Easter Day: Resurrection Encounter

We can experience Resurrection in so many ways - even through 'religious experience'!!

Oh I know they get a bad press: long sermons, stuffy services and overblown ritual.  Yet I still love coming to church! I still look forward to remembering through bread and wine.  I still cherish hymns of faith and prayers of hope.  And I do all of that because on hundreds of occasions as I’ve met with my sisters and brothers, and as we have covenanted together to be that Community of the Resurrection which is the hallmark of every church, I believe something of the life of God has touched my life and once again I’ve started to make those connections.

It happened that first Easter evening on the Road to Emmaus. 

A couple of deflated disciples were walking west towards the sunset and they were asking themselves big questions.  To their surprise their walking companion seemed to come up with some answers and their hearts burned within them.

Yet they made little real sense of it all until they invited him to share supper with them.  It was, we are told, as he said grace, as he broke the bread – that they recognised the risen Lord.

Through ritual, the breaking of bread, an action they must have experienced a thousand times before – at that moment they encountered the life of God.

That’s the definition of a sacrament:  An outward symbol that speaks of an inward grace.

Sacramental moments can be the deepest in life.  Prayers said by the bedside of a loved one, communion taken in church after a draining week, witnessing the baptism of a new life, singing Alleluia on Easter Morning in this Community of the Resurrection – all these can be moments when we encounter the living presence of God among us – and like those Emmaus disciples we too find our hearts strangely warmed.

In many ways today is a 'Defiant Day'.

This is the day when we say: Love Wins!

This is the day to believe in the power of hope and the supremacy of love which we find in the cross and empty tomb of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu goes some way in summing up Easter when he wrote:

Good is stronger than evil; love is stronger than hate; light is stronger than darkness and life is stronger than death.

And that, I believe, is the message of resurrection that we celebrate today with all our Alleluias.

May God's blessing of peace, hope and new life be yours this Easter Day and always.

Christ is Risen!
He is Risen indeed - Alleluia!!