The “alleluia” sustains itself and actively shapes the way in which we see ourselves and the world around us to say nothing of our Lord and God.
The resurrection rejoicing was hard to get going that first Easter morning too. The women ran to spread the word, just as the shepherds did when the angels had sung of the birth of the baby who came to be crucified. We do not know how their message caught fire in Bethlehem and the surrounding environs. We only know of people coming to see the baby from the distant East. On that first resurrection day, the enthusiasm definitely held itself in bounds. When the disciples from Emmaus returned from a shopping trip to Jerusalem that evening, they had heard nothing of the return to life of their Lord. They were sorrowful until He confronted them Himself. The core of Jesus’s followers were gathered behind locked doors, and they were not celebrating that evening, until Jesus dropped by. So, perhaps the lagging of our spirits in the weeks after Easter is not all that surprising.
But it is unjustified. For the reality of Jesus coming back from death casts its beams, illuminating every corner of life as we experience it in the daily drag. The moments of rejoicing that the news of His coming to life again produces should and can triumph over the serious frustrations and vexing challenges of the daily grind. The fact that He came to life evokes an “alleluia” (Praise the Lord!) when we turn our minds to it. It is not just the joy of praising the person who triumphed over every enemy and placed our lives in a whole new field of perception by leaving His tomb. The joy of the “alleluia” also arises out of the perception of our own identity which results from His reclaiming us as God’s own children when He leaves the grave behind. For He left our identities as sinners out of touch with their Creator behind in His tomb. He grabbed the weaknesses and failures, the mistakes and offenses, which rise up to shape our perception of who we are and our feeling of our own worth from us, in our baptisms. He laid them in the tomb and left them there when He came out, returning to the world He had made, the world that rejected Him, the world over which His lordship became clear when He came back from the dead.
Wipo of Burgundy wrote “Christ the Lord is Risen Today, Alleluia” in the midst of a life that confronted him with problems of the daily grind which were being experienced by people in the eleventh century. As chaplain for the German emperor Conrad II, Wipo endured military campaigns and court intrigues along with the other vicissitudes of health and well-being that plagued people of his day. In the midst of all, it is amazing that he could rejoice in Christ’s resurrection and bid his fellow believers to make haste to worship at the pascal victim’s feet. That sacrificial lamb became the substitute for all sinners when it comes to meeting the Law’s demand for the death of all those who break it. Because Jesus was indeed the Lamb without spot or blemish, He reconciled us along with the people around us to our Creator by conquering death in the strife over life. He won, and thus life won and was won for us. He lives, no more to die, and we, too, are alive, with new identities as children of God.
Because Jesus was indeed the Lamb without spot or blemish, He reconciled us along with the people around us to our Creator by conquering death in the strife over life.The resurrection demonstrates what it means that Jesus of Nazareth came into this world as its light (John 1:8-9). His resurrection means these days, just as on Easter morning, that He lights up our lives on the darkest days. He radiates the heavenly light which shines through from His throne and though His empty tomb with the stone rolled away into the lives of His people here. This means we can see the illnesses of our children, our own troubled health, the emptiness of old routines, the vacuous nature of much of what we have to do in a different light. His resurrection has given us life as members of our heavenly Father’s family. We know that in the midst of whatever troubles and threats the Devil throws at us, as he tries to return us to darkness, we see resurrection light shining from the end of every tunnel. Even (or especially) as death crowds in upon us, life with our Lord and our Creator sustains us, buoys us, and carries us through.
For as Wipo reminds us, we are reconciled with our God through the dying and rising of Jesus. He went to the pain of rescuing us from the turmoil and turbulence that shakes life in the now-normal course of our days in a world in revolt against its Maker. He sends His Holy Spirit to lift our heavy hearts on the breeze that flows through the empty tomb and into our lives. He gives us new breath as the reborn children of God, and He administers the oxygen of His Word of forgiveness and the promise of His presence when the daily grind seems to choke us and squeeze us.
His resurrection has reset our clocks for eternity. Therefore, even though we often feel as though “we are running out of time,” the resurrection has changed our sense of identity in the context of all the challenges we face today. Christ has also changed our feeling that we are running out of time because His resurrection has opened up the eternal perspective on our lives. As a result, we know that, in the short-term, we are likely to suffer, whether it be from boredom, from the loss of someone close to us, from temptation to return to old sins, or from fear of death, but we understand our suffering within the frame of life set by Christ’s resurrection. We know, for today and tomorrow, things will not go better for us necessarily because He rose. Nonetheless, we know we are better, the very best in the eyes of our heavenly Father, in the midst of a world of misery and blessing, because Jesus rose to restore our righteousness, as Paul said in Romans 4:25 and 6:4. Knowing who we are, helps us perceive the significance of the troubles of the day in the light of the new life which will never end.
Therefore, precisely in the midst of the plagues and perils of this week, we can sing out the praise of “Alleluia!” adoring Father, Son, and Holy Spirit for this gift of new life which has come because Christ the Lord rose that day and rises each day to defeat our enemies and confirm our identities as children of God. The “alleluia” sustains itself and actively shapes the way in which we see ourselves and the world around us to say nothing of our Lord and God.
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