Saturday 4 May 2019

Sermon Opoho Church Sunday 21 April 2019 Easter Sunday with Holy Communion


Reading:  John 20:1-18

We pray:  Holy God, risen Christ, may we know you in your word, may we explore your way for us and may we be blessed in our service to those whom you love, to all people.  Amen.

I begin with a poem – written last year by Abby – she called it ‘Women’s Work’ – it goes like this:

We came there to do the work;
Nobody wanted to do it, so we went--
            It was for him.
Everything was all wrong,
The stone moved, the door open.
            We couldn’t find him.
Where have they taken him?
We asked the gardener,
            But it was him.
Suddenly all those times he spoke to us
Came to life,
            And it was him.
When he said he would rise,
This is what he meant.
            It was him – him!
We ran back so fast it was like flying.
Nobody understood us we talked so fast, but we knew
            It was really him.
We had been hoping for a saviour, a messiah,
Looking for a way to reach God,
            And it was him
            It was always him.

It was him, it was always him!  
How many times, I wonder, have we cast our eyes out to the horizon, to the far distant hills or the unseeable future looking for our messiah, only to find that someone has been tugging on our hand, saying ‘I am here, I am here.’

Abby’s poem really touched a chord for me – a new path, you might say, into the story of Jesus risen and in our midst.
It may not be the path she envisaged but it was the one I found.

I have to say we are truly blessed here with our creative writers –of psalms, poems, prayers, hymns – and I love the way each of them invites us to consider things anew.  Something that may have become a bit old hat suddenly takes on a new life because someone has been brave enough, enthused enough to share their innermost thoughts with this community – and further afield.  

And with this poem, I am encouraged to think about the times I have been looking in the wrong place for the presence of God – the respectable, the safe, the predictable places where I invite God to come to me.  And instead maybe we, like the women at work, need to come to that understanding that Jesus is to be found in the person of the gardener, the friend you walk the dusty roads with, the one you sit down to a meal with, the one you explore the living of life with.

The Jesus of Easter Sunday and the days to follow can be a conundrum for us – we might choose to stand for a while in the impossibility of this thing that has happened, this man come among us again.  And so we look for him in the miraculous, the far distant untouchable mystery, the ascended Christ shining with glory to whom we can only look with eyes averted lest we be blinded.   And yet Jesus takes pains to assure the disciples of his familiarity to them; to walk with his people, talk with them, eat with them, discuss scripture with them, to be beside them in their daily living.  He is trying to tell them that it really is him and he really is with us again. 
There is a sense that nothing has changed and yet everything has changed

The Jesus of Easter Sunday can also be the cause of much perplexity – has his body been stolen, did this really happen, it’s impossible, that can’t be him – that’s the gardener, surely……
Just like the women – time spent looking down trails that detour us, trails that we imagine because the reality seems too fantastic.  So much time spent on trying to find an acceptable explanation, a robust thesis of resurrection that will get pass marks.  So much time spent determining his status when in fact all we need to know is that it was him, is him – and he is here with us, now.

The Jesus of Easter Sunday is, too, the focus of much excitement – imagine the transformation of hope when the news spreads around, when even the doubters are convinced that this ‘thing’ has happened.  Imagine the hand reaching out saying ‘It is I!’ when you expected to return to a life without him.  Those lines: ‘We ran back so fast it was like flying. Nobody understood us we talked so fast….’
When was the last time we were that excited about discovering again the risen Jesus with us, of realising that despite every nail of fear and hatred that put him on that cross, he triumphed over death to come among us again; when was the last time we danced with excitement – now that can be metaphorical rather than physical – as we recognised the risen Christ, come among us still. 

Can I invite you in the time of reflection to ponder the Jesus of Easter Sunday for you, can we find anew that excitement and conviction that despite all our looking in the wrong places, it was always and will always be the risen Christ who moves among us in the most unlikely and commonplace people and places, bringing love and hope to us all.   Can we too, when we do stand to sing ‘Jesus Christ is risen today, Alleluia’, do so with delight and excitement for we have suddenly realised ‘ It is him, I have seen the Lord and he is with us, not stolen, not dead, not distant but alive and with us as we continue to work out God’s purpose here in this place.’ 

Margaret Garland


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