Easter Sermon

Christ is Risen: The world below lies desolate
Christ is Risen: The spirits of evil are fallen
Christ is Risen: The angels of God are rejoicing
Christ is Risen: The tombs of the dead are empty
Christ is Risen indeed from the dead, the first of the sleepers,
Glory and power are his forever and ever. Amen. ~ Hippolytus (AD 190-236)

My older brother, Ed, and I shared a bedroom. He was 12 years my senior, so when he went off to college, I took over our bedroom. My pennants replaced his pennants. My cool Star Wars clock replaced his boring analog clock. I slowly transformed the room into my own. Save for the one sticker above our light switch. It read:

"Today is the first day of the rest of your life."

Later on, as a teenager, when everything seemed so big, every emotion, every event, everything, that phrase near the light switch always reminded me that today was a new day. It was the first day. Things could begin again.

In today’s account of the resurrection, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome come to the tomb while it is still dark. They must have felt the predawn darkness around them: a void of hopelessness, a crushing sense of loss, grief that cannot be articulated in words. How would they ever have thought it would end like this and now they come to anoint Jesus, their friend and the messiah!

It began in the darkness of the night on Maundy Thursday, with the betrayal, abandonment and arrest of Jesus, then came the cruel cross on Good Friday and the tomb of Holy Saturday. It began with fear and violence, doubt and desertion, with the women this morning walking faithfully to the tomb to do what ritual and their hearts told them to do. But inside that tomb, or better said, what wasn’t in the tomb changed everything. The light shined, an angel spoke and the tomb was empty.

Jesus was alive! And it was the first day of the rest of their lives.

Starting over. Beginning again. That first day, we do it all the time…

· A new school year.
· A new baseball season.
· New seeds are planted.
· New jobs are begun.

Starting over. Beginning again. That first day…

Every morning you wake up and, by God, you're still alive, you have another chance to start over. Perhaps when you put your head down on your pillow the night before, you still carried in your body and soul the burdens of the day just completed: things left undone, bad things said, good things left unsaid, and lots of things left suspended. In the morning all is possibility, all is opportunity, all is good and all is God.

Starting over. Beginning again. It’s the first day…

Ours is a religion about dawn. Creation begins in the morning. The women come to the tomb in the morning. The morning is when it happens. Lose the morning and you have lost the day. Jesus' resurrection is the new day, the fresh pages of the calendar book, the new moment on the horizon. Whatever was yesterday is passed and done.

Starting over. Beginning again. It’s the first day…

Over and over and over again Scripture is the story of one chance after another, one renewal after another, until it all comes together at the empty tomb of Easter morning. The empty tomb is God's everlasting invitation to start over.

Who of us are content with who we are? Who of us are content with things as they are? Who among us does not long to be more loving, more generous, more tenderhearted, more passionate, more creative, more thoughtful, more imaginative, more useful. Who of us would not love to have the courage to act upon our convictions as opposed to our fears? Who among us does not know a heart to heal, a broken relationship to mend, a lost soul to find?

God wakes us up again this Easter. It is a new day. It is a new season. There are new seeds to plant, new places to see, new tasks to complete, and new lives to live.

Starting over. Beginning again.

Today. Right now. This Easter. It is the first day of the rest of your life.

[Adapted from Strength for the Journey: Biblical Wisdom for Daily Living by Peter J. Gomes.]

Let the angel's good news to the women, open our imaginations to the possibilities; let the light that illuminates the cave that can no longer hold Jesus illuminate our hearts to see our lives transformed by God's grace; let the Spirit of God release in us hope that we dare not imagine, joy that we fear will be betrayed, dreams that we doubt can ever be realized.

Easter is more than an event - Easter is being set free; Easter is resurrection; Easter is life, our life, in the here and now. Let this morning be the morning to begin again, to start over, to cross the chasm, to repair the broken - to rediscover God's extraordinary grace transforming our most ordinary of days, for today is the first day of the rest of your life!

Alleluia! Christ is risen!
He is risen indeed! Alleluia!
Amen.

Easter Vigil Sermon

Given by Deacon Christopher:
As I sit here, huddled in the silence of an upper room at a secret location, the sounds of my brothers breathing echoes through utter darkness where no candle dares be burnt. My life has changed. In the matter of hours everything that I had come to know, everything that I had come to see so clearly has been erased and now my existence is smothered in darkness.

I left my home three years ago. I left behind my family, my wife and my children I said good bye to them and that I would return a better man. I left behind a job which gave me security. I left behind an entire lifetime of who I thought I was supposed to be.

