Easter Message & Music 2017

Easter’s Message & Music 2017

Groucho Mark said: “I wouldn’t want to belong to a club that would have me as a member in it.” That is the definition of Good Friday. That day is the human day. It belongs to us. The day of sin, sadness and death. A day like any other day. A day where the good guy loses and the buy guys win.

But Easter is a day unlike any other. It is God’s day. The day of life out of death. The day of bodily resurrection into a new reality and new existence the likes we only can get glimpses of in this life when live as Jesus lived. Not only is the resurrection the greatest story ever told. It is the only real choice there is. It even makes sense. Something more must exist if this was created what else will be created after this life? Something bigger than myself must exist. Something like forever must be possible. And finally life is a story, and we get to choice the story we want to follow.

The only real question for today is this: Does any other story cover existence better than the Christian story? Is there a better story for humans to hold on to? The Christian claim is that God came down to the human level – and came up again, pulling all of humanity up with himself. In Adam all have died to sin. In Christ all rise to life.

The alternative story would be that after death there is nothingness. Unless you like this alternative, and I don’t, it makes sense to turn to the Christian view of reality. Without the resurrection how do you get to hope? How can you possibly save yourself from yourself? Must less against the principalities and powers of this world?

The real question isn’t what are we to make of Christ’s resurrection. The question is what does that story make of us? You must either accept or reject the story.

What Jesus says to us and does for us no other teacher has said or done in the history of humanity.   Other teachers say, “This is the truth about the universe. This is the way you ought to go, but Jesus says, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life.” Jesus says, “No person can reach absolute reality, except through me. Try to save your own life and you will lose it. Give yourself away and you will be saved.”

He says, “If you are ashamed of me, if, when you hear this call, you turn the other way, I also will look the other way when I come again. If anything is keeping you from God and from me, whatever it is, throw it away.

If it is your eye, pull it out. If it is your hand, cut it off. If you put yourself first you will be last. Come to me everyone who is carrying a heavy load. I will set that right. Your sins, all of them, are wiped out. I can do that. I am Life. And finally, do not be afraid, I have overcome the whole Universe.”

This is what this day is all about. This is the issue. That God lifted human life out of certain and inevitable death. And forgiveness is the key that bridges the gap between death and life. Amen