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EASTER ENCOUNTERS 2008

The Sunday Gospel with daily meditations on the Gospel theme

-- encounters that define and illuminate our journey of faith

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The Week of Easter - March 23 - 29, 2008

I KNOW MY REDEEMER LIVES

THE EASTER GOSPEL: Saint John 20:19-31

Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the tomb. So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.” Then Peter and the other disciple set out and went toward the tomb. The two were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. He bent down to look in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he did not go in. Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen wrappings lying there, and the cloth that had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself. Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead. Then the disciples returned to their homes.

     But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb; and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet. They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” Jesus said to her, “Mary!” She turned and said to him in Hebrew, “Rabbouni!” (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, “Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord”; and she told them that he had said these things to her.

DAILY ENCOUNTERS - I KNOW MY REDEEMER LIVES

MONDAY OF THE WEEK OF EASTER – March 24

It is right and proper that we celebrate the days of Easter with you. I will admit to having kept my children out of school on Easter Monday for years. The School holidays before Easter were steeped in preparations and anticipation. Now we needed time for rejoicing. I think the children liked that Monday Holiday especially; it was so unlike us to take a “well day” off work and school.             Gertrud Mueller Nelson

TUESDAY OF THE WEEK OF EASTER – MARCH 25

…the translation {of Alleluia as “Praise the LORD”} does not explain why the church chose and retained this word from the Hebrew language of prayer in order to express her Easter jubilation, even though in later centuries her own children did not understand the meaning. I think the church meant to say: “In the presence of the mystery that we celebrate on Easter,…our usual intelligible vocabulary is inadequate; when faced with the superabundant mercy of God we can only stammer in amazement like children.” Balthasar Fischer

WEDNESDAY OF THE WEEK OF EASTER – MARCH 26

Christ is the Son-day….Just as there is no night at all to follow the heavenly day, so too the darkness of sin does not follow the justice of Christ. For the brightness and the luminous splendor of the heavenly day last for ever, and there are no shadows which can put an end to it; and so too, the brilliance and the flashing radiance of Christ’s light never cease, and there is no darkness of sin which can overcome them. This is why Saint John the Evangelist says; “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”                                                                                         Maximus of Turin 5th century

THURSDAY OF THE WEEK OF EASTER – MARCH 27

Baptism is...the death of our selfishness and self-sufficiency, and it is the “likeness of Christ’s death” because Christ’s death is this unconditional self-surrender. And as Christ’s death “trampled down death” because in it the ultimate meaning and strength of life were revealed, so also does our dying with him unite us with the new “life in God.”                                                                           Alexander Schmemann

FRIDAY OF THE WEEK OF EASTER – MARCH 28

That He is risen and lives means that God has thwarted and undone our human work of Good Friday; the Crucified One died for us and God spoke his Amen to that. Now there is truly good news: “Christ was sacrificed for the sake of our sin and for the sake of our righteousness was raised.” We have peace with God, for God Himself has spoken the last Word! Martin Niemoeller

SATURDAY OF THE WEEK OF EASTER – MARCH 29

Oh, would that my words were written down! Would that they were inscribed in a record: That with an iron chisel and with lead they were cut in the rock forever! But as for me, I know that my Vindicator lives, and that he will at last stand forth upon the dust; whom I myself shall see: my own eyes, not another’s shall behold him, and from my flesh I shall see God; my inmost being is consumed with longing. Job 19:23-26