3rd Sunday of Easter: Cycle A 22-23

Third Sunday of Easter
Acts 2:14, 22-33 | 1 Peter 1:17-21 | Luke 24:13-35

May your people exalt forever, oh God, in renewed youthfulness of Spirit so that rejoicing now in the restored glory of our adoption we may look forward in confident hope to the rejoicing of the day of resurrection.  Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God forever and ever, amen.

So many of the gospels that we’re reading now are post-resurrection stories, and so much about that is that the people that had gone through something as mysterious and life-changing, in a sense.  They went through that experience and just had to ponder it and wonder about it, and the issue seems always to be, “Do you really believe that he rose from the dead?  If you believe that, then you’ll believe everything that he said.”  But I’m not sure that’s exactly the way it works.  I think the thing that is most attractive about the fact that God came and spoke with us is not the fact that that happened but what he was revealing, what he was saying to you and to me, and what we have to do is not so much decide on whether or not we’re going to receive the mysterious ways in which God has called us to live in him in this life.  We’re not so much asked to base it on whether or not he rose from the dead, but do we want this?  Do you want to share ⎯ does your ego want to share with God the very thing that is in you that gives you a sense that you’re in charge of your life?  We like to be in charge of our life.  That’s what Adam and Eve wanted to do, and when you look at that carefully, you say, “Well, what is it that you can tell me?  What is it that you can give me as an indication that I should surrender my will to your will?”  And it’s pretty amazing what he is promising.  

In that first reading, we go back to something that was famous in terms of King David having a premonition that there would be some moment in history when human beings would be enlightened in such a way that they would have a different outlook on the world with all its problems and darkness.  He’s saying something about this king, this new king, that when we listen to him, when we listen to his words, we’re not any longer disturbed.  We’re confident.  He says we dwell in hope, because we know somehow the path of life.  That’s so interesting to me, that image, the path of life.  Is God really giving us, through this extraordinary story of the Old and New Testament, that God finally is ready to share with you and me the mystery of who we are and why we’re here?  And he said, “I want you to allow me to partner with you to enable that to happen.”  And in the process of it, in the doing of it, even though there will be things that disturb you, even though there are things that look hopeless, even though there seems to be no direction to anything, you can be given, God promises, something that enables you to endure all of that with a light in you that is different than the world normally could ever produce.  It can’t produce it.  Human nature isn’t enough.  Perhaps that’s the most important thing to remember about the whole story of God in us, that he’s saying, “I made you in such a way, gave you a world that is in such a way that you can’t do that alone.  It will destroy you.  It will lead you into violence and destruction, but if you open yourself up to my partnership ⎯”   If you understand that Jesus came into the world not just to give you a Savior that you can call upon and say, “Jesus, help me this, and Jesus, help me that.  Heal this, Jesus.  Heal that, Jesus.”  Jesus gave us the best description and understanding of his Father.  Jesus’ gift to the world is he revealed who God is, not who Jesus is.  Jesus is a model of who we can become.  He is the one filled so much with divinity that he lives out this life, and he lives it following the path of life.  You might say, “Well, it didn’t turn out very well for him.”  He ended up not having the success that he wanted.  His life was cut short.  He was humiliated, went through a death that was absolutely horrific in terms of not only the pain but the humiliation.  He didn’t want to do it, but he said that most important thing in the garden.  He said, “Father, I don’t want to do it this way, but if this is the way it is written, if this is my path of life, I’ll do it.  I’ll give in to it without demanding that I’m experiencing something constantly that is life-giving and wonderful and I’m peaceful all the time.”  No, it means that ultimately in the struggle you will find the space, a place where you can dwell, and it’s with God.  And God is hope.  And God is life.  And being in that place is so different than being in a world that now we hear every ⎯ it’s everything going on in the world that is destructive.  The news is nothing but how people have destroyed other people, and you listen to that all the time, and you begin to feel that there is no hope.  

But then you need to turn to the mystery that we’re celebrating through Easter and this period of time as we move toward Jesus’ ascension into heaven.  We want to focus on the message, and the message is something so hope-filled, but it has to be chosen.  You can’t say, “Maybe it’s right, and maybe this is going to work,” or, “Maybe I’ll give in to this, and maybe I shouldn’t fight that.”  If you try to do it on your own, you’re never going to do it.  It needs a reflective life with the presence of the God that dwells in you.  Without that, the periods of darkness, the periods of hopelessness that come and go are going to take over, but if you keep going back to the simplest, most basic promise, God created you, gave you life that lasts forever.  He wants you to engage in this path that you’re on here in the fullest way possible, which means you are open to receiving what is going on, dealing with it, struggling with it, trying to make it better but at the same time knowing that you’re not doing this on your own.  And then when you’re open to his presence in you, you will find ways in which you are doing things that change the world, and you don’t even know it.  That’s the hope.  In the midst of all the struggle and the pain and the discord and the separation and the isolation of human nature, something is working.  Something is moving us.  Something is bringing us life.  

It’s not so much that we believe that Jesus the man rose from the dead.  Yes, he did, and that makes him very, very important.  But the resurrection thing is something that happens to you when he pours himself into you.  You rise.  We’re celebrating our resurrection.  That’s the secret.  That’s the plan of God.  Trust it, because without it, we can’t find the life that God created for us.  Amen.

Father, you’ve given us a power, your presence in us, to go beyond the limitations of our mind and enter into the world of the heart that is filled with hope, open to mystery and longing to engage in something meaningful, not only for ourselves but for the world.  We thank you for this great gift, and we ask this in Jesus’ name, amen.