbol awaiting us in the age to come, it also reminds us of the hospitality we have already received from God (at this table and in so many other ways). Further, this invitation is also a reminder that the hospitality we have received, that the daily bread we have been gifted, is given so that we might give. We are called to be a hospitable people. A people who love the stranger, care for the foreigner, who provide for the crowds, who open hearts and homes to those in need. By this we find ourselves in the surprising presence of the divine, by this we welcome Christ, by this life comes to our homes and heart. The offering of hospitality is not a line that proceeds from us and leaves us with less than before. Rather it is a circle, by which the love of Christ flows through us, to others, and returns to us as the very presence of God.
 
So to build on our Lenten invitation:
The Spirit and the bride say, ‘Come.’
And let everyone who hears say, ‘Come.’
And let everyone who is thirsty come.
Let anyone who wishes take the water of life as a gift.
 
And let we who have freely received, freely give.
Let we who have taken the water of life as a gift, share that life with others
Let us give drink to the thirsty,
Clothes to the naked
Food to the hungry,
Shelter to the lonely
Welcome to the stranger
For in this we receive the life abundant!

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IMage: Abraham and Three Angels. Marc Chagall 1966. Musée national Message Biblique Marc Chagall, Nice, France.

Readings Revelation 22:1-5, 16-17, Matthew 3:1-6
 
Lent begins, and here is your invitation for this whole season:
The Spirit and the bride say, ‘Come.’
And let everyone who hears say, ‘Come.’
And let everyone who is thirsty come.
Let anyone who wishes take the water of life as a gift.
 
The vision of Revelation is of the river of life, which flows from the throne of God and the Lamb through the streets. The river gives life to trees on each side, the leaves of which are for the healing of the nations. 
 
Come to this river, come to these waters, anyone who hears this, anyone who thirsts, come to the waters, take the water of life as a gift.
 
You who thirst for righteousness and justice - come to the water of life, drink, and be refreshed for the work.
You who thirst for mercy and relief - come to the water, drink, Christ is with you always.
You who thirst for wisdom and truth - come to the water, drink, be nourished by the Word.
You who thirst for new life - come to the water, drink, and die and rise with Christ.
 
For just as the Spirit and the Bride say come, so too did John. John called the people to the waters of the Jordan, for here too the water brought life: repent for the kingdom of heaven has come near. 
 
You who mourn what has gone - the kingdom of heaven has come near, Christ sets us free from the past.
You who fear what is to come - the kingdom of heaven has come near, Christ gives us a future
You who don’t know what step to take - the kingdom of heaven has come near, Christ walks beside you.
 
Traditionally the church has practised baptisms on Easter Sunday. The Lenten season of preparation and repentance functioned well in readying new converts to immerse themselves in the water of life, to die and rise with Christ. The Lenten season, echoing Christ’s time in the wilderness, teaches us to rely on Christ for everything, even life itself. Lent readies us to answer Christ when he calls us from our boats, to live lives that prepare the way for the Lord!
 
We who have been baptised are also invited to come, come and drink the waters of life. The invitation is not to be baptised again, but to remember your baptism, remember the new life inside you, remember Christ’s claim on your life, remember that the kingdom of heaven has drawn near, has sprung up within you! For those of us already baptised can still grow thirsty, we too need to be refreshed and nourished, we too need to be led to water and reminded to drink. Take this time to draw nearer to God, to reflect on anything that has grown up in our life which is interfering with our worship and witness, which is distracting us from the need of our neighbour, which is crowding out our seeking of the kingdom. 
 
The waters of our life can often feel polluted, or that their flow is being stifled somewhere upstream. Whether that be the industrial pollutants of systemic sexism, racism, economic scarcity, or ecological crisis, or whether that be the damming of potential caused by trauma, abuse, harsh words, undue pressure or low expectations. There are forces, and people, and moments in our past and present, or looming over our future that can muddy our waters. The waters of the world, so easily degraded, might not feel inviting, or refreshing, or life giving. But these are not the only waters… the waters of life, that flow from the throne of God and the lamb, these break through dam walls, these burst over the banks, these purify and transform stagnant waters, so that we might drink again! So that we might immerse ourselves once more, so that we might luxuriate in the waters that bring healing and wholeness, restoration and new life! 
 
So come! The Spirit says come! Let these waters cleanse and renew, let these waters refresh and remind, let these waters quench and revive. For the waters of life are a gift of God. In them we have the freedom to repent, in them we feel the closeness of the kingdom, and by following their stream we make the path straight and prepare the way for the Lord.
 
This Lent, all Lent, remember: 
The Spirit and the bride say, ‘Come.’
And let everyone who hears say, ‘Come.’
And let everyone who is thirsty come.
Let anyone who wishes take the water of life as a gift.


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Image: Claude Monet, Banks of the Seine, Vétheuil, 1880