Wednesday in Holy Week
In the midst of this Holy Week, we fully grapple with the enormity of the sacrifice of Jesus as he moved from a parade of palms to the pain of the passion. We are reminded once again that God is not remote and distant from us, but through Christ, enters our lives filled as they are with both sorrow and joy.In the season of Easter that is upon us, we make an awesome claim that God who relentlessly pursues us in love will not abandon us. We are not left to sin and evil; we are not left to death. The miracle of the empty tomb is a promise of life. Between Good Friday and Easter, something happens to Jesus. Between Good Friday and Easter, something should likewise happen to us. We too are to be changed.
And so as the Easter light breaks, something new should break open in us. There is a new future for the world for which Christ died. The late William Sloan Coffin once said in a sermon,
Christ is risen to convert us, not from life to something more than life, but from something less than life to the possibility of full life itself. Christ’s resurrection promises to put love in our hearts, decent thoughts in our heads, and a little bit more iron in our spines.
In these Great Fifty Days of Easter may you live into our Easter love, have the mind that was in Christ Jesus, and be a courageous Church that dares to follow Jesus Christ in his life of fearless love for the world.
God’s blessing be upon you.
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Jesus saves us by his incarnation and his message to us. He is the logos the pre-existed his earthly life. The forces of evil that put him to death are still among us.Jesus was crucified for what amounts to political reasons. He was a threat to those in power, both the Sanhedrin and the Roman authorities. He was their scapegoat. Nowadays the world scapegoats Christians, particularly progressive Christians; we are seen as a threat to their power. The resurrected Jesus was a statement that no one can really kill the Word of God, and that Word is still among us. The bottom line is Jesus wins.
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