Many will spend this day looking at the Resurrection of Jesus in many ways. Some will deny it, others will embrace it. Others will not understand and still others will understand it at a deeper level than you and I have ever experienced. I want us to look at it from a slight distance.

The Resurrection of Christ is the powerful event that is the key to Christianity. Indeed, it is so central that St. Paul says that if it did not happen, then we are wasting our time in our faith. We are still in our sins and in that sense we can say there is no hope for us.

Let us go back to that for a second. This is what St. Paul taught. He then explains that Jesus’ resurrection is real and that he was an eyewitness to the resurrected Jesus. That is an important fact, however another one that is just as important is to realize that he preached this message having suffered intensely being shipwrecked, imprisoned, beaten and so much more. The Resurrection gave him the hope and strength to preach the message under such severe duress. He had a hope and a vision of the gift of Christ’s Resurrection. Nothing could take that away from him. Despite many trying to do so.

This is the other side of Easter. When Jesus resurrected from the dead, He testified to a deeper reality that gives us a hope beyond anything we can find without Jesus. It is well described in John’s prologue: The light shined in darkness, a darkness that did not overcome it. This simple message is what gave the Apostles the power to preach the gospel to the whole world. No matter what they suffered they knew that the glory of the resurrection confirmed their resurrection. The light shines in darkness and the darkness cannot overcome it.

One of my favorite teachings about that dynamic comes from one of my favorite short stories: A Hint of an Explanation by Graham Greene. There is a part of the story where the narrator explains that evil always seeks to overcome the good and almost does, but then it is thwarted and falls back to its original position lost and frustrated again.

This is what the resurrection is all about. Jesus is crucified by the darkness of a humanity that separates itself from God. Remember, the Pharisees were focus of their own power. they had hardened their hearts against Christ and against the Father. They turned from God and allowed the resulting darkness to drive their every second. The darkness without the Father would have overcome not only the new faith in Christ but humanity itself. However, the dynamic that Graham Greene describes is brought forth through the resurrection that Paul preached.

This gives us a hope in Christ, for we know the darkness of a humanity that separates itself from Christ is not stronger than Christ Himself.

We are living at a time when people are claiming the events of the Book of Revelation are just around the corner. Others, of course, explain that we will never see those events, they are all symbolic. Whatever the case, if we look at those who talk about an end of the world being imminent, we have to understand what that means. This is what it means, a worldwide humanity that hardens its heart against the Father and allows the darkness in its heart to overcome its whole being.

The Christian knows that time comes in any society that rejects Christ, but that those who embrace Christ will see His glory and that human darkness will be no match for God’s loving power.

This is what happened at the resurrection. But notice there is also a choice. St. Paul reminds us that Jesus appeared to about 500 people. Those who had hardened their hearts against Christ, never saw His glory because they had allowed themselves to be overcome by the darkness. Those who chose Christ learned the truth. From that point on, they understood that darkness was real, but was not powerful enough to overcome the light of Christ. Those who had been attacked by darkness such as St. Paul in his many trials in preaching the gospel knew that the glory of the resurrection rendered the power of darkness to be moot. It could try to defeat him, but would fail every time. So the resurrection is a teaching of the reality that God’s power will always win, even when defeat of darkness appears humanly impossible. God is the  ultimate power. Darkness and its greatest weapon, death, have no power over those who unite themselves to Christ.

The Resurrection, therefore, is not just an event, it is a message. Darkness and death have no power over those rooted in Christ.

This is a message you need to comprehend. Darkness tries to overcome God’s creation in every generation. In the latest manifestation we have a secularism that is seeking to lead people away from Christ and into Atheism. The secularists’ chief apologist a British professor teaches that all that surrounds us is the product of randomness. You and I can look at nature, even though we may be as educated as this man and say that makes no sense. How can someone look at the world around us and say it is all accidental. Simple. he’s blind. The darkness has blinded him and his followers. To get him to see what you see and understand what you understand is like trying to teach a blind man the color blue.  It cannot be done because something you can see and understand so simply, is an impossible task for the blind man. Likewise, something that you can see and understand so easily about the reality of God’s hand in creation,  is a virtually impossible thing for them to understand because of the darkness that has blinded them, it is that simple.

The book of Revelation has a simple message, the darkness will seek to overcome all of God’s creation and again God’s intervention in the Second Coming of Christ will set darkness back forever. Those in darkness will become its victims just as Jesus’ enemies were victimized by the darkness in their own hearts, but those who seek the light will see the defeat of darkness and death and in that we have our hope.

St. Paul could be imprisoned, tortured for the gospel but he saw his persecution as what it was, the power of darkness trying to overcome the light and failing miserably.

The resurrection reminds us that darkness and death never win, Jesus always does. Not even death can overcome the Power of God, ever.

A Blessed Easter,

Fr. Robert J Carr

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