Category : Easter

A Prayer for the day from the Scottish Prayerbook

O Almighty God, who hast created the earth for man, and man for thy glory: Mercifully hear the supplications of thy people, and be mindful of thy covenant; that both the earth may yield her increase, and the good seed of thy Word may bring forth abundantly, to the glory of thy holy name; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Posted in Easter, Spirituality/Prayer

A Prayer for the day from John Cosin

Almighty God, Lord of Heaven and earth, in whom we live and move and have our being; who doest good unto all men, making thy sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sending rain on the just and on the unjust: Favourably behold us thy servants, who call upon thy name, and send us thy blessing from heaven, in giving us fruitful seasons, and satisfying us with food and gladness, that both our hearts and mouths may be continually filled with thy praise, and we may ever give thanks to thee in thy holy Church; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Posted in Easter, Spirituality/Prayer

A Prayer for the day from the Church of England

God our redeemer,
you have delivered us from the power of darkness
and brought us into the kingdom of your Son:
grant, that as by his death he has recalled us to life,
so by his continual presence in us he may raise us to eternal joy;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Amen.

Posted in Easter, Spirituality/Prayer

A Prayer for the day from the ACNA Prayerbook

O God, you have prepared for those who love you such good things as surpass our understanding: Pour into our hearts such love towards you, that we, loving you in all things and above all things, may obtain your promises, which exceed all that we can desire; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.  Amen.

Posted in Easter, Spirituality/Prayer

A Prayer for the day from Thomas Becon

O Lord, we most humbly beseech thee to give us grace not only to be hearers of the Word, but also doers of the same; not only to love, but also to live thy gospel; not only to profess, but also to practise thy blessed commandments, unto the honour of thy holy name.

Posted in Easter, Spirituality/Prayer

The Bishop of Chichester’s 2024 Easter Sermon

There is not a lot of running in the gospels: the pace is rather more exploratory, leading from Galilee to Jerusalem where the drama of redemption is to be played out. This journey could not be rushed because there is much to learn on the way.

But when people do run, it’s a sign that something profound and significant is happening.

In the gospel of Mark, when Jesus gets out of the boat on the far side of the sea of Galilee, in the land of the Gerasenes, a man possessed by mental illness sees him and runs directly towards a person he instinctively knows will engage with his torment.And when Luke recounts the story of the prodigal son, it is the elderly father who runs towards the boy he thought he’d lost, in order to welcome him back to life.

Matthew and Mark both note that as Jesus is about to die, someone runs to get him a drink of vinegar, so that one final detail of the Old Testament could be fulfilled: ‘And when I was thirsty they gave me vinegar to drink’ (Ps 69.21).

Read it all.

Posted in Church of England (CoE), CoE Bishops, Easter, Preaching / Homiletics

A Prayer for the day from the Church of England

Almighty God,
who through your only-begotten Son Jesus Christ
have overcome death and opened to us the gate of everlasting life:
grant that, as by your grace going before us
you put into our minds good desires,
so by your continual help
we may bring them to good effect;
through Jesus Christ our risen Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Amen.

Posted in Easter, Spirituality/Prayer

A Prayer for the day from New Every Morning

O God our Father, whose law is a law of liberty: Grant us wisdom to use aright the freedom which thou hast given us, by surrendering ourselves to thy service; knowing that, when we are thy willing bondsmen, then only are we truly free; for Jesus Christ’s sake.

New Every Morning (The Prayer Book Of The Daily Broadcast Service) [BBC, 1900]

Posted in Easter, Spirituality/Prayer

A Prayer for the day from the ACNA Prayerbook

Almighty God, whom truly to know is everlasting life: Grant us so perfectly to know your Son Jesus Christ to be the way, the truth, and the life, that we may steadfastly follow his steps in the way that leads to eternal glory; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.  Amen.

Posted in Easter, Spirituality/Prayer

Christina G. Rossetti for Easter–‘Speech is left speechless;— Set you to singing’

Words cannot utter

Christ His returning:—

Mankind, keep Jubilee,

Strip off your mourning,

Crown you with garlands,

Set your lamps burning.

Speech is left speechless;—

Set you to singing,

Fling your hearts open wide,

Set your bells ringing:

Christ the Chief Reaper

Comes, His sheaf bringing…

Read it all.

Posted in Easter, Poetry & Literature

A Prayer for the day from Charles Kingsley

O Lord Jesus Christ, exalt me with Thee so to know the mystery of life that I may use the earthly as the appointed expression and type of the heavenly; and by using to Thy glory the natural body, I may be fit to be exalted to the use of the spiritual body.

