An Easter Poem
We believe that God is alive.
then God meets us on the road and opens our eyes.
And we know that God is alive.
We believe that God is Love.
Then we are loved beyond all reason.
And we know that God is Love
We believe our faith is food indeed
Then we are fed
And know that Faith is Food.
Indeed!
We believe
And then we know
It's called living our faith.
It's called doing our faith
It's called being our faith.
We believe.
We know.
We do.
We are.
An Easter people.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
I wrote this poem to use in the Ascension liturgy during Easter season. It plays off the believing vs. knowing theme that, if you have been paying close attention, has been the underlying concept of most of the sermons preached here these past four or five weeks. The idea of belief vs. knowing, or perhaps better put belief becoming knowing, was presented in the book we read this Lent: Selling Water by the River, by Shane Hipps.
Hipps says that our faith, to be relevant in our 21st century world must be more about knowing rather than merely believing. That our worship, to be relevant to the vast number of non churched people in our world, to be relevant to those people who find (football games, dinner, doing yard work) (brunch, sleeping in, a round of golf or some ice time) more appealing than anything we offer here; that our worship, that thing that fuels and propels our faith, must be less about creeds (what we believe) and more about what we know (what we do, what we experience, what we observe and how we respond), that it needs to be less about endowments and buildings and rite one vs. rite two, inclusive language vs. traditional and more about taking what we believe and experiencing it in the world so that it becomes something we know, something we do and something we are.
Our two travelers on the Road to Emmaus believed a lot. They were disciples of Christ and like many of Jesus’ disciples they had a clear creed that they held dear. They believed that Jesus was the promised Messiah. Now Messiah is a very specific concept in Judaism. the Messiah would oversee the ingathering of the exiles; the restoration of the religious courts of justice; an end of wickedness, sin and heresy; reward to the righteous; rebuilding of Jerusalem; and the restoration of the line of King David. The Messiah would accomplish all of that. The messiah would not allow himself to be arrested beaten mocked and executed.
The travelers tell this stranger who walked among them that they had hoped Jesus would have been the one to redeem Israel, that Jesus would have been the promised Messiah.
It’s what they believed, it’s what they expected, but it’s not what Jesus delivered. So, as they walk along, they’re disappointed, disheartened, disillusioned, sad and even a little angry.
And Jesus? Well Jesus, as he walked along with them, was disappointed, frustrated and angry, that these disciples of His were still seeing through a glass darkly, oblivious to the reality of resurrection, blocked from the realization that death, darkness and all forces of evil had been defeated—beaten at their own game. And so he begins to teach them, beginning with Moses and heading right through all the prophets leading up to Jesus himself, he talks, he lectures, he teaches. And he waits for them to…
Notice….
to
Accept….
to
Know….
This is our Easter story…we experience the Risen Christ and then we notice Him. We experience Resurrection and then we know it.
We take, we break, we eat and then we DO.
This is the story of us, an Easter People.
Knowing the Easter story is so much more potent than just believing the Easter story.
You see, we can believe the Easter story inside these doors, sitting in this beautiful familiar space. But believing it without experiencing it, believing it without doing it, believing it without knowing it will, as Shane Hipps cautions us, lead us quickly and unceremoniously into irrelevance and extinction.
Jesus, through his Resurrection appearances—to Mary Magdalene, to Thomas and today to our Emmaus travelers -- takes what has always been expected and turns it into something completely new. All Jesus wants us to do is move beyond belief toward experiential knowing, living and doing. He wants us to move from simple belief to incredible, astounding and miraculous knowing.
• Believing the Easter story doesn’t make Buffalo Public School students learn how to read. Living the Easter story, knowing the Easter story, Being the Easter story does.
• Believing the Easter story doesn’t change the systems of poverty that keep the poor poor and the rich, rich. Living the Easter story, knowing the Easter story, Being the Easter story does.
• Believing the Easter story doesn’t solve the problem of violence in this city, the country and the world. Living the Easter story, knowing the Easter story, Being the Easter story does.
• Believing the Easter story doesn’t take guns off of our streets, out of our schools and away from those who wish others harm. Living the Easter story, knowing the Easter story, Being the Easter story does.
• Believing the Easter story doesn’t give the elderly the respect and dignity they deserve. Living the Easter story, knowing the Easter story, Being the Easter story does.
• Believing the Easter story doesn’t give disabled people the respect and dignity that they, too, deserve. Living the Easter story, knowing the Easter story, Being the Easter story does.
• Believing the Easter Story doesn’t give those who look different, act different, believe different, love different the freedom to do so. Living the Easter story, knowing the Easter story, Being the Easter story does.
Believing the Easter story doesn’t feed the hungry; clothe the naked or stop injustice. Living the Easter story, knowing the Easter story, Being the Easter story does.
And so my brothers and sisters in Christ, your job, our job today and for as long as we take breath is to BE THE EASTER STORY to everyone everywhere, always.
If we do that, when we do that, the Kingdom of God will reign here on earth. And that, my friends is the point of this, our Easter story.
Amen.
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