Resurrection Strength

Today we celebrate 4 years of publishing our Daily Devotions with an average of over 200 folk sharing these  reflections each day and I give God grateful thanks for allowing me to minister in this way. But onto today’s resurrection thoughts.

I heard of a man who attended church one week and become increasingly agitated with the message. On the way out he stopped to speak to the Pastor. He said, “You really have to do something about your sermons. You speak about the same topic every time I am here.” The preacher said, “You only come on Easter Sunday.”

I wonder what it was about Easter that made that man attend church once a year; more to the point I wonder what it was about the Pastor’s sermon that troubled him. 

Is it the fact that to encounter the Risen Christ we must also face Calvary’s Sacrifice?

It was Paul writing to the Philippians who desired “That I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death,” Philippians 3:10

St Augustine explains this suffering/resurrection axis as, “The joyful news that He is Risen does not change the contemporary world. Still before us lie work, discipline, sacrifice. But the fact of Easter gives us the spiritual power to do the work, accept the discipline and make the sacrifice.”

In a real sense, as Resurrection People we must subscribe to the adage, “No pain, no gain.”

Easter Glory is built on the foundation of the Cross. Or again as Paul writes. ”….but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength.” 1 Corinthians 1:23-25

O Wise God

You have come to us in the form of a vulnerable child;

You teach us that the last are first and the first, last;

You lead us on a Way to new life that leads through death.

Truly your wisdom is different than ours!

Meet us in this place and teach us your foolish wisdom

and your vulnerable power;

give us joy to receive it fully

and courage to live it foolishly,

through Jesus Christ, your Wisdom and Word. Amen