Today's Easter celebration marks the end of Holy Week, in which we commemorate the crucifixion, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The resurrection of Jesus is the linchpin of the Christian faith.
In his first epistle to the Corinthians – written about twenty years after Jesus' resurrection, he says the following emphatically.
"And if Christ has not been raised, then all our preaching is useless, and your faith is useless. And we apostles would all be lying about God—for we have said that God raised Christ from the grave. But that can't be true if there is no resurrection of the dead. And if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, then your faith is useless, and you are still guilty of your sins. In that case, all who have died believing in Christ are lost! And if our hope in Christ is only for this life, we are more to be pitied than anyone in the world." (1 Corinthians 15:14-19)
[As a footnote, it is important to point out here that St. Paul wrote the above based on the earliest reports of Jesus' resurrection he had received within months that he had risen from the dead (See 1 Corinthians 15:3-7). According to St Paul, there were more than five hundred first-hand eyewitnesses to the Risen Christ (1 Cor. 15: 5-8). Many of them were still around when Paul wrote his epistle, and he would have been quick to point out if there were any discrepancies in what he had been preaching and writing about.
Gary Habermas, the American historian and New Testament scholar lists thirty-nine ancient sources outside the Bible that provide more than one hundred facts about Jesus' life, teachings, death and resurrection (See Historical Jesus: Ancient Evidence for the Life of Christ, College Press Publishing Company, Joplin, Missouri, 2008)]
Christians celebrate Easter, not just for historical reasons. Our belief in the resurrection of Jesus Christ is the belief on which every other Christian belief rests. They are the beliefs about God; our Heavenly citizenship and heritage, God's revelation of Himself as Love; God's purposes and promises for this world and us in the Bible, our sojourn in this world, God's coming to us in Jesus; God drawing and receiving us back to Himself in Jesus; God's Angels who have been appointed to watch over and journey with us in this life; the testimony of God's saints, martyrs and prophets, the church and its purpose and witness in the world; and, the end of this world as we know it and the final consummation when God comes to be in all in all.
Because our Easter faith is the foundation of all these beliefs, Jesus' triumph over death on Easter wasn't just his triumph — it was ours, too. And because it is so, God draws us intimately to the profound joy of participating in the mystery of Easter. It is a mystery not because Easter is a riddle we cannot explain away with our scientism and the materialistic-reductionist tools we have but because our lives and individual selves are intricately woven into the tapestry of God in whom we are loved lavishly, accepted unconditionally and cherished forever with the gift of eternal life. The Bible tells us: "In him, we live and move and have our being." (Acts 17:28).
Now, let's try to explain all of this with the words and limited tools we have to explain the physical world we live in. I bet we would fall far short. That is why the Easter experience is a mystery. We know it, but we cannot explain it.
However, God speaks to us today through Easter, the event in which God raised Jesus from the dead. God tells us this: Each one of us, as a child of God in Jesus, is a part in whom the mystery of Easter is present in its whole.
How so?
Christians believe that Jesus's death and resurrection changed the world not just at a historical level—which it clearly did—but also at a spiritual level. By willingly going to the cross and then rising from the dead, Jesus tweaked the constants of the spiritual universe. Jesus has bridged our separation from God (what sin and death are about) by coming into this world.
In Jesus, the connection that we always have with God, but forgotten, weakened or lapsed because we are away from Home, is renewed and restored. When we were baptised, we washed away the layers of forgetfulness. We re-established ourselves to live in the experience of Easter as a child of God. For this reason, on Easter Day, we renew our Baptism vows. (Following this Reflection, you can renew your Baptism vows before God).
Because of Easter and the bridged cleavage between us and God, our faith is confirmed, sure, and secure. In this assurance, we may take to heart what the writer of the Letter to the Hebrews said: "Faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see" (Heb. 11:1).
