Easter Sunday Sermon 2020
One of my favourite modern theologians is not someone who has written many deep, meaningful and difficult to read books. Rather, I love the work of Michael Leunig, an author who uses little cartoon figures to illustrate his ideas.
Some of you may be familiar with his work; he draws bewildered little men and writes amusing yet profound prayers. This is a man who can write prayers about hair and about door handles. In one of his cartoons, there 3 men hanging on crosses, obviously meant to be Jesus and the two thieves crucified with him. And in the foreground one Roman soldier is telling another soldier “See, I told you if we killed the leader we would nip this in the bud”.
I can understand the soldier’s logic, for the Romans were used to disposing of troublemakers, and once this Jesus of Nazareth was out of the way, surely all the upset he had caused would end. It would end because all his friends had run off and left him, and clearly there would be no one to keep his new troublesome movement going. How wrong the Roman soldier was. The Jesus movement did not end, it grew and grew in a way that those early believers could not have imagined. We are a long way and many years apart from those events in Jerusalem, yet here we are, remembering Jesus and his crucifixion.
If you took notice of the TV ads with their images of Easter eggs and hot cross buns, you might think that Easter began in January, and that it finishes on Easter Sunday, when we have consumed as much of the chocolate and the hot cross buns as is humanly possible. But that’s not so, because as far as the church is concerned, Easter begins with the great triduum – the 3 days of Easter beginning at sundown on Thursday and ending at dawn on Sunday.
In fact, I think that the services of the great Triduum are a microcosm of life: the good times and the difficult times. The ups and the downs. We know that on Maundy Thursday, Jesus washed the feet of the disciples and gave us the Eucharist to remember him by.
There were celebrations at the feast of the Passover when Jesus celebrated his last meal with his friends. And just a few hours later, in the Garden of Gethsemene, Jesus was arrested and tried.
On Good Friday, the second day, we remember Jesus crucifixion, and his burial by his friends in a borrowed tomb. It was the day when his disciples thought that their world had come to an end. They didn’t understand Jesus words about being in the tomb and after 3 days, rising from the dead. After following Jesus for 3 years, they really thought it was all over.
They must have felt crushed with disappointment, they had really believed that Jesus would overthrow their Roman oppressors and change the world. And that they were all going to be a part of it. No wonder they hid themselves away and brooded on their future all through Friday and Saturday.
On Easter Sunday, the third day, we always read the story of Jesus resurrection, which is told in all 4 Gospels, and despite some differences between them, they all agree that the first people to see the resurrected Jesus were women. Jesus appeared first of all to society’s second-class citizens. And over the next 40 days, hundreds and hundreds of people saw Jesus. They ate with him, they talked with him and their hopes and their faith were renewed. They were encouraged and equipped to go and tell the world about Jesus. His story is told in art, in music, in architecture and in the written word for everyone.
As I said earlier, these 3 days, the great triduum, are a reflection of real life. We all of us have days like Maundy Thursday, when we are enjoying life with people we love, and then something happens that leave us stunned and grasping for answers. We are traumatised by events and we simply can’t understand how such things could happen.
Good Friday reminds us that there are days when we simply have no control over what is happening.
When nothing we can say or do makes any difference; we feel powerless, we feel angry and we feel afraid. We lose confidence in life and we simply can’t see our way out of a dark place. We just want to run away and hide from the world.
But for the people of God, Easter Sunday always comes. Maybe after three days or maybe after three months, or even three years, but Easter Sunday always comes. Easter Sunday, the day of resurrection, reminds us that there is always hope, that we can be surprised by unexpected events which make us feel that perhaps life isn’t so bad after all. We begin to see just a small glimmer of light that makes us think that perhaps there may be some meaning and purpose in the world.
Perhaps like Jesus Christ we may be raised with scars that speak of what we have experienced. Life may have left a permanent mark in our hearts and on our bodies. But somehow and in some way, there is Easter Sunday.
So that is why Easter is such a special time for Christians. The Roman soldier in the cartoon was most definitely wrong about Jesus and his movement. We are all still here.
My hope for all of you this Easter is that you will look beyond the new life signified in the chocolate eggs. Look beyond the hot cross buns, and think about what that cross actually represents. It represents love and the light of Christ overcoming the darkness of the world.
