Witnesses to Resurrection today

 

Mark 16:8

So they went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.

This

This is the account

that speaks most piercingly today

Not the tender moment in the garden

Or the women’s “idle tales”

But the flight

and the silence 

Our usual

“The Lord is Risen

He is Risen indeed

Alleluia!”

Still rings true

Of course it does

But the terror 

and amazement

are the emotions that linger

in this year of pandemic

when, it seems, for us

there may be a kind of emerging

into a changed future

For who are we -

the ones called

to witness and proclaim

resurrection today?

When so much has been lost

and lives have been forever changed?

When it seems insensitive

to speak of new discoveries 

of joy in things found

in our forced isolation 

Who are we called to be?

As we face the uncertainty

of life beyond pandemic?

In the midst

of grief and trauma

of austerity and oppression

of loneliness

or lingering illness

of growing awareness

of systemic global injustice

to which we have contributed

How are we being called

to bring resurrection light?

With trumpet fanfares

or subdued whispers

of love in action?

I believe

that living in Resurrection today

demands more of us

than ever before

It’s easier to loudly proclaim our faith

than it is to quietly live

with the anxiety

and the uncertainty

of emergence

to which we are called today

When we can no longer rely 

on all that we’ve known

when there’s no going back

to the tried and tested

but are called

to follow the Risen Christ

into a new dawn

of dismantling empires

and institutions

designed to control and oppress

and into a new era

of release for the captives

freedom for the oppressed

healing and wholeness

for all of creation

Emerging with the risen Christ

with wounds still fresh

to transform the world in love

.witnesses to resurrection 

for these days.