Greetings in the Name of the Risen Christ!
With all that we have experienced over the last year, I do not want to think of dying as a means to living our best lives. However, as we celebrate Resurrection morning, we remember that it was through Good Friday and Holy Saturday that we have come to celebrate Christ’s Resurrection. Richard Rohr describes this spiritual pattern as loss to renewal. In the article “Hope in a Time of Crisis,” Sister Ilia Delio wrote:
Christianity can help us realize that death and resurrection are part of the evolutionary path toward wholeness; letting go of isolated existence for the sake of deeper union. Something dies but something new is born—which is why the chaos of our times is, in a strange way, a sign of hope; something new is being born within. Out of chaos, a star is born. A breakdown can be a breakthrough if we recognize a new pattern of life struggling to emerge.
Many new patterns are struggling to emerge in our time—new ways of being Church, Post COVID. A new way of living together as Missional Gospel Communities. After one of the most contentious years in recent U.S. history, people are renewed in their resolve for justice. Stay-at-home orders have restored the meaning of family values. New interest is emerging around simple living. A desire for more authentic relationships is awakening within us. Quality time with one another is now sacred time. New patterns of thought are emerging around personal meaning and human dignity. We are renewed and set free from the grips of demise that bind us to ways of being that lead to death instead of life.
This Resurrection Sunday Hebrew 12:1-3 calls us to remembrance and action “let’s rid ourselves of every obstacle and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let’s run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking only at Jesus, the originator and perfecter of the faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider Him who has endured such hostility by sinners against Himself, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.”
In many ways, as vaccines are more available for the public, we are coming out of death. Let us rise from the shackles of oppression. I pray that we will also rise from the deaths of indifference and apathy. I pray that we will rise from the death of lost dreams and loss of vision. I pray that we will rise from hate to love. I pray that we will rise from deficit thinking to a theology of abundance. I pray we will rise from doubt and find faith again in God who brought Jesus Christ from the dead and who will do the same for us as we rise from our personal and corporate deaths. The resurrection of Jesus gave a new song to the first witnesses that went forth from the tomb to proclaim He is alive. From the words of Handel’s Messiah, “Hallelujah! For the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth. Hallelujah! The kingdom of this world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ, and He shall reign forever and ever.”
Happy Resurrection Sunday! Christ Has Risen, Christ Has Risen Indeed!
Rev. SanDawna Gaulman Ashley
Transitional Synod Leader