He is not here!
Early that first Easter morning, "the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb… but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus."
(Luke 24: 1–3) "He is not here!" Hope unfulfilled, belied. Expectation greeted with disappointment!
How would we have reacted? How do we react when our hopes are not met, when our carefully-rehearsed plans go awry? Perhaps with disappointment, perhaps with despair, perhaps even anger?
Through the season of Lent we've been grappling with the issue of reconciliation with God, with ourselves, with our neighbours, indeed with all of creation. And yet, just when it seems that we‘ve really made a singular effort to be reconciled, it doesn't seem to work out the way we thought it would. We have the right words, the right attitude, willing to forgive, willing to embrace, and yet it doesn't happen — there is silence on the other side. Perhaps subconsciously we've been thinking of reconciliation on our terms and so, in a sense, we haven't really let go. We haven't gone over to the other side.
When the women went to the tomb they were still holding onto their notions and emotions about Jesus as a person who had walked and talked with them. Yet when they were confronted with the reality that "He is not here; he has risen!", Matthew 28:8 tells us that "the women hurried away from the tomb, afraid yet filled with joy"
. He is really not here! New hope amidst old hopelessness!
How many of us counter our unfulfilled hopes with new hope? Can we hope anew? Jesus, through his resurrection, abolishes the word "impossible" from God's vocabulary. Hope-filled moments now dictate our lives so there is no way we can hang onto the former ways of doing things. "Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here!"
(Luke 24:5b–6a) "for the old order of things has passed away!"
(Revelation 21:4c) May we in our resurrection faith become bearers of new and living hope to one another in a world steeped in despair and gloom!