All Shook Up - Thoughts for Easter Sunday


This Easter, as we listen to Matthew, we are invited to join Mary Magdalene and the other Mary at the tomb. They had suffered the trauma of holy week. Jerusalem had become increasingly more hostile with their growing fear and anxiety all mixed with hope. They had been there at the arrest, heard about the trial, and witnessed the horror of the crucifixion as the earth shook and the sky darkened. They were traumatised. They came to the tomb to mourn in their shock and grief. This is a place to take the ache of trauma.

We are invited to join them in all we have gone and are going through over the last few years. Covid, climate change disasters here and overseas with floods and cyclones, and the deadly slips on Mauao and Pāpāmoa Hills. War in Ukraine, the Middle East and all the ripples here as we wonder what is next. And our personal stories of loss, fear, and sorrow. It is a lot. And so, we are invited to bring our trauma and grief and join Mary Magdalene and the other Mary at the tomb. And we pray that like them we will learn that crucifixion and death is not the end. We are told, “but wait, there is more!”

In “Love Wins” Rob Bell says that for the Prophets and Jesus heaven was not just another place we go to after we die, but the hope of what this world will be like in next age, when God’s will is completely done on earth as in heaven. Easter Sunday is the day we celebrate Christ’s resurrection,  and earth shattering event that defeats death and all that crushes life. It is about hope and life for us all. In all the resurrection stories the risen Jesus meets his grieving disciples in all their mix of emotions, starting with Mary and the other women. Their world literally rocks, and they are filled with joy, expectation, and fear. Jesus is risen and so are they. Their world and their lives are changed. They live resurrection.

We join the Mary’s at the tomb, with all our mix of emotions. We too are invited to have our world shook up and destabilised. We are invited into the ongoing story to live resurrection lives. How have we met the risen Christ? How might we live resurrection?


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