Easter Sunday 2022 The glorious new creation

The cross now covered in flowers is the perfect symbol for Easter’s promise of new life, transformation, and life after death. When we proclaim He is risen we also proclaim We will rise. Halleluiah! Amen.

Well I could stop there really, couldn’t I, shortest sermon ever.

I will go on however because I have wondered for a long time if we sometimes stop short of applying the significance of the resurrection to our everyday lives. Sure, we will gladly accept the promise of life after death because although we don’t often think about it, none of us are delighted by the prospect of drawing our last breath, all that death stuff is pretty scary. We gladly or perhaps begrudgingly accept attending church every Sunday, as part of the whole eternal life deal. God will save us if we save Sunday morning for God, but is that right? Is that all there is? Is that what God actually wants from us?

Accepting God’s grace remembered today in the death and glorious resurrection of Jesus is not like a down payment on a retirement home, something we buy into but hold off using until we are ready to move, no God’s grace takes hold of us the minute we believe, and we are never the same again; we begin the process of inner transformation. This earthly life full of both joy and sorrow becomes the place where we learn how to transform from our selfish, sinful selves into our true selves, godly, holy, Christlike and above all loving.

In Luke’s gospel we can see this process of transformation as something that occurs in the present not in some distant and mysterious heaven. Take for instance Jesus words to the open-minded thief on the cross, Jesus tells him that “Today you will be with me in Paradise”, and to Zacchaeus Jesus says, “Today salvation has come to you and your household.” Buying into the promise of the resurrection and Jesus victory over death for all creation is the foundation of our faith, true? If we stop there though, it’s like buying a ticket to a great show, the best production ever but never actually going, never turning up in person, it’s like burying a great treasure in a field and leaving it buried, or receiving a precious gift and keeping it in a high cupboard so we don’t break it, or like stuffing money in a mattress instead of investing it. I could go on, some of those examples are reflections from day-to-day life, but others are from the gospels. You know when we look carefully into the scriptures we can see that they speak of the gift of new life as one we are meant to using right here, right now. This aspect of faith is evident in the concluding chapters of Luke’s gospel and into its sequel in the Book of Acts, however at the end of today’s reading we are left wondering what Jesus followers will do with the amazing news that Jesus has risen from the grave.

As Luke’s gospel continues the penny drops for them and they start to make sense of what has taken place, and they change, they transform. They began to behave and act differently from other people, gathering together in loving communities, distributing their common wealth to those in need, spending time together in worship and eating together with glad and generous hearts.

Sounds idyllic doesn’t it? Sounds like a little bit of heaven here on earth, a place where all people are welcome, fed, and cared for, as evidence of what God in Christ has done for us.

At the beginning of this service we heard the ancient prophet Isaiah proclaim God’s promise to create a new heaven and a new earth. I don’t now where that will be, or what it will look like or how it will happen, but I do not need to know the details. It is enough to hear this promise and it is a promise the world desperately needs to hear; it is the word of hope for a world on the brink of disaster and devastation due to our greed and violent ways.

What I do know is this, we can all play a part in transforming this world by allowing the Spirit of Love to transform us.

This bare wooden cross now transformed is a symbol of what we are in Christ for we too are called to be glorious new creations!

Amen.