Pastor Will's Easter Vigil Homily 4/4/26
- HTLC & LCM
- 3 days ago
- 6 min read
In the name of the Father, +Son, and the Holy Spirit
Last Sunday, on Palm Sunday, we heard from the Gospel of Matthew that as Jesus was entering Jerusalem on a donkey, and a colt… The “whole city was in turmoil” and the crowd asked, “Who is this?”
Well… This is the night!
This is the night when the light of Christ reveals “who this is.”
We hear the Divine Drama/Salvation History
…that leads us from the fires of creation, to the life-giving waters at the Font, to sustaining bread and wine at the Table to remember again, and a-new, that as our cities are in turmoil… The light of Christ reveals who-this-God-is.
This IS the night!
We just heard a rich tapestry of ancient, and yet timeless, stories of experiences with the Divine… elemental building blocks of awe, wonder, mystery, love and grace…
God’s response to the human condition of awe, wonder, mystery, questions, and building systems that send cities into turmoil.
Up first (Genesis 1), the elemental building blocks of God’s loving purpose and grace begin with cosmic chaotic waters and out of that sea and formless void… God surfs over the waters and creates order, purpose, life… and then creation is invited to surf with the Divine in a diversity of epic rides and unforeseen wipeouts.
We then hear of the Exodus (14:10-31;15:20-21) and God’s love and desire for liberation, and the parting of waters that leads to Miriam’s response with song.
Up next, is the prophetic vision and call from Isaiah (55:1-11) to
“come to the waters” …waters and food and resources free of charge or commodification. The abundance of God for ALL nations.
Then… do you hear that (egg)… the rattling of bones (Ezekiel 37:1-14)
Dry lifeless bones… and yet God the surfer shows back up…
that breath and wind of God does not sit still, the bones rattle with hope and a new purpose… perhaps foreshadowing resurrection.
Then we hear that legendary story about Jonah (1:1-2:1), which sounds a lot like a Saturday Night Life parody skit meant to expose and troll conventional wisdom about God’s wrath and forgiveness, and how humans respond to God’s grace…
And oh look… this too involves water and wind, a mighty storm and waves and water-bound creatures… and God’s divine improv skills of “yes, and” reads, “then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the belly of the fish.” A story and image Jesus used to illustrate his “yes, and” story of death and resurrection.
And then here comes Daniel (3:1-29)and that hyperbolic fiery furnace… sharing with us that there is no place we can go to escape God’s reassuring and redeeming presence.
We then get to read and hear from someone’s mail (Romans 6:3-11)
Paul workshopping some baptism theology…
Because you can’t have life without water…
You can’t have Easter without Good Friday.
You see, God didn’t have a personality change with Jesus…
God’s creativity and relentless love and grace have been from the beginning.
These are the elemental-building-blocks of Love and Grace.
That’s still building
Still expanding and growing
While our cities are in turmoil and we still ask “who is this?” God is not sitting still.
God is still at work.
A few weeks back at the St. Paul Village 5K walk fundraiser we ran into a friend from St. Paul AME church and Cindy invited them to our Easter Vigil this evening.
They asked, “what is the service like?”
Cindy captured it perfectly in one phrase, “It’s so... elemental.”
She described this service as “elemental” and she was 100% right.
This evening we have all the elements…
Wood, fire, and smoke, wind, breathe, stillness and movement
Wax and Candles and Flame
Darkness and Light
Water
Bread
Wine
Me, You, Us
Elements created by God
Elements infused with God’s grace that become sacramental.
Our journey and stories and experiences and faith and questions and doubt entangled and embedded with the Divine.
The material world... Our matter… the space we take up…
Made holy with God’s relentless creativity and purpose and love and grace.
You see, we are a part of the vast and diverse elemental building blocks and family tree and ecosystem of a universe where God’s wind, breath, and Spirit isn’t sitting still, it’s still flowing and at work…
Creating
Re-creating
Forming
Re-forming
Re-deeming
And the crescendo of this Divine story and drama and our vigil, is the Easter story.
This evening, we hear the gospel/good-news of John’s Easter story.
And I notice two parts to this story.
Part one has a lot of running.
In the surprise of the stone being rolled away, and rightfully so, it’s hectic and frantic and all over the place. Mary runs to get Peter.
And then Peter, and the beloved disciple, take off running.
I like the shared detail that, the “disciple Jesus loved”, is evidently faster than Peter, but is polite and waits for Peter to allow him to go into the tomb first.
And then all three… Peter, the unnamed beloved disciple, and Mary leave, rightfully so, out of breath and confused.
But then the story slows down…
Perhaps faith isn’t a competition or a race with winners and losers!
In part 2, the scene holds on Mary with her tears and questions and her encounter with the Risen Christ.
And what stands out to me is this verse where Mary mistakes him for a “gardener”.
Creation starts in a garden… With God recklessly and generously sowing the seeds of cosmic elements and materials around the universe akin to Jesus’ parable of the Sower.
The third chapter of Genesis shares that humanity has a listening problem and isn’t great at being good stewards of our entrusted garden.
On the night before his passion Jesus prays in a garden.
He is betrayed in a garden.
And then after he is executed he is sealed up in a tomb in a garden.
And I love that we began our worship service this evening in a garden, in our memorial garden, a place where we scatter the elemental ashes of our loved ones.
The Cross and Good Friday is less about wrath and punishment and more about God standing in solidarity with humanity and exposing and inverting the systems and powers of this world that think violence and oppression and fear and death will win.
The empty tomb, and the good news of Easter, is the apocalyptic revealing that death does not - and will not - have the final word on our lives.
Mary mistaking the Risen Christ as a gardener is John articulating that the Risen Christ reclaims and redeems the Elemental/Cosmic Garden we are entangled with.
And like with Mary… the Cosmic and Risen Gardner in the life-giving waters of baptism calls us by name and reclaims and redeems us and reminds us that even tonight isn’t the end of the story.
As I like to say, and still feel called to proclaim… Love has more stories to tell
Tonight we remember and celebrate again that…
Love wins
Death does not have the final word
God’s love has the final word and this Divine Love is a gift… for us
With us
With-in us
And as we enter back out into a world filled with turmoil and who still deals in cross building God will not let the waters-of-life get stagnate and stale...
Pharaohs will not get their way
Chaotic seas will be divided
Dry bones will continue to rattle
We will continue to be surprised what God is doing with our tombs
We will continue to gather around the waters of baptism
We will continue to gather around the table where Christ offers the elements of his own body and blood in bread and wine
And we will continue to remind one another that our matter matters as we share God’s love with a world that hungers for hope and new life.
We take our stories of doubt and faith, awe and wonder and curiosity… the elemental fire that began our time this evening and we let it spread.
As fellow gardeners with Christ we take on his posture, not afraid to get our hands dirty. We kindle the flames of love, mercy, and peace
We too are gardeners that tend to the gardens we are entrusted with…
Sowing seeds of peace, mercy and grace…
Resisting and pruning the vines of injustice…
Rolling away the stones that bear false witness to Christ and parting the chaotic waters that stand in the way of God’s liberating justice and love.
Our worship service this evening had 8 readings, including the Gospel reading…
(Side note and interesting fact, the original orthodox Easter Vigil has 15 readings!)
After 8 readings tonight…
Perhaps our lives will be the 9th reading that unfolds and is shared out there, out beyond these walls.
Building on what’s came before us, a story that we can share with the world that embodies the good news that we are loved with a love stronger than death.
AMEN
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