SCRIPTURE: Colossians 3:1-4
TEXT: 1So if you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, THEME: Living new INTRODUCTION As the Corona Virus is reaching its peak here in the United States, China is beginning to return to normal. Freelance Reporters from China have indicated that roads were opening up as travelers are now going in and out of Wuhan. But as life returns to normal, too much has changed for us to pick up from where we have left off. People have died, the economy has shifted, jobs have been lost as business collapsed, people who resisted sheltering in are now afraid to go outside. Maybe social distancing and isolation is lifted but life as we have known it is gone. We live with a new reality of death and destruction. We carry a pending fear of a second wave or new pandemic in the next season. Life cannot return to normal, there is no normal to go back to. The term, “New Normal” has been tossed around. What we have had to do, to survive the pandemic is not the new normal. Social distancing, zoom conferences, cyber church, hoarding, irrational fears, terrorizing tourist, cannot be how we live going forward. When the pandemic passes over, we will have a new reality for us to live into. Our world is changed, 18,000 people in our United States have died with about half of them coming from the New York area. Our perspectives have changed, we are grieving loss, beloved business are gone, trust has been broken, so we have to live in a new way, in which it is too early to determined what normal will look like. Our innocents shattered as our lives adjust to living in a pandemic world. The resurrection does much of the same for us, it shatters our world with a new reality, but with hope instead of demise. SCRIPTURE The light of the sunrise revealed the new reality, as it exposed the empty tomb and the body of Jesus missing. Women were the first witnesses of the Easter event. Filled with grief and love, the funeral preparations gave them one last time to embrace Jesus’ body. To express their love and say good bye, when shock and bewilderment strike this anticipated intimate moment. Its open, he’s gone! These witnesses of the abnormal, are filled with fear and dread, These first witnesses of the Good News, flee, not telling anyone what they have seen as Mark’s original manuscript ends, but if they had really told no one, then there would be no need for Mark to write this gospel. It doesn’t say it, but slowly the idea of the spirit of death passing over Jesus sets in. As Jesus and his disciples sit at their Passover meal, they remember the marking of the door to signal the spirit of death to Passover a household. This final plague releases the Hebrews from their slavery in Egypt. At this new Passover, it is Jesus’ love for us that marks a cross as a sign for death to Passover our dead bodies as our spirits are released to resurrected lives. The sign of this Passover is the blood stained cross and the release of Jesus from the tomb. The resurrection disrupts our world’s normalcy, as death is no longer the only active player in our world. This changes the hierarchy, the order of things in our lives. Our world view is effected by eternity. There is more to life than just an amassing of a personal fortune, or commanding power over others, or the pursuit of praise and adoration. All of these are left behind when our bodies die, but our spirits carry on with qualities of joy, peace, love, kindness, relationships, praise, thanksgiving, worship. This is where the author of Colossians writes, “So if you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above…” The recipients of the letter are those who believe in Jesus, and the resurrection, realizing that although their bodies die, death passes over us and we will live resurrected. So if we can’t take our personal wealth or prestige with us, what can we? We can take with us, the qualities of relationships; Dignity, respect, justice, equality, worth, value, and honor. Consider these things, these qualities of life, that we can live today. In the face of death, what is really important? Seeing from the perspective of the passing over of the spirit of death into resurrection, we can’t go back to living in fear, greed, evil, vice, consumption, and the like. This is what the Colossians letter is mandating, Don’t go back to what was normal. We cannot. It is inconsistent with the new reality we hold. Some will try to return to the same old, same old after the COVID-19 virus has passed. But we will remember how we have been treated. We will remember who tried to cheat us. We will remember who helped us and who did not. We will remember what it was like and we don’t want to go back except for when we forget and snap back into the old habits, and resort to what is familiar. Don’t do it. That is why the Hebrews have a meal to remember that they were once slaves. That is why we have the Lord’s Supper to remember we were once bound to death. That is why we have each other to remember. Because 10 years from now, when the new generation is saying, ”we refuse to wear this stupid mask because we don’t believe in the pandemic of 2020.” The way we live will have to be the evidence that the plague was real, the resurrection is real, the way we live is not for our own comfort, but because of our love and care for others. APPLICATION What is happening in China is a modern day parable of life as they can’t ever go back to the way that things were. Our world has been disrupted by the death’s passing over Jesus and resurrection leaving an empty tomb in its wake. How do we return to our lives when what we know about death has been changed? We live into our reality of resurrection. We move apart from the consumers of the world’s resources to stewards of God’s gifts, we live in ways that foster relationships with love. Here are some triads of resurrected living; forgiveness, listening, patience, tolerance, acceptance, self-control, grace, peace, joy, empathy, compassion, health, respect, dignity, appreciation, thanksgiving, kindness, and blessing. These qualities of living draws us into relational living that forms communities of caring. We live valuing relationships over stuff, relationships are more important than the anger we harbor, relationships allows us to be humble and secure in ourselves. Relationships are preserved over who is right or wrong. relationships overcomes our selfishness as relationships are cherished over our own validation. Resurrected lives leaves our old normal behind for being secure in our relationship with God and fostering relationship with others. CONCLUSION Remember what has happened in these last few months, less we forget the impetus for our new habits. When Lent rolls around next year, and we begin by going out to eat malasadas and Fat Tuesday we will remember that it was just about this time that the pandemic began. Untested celebrants at Mardi Gras in New Orleans unknowing spread the virus. This was the start when we will remember a time when we had to shelter in, gather supplies, share with our neighbor, feed the hungry, volunteer to do a grocery run, wear a mask, keep apart but stay connected. We have been faced with our mortality this Lent. But when our fear gives way to love, We remembered Jesus’ love marking the cross, as a sign for death to pass over and to release our spirits to resurrected life with God and each other. We have been living as Easter people ever since, leaving normal behind. MISSION MOMENTS It is a cold and dangerous time for many of us – in our own lives, in our communities, in our nation and in our world. And yet, while it is still dark, miracles are already beginning, already starting to stir, just about to burst from the tomb. So, do not be discouraged or afraid. Instead, get ready to join the shouts. Alleluia! Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed!
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