Posted in Easter, Spirituality/Prayer

Charles Spurgeon for Easter–The Stone Rolled Away

First, LET THE STONE PREACH.
It is not at all an uncommon thing to find in Scripture stones bid to speak; great stones have been rolled as witnesses against the people; stones and beams out of the wall have been called upon to testify to sin. I shall call this stone as a witness to valuable truths of God of which it was the symbol. The river of our thought divides into six streams.

1. First, the stone rolled must evidently be regarded as the door of the sepulcher removed. Death’s house was firmly secured by a huge stone; the angel removed it, and the living Christ came forth. The massive door, you will observe, was taken away from the grave, not merely opened, but unhinged, flung aside, rolled away! And now death’s ancient prison is without a door! The saints shall pass in, but they shall not be shut in, they shall tarry there as in an open cavern, but there is nothing to prevent their coming forth from it in due time. As Samson, when he slept in Gaza, and was beset by foes, arose early in the morning, and took upon his shoulders the gates of Gaza—posts and bars and all—and carried all away, and left the Philistine stronghold open and exposed, so has it been done unto the grave by our Master, who, having slept out His three days and nights according to the divine decree, arose in the greatness of His strength, and bore away the iron gates of the sepulcher, tearing every bar from its place.

The removal of the imprisoning stone was the outward type of our Lord’s having plucked up the gates of the grave—posts, bars, and all, thus exposing that old fortress of death and hell, and leaving it as a city stormed, and taken, and bereft of power. Remember that our Lord was committed to the grave as a hostage. “He died for our sins.” Like a debt they were imputed to Him; He discharged the debt of obligation due from us to God on the cross; He suffered to the full the great substitutionary equivalent for our suffering, and then He was confined in the tomb as a hostage until His work should be fully accepted. That acceptance would be notified by His coming forth from vile imprisonment, and that coming forth would become our justification! “He rose again for our justification.” If He had not fully paid the debt, He would have remained in the grave; if Jesus had not made effectual, total, final atonement, He would have continued a captive. But He had done it all! The “It is finished,” which came from His own lips, was established by the verdict of Jehovah, and Jesus was set free. Mark Him as He rises—not breaking out of prison like a felon who escapes from justice, but coming leisurely forth like one whose time of release from jail is come. Rising, it is true, by His own power, but not leaving the tomb without a sacred permit—the heavenly officer from the court of heaven is deputized to open the door for Him by rolling away the stone; and Jesus Christ completely justified, rises to prove that all His people are in Him completely justified, and the work of salvation is forever perfect!

Read it all.

Posted in Christology, Church History, Easter, England / UK, Eschatology, Ministry of the Ordained, Parish Ministry, Preaching / Homiletics, Theology, Theology: Scripture

Still more Poetry for Easter–Pieta by Madeleine L’engle

The disciples found the truth hard to believe.
There had to be breaking bread, eating fish,
before they, too, even Thomas, were lit with
joyfulness. Not much was said about me.
I said good-bye to the son I carried within me
for nine months, nursed, fed, taught to walk.
On Friday when they took him down from the cross,
I held the son I knew,
recognizing him in my arms,
and never saw him again,
not my body’s child. How could I laugh, weep tears
of joy?…

Read it all.

Posted in Easter, Poetry & Literature

A Prayer for the day from William Bright

O God, who makest us glad with the weekly remembrance of the glorious resurrection of thy Son our Lord: Vouchsafe us such a blessing through our worship on the first day of the week, that the days to follow it may be hallowed by thy abiding presence; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord.

Posted in Easter, Spirituality/Prayer

More Karl Barth on Easter–‘he has overcome and swallowed death, broken the chains of the devil and destroyed his power, this is so: it is done with, it is accomplished’

“The third day he rose again from the dead.”

This article gives us the explanation of the foundation of our faith in our justification, in our resurrection and in our new life.

Once again we must insist on the fact that we are not dealing with illustrations, or with exaggerations of some religious enthusiasm. If it is said: he has overcome and swallowed death, broken the chains of the devil and destroyed his power, this is so: it is done with, it is accomplished. After Christ’s resurrection death is no more, nor does sin rule. Indeed death and sin continue to exist, but as vanquished things.

Their situation is similar to a chess player’s who has already lost but has not acknowledged it as yet. He looks on the game, and he says: Is it already finished? Does the king still have another move? He tries it. Afterwards he acknowledges there was no more possibility of winning.

That precisely is the situation of death and sin and the devil: the king is checkmated, the game is finished and the players do not acknowledge it as yet. They still believe the game will go on. But it is over. The old aeon, the old time of death and sin is over, and the game only appears somehow to be going on. “The old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new” (2 Corinthians 5:17).

