It has now been two months since I have written to you though a Heartland eNews. In some ways that reflects the complexity of the role of Bishop, being involved in so many things that sometimes you don’t get back to the things that matter most. I hope you have been keeping up with things LCA through the eNews, website, and The Lutheran.
This week, being Holy Week, I had planned for some space as I reflected on the journey of our Saviour to the cross, worshipped, and focussed on the more important things. I even took a few days out of the office to give some space.
However, deadlines still stand, people’s needs demand attention, and every time you take a pause, the work piles up. If it’s like this in the leadership of the church, you must forgive me for wondering what it’s like for Christians working in secular institutions where the timing of Holy Week and Easter are inconsequential to the demanding flow of business. How is it for you?
I believe that Jesus faced pressure as we do, only of a much greater magnitude. People demanded everything from him, and we still do. It wasn’t just them; it was all of us, the sins of the entire world. The more he delivers, the more we demand. In the Biblical narrative, it seems to peak at Palm Sunday, followed by an all too brief expectant pause as everyone waited for him truly to deliver what they all wanted – whatever that was. It was momentary. Their enthusiasm for him quickly waned and he met an increasing wall of resistance and unbelief. John’s gospel even says, “he departed and hid from them” (12:36).
Easter is the crucible of our faith. We can do without the details of Christmas (see, for instance, the Gospels of Mark and John, which do without the Christmas story), but we can’t do without the details of Easter. They are specifically the death and resurrection of the Son of God. We should never tire of hearing it told. It is what you will hear proclaimed in services across the church this weekend, and every Sunday of the year.
We are Easter people. If we have to set aside everything else we do in the church, this is it, the big deal. Not, as I have written elsewhere, religion for religion’s sake, but faith for Christ’s sake. That’s the business the church is in. In ourselves, we are deeply flawed, imperfect – even worse, we are dying, we are already dead. The evidence is all around us, in life, in relationships, in the world, and even in the church. You could easily give up hope and live as selfishly and greedily as you can for as long as the good times last. It will all be over before you know it.
Only Easter turns that around. Only faith in the resurrected Saviour makes our resurrection possible. God does what none of us reasonably expected, against all the evidence. He raises the dead. He raises Jesus. He can raise you. He can raise me. He raises all those who believe in him, to eternal life. Now there is a new story for us to write, a new life to be lived, without end.
“... when you were buried with him in baptism, you were also raised with him through faith in the power of God, who raised him from the dead.” (Colossians 2:12 NRSV)
So let’s celebrate this weekend, as only those who are baptised and saved can. None of it is our own work. It is entirely God’s doing. That makes us confident. We are ready now, to get on with life, with being the church, and with living out the faith in our daily lives.
May you have a blessed and a happy Easter.
Your brother in Christ,
Pastor John Henderson
Bishop
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