Easter Day (Year C), April 8, 2007

BCP: Acts 10:34-43 or Isaiah 51:9-11; Psalm 118:14-29 or 118:14-17, 22-24; Col. 3:1-4 or Acts 10:34-43; Luke 24:1-10

RCL: Acts 10:34-43 or Isaiah 65:17-25; Psalm 118:1-2, 14-24; 1 Cor. 15:19-26 or Acts 10:34-43; John 20:1-18 or Luke 24:1-12

Easter morning is the culmination of the Christian faith. Interestingly enough, the day centers first not on Christ’s presence, but on his absence. The discovery of the empty tomb is the heart of the matter for us. Thus the heart of this week’s lection is “He is not here but has risen.” We should take delight in the fact that the first witnesses found the empty tomb to be a total surprise, something that came in the execution of an otherwise routine, if not heart-breaking task. Jesus’ followers went looking for death, expecting it, preparing for it, ritually acknowledging it, in fact. They were ready for almost anything but what they found.

The women who went to the tomb and found it empty are expected to remember Jesus’ own prophecy. But they do not. In the midst of the trauma of witnessing a horrible death of one they loved, and their agonizing grief over Jesus’ death, the women forget what Jesus had told them.

This is what we are called to remember today. Jesus Christ has risen! And yet, it is often in the midst of our own trauma and agony that we too forget that Jesus has placed before all the world to see that the defining conviction of the Christian hope is that because Jesus was raised from the dead, the grave is not the final reality of human experience. And yet we forget that Christ is risen and have to be reminded again and again. The church, the nascent Christian community, came into being on the basis of the resurrection of Jesus. Jesus’ prophetic mission is also ours.

One of the important aspects of this account, like the other gospels, is the role of women as the first witnesses of or to the resurrection. It is striking that women are given this role in the gospel tradition, given the common male perceptions in Mediterranean societies at this time of women’s unreliability as witnesses, especially in light of Luke’s account of the apostle’s response to the women, “...these words seemed to them an idle tale and they did not believe them” (v. 11). Bishop Tom Wright suggests that if Luke had been making up this story much later after the event, not only would he not have had women going first to the tomb; he would have had the apostles believe the story at once, ready to be models of faith. Through Luke’s artistry, the answer to the identity of Jesus follows next in the road to Emmaus story.

Look It Up

The procession of worship following the powerful account of Christ’s resurrection leads us eventually to the table, when “We celebrate the memorial of our redemption...” (BCP p. 363).

Think About It

In what circumstance have we anticipated finding death, but instead found life?

Next Sunday

The Second Sunday of Easter (Year C), April 15, 2007

BCP: Acts 5:12a, 17-22, 25-29 or Job 42:1-6; Psalm 111 or 118:19-24; Rev. 1:(1-8)9-19 or Acts 5:12a, 17-22, 25-29; John 20:19-31

RCL: Acts 5:27-32; Psalm 118:14-29 or Psalm 150; Rev. 1:4-8; John 20:19-31