(This ran in InCityTimes Easter 2005)
It’s Easter!
Usually Easter coincides with spring, at least if you live north of the equator. But in Worcester this year, Easter is at least a month before spring. If the weather continues at has, Easter might be two months before spring. How can we have Easter without flowers blooming and little baby rabbits and chicks?
Of course, the story of Jesus’ resurrection has never been about the cycle of life, flowers blooming, or babies being born. In fact, resurrection is about breaking the ordinary cycle, recreating the world, recovering the perfection of the Garden of Eden. Resurrection is the start of the new creation.
But believing in the new creation is even harder than trusting spring will come. Two years of war in Iraq, cutting Medicaid and food stamps to fund tax relief for the wealthy, and forgotten refugees in Sudan. Mental illness, addictions, and disabilities are treated like leprosy in the first century—we don’t see the people, touch the people, or care that they are homeless. You can only afford healthcare if you have a job, and you’ll lose the job if you get sick.
It’s hard to see how one man dying and being resurrected in first century Rome has made anything new in the world around us. How can we celebrate Easter?
The trick, I think, is this. In his life, Jesus treated every person as if they were important to God. Jesus could see, care for, even have dinner with those who had mental illness, addictions, and disabilities. Jesus touched people who were unimportant, taught uneducated fishers, was funded by invisible women, and invited children into his circle.
In his life, Jesus spent his time teaching, healing, and eating with those who society had declared were not just unimportant, not just untouchable, not just unloved, but people society had declared invisible. Jesus could SEE what had been declared invisible.
As you struggle to find Easter this spring, look around at the people. Who has been invisible to you? The new creation IS those who cannot be seen.
In the first century, those in government—both in Rome and in all the small countries under Rome’s imperial rule—said that poor people, sick people, women, children, uneducated people, and laborers, just didn’t matter.
In the twenty-first century, we make up our government. And still we say that poor people, sick people, queer people, people with disabilities, just don’t matter.
Jesus insisted on seeing the people that the government declared invisible. Jesus protested the rich and the powerful who insisted that only they could be seen. The Roman authorities killed Jesus because he said God’s way matters more than Rome’s way.
Easter is the celebration that Jesus’ viewpoint could not be defeated by Roman force. The darkness of not-seeing was overcome by the God who sees us all. But to see the new creation we have to believe that God’s way matters more than any Government’s way. And in God’s way, poor people, sick people, women, children, uneducated people, laborers, those living with mental illness, addictions, and disabilities, those who are different in any and every way, yes, even you, and yes, even me, matter. Look out around you for the new creation! Happy Easter.
It’s Easter!
Usually Easter coincides with spring, at least if you live north of the equator. But in Worcester this year, Easter is at least a month before spring. If the weather continues at has, Easter might be two months before spring. How can we have Easter without flowers blooming and little baby rabbits and chicks?
Of course, the story of Jesus’ resurrection has never been about the cycle of life, flowers blooming, or babies being born. In fact, resurrection is about breaking the ordinary cycle, recreating the world, recovering the perfection of the Garden of Eden. Resurrection is the start of the new creation.
But believing in the new creation is even harder than trusting spring will come. Two years of war in Iraq, cutting Medicaid and food stamps to fund tax relief for the wealthy, and forgotten refugees in Sudan. Mental illness, addictions, and disabilities are treated like leprosy in the first century—we don’t see the people, touch the people, or care that they are homeless. You can only afford healthcare if you have a job, and you’ll lose the job if you get sick.
It’s hard to see how one man dying and being resurrected in first century Rome has made anything new in the world around us. How can we celebrate Easter?
The trick, I think, is this. In his life, Jesus treated every person as if they were important to God. Jesus could see, care for, even have dinner with those who had mental illness, addictions, and disabilities. Jesus touched people who were unimportant, taught uneducated fishers, was funded by invisible women, and invited children into his circle.
In his life, Jesus spent his time teaching, healing, and eating with those who society had declared were not just unimportant, not just untouchable, not just unloved, but people society had declared invisible. Jesus could SEE what had been declared invisible.
As you struggle to find Easter this spring, look around at the people. Who has been invisible to you? The new creation IS those who cannot be seen.
In the first century, those in government—both in Rome and in all the small countries under Rome’s imperial rule—said that poor people, sick people, women, children, uneducated people, and laborers, just didn’t matter.
In the twenty-first century, we make up our government. And still we say that poor people, sick people, queer people, people with disabilities, just don’t matter.
Jesus insisted on seeing the people that the government declared invisible. Jesus protested the rich and the powerful who insisted that only they could be seen. The Roman authorities killed Jesus because he said God’s way matters more than Rome’s way.
Easter is the celebration that Jesus’ viewpoint could not be defeated by Roman force. The darkness of not-seeing was overcome by the God who sees us all. But to see the new creation we have to believe that God’s way matters more than any Government’s way. And in God’s way, poor people, sick people, women, children, uneducated people, laborers, those living with mental illness, addictions, and disabilities, those who are different in any and every way, yes, even you, and yes, even me, matter. Look out around you for the new creation! Happy Easter.
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