He is Risen!
That is the part where you are supposed to say “He is risen indeed” but I can completely understand if you didn’t say it. After all, yelling random liturgies at your computer when you are sitting in your living room may not be the most sane way to celebrate your Easter.
But He is risen indeed and boy that fills me with all kinds of silliness and bouyancy and energy and hope.
I don’t know about you, but I longed for Easter this year. Lent was a particularly poignant time of fasting and reflection and prayer. It was also a time of transition and the heartbreaking sadness of loss along with scores of mundane details that threaten to overwhelm me. Needless to say, by Friday night I truly felt like I had died with Christ.
But this morning as I walked to church under a very large, gray cloud, holding coffee in one hand and my tablet in the other, I felt the death fade away and a burst of giddy energy overtake it, the giddy energy of Spring.
Now I know Spring officially began a couple weeks ago, but for me Spring begins today. For six weeks we have been mourning and fasting and longing for life. And today life poured out of the tombs and into our world. The sad songs fade away. The fasting ends. The joy abounds. The light shines forth.
As a dear pastor friend of mine once preached, “After Easter, life has no limit, love has no limit!”
It actually brought to mind a Keith Urban song, probably his best, called “Somebody Like You.” Of course it is a secular romance song but its lyrics, its melodies and its structure serenades us with the reality of Resurrection!
There’s a new wind blowin’ like I’ve never known.
I’m breathin’ deeper than I’ve ever done.
And it sure feels good, to finally feel the way I do.
I wanna love somebody,
Love somebody like you.
An’ I’m lettin’ go of all my lonely yesterdays.
I’ve forgiven myself for the mistakes I’ve made.
Now there’s just one thing, the only thing I wanna do,
I wanna love somebody,
Love somebody like you.
Yeah, I wanna feel the sunshine,
Shinin’ down on me and you.
When you put your arms around me,
You let me know there’s nothing in this world I can’t do.
I used to run in circles goin’ no-where fast.
I’d take, uh, one step forward end up two steps back.
Couldn’t walk a straight line even if I wanted to,
I wanna love somebody,
Love somebody like you.
Go-Before Grace 