The Bishop of Oxford’s 2022 Easter Message

In this resurrection the world knows fully and finally that Jesus Christ is indeed the Son of God: an absolutely unique person in the whole of the human story. We have remembered in Holy Week and on Good Friday his death on the cross for the sins of the whole world – so that we might be forgiven. We recognise that God is at work in Christ to love and redeem the world and that the power of the resurrection is able to transform every life, every place and, ultimately, the whole of creation.

This is a moment and a season to travel deeper into Easter joy – perhaps deeper than we have ever journeyed in our lives before – because the need in the world is so great.

St. Luke tells the story of the resurrection in a particular way across the final chapter of the gospel. Luke’s account is framed in a single day, the day of resurrection.

We begin at the empty tomb in the early morning. The women come and meet the angels who give them the glorious news of resurrection. We continue through the middle of the day with the two disciples walking to Emmaus and the risen Christ draws near, an unseen stranger, recognised as hearts are set on fire and eyes opened in the breaking of the bread. In the evening, the disciples gather in the upper room and Jesus appears with them and leads them out to the Bethany and blesses them.

This great good news is hard to take in. This is how Luke describes the response of the disciples in the Upper Room when he shows them his hands and his feet: “While in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering…” (Luke 24.41). Big truths need time.

Read it all.

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