Sermon for the 20th of April - Easter Day

Lectionary Readings for Easter Day

Isaiah 65: 17-end
For I am about to create new heavens and a new earth; the former things shall not be remembered or come to mind. But be glad and rejoice for ever in what I am creating; for I am about to create Jerusalem as a joy, and its people as a delight. I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and delight in my people; no more shall the sound of weeping be heard in it, or the cry of distress. No more shall there be in it an infant that lives but a few days, or an old person who does not live out a lifetime; for one who dies at a hundred years will be considered a youth, and one who falls short of a hundred will be considered accursed. They shall build houses and inhabit them; they shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit. They shall not build and another inhabit; they shall not plant and another eat; for like the days of a tree shall the days of my people be, and my chosen shall long enjoy the work of their hands. They shall not labour in vain, or bear children for calamity; for they shall be offspring blessed by the Lord— and their descendants as well. Before they call I will answer, while they are yet speaking I will hear. The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, the lion shall eat straw like the ox; but the serpent—its food shall be dust! They shall not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain, says the Lord.

Psalm 118: 1-2, 14-24
O give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his steadfast love endures for ever! Let Israel say, ‘His steadfast love endures for ever.’ The Lord is my strength and my might; he has become my salvation. There are glad songs of victory in the tents of the righteous: ‘The right hand of the Lord does valiantly; the right hand of the Lord is exalted; the right hand of the Lord does valiantly.’ I shall not die, but I shall live, and recount the deeds of the Lord. The Lord has punished me severely, but he did not give me over to death. Open to me the gates of righteousness, that I may enter through them and give thanks to the Lord. This is the gate of the Lord; the righteous shall enter through it. I thank you that you have answered me and have become my salvation. The Stone that the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This is the Lord’s doing; it is marvellous in our eyes. This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it

1 Corinthians 15: 19-26
If for this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who havedied. For since death came through a human being, the resurrection of the dead hasalso come through a human being; for as all die in Adam, so all will be made alive inChrist. But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, then at his coming those whobelong to Christ. Then comes the end, when he hands over the kingdom to God theFather, after he has destroyed every ruler and every authority and power. For he mustreign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed isdeath.

Acts 10: 34-43
Then Peter began to speak to them: ‘I truly understand that God shows no partiality,but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.You know the message he sent to the people of Israel, preaching peace by JesusChrist—he is Lord of all. That message spread throughout Judea, beginning inGalilee after the baptism that John announced: how God anointed Jesus of Nazarethwith the Holy Spirit and with power; how he went about doing good and healing allwho were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. We are witnesses to all thathe did both in Judea and in Jerusalem. They put him to death by hanging him on atree; but God raised him on the third day and allowed him to appear, not to all thepeople but to us who were chosen by God as witnesses, and who ate and drank withhim after he rose from the dead. He commanded us to preach to the people and totestify that he is the one ordained by God as judge of the living and the dead. All theprophets testify about him that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness ofsins through his name.’

Luke 24: 1-12
But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they came to the tomb, taking the spices that they had prepared. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in, they did not find the body.While they were perplexed about this, suddenly two men in dazzling clothes stood beside them. The women were terrified and bowed their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, ‘Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen.Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, that the Son of Man must be handed over to sinners, and be crucified, and on the third day rise again.’ Then they remembered his words, and returning from the tomb, they told all this to the eleven and to all the rest. Now it was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other women with them who told this to the apostles. But these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them. But Peter got up and ran to the tomb; stooping and looking in, he saw the linen cloths by themselves; then he went home, amazed at what had happened.

Sermon for Easter Day

Today we come together to celebrate both the joy and the glory of Easter. This is the celebration of the Risen Christ! For Christians, the greatest celebration, and the greatest feast, of the entire Christian year. Every other day leads up to the dawning of this one day, this outpouring of gladness, in the celebration of which we call on the most beautiful symbols and themes of our tradition.

Joy, and glory.

We can feel joy, but how can we picture glory? The glory of the resurrected Christ---what we celebrate today, that flows out of and into the unspeakable, unimaginable glory of God: is almost impossible to grasp. We can only try to picture it.

