Christ is Risen!

Well, we made it.

We made it through Lent.

We made it through the wilderness.

We made it through tornados and floods.

We have come through our forty days of fasting, our forty days of wandering, and have finally arrived at a land flowing with milk and honey.

This week, as it should be, has been a special week.

On Thursday, we sat with Christ and his disciples at the Last Supper and heard him tell them and us to “Love one another.”

On Friday we watched as Christ was condemned, crucified, and laid in the tomb.

Today, until just a few minutes ago, we lived in the emptiness of Holy Saturday, knowing what is to come, but also knowing we were not there yet. A time when the apostles couldn’t be sure that anything would ever be right again.

Tonight, we have listened to the old, old stories, God’s salvation of Israel at the Red Sea, and my own favorite reading, Ezekiel’s vision of a restored Israel in the Valley of Dry Bones. We have heard Paul tell of what Christ’s resurrection means for us. And we have heard the story of the women at the tomb. I’m glad we read Matthew’s account tonight. Unlike Luke’s telling, in Matthew the women actually see and touch the risen Christ. That’s an important point that we will come back to in a bit.

Some of you of may know that my Father died 3 years ago on Maundy Thursday. It’s because he died during Holy Week that it has become special to me.

You see my father had a rock-solid belief in resurrection. When my Mother died, he talked about how he wasn’t heartbroken, because she was out of pain and he knew—knew—that they would see each other again. This is the faith we should all have, the faith that we should show in our lives every day. His faith was what gave me strength when my own wife Kim died suddenly and unexpectedly last October. Because with his Resurrection, Christ vindicated my father’s — and my — faith. In his Resurrection, Christ showed that Resurrection could really happen, would really happen.

At the beginning of Lent, on Ash Wednesday, we are told “Remember you are dust and to dust you shall return.” We take our mortality out and look it square in the face.

But tonight, when we hear the Exultet, when we hear the readings of God’s saving deeds throughout the ages, when we respond with psalm and canticle, and when we renew the promises we made at Baptism , and declare that Christ has indeed risen front the dead, we are doing something incredibly important. We are declaring to the world that death itself has been conquered. That our death has been conquered. We are claiming that we don’t have to be afraid of it anymore. We are claiming that death has no power over us. And that’s why this week is a week of joy for me, instead of overwhelming sadness.

Because, as Father Paul sang, this is the night. This is the night. This is the night when everything that Jesus said was vindicated. This is the night of which every other church service is only an echo. We make a huge deal of Christmas, and rightly so. Easter Sunday is important, sure. But this night, this holy night, is the most important, most holy time of the year. We have those Old Testament readings because we need to see the whole story. We need to feel the power and depth and sweep of the history that led up to this night.

This special night is the climax of a love story that began in the depths of time before Creation. This night is prefigured by the ancient stories of the Creation, the salvation of Noah and his family from the Flood, and the Israelites’ passing through the Red Sea. This night was hinted at by the prophets. The events of this night were set in motion by an announcement to Mary and the birth of a small child. This night was made possible by a betrayal, arrest, trial, and execution. This night is the completion of all those bits and pieces. This night is what history was headed toward from before the beginning of time.

This is the night when Christ made the down payment on our promise of resurrection. That’s resurrection. Not a disembodied ghost-like existence after we die, but a real, physical, resurrection of the body. That is the promise. In our Renewal of Baptismal Vows just a few moments ago, we said that we believe in the resurrection of the body. When Christ rose from the dead, he didn’t come back as a ghost. The women in tonight’s Gospel touched him. They grabbed his feet. He came back fully, physically alive, and that is what is in store for us.

And so, tonight, we celebrate the Eucharist of our crucified and risen Christ. We celebrate his Resurrection and look forward to our own. And we shout our alleluias to the heavens for the saving work that God began before the heavens and the earth were formed, the saving work that He, through Jesus Christ, has accomplished this holy night.

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed! Allelua!

Amen.