Whenever Christian people take a good look at the Scriptures they gain a new insight into how we must live our life and how we must pray. The New Testament clearly centers the story on the death and resurrection of Jesus. This is the great event of our salvation.
Now, Western Christianity has placed so much emphasis on the suffering and death of Jesus. Just walk into any church building and what do you see? The dying Jesus on the cross and the fourteen stations of the cross on the outer walls. The reason that the Way of the Cross has declined as a personal devotion is due to its incompleteness. The traditional way of the Cross does not convey the full event of salvation. There was no resurrection station.
We must always think of our salvation and revelation as the two sides of our hand. You cannot have just one side to have a hand. Not only do both sides fit together but it is only with both sides that you can have a hand.
Jesus endured the terrible violence of his own execution as a despised and rejected person on the cross. There was an actual burial. But the event of the resurrection is the breaking through and sharing of the very Son of God. Resurrection is not just Jesus coming back to life but the giving of the very Spirit of Jesus to the disciples.
Not only is the resurrection the triumph of God (good) over evil, but it is now time for the disciples (the people of the Church) to be the living continuation of the life, the heart and the mission of Jesus Christ.
We are living in a Church that is trying to recapture the spirit of the New Testament. We want to return Easter to a festival of three days. We once again tell the story of the death and resurrection so that the meaning and purpose of this revelation can deepen in the life of every believer.
The risen Jesus must happen in the life of each disciple. Each person in our Church community is meant to be filled with and energized by the spirit and the life of Jesus. The very event of the resurrection must be recreated in the life of the believer.
We must be filled with the spirit of Jesus in our prayer. As Jesus listened to and was in harmony with the Father, so we too, in our daily prayer seek such unity with the Father.
The risen Jesus is meant to be lived out of our healing ministry towards the world. It will be through our healing hands that the broken and the infirm of this world are lifted up.
Today we are working toward giving Easter its rightful energy. In this way we are making present the great Christian value that the way we pray is the way that we live our daily faith. Our life is one of sacrifice and service (the cross) and a life of sharing the great mercy of the Son of God (the resurrection).
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