I followed you for three years and in that time your words that were at first pleasing to me took life in the form of miracles that I could not explain, and the wisdom that you taught me had become truer than any truth I had ever thought possible.

Then, we arrived into Jerusalem. I rejoiced with thousands of followers and strangers as you entered the city gates and I knew without a doubt that you were the Messiah, the Annointed One, the Christos of my people’s prayers come to life. But, everything changed so fast. I saw you crying in the garden. I saw you beaten by Herod’s men like a dog. From far away, I heard your conviction like a criminal and then watched as you died like any other man.

What was once so profound and what impossibilities had become so plausible, had within one week’s time become obliterated before my very eyes and my life was over.

So, I hide. I hide in the shadows of my fear, my shame and my confusion. The other men hide with me, for we know that if we are seen by the Romans or the Temple Guards that we will be arrested. The women had left. They said that they were bringing spices and clean linen to the Master’s body. They wept at his feet. I was hiding behind the crowd.

Now, where can I go? Back to Galilee? Back to my wife? My job? I can no longer look into the eyes of my children. How does a broken man who left on the promise of Salvation return to those he abandoned? Jesus gave me the way. He gave me the path to walk on and walk on it I did with my head held high, but it is so dark that the path has disappeared.

Then, my heart stopped and I suck in one last breath as someone bangs on the door. My life is over and I will die here as a coward. No, it is the women returned. They come in with tears in their eyes and words caught in their throats. They tell me everything that I had once desperately wanted to hear; words that I expected to hear; the story that the Master told me to believe.

But, I am so tired now. I have not the stomach to be let down again. I have not the strength to find my way out of the darkness of this room. This night is darker than any other night I can remember and no light seems to pierce it.

As the women talk, as they plead to my brothers who don’t believe, can’t believe, wish with all of their hearts that they could believe, I sit in my loneliness of one whose way has been taken from him. I remember someone else’s words that seem so faint. The truth that appears so small, so insignificant in my mind; yet, my heart begs to be heard.

“The Light shines in the darkness and the darkness did not overcome it.”

For what is hope if not to believe in the impossible? That speck of light at the end of the tunnel which we claw ourselves towards over the uneven ground. Reaching out to steady ourselves against empty spaces as the light illuminates just a little more, and a little more.

If I ask myself truthfully, while the women retell their stories of the empty tomb and the stranger with whom they spoke, what terrifies me more? That alone in the darkness I sit without direction because my Lord is not here to direct me anymore? Or, is it that if I follow that distant point of light and it leads me to the empty tomb that I now take on the responsibility of the Master and that it is now my turn to lead others in His name?

What do I owe this man who had put his life on the line so that I may know how to live my own? Does the man who proved the impossible time and again deserve for me to give him at least the chance to prove the impossibility of returning to life like he prophesied? So, I run. I run to the tomb
struggling against the darkness of this night and holding back my hope that the women are wrong. All the while focusing on that still, small light within me; praying to God with all my might that the women are correct.

This is the night of which the Hope of Lent has come to an end. Hope must now be replaced by Faith. Hope is what got us through these forty days. In the darkness of this night we must take action through Faith and step out of the darkness and once again bask in the light. Faith is hope taking action. Hope gets us to the fire; Faith pushes us through it.

It is now 2,000 years later. Tonight, we come in darkness as a community of Faithful friends and family, but also as Disciples of Christ. Upon our journey to the tomb still, we are still wondering what it is that we may find, or not find, upon our arrival. Asking ourselves, what will happen to me when I get there?

The stone has been rolled away. The linen neatly folded and left behind. What then is our responsibility as we walk away from the barren rock to the others who did not follow? What does it mean that Jesus was not satisfied with his rest in the grave? That he returned after descending into Hell and releasing the souls that had no advocate so that they may have peace? What does it mean that Jesus appeared to the women who loved him, the men who wanted to emulate him, and instructed them one last time?

As we pull ourselves out of the darkness of this night and exchange our hope for ourselves as a manifestation of faith, a mantle in the form of this Easter Candle is given to each one of us. It shines forth as a beacon so that we may lead others through the darkness. Our Easter Candle burns so that others may see our light and be comforted on their own journeys of faith. At Baptism, we are given the flame of tonight’s light. We are commissioned to not remain in a locked room but to enter into the world as a disciple of Christ. Let this flame be a reminder to you that in the darkest times of our lives, and even in the what may seem the brightest of times, that the truth you received in the happy hours of the day do not lose their veracity because of the twilight of just another night.
Amen.

