And suddenly... Easter insight

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As I write it’s Easter Monday. In some parts of the world, including Madagascar, this day is known as “Second Easter” and is set aside for outings and picnics with family and friends. It’s a kind of basking in the glow of the Resurrection Celebrations from Sunday.

St. Paul's Lutheran Church, Cheyenne, WY
In our context, Easter Monday is just another day, a return to the “daily grind." It can often feel like something of a letdown, especially for pastors, rostered lay leaders, and other church professionals who have poured their heart and souls into guiding us through the Lenten journey, and especially the Three Days leading us through the darkness of death to the Resurrection dawn. Monday comes and it’s all over... and there’s a tendency to wonder.  Did any of it matter? Did anything really change because we once again recognized the reality-shifting events of the cross and empty tomb? What does it take to sustain the Easter insight?

That’s when it helps me to remember how often the gospel accounts are punctuated by things happening “suddenly." I noted that yesterday in Matthew’s account of the resurrection... in a blink of an eye, something was different... suddenly there’s an earthquake or an angel, suddenly the risen Jesus shows up! 

“Suddenly” is how I have come to appreciate the power of the Easter gospel in my life. I realize that when Easter Sunday is over and Monday feels like a let down—what has returned to “normal” isn’t the earth-shattering truth we just proclaimed, it’s me. Somehow I’ve fallen asleep again, allowed my narrow view of things to overshadow the divine perspective that seemed so clear on Easter morning. 

What I’m learning to trust is that the Easter insight is always lying in wait and that it will indeed return... suddenly and unexpectedly. It certainly helps when I create space to invite it in. But sooner or later something will happen, and in the blink of an eye I’ll get it again... life is so much bigger than my constructs, death is not the final word, God is never absent from my suffering, nothings escapes the divine power to transform. In the words of Desmond Tutu: “Good is stronger than evil; love is stronger than hate; light is stronger than darkness; life is stronger than death. Victory is ours, through him who loves us.”


Not a bad word for Easter Monday... or Tuesday, or Wednesday, or Thursday...

Yours in Faith,
Bishop Jim Gonia


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