Bible Studies

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My dear friends,

“The Lord is risen ! He is risen indeed!”

This is our Easter greeting to all the world! After the hard long days of Lent and Holy Week, our tongues are let loose and our voices are raised because Christ is risen from the dead!

However, it feels far too early in the year to be celebrating Easter! After all, it’s only 23rd March. Even the school holiday timetable has been affected, and it all seems very odd this year, having this, the greatest of all Christian festivals (which sadly for many has been reduced to an Easter Egg competition and a search for the Easter Bunny, with an excuse for a few days holiday thrown in) jumping out at us so very early in the year. The last time it was this early was in 1812!

But the power and meaning of Easter is something that takes us by surprise, in so many ways we simply do not expect. The heart of the matter is that a new creation came into being when Christ was raised from the dead. We believe that through the sufferings and pain of Christ dying on the Cross, God was bringing a new world to birth - like a mother going through the agonies of child-birth.

Just as the universe came into being (we believe by the creative act of God in the beginning of all things), so we believe the rising of Jesus from the tomb brought into being a new universe. And this universe is identified and recognised by all those aspects and qualities we see in Jesus Christ.

There is now a universe in which hope,joy, peace and love take pride of place. There is now a universe in which trust, reconciliation, forgiveness and healing of both body and mind and spirit are not “pie in the sky” or some fanatical religious pathology. The one who embodied all these qualities of hope, joy, peace and love - Jesus Christ himself - has been vindicated by God, and his life has been shown to have enduring power and influence for all creation.

As we celebrate Easter together, let us seek to become Christ-like as we seek to bear witness to all these life affirming qualities in our daily life and world which too often have more interest in things that are death-dealing and life-denying.

So we shout “The Lord is risen! He is risen indeed!”

With love and kindest good wishes this Easter-tide.

Harvey (Revd Harvey Richardson)