Yesterday I spent some time sitting on my patio enjoying the view and the smells of spring. In this part of the world, the fruit trees are in blossom and some flowers are already blooming. Even so, some have already presented their colors and their fragrances, and they are now fading. It has been two weeks since we began singing “alleluia” and, after a while, the beauty of the Resurrection can fade away as well. How long can you sustain a grin or a smile? How long can you stay upbeat over any bit of good news?
Well, the liturgies for the Sundays after Easter invite us to hear some parts of the Good News again so as to keep us in touch with how the Resurrection of Jesus really is the Good News about our own risings.
We hear Peter reminding his Jewish listeners, and us, of their/our being guilty bystanders in the death of Jesus. He reviews the history of God’s relationship with the ancient holy leaders of Israel and that the faithful God has raised Jesus to fulfill all the prophesies of the Servant of God. The Good News is that forgiveness of our sins is now available, if there is repentance. The author of life has been put to death so that life may be authorized once more.
The Gospels recount Jesus’ appearing to His friends and proving to them that He is quite alive and quite real. He shows them His wounds and then asks them for something to eat. He is offered some baked fish and eats it all, right in front of them. What is more real is His insistence that all that has happened is to complete the scriptures about the Christ. Then He tells them the implications of His rising: He died that forgiveness of sins might be presented to the whole world.
The beauty of the flowers does fade, and the smells in the air become wonderful memories. The beauty of the forgiveness of sins can fade as well and become little more than a memory. We humans tire easily of hearing about the same news stories. Day after day, week after week, there might be a very important story, perhaps of a war thousands of miles away, being announced every evening on the news programs. We grow bored with the familiar, we say, “What ‘s new?” “Tell us something we do not already know!”
Jesus appears and announces His peace and His forgiveness of us. He shows us He is real as He proves Himself to be so by showing us His wounds. Our Easter joy is as real as our being shown the wounds of our lives and the wounds of this world. The Good News is still good news, as long as we tune into our own need for healing and forgiveness.
It has been two weeks since Easter. We can assume that Jesus, the man, would rather have skipped Good Friday. We would, at times, rather skip over the reality that we need to taste our need for forgiveness before getting to smell the Easter fragrance. Jesus does not skip over the facts of His wounds and the needy of this world must be told the Good News, “Thus it is written that the Christ would suffer and rise from the dead on the third day and that repentance for the forgiveness of sin would be preached in his name to all the nations.“
Our being witnesses to our being forgiven, and living beyond our memories of sins, is our participation in Christ’s Resurrection. He rose that we might rise and live, to live in His love with our love for others. We cannot skip over this and simply go on singing alleluia and smelling the flowers.
May God Bless You and Grant You His Peace!