It’s the week after Easter, and everything is back to normal. After the celebration on Sunday—sunrise services, baptisms, Easter lilies, family gatherings, and children finding Easter eggs—the same worries, fears, and anxieties await us at our bedside Monday morning.
But wait. Isn’t something missing? What happens after Easter?
My thoughts drift to a story that supposedly happened in a small town in southwest Oklahoma years ago. This community celebrated Easter with an Easter pageant.
It so happened that the character playing the role of Jesus was miscast, appearing more like a Roman soldier than Jesus.
The character was a roughneck, a seasoned oil field worker known for an occasional barroom brawl. He was a rough and tumble, brawny guy with a no-nonsense personality; he could have been a bouncer at any of the bars he frequented.
In the moving scene when Jesus was carrying the cross to Calvary, a host of characters shouted, “Crucify him! Crucify him!”
At that point, one little man got caught up, shouting, “Crucify him!” with energetic gusto. This small guy, who could have passed as the skinny man in the “before” pictures for the old Charles Atlas commercials, shouted insult upon insult at Jesus.
And then he did the unthinkable: He spit in the face of Jesus.
What did the big, burly, tough guy do? He stopped, wiped the spit from his face, glared at the scrawny man, took one step toward him, and whispered through clenched teeth, “I’ll be back to take care of you after the resurrection!”
The week after Easter, Jesus came back to take care of us. He didn’t come back to exact revenge on those who had falsely accused or tortured him, and neither does he want to punish us for our failures. Instead, he assures us that despite our missteps, he is for us; he forgives us. John 3:16 (“God so loved the world…”) is true after the resurrection as much as before it. And he gives us a purpose to live for and the power by his grace to do it.
Think about it: Jesus’ lead disciple, Peter, denied him three times. His chief financial officer had committed suicide after embezzling funds and betraying Jesus. The rest had scattered, and only one (John) had shown up at the crucifixion.
But Jesus went to them after the resurrection to take care of them.
Of course, it took Jesus’ special appearance to Thomas for the doubter to return to faith. Then, Jesus had to remind Peter three times that he was forgiven in that conversation by the sea of Galilee.
But Jesus did show up. He did come back. And he would take care of them. Everything was different.
I’ve never seen Jesus, but I’ve felt his presence. I know that just as he came back for the disciples, he came back for me.
After Easter, we still are the same mess we were before. The same temptations are waiting for us. And we still stumble and sometimes fall flat—more than once. We are repeat failures.
I like how Brennan Manning said it, “Sin and forgiveness and falling and getting back up and losing the pearl of great price in the couch cushions but then finding it again, and again, and again? Those are the stumbling steps to becoming Real, the only script that’s really worth following in this world or the one that’s coming.”
Jesus came back for us, recovering sinners that we are.
If we receive him, we can walk in a life ever new.
Sunday through Saturday. Every day of every week.
And that’s what happens after Easter.
Beautiful, Amen!