He Is Risen Alleluia !!

Yesterday on the Radio there was an interview with the Archbishop of York, who was addressing the comments of the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Birmingham who said that Britain was fast becoming an anti-religious country – what message, the radio presenter asked, would preachers be giving on this Easter Day.

The Archbishop of York, amongst his answers, said that he felt the Church had not been so good at spelling out the Christian message very clearly – that message is that Jesus came amongst us, he died, he rose again, he is present with us now and he transforms lives !

That is the wonderful message that we celebrate today – a message that is worthy of being shouted out into the streets of this country, as Jesus calls people back to him.

There’s a true story which was reported in the USA Today news paper. ‘An elderly Florida woman did her shopping, and upon returning to her car, she found four men in the act of leaving with her vehicle. She dropped her shopping bags and drew her handgun, proceeding to scream at the top of her voice, ‘I have a gun, and I know how to use it ! Get out of the car !’

The four men didn’t wait for a second invitation. They got out and ran like mad. The lady, somewhat shaken, then proceeded to load her bags into the back of the car and get into the driver’s seat. She was so shaken that she couldn’t get her keys intot he ignition.

She tried and tried, and then it dawned on her why… A few minutes later she found her own car parked 4 or 5 spaces further down. She loaded her bags into the car and drove to the police station.

The officer to whom she told the story doubled over with laughter. He pointed to the other end of the counter, where 4 pale men were reporting a car-jacking by a mad, elderly woman described as white, less than 5 feet tall, with glasses and curly white hair, and carrying a large handgun… No charges were filed.’

Sometimes we hear of stories like that one which are so unbelievable but they’re true. Christianity is built on a similarly unbelievable story – a man with a relatively small number of followers, fighting against the authorities of the day, both religious and political, trying to defend the rights of those who most people didn’t think it was worth defending, was defeated – arrested, tortured, mocked and killed…

But then he came back to life – he appeared to many, and there began the most transforming faith ever seen. An unlikely story, but then frightened and broken followers of Jesus, rose up as powerful preachers, strong and courageous workers, with powers of compassion and forgiveness, of healing and strength and wisdom. They felt that the news of a risen Saviour was so important that they dedicated their lives to telling others about him – the news spread, and today 2000 years later, contrary to what we are often being told, it is still spreading.

Someone said to Joseph of Arimathea who gave up his tomb for Jesus to be buried in, ‘That was such a beautiful, costly, hand-hewn tomb. Why did you give it to someone else to be interred

in ?’ And Joseph replied, ‘Because he only needed it for the weekend.’ Christ is risen, and alive for evermore and today we celebrate that wonderful news !

And there are all kinds of reasons why that must make a difference in our lives – we have a Saviour who loves us, we are precious enough to God that Jesus should give up his life for us, we have knowledge of salvation and eternal life, we have a hope of a transforming love that can make a difference to people not just in the future, but here and now, we have a friend to whom we can talk and seek comfort and advice in our prayers, we have a strength through the power of the Holy Spirit which allows us to go out confident and strong and ready to do God’s will, to love… to love all people…

But there was one more challenge of Easter – yesterday on that radio programme there was talk of the problems of the Church, talk of the weakness and disillusionment, talk of the failure, but Easter reminds us and challenges us to be more confident and much more bold.

The resurrection story is an unlikely one, but it is true – Christ has conquered death, just as he will conquer every evil and sadness in this world, and he is calling on us to help. As Churches we can be strong, we can be confident, and we must be strong and we must be confident, to go out and live and preach the good news of the Christ who came amongst us, lived, died, rose again, is with us today and who transforms lives today.

Churches have, I think, often been timid in their approach to people. Doing good works is a wonderful and very necessary part of our role as Christians, but there are people wanting to know why Jesus makes a difference to us, and that is a part of the message that we have often neglected to tell people. It may be because we’re afraid of being ridiculed, or getting the wrong words or just making a fool of ourselves, but with faith, God will give us the words and God will give us the courage. It is time for us to be showing that we are resurrection people…, people for whom the resurrection of Jesus has really made a difference.

Walt Disney doesn’t often get quoted in sermons, but it was he who said, ‘If you can dream it, you can do it.’ It is time for the Church to start dreaming and start working harder to transform lives – it is time to dream that we can fill our buildings with people joyfully and thankfully praising the God who loves every one of us. It is time to move out into our communities telling people that we have good news for them – Good news that we know a Saviour who came amongst us, lived, died, rose again, is with us today and who is today transforming lives. It is time to make a difference in our communities so that people are saying that God is working here through his people.

In a years time let’s pray that whoever is standing here, whether it be me, or anyone else, will be preaching to even more people in our Churches, and let’s pray that outside in our communities people are saying that the Church is alive and very much making a difference.

May God give us the vision and may we have the courage to follow that vision for his glory and for the extension of his kingdom. AMEN