You must note this down: you take it or leave it. Such is Easter, or it is nothing at all.

–Karl Barth–The Faith of the Church: A Commentary on the Apostles’ Creed According to Calvin’s Catechism (Eugene, Oregon: Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2006 E.T. of the original by Gabriel Vahanian), p. 104

Posted in Christology, Church History, Easter, Eschatology, Theology, Theology: Scripture

More Poetry for Easter–‘Resurrection’ by John Donne

_Moyst with one drop of thy blood, my dry soule_
Shall (though she now be in extreme degree
Too stony hard, and yet too fleshly,) bee
Freed by that drop, from being starv’d, hard, or foule,
And life, by this death abled, shall controule
Death, whom thy death slue…

Read it all.

Posted in Easter, Poetry & Literature

More Music For Easter–J.S. Bach’s Easter Oratorio

Posted in Church History, Easter, Liturgy, Music, Worship

More Frederick Buechner for Easter–‘There is no poetry about it. Instead, it is simply proclaimed as a fact’

We can say that the story of the Resurrection means simply that the teachings of Jesus are immortal like the plays of Shakespeare or the music of Beethoven and that their wisdom and truth will live on forever. Or we can say that the Resurrection means that the spirit of Jesus is undying, that he himself lives on among us, the way that Socrates does, for instance, in the good that he left behind him, in the lives of all who follow his great example. Or we can say that the language in which the Gospels describe the Resurrection of Jesus is the language of poetry and that, as such, it is not to be taken literally but as pointing to a truth more profound than the literal. Very often, I think, this is the way that the Bible is written, and I would point to some of the stories about the birth of Jesus, for instance, as examples; but in the case of the Resurrection, this simply does not apply because there really is no story about the Resurrection in the New Testament. Except in the most fragmentary way, it is not described at all. There is no poetry about it. Instead, it is simply proclaimed as a fact. Christ is risen! In fact, the very existence of the New Testament itself proclaims it. Unless something very real indeed took place on that strange, confused morning, there would be no New Testament, no Church, no Christianity.

Yet we try to reduce it to poetry anyway: the coming of spring with the return of life to the dead earth, the rebirth of hope in the despairing soul. We try to suggest that these are the miracles that the Resurrection is all about, but they are not. In their way they are all miracles, but they are not this miracle, this central one to which the whole Christian faith points.

Unlike the chief priests and the Pharisees, who tried with soldiers and a great stone to make themselves as secure as they could against the terrible possibility of Christ’s really rising again from the dead, we are considerably more subtle. We tend in our age to say, “Of course, it was bound to happen. Nothing could stop it.” But when we are pressed to say what it was that actually did happen, what we are apt to come out with is something pretty meager: this “miracle” of truth that never dies, the “miracle” of a life so beautiful that two thousand years have left the memory of it undimmed, the “miracle” of doubt turning into faith, fear into hope. If I believed that this or something like this was all that the Resurrection meant, then I would turn in my certificate of ordination and take up some other profession. Or at least I hope that I would have the courage to.

–Frederick Buechner, The Alphabet of Grace (New York: Harper and Row, 1970)

Posted in Apologetics, Easter, Eschatology, Theology, Theology: Scripture

A Prayer for the day from Eric Milner-White (1884-1963)

Make our hearts to burn within us, O Christ, as we walk with thee in the way and listen to thy words; that we may go in the strength of thy presence and thy truth all our journey through, and at its end behold thee, in the glory of the eternal Trinity, God for ever and ever.

Posted in Easter, Spirituality/Prayer

More Music for Easter–Easter Song, 2nd Chapter of Acts

Watch and listen to it all from the original writers of the song.

Dated I know, but it is still wonderful.

Posted in Easter, Liturgy, Music, Worship

More Poetry for Easter–Oscar Wilde’s Easter Day

From there:

The silver trumpets rang across the Dome:
The people knelt upon the ground with awe:
And borne upon the necks of men I saw,
Like some great God, the Holy Lord of Rome.
Priest-like, he wore a robe more white than foam,
And, king-like, swathed himself in royal red,
Three crowns of gold rose high upon his head:
In splendour and in light the Pope passed home.
My heart stole back across wide wastes of years
To One who wandered by a lonely sea,
And sought in vain for any place of rest:
‘Foxes have holes, and every bird its nest.
I, only I, must wander wearily,
And bruise my feet, and drink wine salt with tears.’