The Women at the Cross

Dorothy Sayers in her essay, “Are Women Human?” (1938) said,

Perhaps it is no wonder that the women were first at the Cradle and last at the Cross. They had never known a man like this Man … A prophet and teacher who never nagged at them, never flattered or coaxed or patronized … who rebuked without querulousness and praised without condescension; who took their questions and arguments seriously; who never mapped out their sphere for them, never urged them to be feminine or jeered at them for being female … Nobody could possibly guess from the words and deeds of Jesus that there was anything [inferior] about woman’s nature.

Good Friday Sermon

(O Lord) By your wounded hands:
teach us diligence and generosity.
By your wounded feet:
teach us steadfastness and perseverance.
By your wounded and insulted head
teach us patience, clarity and self-mastery.
By your wounded heart:
teach us love, teach us love, teach us love,
O Master and Savior. Amen. (Daphne Fraser)

On this Good Friday, as we gather with the women disciples and watch from a distance or even at his feet, as we watch with the male disciples from secretive places away from it all, the Cross asks us to bear witness to what has happened to Jesus. The cross will not let us stay away.

I often think of Langston Hughes poem as I meditate on the passion of Jesus:

Encounter by Langston Hughes

I met You on Your way to death,
Though quite by accident
I chose the path I did,
not knowing there You went.

When I heard the hooting mob
I started to turn back
But, curious, I stood my ground
Directly in its track
And sickened suddenly
At its sound,
Yet did not
Turn back.

So loud the mob cried,
Yet so weak,
Like a sick and muffled sea.
On Your head
You had sharp thorns.
You did not look at me—
But on Your back
You carried
My own Misery.

Jesus carried us on his back with him during the passion and it is Jesus who calls us to go with him to the cross. For when Jesus calls each of us to take up our cross and follow him, it is a call to follow him not only as part of the crowd at his triumphant entrance to Jerusalem waving our palm branches, in the best of times, but traveling with him throughout Holy Week from celebration, to betrayal, to abandonment, to the cross of Good Friday, to the worst of times.

So the grim charade has happened, as that old hymn puts it, and we are left wandering in the darkness, Jesus has died on the cross and has been laid now in the tomb.

But even at the worst of moments, Jesus has given us his words to ponder for our lives.

So tonight, let us recall the words Jesus spoke from the cross, from all of the Gospels, and consider what Jesus might be saying to us today. (adapted from the prayers of Caryl Micklem)

Father, forgive them: for they know not what they do. (Luke 23:34)

Jesus did as he told others to do, and forgave those who wronged him, who placed him on the cross, those who judged him & put him to death. It was an act of strength and courage to forgive. My we forgive others from our hearts and may God forgive us for committing acts of great cruelty.

Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise. (Luke 23:43)
Jesus gave his assurance to a man convinced he deserved to die, one condemned just like Jesus to a cruel death. All of us are sinners, one way or another, we must understand who we are and what we have done. But, too, we must know the same assurance, that whoever we are, whatever we have done, nothing can separate us from the love of God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Nothing.

Woman, behold your son. Behold your mother. (John 19:26-27)
In the darkest of moments, Jesus thought of others even when he was dying. May we follow his example and not be absorbed by self-pity, from brooding on our own wrongs or misfortunes. We need God’s help to be Christ like to our neighbor, acting as Jesus would act, mediating God’s love.

My God, my God, why have your forsaken me? (Mark 15:34)
Jesus was fully human and no stranger to the anguish of despair. His own cry can help us also through the dark times, so that we may emerge with our faith strengthened.

I am thirsty. (John 19:28)
When he cried out in thirst, someone answered this cry. May we in our time, answer the cry of those in our world who are hungry and thirsty.

It is finished. (John 19:30)
Jesus died believing he had done the will of God and accomplished the work he was called to do. His focus on his calling is what we need to do in our life, so at the end of our days we do not die suddenly and unprepared, and squander the gifts of love and life.

Father, into your hands, I commit my spirit. (Luke 23:46)
On the cross, Jesus died trusting fully in his Father. May we all have such confidence in the hour of death. May we know that Jesus has conquered death for us all.

Even with these words for us, with faith, hope & trust, we end with the silence of the cross. St. Ignatius of Loyola said, “The death of Jesus is a mystery wrought in the silence of God.”

When I think of that silence, I always think of the inscription found in a house where Jews were hiding from the Nazis in WW II…

I believe in the sun when it's not shining,
I believe in love even when I feel it not,
I believe in God even when God is silent. 

 And in the silence of cross & tomb, we faithfully wait. Amen.

