In the week before Easter, Christians reflect on the suffering and death of Jesus. This year has been very different with suffering and death surrounding us in these unprecedented times. The whole world has been transformed in an extraordinarily short space of time and the suffering of Jesus finds new resonance in everything that is happening around us.
For some people, the death of Jesus is just one among billions across the globe that have taken place in the past two thousand years, but for Christians it is different – different because of what happened on Easter Day, different because Jesus was raised from the dead.
God brought good out of the horror of the crucifixion through the resurrection. He brought good out of evil. That is what God does: he turns suffering to joy and death to new life.
I pray that he will bring good out of the all the suffering that we are witnessing around us now. How wonderful it would be if this extraordinary ‘lockdown Easter’ led to our society becoming more loving, compassionate, just and free. I see seeds of it happening in, for example, new found respect for those who dedicate their lives to caring; resurrection in the here and now. May those seeds grown and blossom.
In the end, Christians believe that God’s resurrection love will prevail on earth as in heaven. As the Book of Revelation puts it.
God himself will be with us,
he will wipe every tear from their our eyes.
Death will be no more;
mourning and crying and pain will be no more,
So my message to you this Easter is one of hope.
Happy Easter!
Bishop John