Posted in Easter, Poetry & Literature

Albert Mohler–The Resurrection of Jesus Christ and the Reality of the Gospel

As the disciples preached in the earliest Christian sermons, “This Jesus God has raised up, of whom we are all witnesses . . . . Therefore, let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ” [Acts 2:32,36].

The Resurrection was not a dawning awareness of Christ’s continuing presence among the disciples, it was the literal, physical raising of Jesus’ body from the dead. The Church is founded upon the resurrected Lord, who appeared among His disciples and was seen by hundreds of others.

The Church does not have mere permission to celebrate the Resurrection, it has a mandate to proclaim the truth that God raised Jesus Christ from the dead. The resurrected Lord gave the Church a sacred commission to take the gospel throughout the world. As Paul made clear, the resurrection of Christ also comes as a comfort to the believer, for His defeat of death is a foretaste and promise of our own resurrection by His power. “For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality” [1 Corinthians 15:53].

So, as the Church gathers to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ, we should look backward in thankfulness to that empty tomb and forward to the fulfillment of Christ’s promises in us. For Resurrection Day is not merely a celebration–it is truly preparation as well. The resurrection of Jesus Christ is the promise of our resurrection from the dead, and of Christ’s total victory over sin and death. The resurrection of Jesus Christ is at the very center of the Christian gospel. The empty tomb is full of power.

Read it all.

Posted in Easter

A Prayer for Easter from Daily Prayer

O Lord Jesus Christ, who hast promised in thy holy gospel that thy disciples shall know the truth, and the truth shall make them free: Give us, we pray thee, the Spirit of truth, sent by thee and leading to thee, that we may find the truth in finding thee, who art the Way, the Truth, and the Life, for ever and ever.

Daily Prayer, Eric Milner-White and G. W. Briggs, eds. (London: Penguin Books 1959 edition of the 1941 original)

Posted in Easter, Spirituality/Prayer

More Poetry for Easter–Christopher Smart’s Easter Day

O GLADNESS! that suspend’st belief
For fear that rapture dreams;
Thou also hast the tears of grief,
And failst in wild extreams.

Tho’ Peter make a clam’rous din,
Will he thy doubts destroy?
Will little Rhoda let him in,
Incredulous with joy?

And thus thro’ gladness and surprize
The saints their Saviour treat;
Nor will they trust their ears and eyes
But by his hands and feet.

These hands of lib’ral love indeed
In infinite degree,
Those feet still frank to move and bleed
For millions and for me.

A watch, to slavish duty train’d,
Was set by spiteful care,
Lest what the sepulchre contain’d
Should find alliance there.

Herodians came to seal the stone
With Pilate’s gracious leave,
Lest dead and friendless, and alone,
Should all their skill deceive.

O dead arise! O friendless stand
By seraphim ador’d—
O solitude! again command
Thy host from heav’n restor’d.

Read it all.

Posted in Easter, Poetry & Literature

More Music for Easter–Pilgrim’s Hymn – Stephen Paulus

Lyrics

Even before we call on Your name
To ask You, O God,
When we seek for the words to glorify You,
You hear our prayer;
Unceasing love, O unceasing love,
Surpassing all we know.

Glory to the father,
and to the Son,
And to the Holy Spirit.

Even with darkness sealing us in,
We breathe Your name,
And through all the days that follow so fast,
We trust in You;
Endless Your grace, O endless Your grace,
Beyond all mortal dream.

Both now and forever,
And unto ages and ages,
Amen

.

Posted in Easter, Liturgy, Music, Worship

A prayer for the day from Frank Colquhoun

O Heavenly Father, by whose gracious will we have been born again by the Word of truth: Make us ever swift to hear that Word and responsive to its saving message, that henceforth we may live as those who are partakers of thy new creation; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Posted in Easter

Tom Wright on Easter–It ‘is about the wild delight of God’s creative power’

So, how can we learn to live as wide-awake people, as Easter people? Here I have some bracing suggestion to make. I have to believe that many churches simply throw Easter away year by year; and I want to plead that we rethink how we do it so as to help each other, as a church and as individuals, to live what we profess.

For a start, consider Easter Day itself…Easter is about the wild delight of God’s creative power—…we ought to shout Alleluias instead of murmuring them; we should light every candle in the building instead of only some; we should give every man, woman, child, cat, dog, and mouse in the place a candle to hold; we should have a real bonfire; and we should splash water about as we renew our baptismal vows…It’s about the real Jesus coming out of the real tomb and getting God’s real new creation under way.

