Living into God’s New Age

“Alleluia, Christ is risen.”  The message of Easter is, "Do not be afraid…. He is not here; for he has been raised.'"  Christ is risen.  God’s love endures for all creation and for every person of every nation, race and religion.  The good news of Easter is that we do not need to live in fear.  God's love and the truth of Christ's resurrection cast out all fear.

The hope of the resurrection with its message that God's love gave birth to Christian faith; and that same hope sustains and motivates the Church's ministry and mission through all succeeding generations.  It is about building those things that shall endure through a vision of God’s new age.

In his book, The Meaning of Jesus, the Anglican bishop N.T. Wright says, the "resurrection of Jesus means that the present time is shot through with great significance.  What is done to the glory of God in the present is genuinely building for God's future.  Acts of justice and mercy, the creation of beauty and the celebration of truth, deeds of love and the creation of communities of kindness and forgiveness -- these all matter, and they matter forever." 

The vocation of Christians is to build those "things that will last into God's new age."  It is the "vocation to holiness: to the fully human life reflecting the image of God that is made possible by Jesus' victory on the cross and that is energized by the Spirit of the risen Jesus present within communities of persons."

The Christian vision of God's new age is a vision that is greatly transformed from present reality.  Our world is hurting and in need of repair and healing.  In God's new age there will be no famine or malnutrition, no war, no racial or religious prejudice, no crime, no poverty, no lack of health care. 

In God's new age there will be a spirit of freedom and peace, of love and compassion, of justice and equality.  In God's new age there will be a renewed respect for the environment and responsible stewardship of both natural and human resources.  The meaning of the resurrection is that all of our accepted and familiar ways of living are turned upside down.  A new day and a new age is coming.  It is up to us to build those things that will endure.

Our Presiding Bishop, Michael Curry has a powerful Easter message.  Bishop Curry says, “Jesus arranged his entrance into Jerusalem  [on that first Palm Sunday] to send a message.  He entered the city, having come in on one side of the city, the scholars tell us, at just about the same time that Pontius Pilate made his entrance on the exact opposite side of the city. Pilate, coming forth on a warhorse.  Pilate, with soldiers around him.  Pilate, with the insignias of Rome’s Empire.  Pilate, representing the Caesars who claimed to be son of god…. Pilate, who represented the Empire that would maintain the colonial status of the Jewish people by brute force and violence.

“Jesus entered the city on the other side, not on a warhorse, but on a donkey, recalling the words of Zechariah:

Behold your King comes to you
Triumphant and victorious is He
Humble and riding on a donkey

“Jesus entered the city at the same time as Pilate to show them, and to show us, that God has another way…. The way of unselfish, sacrificial love.  That’s why he entered Jerusalem.  That’s why he went to the cross.  It was the power of that love poured out from the throne of God, that even after the horror of the crucifixion would raise him from death to life.”

Jesus “didn’t just happen to be in Jerusalem on that Palm Sunday.  He went to Jerusalem for a reason. To send a message.  That not even the titanic powers of death can stop the love of God.  On that Easter morning, he rose from the dead, and proclaimed love wins.”

God invites us this Easter and every day to live into his new age, to live into Christ's resurrection and to be hopeful about those things that will endure.  Love as Jesus loved.  Have a blessed Easter.  Bless all the people of God everywhere.  Christ is risen.  Alleluia!  Amen.