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Sunday, April 24, 2011

Easter Vigil, Year A, 23.04.2011

Today we celebrate the deepest and the most profound mystery of our faith.

Yes, the Resurrection is indeed the core and the center of our faith, the very reason why we are here, the very reason why we are Church, the very reason why we believe in God.

Yet, having said that, the stark reality is the finality of death.

So even though we may believe in the Resurrection, do we dare to take death lightly?

Yes, preparing for death is a serious matter, but let’s see if we can take this story lightly.

An elderly woman was getting her earthly matters in order.

So she prepared her will, and made her final arrangements.

As part of the arrangements, she went to see the priest to talk about the type of funeral service she wanted, the hymns to be sung, etc.

She told the priest that she wanted 2 things done.

Firstly, she wanted to be cremated. That’s well and good.

Secondly, she wanted her ashes to be scattered over every golf course in Singapore.

The priest was so puzzled that he had to ask why.

The elderly woman explained – Well, in that way, I will know that my son will visit me whenever he goes to play golf.

Yes, death is a serious matter, whether we are prepared for it or not.

Yet, whether prepared or otherwise, we will have to face it, and accept it.

The disciples of Jesus were not prepared for His sudden and violent death on the cross. It was just too fast, too furious.

When Mary Magdalene (and the other Mary) came to the tomb and saw that the stone was rolled away, her (their) reaction was not one of immense relief or joy, that Jesus was not dead.

In fact, she (they) came to the tomb to finish the embalming of the crucified and dead Jesus.

Mary Magdalene saw how Jesus died and her only conclusion was that the dead body of Jesus was stolen.

So the reality of the death of Jesus was accepted and sealed, and there was no question about it.

But, it was from the reality of His death that came about the resurrection.

God accepted the death of His Son. But God did not leave Him for dead.

In raising Jesus from the dead, God did not allow death to have the final say.

God will always have the final word and that word is the resurrection.

God loved His only Son, and He won’t leave Him for dead.

Indeed nothing could ever separate the love God has for His Son, not even the reality and finality of death.

It was with God’s love that Jesus rose from the dead and conquered death and sin.

The letter to the Romans 8 will ask us this – What will separate us from the love of God?     Trials? Tribulation? Anguish? Persecution? The sword of death?

But because of the Resurrection, we now know that nothing could ever separate us from the love of God, which is in Jesus Christ, our Risen Lord!

Just as nothing could ever separate God’s love for His Son, nothing could also separate the love that our Risen Lord has for us.

Yes, God accepted the death of His Son. But through the Resurrection, God saved Him, not from death, but out of death (Hebrews 5:7-9).

So for us who believe in the Resurrection of Easter Sunday, we also have to accept the crucifixion of Good Friday.

We have to accept that life is going to be a series of dyings.

It is essentially a dying to self – dying to our pride and ego, dying to be a perfectionist and a control freak, dying to be acknowledged and praised, dying to be looked up to.

Dying to be remembered and visited by our descendents, long after our ashes are frozen in the columbarium or scattered in the golf course or whatever.

Come to think of it, we so carelessly use the phrase “dying to”, for e.g. we might say later “I am dying to sleep”. Well you may just end up with eternal rest.
Maybe we should say – I am dying to live, and mean it.

Because the truth is that it is in our dying to our old life that we rise to a new life.

That is what the Resurrection is telling us. That is what God is telling us.

Maybe let me just tell you a little joke about death, so that we can have some humour about life.

One morning, a man opened the newspapers and he was shocked to see his obituary. He was surely not pleased at all.

So he called up his best friend and said to him – Hey! Did you read about my obituary in the papers?

His friend replied – Ya, I just saw it ……… Err… by the way, where are you calling from? (That’s what friends are for!)

Yes, Jesus Christ is risen. He is calling the Elect to be baptized into His death so that they can rise to a new life.

And the Risen Lord is also calling us who are already baptized to accept our dying, so that we can truly go on living.

Because we believe that Christ is risen, we can truly say, we are dying to live. And it’s not a joke.