When we can experience being embodiments of the whole mystery of Easter, we can align ourselves with the heroes and heroines of faith who lived among us. The Scripture says they lived in the face of God's promises without necessarily receiving them in this temporal life and yet lived faithfully because they knew that they were only foreigners and strangers on earth (Heb. 11:13).
This said we will readily admit that sin and death seem to be as powerful as ever. Just now, with the rampant spread of the COVID-19 virus, with the help of mass media, we see disease and death more than ever before. While death is tragic to human eyes and brings physical separation from loved ones, I wonder why we should fear death. Of course, while we may fear the agent and the one/s who made it that brought death, death itself is not to be feared.
In the Easter story, death is depicted as the comical staggering of a stage character who has just been stabbed. St. Paul questions, " Where, o death, is your victory? Where, o death, is your sting?" (1 Cor 15:55).
Sin is the state of being separated, and sins are things we do while in the state of separation. Death is a natural conclusion to our physical bodies. Death is also the expiration of the time of our tour to earth. We are here on earth on tour to experience things that value love, which we may have taken for granted in Heaven. It is like our children who come to appreciate the joy of home and the love they receive from their parents only when they are out of home.
Today, we explode with joy on Easter because we believe that through Christ's resurrection, we are resurrected as well. Because Jesus Christ defeated sin and death, we are free from it in this life and gifted with eternal life. And because we embody the Easter mystery, eternity is always God's gift to us. This gift of eternal life breaks into our lives as "the eternal now" in every moment. As I mentioned, "In Him we live and move and have our being." (Acts 17:28).
Because we embody the Easter mystery in Jesus, our salvation is sure. If Jesus had remained dead, he wouldn't have been able to save us from sin and death. But He is alive! Therefore, our salvation is sure, and we are saved and safe in Jesus. "We are no longer condemned because the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made us free from the law of sin and death! (Romans 8:2).
We now have eternal life because we embody the mystery of Easter through Jesus' death and resurrection. He took our separation (sin and death) and nailed it to the cross and arose a conqueror over death for us. In Christ, we can look at our separation from God (sin and death) and refuse never to be separated again.
Of course, because we live in this material world, we will be tempted again and again to distance ourselves from God, but Easter tells us that Christ had destroyed the power of separation over us when he died. He conquered sin and death – separation and its consequence -- by His resurrection. St Paul says: "For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord." (Romans 6:23)
Through his resurrection, Christ restored to us our heritage: eternal life—the very life of God, which is the heritage of every child of God.
Therefore, no matter what we face in this life. Things we face in life, it seems, happen to be what we had included in our itinerary for the trip so that we may experience the depth, width and height of God's love. For this reason, we will only experience trials in the form of challenges and crises while we are here on earth. For a moment, think of them as opportunities and gifts to experience love, and you will experience the hope of victory over every circumstance.
Jesus has assured us victory because we share in his glory. This hope gives us the strength and courage to live. It gives us reason never to give up, no matter what. St. Paul wrote to the Colossians: "And this is the secret: Christ lives in you. This assures you of sharing his glory. (Colossians 1:27).
When seen this way, for us who embody the mystery of Easter, even suffering appears only an illusion. Yes, we do experience suffering as real. Still, because we share in Jesus' glory, which is re-gifted to us with love native in God, suffering is only an illusion. Perhaps this is the reason St Paul, who was no stranger to suffering, was so bold in saying: "Now if we are children, then we are heirs – heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ if indeed we share in his sufferings so that we may also share in his glory".
He then says, "I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us." (Romans 8:17-18). What is "not worth comparing" with glory is obviously something insignificant, inconsequential, without substance and illusory.
We are victors in everything because Jesus rose from the dead! In Him, we have been reunited with God! In him, our heritage has been restored! In Him, we share in glory! In him, we are again made children of God, the embodiments of the Easter Mystery and inheritors of eternal life!
Christ is risen; Hallelujah – He is Risen, indeed, Hallelujah!
Happy Easter to you and your loved ones! Celebrate this feast in rejoicing of all that Christ's resurrection has done for and provided for us.
