THE key to Easter is resurrection, writes Revd. Paul Lawlor, town centre chaplain and vicar at St Stephen’s.
This year my attention has been drawn towards the way in which the resurrection points to a transformation, not only of the church, but of the whole of creation.
I am always struck that Easter does not have the same connection to public awareness as Christmas.
The commercial world embraces the eggs and the spring paraphernalia, but the Cross and the Resurrection of Jesus, tend to be somewhat side-lined.
The Easter Story is a harder one to approach, a story of a sham trial, of corruption and power, of torture and a brutal execution.
Hardly, the stuff we like to dress our small children up to re-enact is it?
And this brings us to Good Friday.
The Good News comes on Easter Day, the empty tomb and the encounters with the risen Jesus.
For some reason, in popular culture, this is more difficult to engage with than angels visiting shepherds and a virgin birth.
Perhaps this is because we can come up with plausible work-arounds for the miracles of the Christmas story, but resurrection from the dead is…more difficult?
We have to remember that it is the entirety of the Jesus Story which is the Good News not just selected excerpts of it.
It is the whole of the Jesus Story that moves the narrative of God, from being the God of Israel, the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Moses, to being the God for all nations.
The Jesus Story speaks of a relationship with God being available for all people.
The Kingdom of God encompasses the whole of creation not just selected areas.
The challenge for us is to see how the power and wonder of the resurrection transformed our lives and applies to the world we live in.
There is much discussion of how Redditch town centre can be transformed with money coming from central government.
New buildings and better infrastructure are one thing.
These are important and helpful, but what about the hearts and minds of the people of Redditch?
To steal from Stephen Hawking, are we looking up to the stars or down at our shoes?
The resurrection can be difficult for people to grasp – BUT – the resurrection is key to the Jesus Story.
Not just the resurrection of God made man but the power of God to transform our individual lives, to transform our churches AND to transform our communities, our towns and our Cities.
Can we embrace that power to change? I pray you all have a transforming and joyful Easter.
Paul Lawlor, Easter 2018
