Easter Everyday

By Mike Glenn

Several years ago,  a friend and I were discussing theological education and our conversation focused on the number of New Testament scholars who didn't believe in key elements of the Christian faith. Some didn't believe Jesus ever lived at all. Some didn't believe in the historical reliability of the Scriptures and none of them believed in the bodily resurrection of Jesus.  Neither one of us understood how you could commit your life to  studying something you didn't believe in. He remarked  preaching on Easter would be tough if you didn't believe in the resurrection.

I smirked and said, "I couldn't show up on Monday for work if I didn't believe in the resurrection."

 He asked me what I meant.  I told him everyday  when I showed up for work in the church,  I faced situations people thought were impossible and most of the time, when you did the math, the situations were impossible. There wasn't a way out. There wasn't a way to fix the mess in front of us. I faced these situations every day. Every pastor does. If Easter didn't happen, if Jesus wasn't alive, then,  as far as I could see, there was no hope at all.  

There wouldn't be hope for the marriages trying to survive the betrayal of an affair.
The addict trying to get into rehab wasn't going to make it.
The darkness of depression could never be lifted.  
Love would be lost in bitterness and regret.
And the rest of us would slowly, but ever so surely, give into the despair of living our lives without meaning.

And this rag tag bunch of  misfits we call the church would never make it. The church barely makes it in the best of times.

Like the disciples before us, we look at the situations of our lives and we wonder who can be saved. Human beings seem to have the Midas touch for destruction. Anything we touch we end up ruining. "With men this is impossible," Jesus told His disciples in Matthew 19.  We can all agree on this point.  Every day we're humbled when we encounter some problem and remember the problem before us today was the solution we were so proud of yesterday. I remember when computers were first coming out, people worried about what we would do with all of the time computers would save us.  Stop laughing. There were books and impressive scientific articles written on the future of leisure. With human beings, fixing anything is impossible. Every one of our solutions causes more problems for tomorrow.

Jesus goes on in Matthew 19, "but with God, all things are possible."

All things.

A husband and wife can fall back in love.
A father can welcome the wayward child home.
The addict can be set free.
The wounded child can forgive the careless parent.
The homeless can be welcomed and the hungry fed.
The orphan can be brought in and the wounded can be healed with compassion.

I believe this. I preach this. I never give up. Why?  Because there was another time when the world told us it was over.  A moment when they pulled Jesus down from the cross, wrapped his body in linen cloth and laid Him a borrowed tomb. They pushed a heavy stone in front of that tomb and told everyone to go home. It was over. Jesus was dead. Pilate and his soldiers had made sure it. The religious leaders had demanded it. Dead is dead and nothing is going to change that. This is why the Lenten journey is so hard if we do it right. Too many of us run through the shadows of Holy Week trying get to Easter Sunday morning.   We don' t want to sit out here and talk about what might have been  if Jesus had not been raised. We don't want to think about how bad our lives would be if there was no way to escape the consequences of our failures.  We don't want to consider what it would be live with no hope.

But...

The word "but" is a funny word in the English language. Did you know when you use "but" in a sentence, it erases everything you said before it? Remember the "Dear John" letter you got in high school (I guess it would be a text these days)?
I've really enjoyed dating you these last three months, but...You don't say, "Hey, they really enjoyed hanging out with me." No,  you say, "They dumped me."  Easter means we live on this side of  that sentence.  The Apostle Paul writes in 1 Corinthians, "But as it is, Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep."

If Christ has not been raised, we are still in our sins.
If Christ has not been raised, our faith is in vain.

But...

But Christ has been raised.  Jesus was the first born from the dead, but he won't be the last and He's proving that everyday.  God brought life back to Jesus after the cross. He can bring back life to us, not matter what we're going through.  There's not just one Easter. There's lots of them. Everyday. For everybody.  I know, for us it's impossible, but with God...Don't leave Easter this year without getting the Easter Jesus promised you.