Maundy Thursday Sermon

Lord Jesus Christ, our Servant and Savior, on earth you washed the feet of your Disciples & fed them at the Last Supper and now through your cross and resurrection you always live to make intercession for us & through the breaking of the bread are known to us: give us grace to be your faithful disciples and servants to our lives’ end; for your name’s sake. Amen. (adapted from Stephen Smalley)

Behold what you are. May we become what we receive.

These words used at the presentation of the Bread and Cup here at St. Peter’s; I first heard them used at the Monastery of SSJE. They come from St. Augustine who preached a sermon On the Eucharist (Sermon 57):

“You are the body of Christ,” he said. “In you and through you the work of the incarnation must go forward. You are to be taken; you are to be blessed, broken, and given; that you may be the means of grace and the vehicles of the Eternal love. Behold what you are. Become what you receive.”

Our brothers at SSJE tell us that “these words point to one of the deep truths of Christian faith: Through our participation in the sacraments (particularly baptism and Eucharist), we are transformed into the Body of Christ, given for the world.”

Behold what you are. May we become what we receive.

What do these words, this communion, this Maundy Thursday mean for us, as we become what receive. A few words from priest and author Barbara Crafton:

“On this night of Jesus' last supper with his friends, he instituted what we would come to call the Holy Eucharist and also washed the disciples' feet, as if he were not their master, but their servant. These things, he said, were dramatic examples of a new commandment, that we should love one another as he has loved us. Unstinting. Self-giving.

But isn't that an old commandment? Don't we already know something about it? You are up in the night again with a sick child -- not the sick child you were up with last night, but her sister. The family is passing the same germ from person to person, and you yourself feel heachache-y and a bit limp as you set up the vaporizer in her room and prop an extra pillow behind her, so she's all but sitting up. You sit down on the floor by the bed, rub some eucalyptus on her chest and a little on your own... She takes another drink of water and asks you to sing. It's three in the morning, but you rest your head on her mattress and quietly begin to sing. Just a few rounds is all it takes; your little one's cough quiets down and she is asleep. You pad back to bed and pull the covers up to your chin. You drift back to sleep, smelling the eucalyptus.

Love transforms service, teaching us that there's no such thing as a menial task. Love teaches us that, if nothing is beneath us, nothing will be beyond us. Love remains with us after our unstinting efforts have all failed -- it doesn't conquer all, as the old saying goes, but it bears all things without turning away from any of them.”

Behold what you are. May we become what we receive.

How is God transforming you into Christ’s Body and giving you to the world?

Holy Wednesday

Tenebrae - Service of Darkness - Tenebrae is distinctive for its gradual extinguishing of candles while a series of readings and psalms is chanted or recited. (from Wikipedia)

(A Holocaust poem)

Paul Celan's Tenebrae 

We are near, Lord,
near and at hand.

Handled already, Lord,
clawed and clawing as though
the body of each of us were
your body, Lord.

Pray, Lord,
pray to us,
we are near.

Wind-awry we went there,
went there to bend
over hollow and ditch.

To be watered we went there, Lord.

It was blood, it was
what you shed, Lord.

It gleamed.

It cast your image into our eyes, Lord.
Our eyes and our mouths are open and empty, Lord.

We have drunk, Lord.
The blood and the image that was in the blood, Lord.

Pray, Lord.
We are near.

Easter Message from the Bishops in CT

"Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here."

The Gospel of Mark tells us that Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome brought spices to the tomb to prepare the body of Jesus for a proper burial. But when they arrived, the stone that had sealed off the tomb had been rolled away. We can imagine that they were perplexed, confused, and scared of what they might find in the tomb. Had the body of Jesus been disturbed, or perhaps even desecrated? Could the horror of the cross get any worse?

An angel in the empty tomb spoke into the women's confusion and fear. "Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here." And then added, "Go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you."

What stones of disbelief, unknowing, and fear need to be rolled away from the tombs of our own lives? What hinders us from believing the reality of Jesus' resurrection? What constrains us from telling the world that Jesus is alive? What are we afraid of?

The truth of Easter morning is that God will not leave us alone in our confusion and fear. The risen Lord always goes ahead of us, calling us to live in the fullness and possibility of God's love for us, and for the whole world. So let us leave our empty tombs behind. Let us go forth heralding and participating in the new life of Jesus' resurrection. Let us sing our hallelujahs and recommit to restoring all people, and all creation, to unity with God and each other in Christ. There can be no greater Easter joy.

Faithfully,
The Rt. Rev. Laura J. Ahrens & The Rt. Rev. Ian T. Douglas