Easter Morning

“On Sunday Morning”
Rev. Carolyn Waters
Easter Day, April 8, 2007
CCUM

What is the meaning of your life?

Some people have literally driven themselves crazy asking that question. Others seem to float through their existence never pausing to wonder.

But it seems like on a day like this, on a day in which we gather to celebrate “the risen Christ” with high energy, triumphant song, and shouts of Alleluia---it’s appropriate to stop and ask……… “what is the meaning of all this”----------and from that question, for me the next question is “what is the meaning of all this!” (Pointing at myself)

Purpose would be an easier focus. The purpose of my life could be directed at a goal, a service, relationship with others, a contribution to society through work, research, writing, or even discovery. If the purpose of one’s life was only to raise a family, that contribution alone is enough to potentially change the world.

Purpose is focused on what I do “out there”…………. What others can see and observe. Meaning, on the other hand seems to be an inside job. Purpose is what you see in me, meaning is what I live with.

I have a clear and convincing picture, at least for myself, about the purpose of Jesus life. When I am most confused about who Jesus was or is, I can always settle with saying his life served as a clear example of how to live and be in relationship with people and creation. That’s when I am most confused about Jesus. But when I am most confident and strong in my belief, I say the same thing. Jesus is the one whom I call “teacher” for living my life. It’s the word on the window behind us, “Rabboni”, teacher………the way Mary addressed Jesus in the garden after he had been in the tomb and then appeared to her. Upon recognizing him, she called him “Rabboni”.

Isn’t that enough? To find one’s teacher for life! To discover a “teaching” that serves to challenge and engage one throughout life, isn’t that enough?
To be the source of that teaching, as Jesus was for Mary, for most of you, and for me is certainly a clear and worthy purpose!
So why did the story add this resurrection piece? What was God thinking in allowing such a strange thing to happen? Good grief, look at how confusing things become when we start to untangle the resurrection. But on the other hand, look at how wide open the interpretation of our faith becomes when the resurrection is a part of our story.

Jesus lived his life with clear purpose. Jesus was crucified, died, was buried………and on the third day……….his life had meaning. In the act of his death, his life moved from purpose to meaning.

And what is that meaning? Well, have you found the answer to my first question? What is the meaning of your life? Somewhere hidden in the way we answer that question for ourselves is the answer for the meaning of Jesus life. It’s the flow of his words when he said “I am in you and you are in me. The Creator and I are one.”

I turned 54 years old yesterday. Those of you, who know me well, know that I always love a good party. My mother said that when I was a little girl “party” was one of my favorite words! Easter Sunday seems to be a really good reason to have a birthday party and wake up and smell the flowers, see the sunshine, and celebrate life kind of day! Even if I couldn’t stay up late last night!

If I follow the pattern of both parents, I have about 40 years of living left. And if the path I have ahead of me is anything like my parents, my mind and my body will serve me well.

40 years is a lot of living left to do. I’m confident that I’ve found a very good life purpose. Not only do I love my work, there are days that my work makes a clear difference for someone else. It is good to be alive! I celebrate life!

But I always ponder the meaning of it all. I’m always searching for something to explain “all this.” I often wonder, stand bewildered at the messes made in our world, hurt by the depth of despair and even hopelessness in some places and situations. When I am willing to really open my eyes and my heart to God’s creation, sure I see the beauty of the Rockies and the wonder of a tulip! I see the joy on the faces of the incredible kids in this church. I see the expectation in your eyes. But I also see changing of the earth from our own indulgences and wonder how long the tulips will bloom. I see the faces of the soldiers being killed, the innocent victims in Iraq, Afghanistan, starvation in Darfur……….and I ask “what is the meaning of it all?” Where is the resurrection?

Perhaps the meaning of the resurrection is about the journey we each take toward our death. The way we take that journey impacts the meaning of our death. Even more important, the way we take this life journey……impacts the suffering of our world, or not. Jesus had his eyes open to the suffering around him, and did all he could to alleviate that suffering. And his death had meaning. Jesus took every opportunity presented him to party and give thanks, and his death had meaning. Jesus considered the lilies of the field and could bask in their beauty, and his death had meaning.

Esther de Waal in her book The Celtic Way of Prayer says “the Celtic understanding of journey is in itself so rich and so significant. It is peregrination----seeking, quest, adventure, wandering, exile----it is ultimately a journey to find the place of my resurrection, the resurrected self, the self that I might hope to be, to become, the true self in Christ.”


I may have another 40 years to figure this out. To find that self, my true self………the one that helps me understand the meaning of my life……which is my true self in Christ. Or I may not have 40 years, or if I’m too distracted by my purpose I may never discover my meaning.

What are you banking on for the rest of your life?

A few weeks ago I heard Catholic Priest Father James Martin being interviewed on National Public Radio. (3-14-07) He said “Easter is harder to tame than Christmas.”

May you go into the world and have an extravagantly wild Easter day. May it in fact be so wild that something gets your attention, and changes the way you live the rest of your life.

