8. He’s Alive?

Meditations on Aspects of Easter: 8.  He’s Alive?

Lk 24:2,3    They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus.

It is Sunday, Easter Sunday, Resurrection Sunday.  Whatever I write today will be inadequate. From that perspective I wrote about yesterday, of two thousand years of hindsight, I am convinced that so much of the time we just skim over the accounts of the first day of the week rather like we skim over the evening news on TV. It comes and goes. It may be terrible and for a moment or two we may be moved. It may be wonderful and for a moment or two we rejoice but as they say in the news world, the news cycle is incredibly short these days and so today’s news will be superseded by a new batch in a day or so. Is that how we will treat this incredible day? May it not be so. I have sought, during this week, to face the realities of what happened and why, in broad terms, rarely focusing on individual scriptures but seeking to capture the big picture. I want that for today especially.

Today we rejoice in our celebration services and so often it all seems so sure and so clear. For those involved, there on the ground in Jerusalem, I suggest, it was utterly confusing. If I may cite again, for I have used this story many times over the years, the illustration I came across a number of years ago, it might shed some light. Some people I knew, leaders of the church grouping of which I was part, went out to Africa to see for themselves the reality of accounts that had been coming of an amazing healing ministry that was going on in one country.

I will never forget one of the things they said: “For the first four days we struggled as our minds desperately sought to catch up with what our eyes were seeing.”  So dramatic and so incredible were the healings they witnessed, hundreds every day I believe, that their minds just could not cope with what they were seeing. For example, bodies changing shape in front of their eyes as God healed and straightened out broken and distorted limbs, and so much more.

Now imagine you were one of the people who were there two thousand years ago. We saw Jesus broken and bleeding body taken down from the Cross, utterly pale, no question, dead! And now standing before me is this man I have followed for three years and he doesn’t look an invalid even, and he is well and truly alive, and smiling at me. I think if I was me, I would have burst into floods of tears at the relief, once I passed the stage of believing it is him and he is alive. I often say that when it comes to the loss of a loved one through crippling old age perhaps, we should not feel guilt about having a feeling of relief mixed in with our mourning for loss. Sometimes death brings a sense of relief; this terrible ordeal is at least over. Now if that is so over a death, I wonder what it would be like when the person we feared was gone, proves to still be with us?

There are many questions over the accounts of the things leading up to the crucifixion and his death and resurrection, but that is not surprising. These close followers of Jesus have just been through the most dramatic three years of their lives as they have followed him around Galilee transforming the lives of thousands. It has been the greatest roller-coaster ride in history.

The biggest question has been “How?” followed by “Who?” Answers have not always been clear. Then come the events of Passion Week that we have sought to briefly reflect upon this week. It was confusing, often hostile, frequently chaotic; the fact is that these were incredibly tumultuous times and so although the facts are all there, they are a) not always there in their entirety and so b) the order is not always abundantly clear.

I did warn at the beginning that whatever I wrote would be inadequate. What I seek to suggest is that these events are so tumultuous and mind blowing that it is probable that if we could time travel back there with a bunch of psychiatrists, I am fairly certain they would diagnose most of Jesus’ followers as suffering from post-traumatic-stress syndrome. However many words Jesus spoke when teaching his disciples beforehand, nothing would ever truly prepare them for the emotions that would accompany the events we have been considering this week. And therein is the ring of truth.

If the four Gospel accounts had been precisely the same and neatly and orderly spelled out these events, I would be seriously suspicious about their veracity. These slightly shambolic records (at times at least) say, “This is true! This is what really happened.” And if it did, why did it? Well I have been desperately trying to catch a sense of reality about what went on in this week, but now we come to the words so often and so easily spoken in church: “Jesus died on the Cross to take the punishment for your sins.” Do I believe it? Utterly! Do I understand it? In general terms, as far as the words are all familiar words, yes, in a measure. Beyond that, if I am honest, and I have sought to be this week, not really. I struggle to comprehend my need (hence some of the earlier meditations) and I certainly struggle to understand how awful it must have been for Jesus to do what he did, and therefore how he could love you and me so much that he still went through with it.

The best I can do is say, I will declare it as the truth and that truth I comprehend more clearly on some days than on others – but I will live by that truth and trust that truth, and my knowledge of God, accumulated over nearly fifty years of following Him, says He is content and pleased with that. That truth opens up a doorway to a life in which I can experience the love and the goodness and the grace and the power and the wisdom of God on a daily basis. On a good day it is brilliant, and on a bad day, it is still the truth. And it is all like that today because nearly two thousand years ago in time-space history Jesus went through the things we have been considering this week, and he did it for you and me. And he rose from the dead and a whole new world opened up! Amazing! Staggering! Incredible! Wonderful! Hallelujah!