He is Risen

...declared to be Son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness by resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord...
Romans 1:4

Many Pharisaical Jews in the first century believed in the Resurrection from the dead, a day when the God who created the heavens and the earth would plant his feet on this world and raise the righteous ones to eternal life in God’s Kingdom. This ‘end-times’ expectation was contested within Judaism, but it was an ultimate hope for many. The Pharisee Saul, believed fervently in this hope, and on his road to Damascus to arrest Jews for Jesus, he was confronted by the resurrected Jesus himself!

Saul became the Apostle Paul after 3 days of physical blindness and spiritual illumination. It seems that this long-hoped-for day of Resurrection had actually come in this crucified Servant-King Jesus from the out-of-the-way town called Nazareth. God inaugurated the ‘end-times’ in Jesus partially, as a foretaste, a first-fruit of a still future reality for all of God’s people. In Jesus’ resurrection, God vindicated Jesus’ interpretation of what the kingdom of God looks like: the vulnerable and marginalized are given dignity and priority, forgiveness and reconciliation is bestowed in relationships, neighbors and enemies are served and loved, possessions are shared, illnesses and addictions are healed, lust and sexual perversion are shelved, and the whole world—both Jew and Gentile—are invited to participate in what God is doing to redeem his creation. Resurrected life is offered to all…now! But we participate in the kingdom of God only by signing on to the cross: a death to self and the ‘common sense’ of our culture. As the 20th century American prophet Martin Luther King said in Chicago months before his assassination:

The cross we bear precedes the crown we wear. To be a Christian one must take up his cross, with all of its difficulties and agonizing and tension-packed content and carry it until that very cross leaves its marks upon us and redeems us to that more excellent way which comes only through suffering.

Just 25 years after Jesus death and resurrection, the Apostle Paul pleaded with the small Christian community of Jews and Gentiles in Rome to participate in this death and resurrection way:

Therefore we have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be destroyed, and we might no longer be enslaved to sin. [Romans 6:4-6]

Those baptized into citizenship in God’s international kingdom pledge to crucify our old selves in order to live freely in ‘the whole new world’ [II Corinthians 5:17; Galatians 6:15] of Jesus’ way.

On Easter Sunday, 516 Quail Meadow joins Christians all over the world to celebrate God’s vindication of Jesus’ way, but we also renew our vows to journey with him to Jerusalem, bearing the cross, confronting power structures that enslave many. Today, this means committing to ridding our own self-absorption and self-gratification to be a team of healers and givers and servants and energizers to our neighbors and foes. It also means critiquing the counterfeit narratives cleverly told by commercials, print ads, movies, songs and websites. But we are not alone in this hard task of continuing Jesus legacy:

If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit that dwells in you. [Romans 8:11]