March 22, 2008
The Great Vigil of Easter (Year A)
Genesis 1:1-2:2; Psalm 33:1-11
Genesis 7:1-5, 11-18; 8:6-18; 9:8-13; Psalm 46
Genesis 22:1-18; Psalm 16
Exodus 14:10-31, 15:20-21; Canticle 8,
Isaiah 55:1-11; Psalm 42:1-7
Ezekiel 36:24-28; Canticle 9
Ezekiel 37:1-14; Psalm 30:1-2, 5-6, 8-9
Zephaniah 3:12-20
Psalm 114; Romans 6:3-11;
Matthew 28:1-10
Vigil – a time of keeping watch, purposefully staying awake!
I would like all of you to imagine that we began the great vigil when Joseph of Arimathea took Jesus’ body and laid it in his own new tomb and rolled a great stone to close it. And why not? Hadn’t Jesus himself said, “After three days I will rise again.”?
So let us gather at the tomb and wait . . . and wait. And during that time of waiting we pray. And we sing, the old songs composed by our ancestor David. And we talk, we reflect on what has been, we remember what has happened, not just in the last few days or hours, but in our history and how God has been there from the time of our creation, through all our trials and triumphs, bringing us out of captivity, saving us from our enemies, providing us with a new home, a new land. We remember how God has saved us, even though at times it was only a remnant. And we give thanks.
Yes, God has been good to us. He wonderfully created us – and I care not whether you are a creationist or a believer in the Big Bang theory. For most of us it matters not how we got here, not as we consider our relationship with our God. What matters is that we are here. Thanks be to God!
And when our ancestors sinned, what they did we can only guess; but it angered God, and so God said to Noah “you alone are righteous . . . in this generation” and so I will save you. Build an ark and take into it your family and pairs of animals and birds, all living creatures; and the great flood destroyed the earth. One man, one family was saved. Thanks be to God!
As we progress through our history, rejoicing in God’s saving grace, we need to pause and reflect about another family, on how God could in one moment give Abraham in his old age a son and in the next demand that he sacrifice that same son. A terrible story if we take it at face value. In our humanness we ask how God, our loving God, could have asked such a gut-wrenching act of any one of us. But I think we have to look at it as probably the second greatest example of trust and obedience and faith in our God, the optimal word being “trust,” and give thanks.
So we continue our waiting and our talking and our remembering. Our horizons broaden and we contemplate the saving of a nation, not just a son or a family, but a whole nation, again through the faith and trust and obedience and perseverance, of one man, Moses.
Hours have passed; we are still outside the tomb; and still we wait – three days, he said. The great prophet Isaiah is often quoted to show how Jesus’ life, his actions, even his death, fulfilled scripture. And like the captives in Babylon, we have heard Isaiah telling of God inviting us to a joyful banquet and calling all nations to seek the Lord. Yes, God is with us wherever we are. Thanks be to God!
God indeed blesses us as he blessed our ancestors in captivity, giving them a new heart and a new spirit in order to follow God’s statutes and live according to God’s ordinances. Let us not lose that heart and that spirit, easy it may be, as we wait and we wait. Did not Jesus affirm that new heart and new spirit, a new hope? Yet how can it be? Look at what has happened in the past few days. A week ago he entered the city in triumph, but a few days later he was hung on a cross. Why? What had he done? He preached forgiveness, justice, love, respect, dignity; he healed the sick, the lame, the blind, the epileptic. But, he angered the authorities, those in power, and for that he died. To lose heart now would be to deny him and all he stood for.
Oh, it is hard . . . to wait. How much longer?
Is that the dawn beginning to break? But first, do you remember that valley of the dry bones? What a vision that was! Were we such a despairing lot? Were we of so little faith? Are we still? No, God did then, and, believe it, God will again, breathe a new spirit into us. Jesus promised that. But it is so hard to keep that faith in the darkness that surrounds us. Oh, God, “my spirit faints within me; my heart within me is desolate.” (Ps. 143:4) “Revive me, O Lord, for your Name’s sake . . .” (Ps 143:11a)
But look, I think the sky is beginning to brighten. The dawn of a new day, the dawn of the third day is almost upon us. The darkness is dissolving; the light is coming! Do you see the stone moving? Can it be? Can it really be happening as he said it would? In the words of Zephaniah, albeit written six hundred years ago, let us “sing aloud!” Let us “rejoice and exult!” “God is in our midst!” Jesus is in our midst! Our vigil is over!
Yes, our vigil was really over two thousand years ago, but it is good to remember; it is good to look back. We are not here because of who we are. We are here because God so loved us, has so loved us throughout history, that time and time again he sought ways to save us, not just from our enemies but from ourselves, from our pride, from our willfulness, from the entrapments of “do it my way; I’m in charge.” And finally, oh, stiff-necked people, he sent his only son to live and then die for us. But God did not stop there. A good man could and would die for his friends or for a cause; but God wanted no doubt left in our minds as to who is in charge. He caused that son to rise from the dead and to live once more among us but in a new way, bringing us into a renewed relationship with God, with Jesus, and eventually with the Holy Spirit.
It has happened and we are about to celebrate that most marvelous event in history, the cornerstone of our faith, the risen Christ. Thanks be to God!
Amen.
Sonia F. G. Stevenson, M. Div.
Church of the Good Shepherd