We can, in the end, picture glory only by analogy, by some sort of lesser likeness, some resemblance to it.

So. Here is one analogy. Let us contemplate this beautiful creature, the peacock. The peacock, with its display of spreading iridescent feathers, is breathtakingly beautiful; I would say, glorious.

From ancient times in India the peacock has been revered for its beauty. It became a symbol of royalty, and even of divinity.

The symbol of the peacock was brought to ancient Babylon by Indian traders. In Persia the peacock was associated with Paradise, the Tree of Life, immortality.

In Greek mythology, peacocks were sacred to the Queen of the gods, Hera, whose chariot they drew. Hera, although the goddess of the stars and skies, had nevertheless to endure Zeus's endless infidelities. One myth tells the story of Io, a priestess of Hera. She was guarded by Hera’s own servant, a giant with one hundred eyes known as Argos Panoptes. In order to possess Io, Zeus ordered that Argos be killed. All that Hera could do was to immortalise her faithful watchman by turning his one hundred eyes into the “eyes” on the peacock's tail.

For the ancient Greeks, the flesh of the peacock was thought not to decay after death, so it also, there, became a symbol of immortality, of incorruptibility.

The Christian tradition adopted this association with immortality from the Greeks. The eyes of the peacock’s feathers came to represent the all-seeing eye of God. And also the cosmos---the vault of heaven---decorated by sun, moon, and stars.

Countless early Christian paintings and mosaics feature the peacock. Peacocks drinking from a vase is a symbol of Christian believers drinking from the waters of eternal life. Peacocks are often depicted next to a Tree of Life.

So, of all the symbols Christians have used through the ages to picture the faith--- the Good Shepherd, symbol of loving care, the Anchor, symbol of safety, the Dove, symbol of the Holy Spirit and of peace---there are others---it is the peacock that comes closest to picturing glory.

But what bears all this glory---what holds it up?

Feet. And what feet these are, indeed! In my opinion, they are ugly. Black and grey, bony, clawed. But they are an inseparable part of the peacock's glory. You cannot behold the majesty of the plumage without also seeing the feet that hold the feathers up.

How many of us love our feet, or think that they are beautiful?

But, and this is just the reality of the way our human bodies are made, you cannot choose not to have feet, while only having a beautiful head, or chest, or arms.... you have to have feet.

It is the feet that bear the weight of the glory.

Every Maundy Thursday, I am intensely conscious of how my feet look as I allow someone else to bend down and wash them. I think that Jesus knew how distasteful this task was, for the servants of a household, the washing of a guest's worn and dusty and ugly feet.

We re-enact Jesus's act of washing the feet of his followers every year. It is the first act of the great Three Days of Easter, the act that leads to our great celebration today. Because what it sets the stage for is all this glory.

And I think that what Jesus meant to symbolise in that humble and lowly act is the necessary part that feet play in the living of the Christian life: he meant to honour feet.

Feet are about walking long and sometimes tiring distances, about bearing burdens, but also about supporting the rest of the body--our individual human bodies, and the rest of the Body of Christ.

The verb to bear has several meanings. One is to bear a burden, a heavy weight. Our feet will always help us to carry whatever burden we have to bear. Another meaning is to endure. Sometimes we simply have to be faithful, and wait. Suffering comes to all of us---it is what it means to be human. But another meaning of the verb to bear is to be fruitful, to flourish. To bring forth something from inside, something beautiful and new.

The peacock sheds its feathers every year, and from within its body come new ones.

We celebrate our belief today that on that Easter day Christ rose from the dead, defeating death. His human body---real as it was, feet and all--- became, in this act of God's power, glorious in its Resurrection.

And the effect of all that glory on us?

Jesus the Christ now dwells with God, in glory so great that we can only fasten on lesser reflections of it, like this peacock.

But Jesus washed the feet of those whom he loved, the feet that God gave us to help us bear what we are given in this life to bear.

On that Maundy Thursday, the words that went with the feet washing were these: This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you....You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last.

May we use our feet to serve others in love and joy, following the example of the Christ whom we adore. And to God be all the glory. Amen!