All through winter a tray of small plants has sat outside my
front door looking very sad and dead. When spring came they blossomed into the
most beautiful yellow flowers and suddenly the front door looks welcoming and
fresh. We often think that Easter is like spring time. What has seemed dead and
hopeless springs back to beautiful vibrant life. We send Easter cards with
spring flowers on them and we take hope from the new life bursting all around
us.
But Easter is actually not like spring; it is much much more
wonderful!
There are two reasons why Easter is not like Spring.
Firstly, the plants outside my door looked terrible but they
were not really dead: their roots were alive and they were resting. It looks
and feels miraculous that such growth should come back year after year, but it
would be a real miracle if a completely dead plant could flower in spring.
Easter is not like spring because Jesus did not just seem dead on the cross; he really was dead. The centurion pierced
his side with a spear to check that he was truly dead. He was placed in a tomb
for three days and the tomb was sealed and guarded by Roman soldiers. This was
a real death. Things did not just seem
awful and hopeless for the followers of Jesus who had dared to hope that Jesus
was the Messiah: they really were awful. The two friends depressed friends
walking away from the city towards Emmaus had good reason to be depressed. Once
Jesus had been killed all their hope really had gone out of the window. When
Jesus appeared to them on their journey he had really died and was really now
alive. He had not been sleeping or in a
coma but had passed through real death to show that life in him is stronger
than the power of death.
The second reason why Easter is not like Spring is that the
plants are living in a cycle of death and rebirth, spring summer autumn winter
repeating itself as the seasons change. We know of people around us who have
died and been resuscitated by ambulance crews or on a hospital operating table.
We hear Bible stories of people who have been brought back to life after having
died (Jesus raised Lazarus and Jairus’ little daughter. Elijah raised the widow
of Nairn’s son). These are wonderful events and they help us appreciate being
alive; but they are not like the Easter event. When hospital crews revive us we
know that at some point we will die again and then it will be final. When
Lazarus was raised his family knew that he would one day die. When God raised
Jesus from the dead he raised him to a new life that does not end in another
death. The resurrected Jesus is not brought back to anything old, but forward into something completely new.
When we read about Jesus appearing to many people after the resurrection he is
clearly different - that is why they often do not recognise him even though
they knew him really well. He can come into a locked room and can disappear
from their sight. He is not bound by time or space. His new life is very
different from the old life. Just like the plants, Lazarus will die again
because he has been brought back into the cycle of living and dying. Unlike the
plants Jesus will never die again because he has been raised to a completely
new type of life – and this is what is on offer for each of us. Jesus was
raised forwards into everlasting life just so that we can share it too.
Spring gives us hope that when things seem hopeless
there may still be a glimmer of life hiding in the darkness of our lives.
Easter speaks of the promise that when things really are dead, hopeless, dark and defunct, there is a the offer
of a completely new and wonderful life. Now that’s what I call a miracle!