Sermon for the Second Sunday of Easter
May Christ Rise with You
By The Rev. Eric Christopher Shafer -
In the past we have celebrated “Holy Hilarity” Sunday on this Second Sunday of Easter here at Mt. Olive, a day to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus with joy and laughter. This tradition comes to us from the Orthodox branch of Christianity which also calls the day “Bright” Sunday.
This year, just one story: A young boy asked his Dad, “How high can you count, Daddy?” Without thinking, his father responded, “Oh, I guess to about 350.” “Well,” said the young boy proudly to his Dad, “I can count to 4,653.” “4,653,” the Dad responded, “Wow! But, why that number?” “Well,” said the boy, “that’s how far I had counted when the sermon ended.”
I will be much briefer than that today! And much more serious.
May Christ rise with you.
Holy Week and Easter here at Mt. Olive were wonderful. Large crowds – 450 for all of Holy Week, 325 for our Easter services – amazing instrumental and vocal music, beautiful décor, lots of children and guests and so much more. All I can do, all we can do as a congregation, is to thank God for God’s many blessings to and for us.
It was not Easter in Sri Lanka. It was another Good Friday, this time, not with one man dead, but with hundreds of people dead, hundreds more maimed and wounded. And each one, if they did not say it, certainly could have said the very Jewish cry of Jesus from the cross, “O God, O God, why have you forsaken me?”
The Sri Lanka attacks were doubly tragic because, at least as news reports have shared, these attacks might have been prevented if the government had done more to curb identified Muslim extremists, terrorists who, we are told, were even identified as suspect and violent by the Sri Lanka Muslim community itself.
Within the last year, the three Abrahamic religions have suffered violent attacks:
- The murders at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, friends and family at Sabbath worship;
- The murders at the mosques in Churchchurch, New Zealand;
- And now, of course, the mass murders of Christians at Easter Sunday worship in Sri Lanka.
Add to this three African American Christian Churches burned in Louisiana. And now, just yesterday, another shooting at a synagogue, this one nearby in Poway, near San Diego, with one dead, a woman who was shielding her injured Rabbi from the shooter, and several others injured. Another shooting by a young white supremacist filled with hatred for Jews and others. It is far beyond the time to condemn such hatred and call for sensible gun laws.
And, I do not know about you, but my reaction is “How long O Lord, how long?”
Make no mistake, these were, they are, full body blows to the Body of Christ. Full body blows to the Body of Christ.
All of them.
There really are no words – perhaps silence in mourning is the best response.
Except, except the words of Easter – May Christ rise with you.
May Christ rise with you.
I shared on Easter Sunday at our service on the beach this simple message, worth repeating today and every day – In the end, God always wins. In the end, no matter what, no matter what happens, no matter what you are facing, in the end, hatred loses and death is dead and God wins.
May Christ rise with you.
Just one more thought, related to our Gospel lesson today, the story of “Doubting Thomas” which is always the lesson on this Second Sunday of Easter - Thomas one of Jesus’ twelve disciples, Thomas who legend tells us brought Christianity to Sri Lanka.
One of the lessons that the story of “Doubting Thomas” teaches us is that the living Christ, the risen Christ, is also forever the wounded Christ, scarred for eternity. Thomas may have wanted proof that this Jesus after the grave was the same person as Jesus was before the grave. Instead, what Thomas got was proof of Jesus’ presence in Thomas’ life and in our lives forever.
Thomas experiences a Lord who shows up in life, his life and our lives, a Lord who shows up in life with his wounds still visible, with his traces of suffering obvious. From the Thomas story we get further proof that Jesus shows up in our lives, and the lives of Christians in Sri Lanka and all those who suffer around the world, that Jesus shows up in our and their lives with his visible wounds, showing again that Jesus shares our wounds and pain and suffering. Through this, Jesus shows us that he shares a deep understanding of human anguish. And, Jesus offers us strength even when we are not sure where to turn with our hurt and pain.
The message of Easter is and always has been that love is stronger than hatred or life or death, that the ultimate love in our lives cannot be crucified, or murdered or burned or killed in any other way, that God in Jesus Christ is always with us and is especially with us in our times of suffering and pain.
Our faith affirms, because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, because of the Easter story, again and again, our faith affirms that love is stronger than hatred, that love is stronger even than life or death and that, in the end, love always wins.
Love always wins.
May Christ rise with you.
Amen.
(With thanks to Rabbi Jeffrey Salkin).
The Rev. Eric Christopher Shafer
Senior Pastor - Mt. Olive Lutheran Church
Santa Monica, California
Sunday, April 28, 2019