But my biggest problem starts on Easter Monday. I regard it as absurd and unjustifiable that we should spend forty days keeping Lent, pondering what it means, preaching about self-denial, being at least a little gloomy, and then bringing it all to a peak with Holy Week, which in turn climaxes in Maundy Thursday and Good Friday…and then, after a rather odd Holy Saturday, we have a single day of celebration.

…Easter week itself ought not to be the time when all the clergy sigh with relief and go on holiday. It ought to be an eight-day festival, with champagne served after morning prayer or even before, with lots of alleluias and extra hymns and spectacular anthems. Is it any wonder people find it hard to believe in the resurrection of Jesus if we don’t throw our hats in the air? Is it any wonder we find it hard to live the resurrection if we don’t do it exuberantly in our liturgies? Is it any wonder the world doesn’t take much notice if Easter is celebrated as simply the one-day happy ending tacked on to forty days of fasting and gloom?

…we should be taking steps to celebrate Easter in creative new ways: in art, literature, children’s games, poetry, music, dance, festivals, bells, special concerts, anything that comes to mind. This is our greatest festival. Take Christmas away, and in biblical terms you lose two chapters at the front of Matthew and Luke, nothing else. Take Easter away, and you don’t have a New Testament; you don’t have a Christianity; as Paul says, you are still in your sins…

…if Lent is a time to give things up, Easter ought to be a time to take things up….Christian holiness was never meant to be merely negative…. The forty days of the Easter season, until the ascension, ought to be a time to balance out Lent by taking something up, some new task or venture, something wholesome and fruitful and outgoing and self-giving. …if you really make a start on it, it might give you a sniff of new possibilities, new hopes, new ventures you never dreamed of. It might bring something of Easter into your innermost life. It might help you wake up in a whole new way. And that’s what Easter is all about.”

Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church (New York: HarperCollins, 2008) pp. 255-257

Posted in Christology, Easter, Eschatology, Liturgy, Music, Worship, Parish Ministry, Theology, Theology: Scripture

Lancelot Andrewes for Easter–‘And this is indeed is the right way to know Christ, to be known of Him first. The Apostle saith, now we `have known God,’ and then correcteth himself, ‘or rather have been known of God.’ For till He know us, we shall never know Him aright’

[19/20] Ver. 16. ‘Jesus said to her, Mary; she turned herself, and said to Him, Rabboni, that is to say, Master.’

Now magnes amoris amor; ‘nothing so allures, so draws love to it, as doth love to itself.’ In Christ especially, and in such in whom the same mind is. For when her Lord saw there was no taking away His taking away from her, all was in vain, neither men, nor Angels, nor Himself, so long as He kept Himself gardener, could get anything of her but her Lord was gone, He was taken away, and that for want of Jesus nothing but Jesus could yield her any comfort, He is no longer able to contain, but even disclosed Himself; and discloses Himself by His voice.

For it should seem before, with His shape, He had changed that also. But now He speaks to her in His known voice, in the wonted accent of it, does but name her name, Mary–no more, and that was enough. That was as much to say, Recognosce a quo recognosceris, ‘she would at least take notice of Him who showed He was no stranger by calling her by her name;’for whom we call by their names, we take particular notice of. So God says to Moses, Te autem cognovi de nomino, ‘thou hast found grace in My sight, and I know thee by name.’ As God Moses, so Christ Mary Magdalene.

And this is indeed is the right way to know Christ, to be known of Him first. The Apostle saith, now we `have known God,’ and then correcteth himself, ‘or rather have been known of God.’ For till He know us, we shall never know Him aright.

And now, lo Christ is found; found alive, That was sought dead. A cloud may be so thick we shall not see the sun through it. The sun must scatter that cloud, and then we may. Here is an example of it. It is strange a thick cloud of heaviness had so covered her, as see Him she could not through it; this one word, these two syllables, Mary, from His mouth, scatters it all. No sooner had His voice sounded in her ears but it drives away all the mist, dries up her tears, lightens her eyes that she knew Him straight, and answers Him with her wonted salutation, Rabboni. If it had lain in her power to have raised Him from the dead, she would not have failed but done it, I dare say. Now it is done to her hands.

Read it all.

Posted in Church History, Easter, Ministry of the Ordained, Parish Ministry, Preaching / Homiletics, Theology: Scripture

“Then today look how majestically”

All year, death, after death, after death.
Then today look how majestically clouds float in the sky

–Barbara Ras (1949- )

Posted in Easter, Poetry & Literature

More Music for Easter–Death In His Grave by John McMillan sung by Audrey Assad

Listen to it all.

“He has cheated hell
And seated us above the fall
In desperate places he paid our wages
One time, once and for all.”

Posted in Easter, Liturgy, Music, Worship