Palm Sunday

Palm Sunday
“The Journey Home”
April 1, 2007
CCUM Rev Carolyn Waters


Luke 19:28-40
28After he had said this, he went on ahead, going up to Jerusalem. 29When he had come near Bethphage and Bethany, at the place called the Mount of Olives, he sent two of the disciples, 30saying, “Go into the village ahead of you, and as you enter it you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden. Untie it and bring it here. 31If anyone asks you, ‘Why are you untying it?’ just say this, ‘The Lord needs it.’” 32So those who were sent departed and found it as he had told them. 33As they were untying the colt, its owners asked them, “Why are you untying the colt?” 34They said, “The Lord needs it.” 35Then they brought it to Jesus; and after throwing their cloaks on the colt, they set Jesus on it. 36As he rode along, people kept spreading their cloaks on the road. 37As he was now approaching the path down from the Mount of Olives, the whole multitude of the disciples began to praise God joyfully with a loud voice for all the deeds of power that they had seen, 38saying, “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven, and glory in the highest heaven!” 39Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, order your disciples to stop.” 40He answered, “I tell you, if these were silent, the stones would shout out.”



Jesus set out on the road to Jerusalem on this day we have come to call “Palm Sunday” with a clarity of purpose and vision that could not be stalled or stopped. How else could he have entered Jerusalem, knowing in his deepest self what was to happen in the days to come?

I have been doing this “Holy Week” thing with some kind of intentionality for over thirty years. The Holy Week being the days between Palm Sunday and Easter Morning, a journey so to speak with Jesus from the Parade to the Cross, to the Tomb, to the Resurrection. Not to get ahead of ourselves, but we do know how the story goes……..and really cannot ignore the ending even though we are at the beginning of the week.

So this year, I’m approaching this “Holy Week” in a new posture. How do we begin this very significant week in our faith story, knowing the ending? The question causes me to ask the same of the man Jesus. How did you, Jesus, ride the humiliating little donkey into the city of all cities while some people shouted Hosanna and others laughed? How did you, Jesus, participate in the drama of a mock trial knowing its ending? And how did you, Jesus, allow yourself to walk into the ending of your life as you had known it?

Esther de Waal in her book The Celtic Way of Prayer speaks of the Celtic understanding of the word peregrination…………which she says roughly translates as “journey” but means so much more than simply going from one place to another. In the Celtic tradition………pilgrimage or journey is a life long spiritual quest of finding one’s place or home with God. The peregrinatio, journey, or pilgrimage is very connected to the earth, the landscape, the vista or vision of what is in front……….out ahead…….while still bringing along and being with what is inside. As de Waal refers to it in another of her books, the landscape around us begins to reflect itself in our interior inscape, what is inside of us.

A person who is truly on “the journey” poses an attitude of being “ready to go wherever the Spirit might take them” (p. 2) and understands themselves as “guests of the world.” She says that when we are on such a journey what we are seeking is the place of our resurrection, the resurrected self, the true self in Christ, which is for all of us our true home.” (2)

Her words have caused me to reflect on how Jesus was able to enter Jerusalem. How he was able to embrace and receive the shouts of hosanna and praise on one day and several days later be humiliated by sneers, laughter, beaten and killed.

How do you enter such a week? Many of us have lived through what we would have thought to be “impossible weeks.” The operable words in that sentence are “lived through.” What seems to be an absolutely impossible situation to withstand………..and then finding ourselves on the other side having lived through……..must be the grounding that gives one the ability to live and the ability to face death with humility and grace.

No doubt there is the “something more” that Jesus represents for us, but in this week of the waving palms, the secret last supper, the pounding of the nails into the cross………………the man Jesus had to have been grounded in his very deepest self about the reason he was alive……….

All of his ministry, he seemed to be on a pilgrimage, his own peregrinatio, ready to go where the Spirit would take him, knowing that his ultimate “home” the destination of the journey……….was and is to be at home with God.

How else could he have entered Jerusalem?

Esther de Waal speaks of Christ himself being “the Way” and we as followers of Christ are people of the Way. I like that.

The “Way” is a particular path we walk as we go through life. Sometimes parallel with other spiritual paths, sometimes contrary to cultural paths, sometimes the “Way” we take has cobble stones that hurt our feet and cause us to stumble………just as the small donkey would have entering Jerusalem……… but always the “Way” is a journey that leads us home to the heart of a loving God, ever ready and willing to receive us in loving arms………..no matter the kind of week we’ve had, or the mistakes we have made along the way. Our life is a journey, a peregrination seeking that place where we are at last “at home” with ourselves, and “at home” with the one who created us. Dag Hammarskjold once said: “The longest journey is the journey inward.”

This Holy Week, as we all journey in our different ways toward the sacred table set for Maundy Thursday, or as we journey in our own different ways toward the darkness of Good Friday, or as we wake to the mystery and wonder of whatever the resurrection means to us…………let us not simply retell a story from our Christian history, let us not simply rehearse a tradition that has been passed down from generation to generation………..rather let each of us take our own journey…………and dare to take an inward journey………..and ask the question that Jesus must have found the answer for………. “What is it that God wants of me?” I believe in asking that question and seeking the answer…….it is there that we find our home with God.
Celtic Saint Columbanus once said in a sermon: “the end of the road is the end of our life, the end of our roadway is our