AMEN
Some of you may be familiar with his work; he draws bewildered little men and writes amusing yet profound prayers. This is a man who can write prayers about hair and about door handles. In one of his cartoons, there 3 men hanging on crosses, obviously meant to be Jesus and the two thieves crucified with him. And in the foreground one Roman soldier is telling another soldier “See, I told you if we killed the leader we would nip this in the bud”.
I can understand the soldier’s logic, for the Romans were used to disposing of troublemakers, and once this Jesus of Nazareth was out of the way, surely all the upset he had caused would end. It would end because all his friends had run off and left him, and clearly there would be no one to keep his new troublesome movement going. How wrong the Roman soldier was. The Jesus movement did not end, it grew and grew in a way that those early believers could not have imagined. We are a long way and many years apart from those events in Jerusalem, yet here we are, remembering Jesus and his crucifixion.
If you took notice of the TV ads with their images of Easter eggs and hot cross buns, you might think that Easter began in January, and that it finishes on Easter Sunday, when we have consumed as much of the chocolate and the hot cross buns as is humanly possible. But that’s not so, because as far as the church is concerned, Easter begins with the great triduum – the 3 days of Easter beginning at sundown on Thursday and ending at dawn on Sunday.
In fact, I think that the services of the great Triduum are a microcosm of life: the good times and the difficult times. The ups and the downs. We know that on Maundy Thursday, Jesus washed the feet of the disciples and gave us the Eucharist to remember him by.
There were celebrations at the feast of the Passover when Jesus celebrated his last meal with his friends. And just a few hours later, in the Garden of Gethsemene, Jesus was arrested and tried.
On Good Friday, the second day, we remember Jesus crucifixion, and his burial by his friends in a borrowed tomb. It was the day when his disciples thought that their world had come to an end. They didn’t understand Jesus words about being in the tomb and after 3 days, rising from the dead. After following Jesus for 3 years, they really thought it was all over.
They must have felt crushed with disappointment, they had really believed that Jesus would overthrow their Roman oppressors and change the world. And that they were all going to be a part of it. No wonder they hid themselves away and brooded on their future all through Friday and Saturday.
On Easter Sunday, the third day, we always read the story of Jesus resurrection, which is told in all 4 Gospels, and despite some differences between them, they all agree that the first people to see the resurrected Jesus were women. Jesus appeared first of all to society’s second-class citizens. And over the next 40 days, hundreds and hundreds of people saw Jesus. They ate with him, they talked with him and their hopes and their faith were renewed. They were encouraged and equipped to go and tell the world about Jesus. His story is told in art, in music, in architecture and in the written word for everyone.
As I said earlier, these 3 days, the great triduum, are a reflection of real life. We all of us have days like Maundy Thursday, when we are enjoying life with people we love, and then something happens that leave us stunned and grasping for answers. We are traumatised by events and we simply can’t understand how such things could happen.
Good Friday reminds us that there are days when we simply have no control over what is happening.
When nothing we can say or do makes any difference; we feel powerless, we feel angry and we feel afraid. We lose confidence in life and we simply can’t see our way out of a dark place. We just want to run away and hide from the world.
But for the people of God, Easter Sunday always comes. Maybe after three days or maybe after three months, or even three years, but Easter Sunday always comes. Easter Sunday, the day of resurrection, reminds us that there is always hope, that we can be surprised by unexpected events which make us feel that perhaps life isn’t so bad after all. We begin to see just a small glimmer of light that makes us think that perhaps there may be some meaning and purpose in the world.
Perhaps like Jesus Christ we may be raised with scars that speak of what we have experienced. Life may have left a permanent mark in our hearts and on our bodies. But somehow and in some way, there is Easter Sunday.
So that is why Easter is such a special time for Christians. The Roman soldier in the cartoon was most definitely wrong about Jesus and his movement. We are all still here.
My hope for all of you this Easter is that you will look beyond the new life signified in the chocolate eggs. Look beyond the hot cross buns, and think about what that cross actually represents. It represents love and the light of Christ overcoming the darkness of the world.
AMEN
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