A normal resurrection?

Propers for the Day of Resurrection

Sermon for the Day of Resurrection

What do they think is going to happen?

They sit alone and afraid, wondering whether they are safe or whether they will be taken and die miserably. They daren't set foot outside for long but, when they do meet, it's with people they know to be safe and share their fear. 

Will life ever get back to normal?

[PAUSE]

The trouble with normality is that it sets its own boundaries, and beyond those boundaries are fear and darkness. There is yet no light in the darkness as they sit behind their locked doors begging for normality to return. Is this fear the New Normal?

Some of their number date to leave the confines of their dwelling. They can't stand knowing that they have a duty to do and yet risk death by leaving their isolation. What they have to do has more importance than just being safe, clinging to the shreds of normality and despair. Out into the darkness they go. The rest shiver and go back to the silent desperation of their New Normal.

[PAUSE]

The night's darkness softens. There is a shout. A cry of joy. Death is gone! No more is there normality in darkness and fear. The day is here! The light is here! Life is here! And here is a newer normal.

This New Normal is not like the time before the darkness when life seemed indifferent and hope cheap. This New Normal will not be taken for granted, nor will it just tick by comfortably and numb. 

The New Normal will be a time of readjustment of expectation and lifestyle. It will be a reassessment of the truth in the new light. There will be changes and struggles and pain and suffering but there will be life, joy, faith, hope and love. 

To live in the Old Normal is to embrace death and dwell with it forever. To live in the Old Normal is a rejection of life and truth, a rejection of authenticity and meaning in accepting the second best.

Not everything about the New Normal will be different. In fact, it will look much the same but without fear and with the light of the truth. The difference is that Death has been conquered, the tomb is opened and Life walks the Earth once more.

[PAUSE]

And so, even before they undo the bolts, put the keys in the locks and fling open the doors, Life enters and says, "Peace be with you!"

And He breathes on them His Spirit of Life.

And the doors are opened, and they go forth to the New Normal to tell us all that Death is dead and we are safe.

This is the Day that the Lord has made. We will rejoice and be glad in it! Alleluia!