Easter Day has come and gone. In
the eyes of the world, Easter is over. There’s a meme making the rounds on
Facebook noting that Easter lasts 50 days-until Pentecost. However, mostly life
has moved on. Even in our churches, the Easter lilies are drooping. Clergy and
everyone involved in all the services of Holy Week and Easter are tired, and
secretly glad that Easter 2 is a ‘low Sunday’.
What has happened to the
Alleluias? Where are the burning bushes we noticed throughout Lent?
The streets have returned to
their regular rhythm. The homes and people have returned to the daily tasks and
struggles. The news abounds with shootings and disasters and conflict.
Where is the change that should
have happened?
As the hymn Christ is Alive (#182, Hymnal 1982) says, ‘Christ is alive, let
Christians sing. His cross stands empty to the sky. Let streets and homes with
praises ring. His Love in death shall never die.”
Brian A. Wren is author of the
text. He wrote the words in April 1968. Wren notes, “It was written for Easter
Sunday, two weeks after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. I
could not let Easter go by without speaking of this tragic event which was on
all our minds. . . . The hymn tries to see God's love winning over tragedy and suffering
in the world. . . . There is tension and tragedy in these words, not just
Easter rejoicing.’
The hymn goes on “Christ is
alive! No longer bound to distant years in Palestine, he comes to claim the here
and now and conquer every place and time.”
Since it is true that in Christ’s
Resurrection, God has reclaimed the ‘here and now’, we should still be running
around shouting ‘Alleluias’ to everyone we meet. It’s way too easy, though, to
get dragged down by the appearances and challenges of the world we live in. But
Christ is here, “Not throned above, remotely high, untouched, unmoved by human
pains, but daily in the midst of life, our Savior with the Father reigns.”
As Wren’s hymn reminds us, Christ
in right in the middle of everything that happens! That should be cause for an
Alleluia or two. Even “in every insult, rift, and war where color, scorn or wealth
divide, he suffers still, yet loves the more, and lives, though ever crucified.”
We, as witnesses to the Risen One,
are called to stand up against those things that divide, to speak up for those
who have no voice, and to proclaim the victory.
With Wren we can announce, “Christ
is alive! His Spirit burns through this and every future age, till all creation
lives and learns his joy, his justice, love and praise.”
We have seen the empty tomb and
are called to ‘go and make disciples of all’. Even more than in Epiphany, we
need to ‘go tell it’.
Over the next few weeks, until Pentecost, we’ll
consider some of the ways Easter might change us by looking at how the
experience changed the early followers.